There are no chalk lines. There are no squeaking sneakers. There are no blindside sacks. Instead, there are racing lines, squealing tires and, occasionally, breathtaking crashes. And if the NASCAR phenomenon continues to escalate at its current rate, its elements might become as adored as those of the other major sports.
It's conceivable that stock-car racing soon could become the next national pastime.
"It's time NASCAR was placed with the big three: football, baseball and basketball," veteran race reporter Dr. Jerry Punch said.
NASCAR's popularity is soaring at a rate even the NFL must envy. Attendance is up 91 percent since 1990; merchandising has risen 1,100 percent in the same span; new racetracks are sprouting up all over the country.
Some of the reasons for the NASCAR explosion are simple, yet not easy for other sports to replicate.
"We are just regular people," said Dale Jarrett, the two-time Daytona 500 winner who finished third in the Winston Cup points standings last year.
"People identify more with what we do. Everybody drives a car, and some time or another they've probably driven that car fast. So they've been Jeff Gordon or Dale Earnhardt or Rusty Wallace."
But the appeal transcends the track. Many fans get into NASCAR because it is viewed as more wholesome than other sports.
"It is such a family-oriented sport," Punch said shortly after hosting a dinner and bible-study session for several drivers in his suburban Charlotte, N.C., home. "These (drivers) are real role models."
In gaining popularity, NASCAR has broken through several barriers. When many people think of stock car racing they envision uneducated "hillbillies" chewing tobacco and hollering racial epithets.
"I don't see the fans as the type of people they are perceived to be," Jarrett said. "Our fans are really no different than any of the other fans of other sports. ... They're perceived as being the chicken- and rib-eating, beer-drinking type of redneck. That's not what our fans are like."
The numbers back Jarrett up. According to NASCAR's annual demographics report -- figures for the 1998 season -- the typical fan seems like a typical person.
The average NASCAR fan is a white male between the ages of 35 and 44. He is a married high school graduate who owns his home and works full time. His household income is between $30,000 and $50,000, and he lists his job under the "professional/manager" category.
Other statistics that point to NASCAR's mainstream appeal: 39 percent of fans are women; 46 percent have attended college with nearly half of those graduating; 36 percent have a household income exceeding $50,000.
"When you look at racing across the board, I don't feel there is a typical fan anymore," said Corinne Economaki, who publishes National Speed Sport News, a weekly auto racing newspaper founded by her father, Chris Economaki. "It runs the gamut."
As a result of such diversity, all forms of corporate America are trying to get a piece of the action. Sports Illustrated described this year's Daytona 500 starting lineup as "aisle two of a 7-Eleven sprung to automotive life; cars sponsored by, among others, M&Ms, McDonald's, Burger King, Budweiser and Jimmy Dean."
Other prominent sponsors include Kellogg's Corn Flakes, Tide, Hollywood Video, Lucky Dog and World Championship Wrestling.
"Initially, most sponsorships in motorsports were geared toward do-it-yourselfers," Economaki said. "But demographics proved women have a lot of purchasing power, and so do children.
"Sponsors have come to realize they can market through motorsports and reach their target audience."
Economaki traces that realization to 1984, when Ronald Reagan attended the Firecracker 400 in Daytona and witnessed Richard Petty's 200th career victory.
"That generated a lot of interest in motorsports, especially Madison Avenue," Economaki said. "We feel that's when the boom started. It was almost an endorsement of the sport."
Mainstream sponsors quickly discovered affiliations with NASCAR were profitable.
"Every part of the car and the human body are covered" with advertisements, said Dr. Todd Crosset, a sociologist and assistant professor in the University of Massachusetts sports management program.
NASCAR's demographics report claims no other sport approaches it in terms of "audience brand loyalty to sponsorships," a poll which measures a fan's willingness to support an affiliated product.
The Olympics' loyalty rate is 28 percent. The NFL's 36 percent. The NBA's and Major League Baseball's 38 percent. Golf's is 47 percent. NASCAR's loyalty rate is 72 percent.
"It's a form of voting," Crosset said. "They're showing their support with their pocketbooks."
Meanwhile, retail sales of official NASCAR merchandise continue to soar. Last year, it generated $950 million. This year's projections are set at more than $1.1 billion.
What makes those figures even more astounding is the fact NASCAR remains a primarily white endeavor. It has yet to tap into other cultures.
