When I got word that the NHL had given our newspaper the nod to send a photographer for fan coverage of this week’s Heritage Classic between the Calgary Flames and the Montreal Canadiens, I had to turn it down.
The Daytona 500, the Super Bowl of NASCAR, happens to fall on the same day. I suffer from an insatiable addiction to racing. Be it NASCAR, rally racing, street bikes or dirt bikes, I am a fan. Now that February has rolled around, unofficially marking the start of the 2011 racing season, my Sunday worship can begin again.
In the NASCAR world, the biggest event is the first, and this year’s running of the ‘Great American Race’ is expected to be something special. The racing surface has been re-paved this season, marking only the third time the Daytona asphalt has been replaced.
In 1959, when the track first opened a three-wide finish, a lack of modern timing caused the win to be awarded to Lee Petty three days after the event’s conclusion.
Fast forward to 1979: new pavement and another memorable Daytona 500. On the final lap, the two drivers fighting for the lead, Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison, wrecked one another. After coming to rest in the third turn a mere mile away from the finish, the two drivers got out of their cars and fought, right there in the grass of the turn.
On Feb. 20, 43 drivers will again take the green flag on a brand new racing surface, competing to have their name etched onto the Harley J. Earl trophy. If history has its way, it should be an entertaining race.
Being a motorsports nut living in Canada, I know that NASCAR isn’t the easiest of sells around these parts. The most popular rejection I hear is, “cars going in circles is boring!”
Upon first inspection, I agree with that statement. I was once that guy who would flip past the NASCAR on TV, but when you see one of these cars bump into another at 280 or 300 km/h and continue on with the flick of the steering wheel, or when a 3,400 lb-stock car lifts into the air, it tweaks your interest.
It takes a team of about 12 guys, not including the driver, to get these cars ready for the track, not to mention the dozens who built the cars back at the shop. Once I have explained this to people, I will commonly be met with either the “race car drivers are not athletes,” or “car racing isn’t a sport.”
If I am still speaking to you after you make these comments, you will be glad to hear my rebuttal.
I would like you to head down to Genesis Place the next time there is a public swim. Bring your snow pants and a heavy jean jacket, and a full-face helmet and go sit in the sauna. That is the closest to a stock car’s 45-60°C temperatures as we can get without actually doing it. Let’s see how long you last with a heavy steering wheel in you hands and two-G’s of force on your body for three to four hours. These guys (and gals) are athletes.
As for the sport comment, Ernest Hemingway said it best: “There are but three sports; bull fighting, mountaineering and motorsport,” he said. “The rest are merely children’s games played by men.”
If you find yourself with nothing to do on a weekend, or that Flames playoff game is blacked-out, give racing a chance.
It is the fastest paced, most competitive and dangerous sport around, and if you just take the time to watch and understand, deep inside everyone is a race fan. The Daytona 500 is Feb. 20, 10 a.m. on FOX. Give it a shot.
