audvisartist - "People want to see the crashes. That's all there is to it."

Well said. That is exactly it.

People here are so mean. I have thought about this issue some, and have come to the conclusion that it is popular because it is like traffic. If you watch people drive on 6th street or the freeway; they drive fast, in tight packs, and constantly take great risks to advance a single place in the grouping. The cars look much more like normal cars than IRL or GT racing. It is easy to see yourself in the situation and it is easier to watch a race on an oval track (I realize that few are actual ovals).

Racing does use fuel in what some would see as a gratuitous fashion, but so does many other things (like shipping fruit to the grocery store in winter from Chile and Argentina). Maybe they could race NASCAR hybrids. HE he.

I really think this is a bit of a silly question though. Its like asking why someone likes beer or books or the color red. Who the hell knows.

Too bad you feel that way. You should probably not go then. And whatever you do, don't expand yourself and try to learn about it. Then you might enjoy it with the "rest of this generation," thus becoming a hillbilly.

Just out of curiosity, what DO you enjoy?

Bea, I promise to keep the sponsorship stickers off our pole!

Goots - glad to see you thinking reasonably. Stickers on the pole would make sliding rather painful. And if they start to peel, then there becomes the hazard of paper-cuts. Yikes!

RI is absolutely correct -- Eleanor Roosevelt gave the best quotes ever. LOL on that one.

Trinity - nothing could be more snootier than racing! You call soccer snooty, yet all one needs is a ball. In racing, the team that can spend the most money to build the fastest car wins. What could be more elitist?

Bone, again you have simply gone completely over the line. Calling Kevin Federline a "great white talent." Ugh! You know you have gone too far on that on!

Marion, the reason we don't jump on Bone for being a racist is that he does not have a patern of racist comments. He pointed out the obvious, which is that the vast majority of NASCAR fans are white people. He failed to mention that the per capita quotent for mullets is also higher among race fans. Not racist, just observant. (I can't believe I just came to Bone's defense. I think I need to go take a shower.)

I totally agree with Trinity. It looks like colorful guys/gals just going in circles, but there is so much to racin'. Once you understand the strategies and rules, and get to know it, it is a great sport.

I know I would not have the cahoonas to go over 100 mph, let alone averaging 170 in a tight pack for hours in 100+ temperatures. Wow. Talk about discipline. And the fans are very diverse.

And, the hooters are everywhere!!! Even on the men! ;)

Go ahead and make fun and jab, but find out which sport in a season has the most attendees. And they do have a nice time, unless their driver goes out early.

Bea - I don't know what to say? I.....I....I'm speechless. This is usually when I would say,"Damn Bea." , and then walk away from the computer, smarting from the whooping I had taken.

Thanks for the support and you hit the nail on the head. No racism here.

marion,

Speaking of racist, I think it was you who used the moniker: Head White Mother-F----- In Charge

You must be so proud.

Thanks,

Marion wrote -'groups to achive your desired level of "diversity"/' it is ACHIEVE.

If you are going to throw spelling stones, don't break out all the windows on you glass house

lol, oh come the hell on! y'all need to lighten up on NASCAR. have any of you any idea at all about the precision, the meticulous nature of a race car?? i doubt it. i for one truly admire the workmanship and mechanic skills it takes to make a car go as fast as the racers do; and skill at driving, wow...don't know about any of you but i'd have a heckuva time handling a car at 150+mph!

i'm sure some of the snootier posters will have to say, "oh yes i could drive like that " or whatever. go right ahead-go back to your fencing, your soccer, tennis or whatever high-brow endeavors you choose to indulge yourselves with, and leave the racin' to us edumacated redneck folk, m'k?

It's popular because the general public is too stupid to engage themselves in anything that requires more than G.E.D. After all, watching cars drive around in circles all day entertains both infants and grown men.

What I don't understand is the connection between NASCAR fans and their disdain for Terrorist Supporting Nations. I mean all the oil/fuel that is wasted during these events could drop the price of gas a nickle a gallon.

who could resist those hottie hunkie drivers?? ;)

besides...i'm a girl who just loves cars! it's alllllllll good.

MARION, You really do have some racist overtones. Misery loves company and I am not coming along for the ride.

Why don't you go starch your white hood and robe and leave us decent people alone.

Marion, I was simply responding to your accusation of Bone being a racist, or having made a racist statement. I did not say or imply that you, in turn, do show a pattern of making such statements yourself. You read that into what I wrote when it is not there.

But lets consider how you defend yourself: "When I point out that the biggest percentage of the prison population in the USA is black, will you then accuse me of being "racist"?" Well, it would depend on the context. If you were using this to point at some perceived inferiority in blacks, then yes, it would be racist. If you were pointing this out to make a comment of the effects of economic struggles still placed on many blacks so many years after slavery or of the potential for racism to corrupt our judicial system, then no, you would not be making a racist comment. Either way, however, I would ask that you site your source.

To be honest, since your posts tend to be overly long and filled with postings to other sites that I never care to visit, I frequently just scroll past your comments. I don't know if you have a pattern of making racist statements or not, nor would I suggest otherwise without being confident in makeing such a repugnant accusation. However, reading your rambling protest, I would just like to quote Shakespeare -- "Methinks thou doest protest too much."

Whoever says people watch it for the crashes is obviously not a fan of NASCAR. People watch it for the racing. I'm not quite sure what's so hard to understand about that.

Get ahold of the best NASCAR out there for the PC - NASCAR Racing Season 2003, a good set of pedals and a steering wheel and race that for awhile. Not on the kiddy arcade settings, but ramp up the realism. "Driving in circles" and "turning left" isn't quite as simple as you might think.

Bea- Kevin Federline might not be the most talented fellow, but he is alot like Ross Perot.

He nows how to get rich.

Hyppogryph? Are your referring to Marion, aka. Draco Malfoy

Marion -- you really do need to re-read my posts. Your suggestion that I have called you a racist is an apparent paranoid delusion on your part, because I never did. In fact, I went as far as to say that from what I could tell of your posts that I have read, is that it appears that you do not show a pattern of making comments that could be considered racist. My defense of Bone was not meant as a projection in the opposite towards you. For some reason, however, you read it as such.

Now, looking at your late-night, apparently alcohol-induced ramblings, I must again restate Shakespeare: "Methinks thou doest protest too much."

As far as editing your comments -- no thanks. I'd just as soon continue to scroll on past.

Marion - Plain and simple, I didn't call you a racist. I've called you other things in the past and have made fun of your patern (sic) of business failings (i.e. bankruptcy), but never have I called you racist. How do you see that what I was stating -- about Bone! -- is an implication about you? Does this mean that I implied that everyone that isn't Bone are racists? Hardly. I said it earlier, and it apparently warrents repeating -- my statement about Bone was about Bone and Bone only. (Oh, but your swipe at my ability to read -- ooooh, scathing.)

So I will say it for a last time, I did not call you a racist. If I had, I wouldn't couch it in an implication. That isn't my style. I'd just come out and say it. Nor did I call NASCAR fans racists, as you claim I have -- not even close. Again, you are projecting.

But you do seem overly sensitive to such matters. Hum, interesting ... and you do try to score points by parading the name of Chase Austin. What is next, you will tell us that many of your friends are black?

Once again, Shakespeare, my lad, Shakespeare.

Your Welcome, Beatrice