Engle - The Nuts and bolts of NASCAR: the definitive viewers guide to big-time stock car auto racing

Copyright 2017 by Greg Engle

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Tom Lau

Cover photo credit AP Images

ISBN: 978-1-68358-009-6

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-68358-010-2

Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS

There is no doubt about precisely when folks began racing each other in automobiles. It was the day they built the second automobile.
Richard Petty

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

T O THANK EVERYONE who has helped me during my time in and around NASCAR would require an entire volume. I do, however, want to single out several special people who were mentors and are now my friends. This includes Candice (Lee) and Reid Spencer, who got me my first NASCAR job. This also includes Bill Marx (the best editor I have ever known), whose numerous red pen marks on my early work taught lessons that I have carried with me and imparted to others throughout the years.

Also Kurt Busch and Todd Berrierwho are my go-to guys, the ones who explain things inside the sport that I dont understand. Also Richard Petty, who I once spent several hours with in his hauler while he explainedwithout his trademark cowboy hat and sunglassesthe inside workings of NASCAR.

Tony Fabrizio has been helpful through the years in allowing me to become a better reporter. Randy Fuller, the PR person for driver Carl Edwards, has been a wealth of information through the years and is someone I consider a good friend.

Every NASCAR driver I have interacted with over time has always been gracious and kind, especially when talking off the record. Specifically, Jimmie Johnson and Carl Edwards, who I worked for, for a short time. Both drivers are the type of guys I wish fans could see away from track. They are the type of people you would want to hang out with after work on a Friday night.

The one man who meant the most to me, however, was Jim Hunter. This NASCAR PR guru taught me more about NASCAR than anyone. We spent many, many hours together, and I learned more about the real workings of NASCAR from him than from anyone. He was the first person to call me after my father passed away in 2009, and he became like a second father to me. I miss him every day, and I will carry with me forever the lessons he taught me about NASCAR and life.

As for this book, all the people at NASCAR have been invaluable. Several NASCAR folks who stand out are Rosalie Nestore, Mike Forde, and Pete Stuart. Tireless Megan Englehart from Fox Sports spent many hours arranging interviews and getting photos. Jessica Rohlik from Joe Gibbs Racing and David Hovis from Team Penske were invaluable. Jessica secured an interview with driver Matt Kenseth and provided pictures, and David provided some wonderful shots of the Penske Racing facility. I am grateful to them all. Also thanks to Mike Zizzo from Texas Motor Speedway for the wonderful insights. In addition, thanks to another of my go-to guys, Larry McReynolds, champion crew chief-turned FOX Sports analyst, for taking the time to review this work.

My family has also been an invaluable source of support throughout the years. My children Amanda and Jon, both now grown, spent many days in their youth being dragged around a garage area and getting bored (and doing their homework) in the media center during NASCAR test sessions at Daytona, because Mom had to work. That Mom is my wife of 35 years, Carla, who has always been my rock. Then theres my own mom, Rose, who, thanks to her North Carolina location, has allowed me to save money on hotels through the years to cover races at Charlotte, Bristol, and Martinsville. I could not have done any of it without them.

Finally, I am grateful to all the people who call themselves fans of NASCAR. Without the first dollar they spend for a ticket, a sponsor product, or a piece of driver merchandise, none of it would be possible.

NASCAR is an industry and a lifestyle, because of its fans, and if not for the fans, thousands of us who make a living in the sport would be looking for jobs elsewhere.

Thank you, NASCAR fanspast, present, and future. It is to you this book is dedicated.

INTRODUCTION

A T SOME POINT youve seen it, either as part of a sports report inside your local news broadcast or perhaps youve been flipping TV channels and seen a bunch of brightly colored cars (or highly modified pickup trucks) racing around, usually in a circle. Maybe, at the time, you were curious enough to watch for a few moments, or perhaps until the very end, and wondered just what it was that you were watching.

Perhaps, all these days later, you are still curious to know more, or maybe you are a new fan lured in by a spouse or friend. No matter what has piqued your interest, what I hope you will learn in the following pages is just what is going on. A NASCAR race is much more than a bunch of race cars circling a track. To some its a way of life, and to many its the reason that they say, Sundays are made for racing.

In the following pages, I try and break down all there is to know about the sport I first fell in love with as a young boy. In the early 1970s, my father, a professed IndyCar aficionado, took me to that most grand of speedways, Daytona International Speedway, while on vacation in Florida. The white sand beaches and tall stately palm trees were a far cry from my Indiana home. The race cars I saw at Daytona were different, too. Growing up, I journeyed to Indianapolis Motor Speedway almost every May, thanks to my dads love of racing. There I witnessed greats like Mario Andretti and AJ Foyt. I was there in 1977 when Janet Guthrie qualified and raced in what was then the biggest auto race in America. The cars these men and women raced looked nothing like I saw anywhere outside a race track. They had no fenders, the cockpits were open, and the engines were in full view.

So it was then that I stood near the fence and looked in awe at the expanse of Daytona International Speedway for the first time. Indianapolis Motor Speedway was just as big, but it was hard to see just how big from the stands. Daytona was different. The 2.5-mile high-banked speedway stretched out before me like a vast desert with a ribbon of pavement surrounding it. That day several cars were testing, and I vividly remember that first car passing me. It exploded by with a roar that frankly scared the hell out of me. But I didnt just hear it, I actually felt it. The power, the speed, the sound of the engine as it rocketed off in the distance was something I wouldnt soon forget. These cars looked so different than the IndyCars I was used to. They had fenders, roofs, and hoods. In fact, they didnt look all that different from the cars I saw on the highway as we journeyed home to Indiana.

From that first brush with NASCAR to today, I have worked and lived around the sport. In previous decades, I worked as a member of the media at nearly all the speedways on which NASCAR races, and I now live not far from Daytona International Speedway here in Florida. Starting as first a fan, then a member of the media corps that endures the grueling travel schedule, I have enjoyed the sport as a fan and have also covered the sport as a reporter. I even spent a short time working as a PR person for a driver.