NASCAR is an American favorite

Who would have ever thought that a sport that literally had cars driving in circles could be one of the most popular in America. It is true. NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing) is the second most popular sport only falling behind football. Shocked? Most people would be. But according to fans, there is so much more to it than just left turns.

"I like it because it's a family oriented sport," said Bobby Arnett, an electrician from Ruidoso N.M. "Watching the competition between the drivers is almost like a soap opera, there are fights and tears and excitement."

The largest NASCAR stadium can seat up to 250,000 people, according to Jaski's Silly Season website (http://www.jayski.com/pages/tracks-seating.htm) and most of the time, every single seat is taken. When it comes to live viewing, NASCAR is again one of the top contenders.

"The events of a live race are much more fun. The camping out before the race, the vendors around the track and not to mention the race itself," said Skyler Evans, 19, a sophomore civil engineering major at Texas Tech University from Ruidoso, N.M. "It's hard to explain the feeling of the cars. It's just much more in your face."

The other interesting thing about live races is that people will come days in advance to camp out and socialize with other fans.

"They are all pulling for the same thing which is the race and you have 70,000 people pulling for the same thing," said Ann Brown, a cattle rancher from Summit, Ark. "They will come days before, it is not just an afternoon thing and celebrate (the race) for hours and hours before it actually starts."

Most fans get into NASCAR because of others introducing them into the sport. Some people still are reluctant and usually take time to warm up to the idea of NASCAR racing.

"My daughter was actually the one who went first. She got invited to a race and came home bragging about it so we started watching it on TV," Arnett said. "It took me three or four races to understtand what was going on and to get into it. But after the first live race, I was hooked!"

After they are hooked, people make an effort to watch the weekly races every Sunday. Some even get upset if they can't watch it.

"I try to watch the races every Sunday," Brown said. "I do get upset (missing the race) sometimes, but most of the time it is just because I am busy, so it isn't that big of a deal."

Each fan also has a favorite driver. Some drivers are more popular than others: Dale Earnhardt Jr., Tony Stewart, and Jimmie Johnson are some of the most favored. Evans and Brown are both fans of Jimmie Johnson, while Arnett is a fan of Kevin Harvick.

Each year in NASCAR there is a competition that is called the Chase for the Sprint Cup. The unique part of this however, is that only the top twelve drivers get to compete for the cup.

"The first twenty races the teams are racing to get into the chase," Evans said. "If you are one of the top twelve drivers, those drivers compete in a separate point system for the last ten races to determine the champion."

After making the chase, those top twelve drivers start back at zero. This year Jimmie Johnson won the chase and took home the Sprint Cup Series title for the fifth consecutive time. Last year, he won it for the fourth time making him the only driver to win four consecutive titles. He made history for the second time with his fifth win.

"I wasn't shocked by his fifth win, but maybe I faltered in my belief that he could do it in the face of having two major competitors in his face so close in points," Brown said. They could have teamed up against him. Plus those two drivers had teammates that were in the race that could have knocked Jimmie out."

Jimmie Johnson has certainly defied all odds in the NASCAR world. Some people even call him and his team the modern dynasty of sports. Brown says that, "Jimmie is the Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and Lance Armstrong of NASCAR."

But despite all the fun in driving a car at 200 mph is the long and hard seasons they have. They begin in February at the Daytona 500 and have a race in a different city every week, with the exception of one weekend, until November.

"You don't see it in them but it has got to affect them," Arnett said. "They put a lot of miles on going from east coast to west coast. "

But no matter how popular the sport is, a lot of people are still very critical of the sport. According to Evans, people have built this stereotype of NASCAR being a "worthless, white trash, redneck" sport. This initial stereotype immediately turns people off to the idea.

"People just like to bash on things they don't have any interest on," Evans said. "And since most NASCAR races are in oval shape, their first thought is that could get real boring after 400-500 trips around the circle. They don't really understand what goes on during the race."

Despite all the negative feelings NASCAR gets, it has continued to grow as a sport. It still has its loyal fans and they don't plan on going anywhere anytime soon. NASCAR fans like Arnett want the world to know, "NASCAR is not a hillbilly sport like everyone thinks!"