Dr. Mark Howell addressed that issue and many others in his book "From Moonshine to Madison Avenue: A Cultural History of the NASCAR Winston Cup Series." Howell also is a columnist for "Speedworld Online" and an assistant professor of communications at Northwestern Michigan College in Traverse City.
"It really is the last bastion of white sport," Howell said, "based on the fact there are no black drivers right now actively competing at the Winston Cup level."
Virtually everyone tracking the sport, however, claims it's only a matter of time before minorities start contributing to the frenzy.
"I think there's a tremendously huge opportunity," Jarrett said, "if we can get the right type of personality for a black individual to make an impact in the sport in a huge way.
"We would only welcome it. It would be great for everybody involved."
But why hasn't that happened yet?
"It's just the nature of the sport," Howell said. "Typically, to get into stock car racing, the best path to take is being in a family already in the sport. It's not like you can go out on the sandlot, develop a talent and start a racing career.
"It's not a sport. It's a lifestyle. That lends to the whiteness of the sport."
But NASCAR is becoming more urban.
With tracks cropping up in places like Las Vegas, Fontana, Calif., Chicago and Kansas City, NASCAR is broadening its Southeast base. Real estate mogul Donald Trump has proposed building a track on Long Island.
The sport's explosion on television has facilitated such growth. From 1993-98, NASCAR ratings increased 19 percent on network broadcasts and 33 percent on cable.
NASCAR announced this winter it will consolidate its 34 Winston Cup races and sell them as a package, as opposed to each track owner striking his own deal. One report stated the potential package purchaser may have to pay $1 billion for the rights.
"The TV exposure that we see now has carried the sport to non-traditional audiences," Howell said. "I remember being a young race fan growing up and we never saw races on television. Maybe we'd get the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500.
"Now you've got cable taking every little race into different markets. As you get urban markets developing an interest in NASCAR, it's naturally going to bring a more diverse audience into NASCAR, which is great."
Possibly the most impressive aspect of NASCAR is driver-fan loyalty. There is a bond between athlete and fan like no other sport.
"The drivers all understand the importance of the people who buy those tickets and sit in the stands," Punch said. "There's no way that driver can sign that many autographs or shake that many hands, but they certainly try."
Fans further appreciate drivers because they perform every week -- unlike the four major sports, all of which have either gone on strike or been locked out in recent memory.
"People are getting frustrated with that sort of mightier-than-thou attitude most professional sports seem to have," Howell said.
NASCAR doesn't have the same labor strife as the other sports, partly because there's no drivers union.
The birth of NASCAR can be traced to a meeting in Daytona Beach, Fla., in December, 1947, when race car driver Bill France, Sr., called together a group of his peers to bring organization and control to the burgeoning sport of stock car racing.
The group formed the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing and incorporated the sanctioning body in February, 1948. The France family has controlled the organization since inception, and, by-and large, it's been one, big, happy family.
Drivers attempted to organize themselves in 1961 (with help from the Teamsters) and again in 1969. The effort in 1961 fizzled and in '69, when the drivers boycotted over perceived unsafe driving conditions at Talladega Speedway in Alabama, France invited other drivers to take their place. The union immediately disbanded.
"The problems the other sports have had certainly have benefited us," Jarrett said. "There are people I know that were never fans of stock car racing that have said they always were football, baseball or basketball fans, but something always seems to happen where their team's not playing. But they know we're going to be there racing."
And, at least up until now, drivers haven't embarrassed the sport or their fans away from the track.
"In my 21 years as a sportscaster," Punch said, "I have never, ever had to get up on Monday morning and apologize to my son or daughter because of something they've read in the paper or seen on TV about a guy they were pulling for. You can't say that about any other sport.
"These guys are accountable to their families, their fans and their sponsors. When that sponsor pays that kind of money -- on the average $5 million to $6 million a year -- they want to be able to back that investment up, and the drivers can't risk doing anything to jeopardize that."
There have been very few public relations nightmares for NASCAR, the most infamous coming when veteran driver Tim Richmond died of sexually transmitted AIDS in 1989.
"It would be naive to deny that (negative activity) doesn't go on," Howell said, "but it's not an accepted part of the culture. You hear of a football player getting arrested for spousal abuse and you say 'Here we go again.' When you hear of a stock car driver doing that it would be reason to stop and be surprised."
read the rest here..
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/daily/05-99/05-05-99/d01sp122.htm
some of you guys are pathetic.. your so afraid of everbody realizing your just an average american you can't even admit you been to a mcdonalds, or a walmart.
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