Soap Box

NASCAR has come a long way since the days of Lee Petty, Fireball Roberts and Herb Thomas and his Fabulous Hudson Hornet. When Bubba and Junior saved up for months to make it to North Wilkesboro and sit shirtless in the stands with a case of beer and live the dream, watching their heroes swapping paint and making hard left turns all day.

It was called Stock Car Racing and the cars looked as if they'd just been driven off a dealer's lot,
had a number painted on the side and taken on the race track, and with the exception of whatever the crew and mechanics could get away with, that's what they were, things you couldn't see like Jr. Johnson's oversized gas lines, notwithstanding. 

The drivers were feisty and not above settling a disagreement off the track or on it and several long running feuds developed, resulting in some interesting Sunday afternoons.

Slick, well-spoken, young athletes have replaced the likes of Legends like Cale Yarborough, Benny Parsons, Darrell Waltrip and Richard Petty, men who looked and spoke as if they'd just got off a tractor and into a race car, colorful characters who minced no words and didn't back away from a confrontation, be it in the straightaway or the pits.

Stock car racing began on the obscure red dirt tracks of Dixie where the amateur drivers regularly had to decide between paying the rent or replacing a bad carburetor so they could have one more shot at taking the checkered flag at some dimly lit track where the purse barely paid their gas bill.

It was a hard scrabble, hand to mouth existence for the boys who lived to race, working all week, racing on Saturday night and giving up even the mundane creature comforts to do whatever it took to get a little more speed out of their car.

Most of these boys would never make it to Charlotte or Daytona but they helped to foster a breed of grassroots fans, loyal followers who spent way above their means to make it to a race or two a year, the bedrock that NASCAR built on, depended on and then walked away from.

The down home, earthy, folksy image of NASCAR has been replaced by an air of sophistication and politically correct attitudes that smacks more of Hollywood than Darlington, the eternal left turn corrupted by road courses and Indy tracks that completely change the rough and tumble strategies that make the race so exciting.

The "good ol' boys" who once constituted so much of a race crowd can't afford to make the long trip to Concord or Phoenix, so they sit by their TVs and watch a sport that to some degree has become foreign to them with restrictor plates, oversized spoilers and curse the new track surfaces and the new generation of rules.

But there are a few exceptions.

To many fans, the mantle of their fierce loyalty and devotion seems to have passed to Dale Earnhardt, Jr., his legions of fans include those who idolized Dale Earnhardt, Sr., and the era of competition.
�The Intimidator" represented.

But Dale, Jr. is much more than the one who carries on the Earnhardt family name, that would never be enough, he's a top level competitor who has made his bones on the track, a force to be reckoned with every Sunday afternoon.

Tony Stewart's colorful temper and Kyle Busch's "balls to the wall" driving style help keep the flickering lamp of old school NASCAR alive, but as the legends retire and the rules committee continues to tighten the screws, and the races move farther from the cradle, one has to wonder 
what will happen to the sport that once was dominated by dirt track drivers and moonshine runners.

Congratulations to number 24 for all the years of excellence he devoted to NASCAR. 

Thank you, Jeff Gordon, enjoy your retirement.

What do you think?

Pray for our troops and the peace of Jerusalem

God Bless America

� Charlie Daniels

​

PLEASE READ BEFORE YOU POST

Feel free to comment on Charlie's soapboxes, but please refrain from profanity and "Anonymous" posts are not allowed, we need a name (it doesn't have to be your first and last name) and you MUST provide a valid email address. If you provide an email address, but leave the name as "Anonymous" we will pick a name for you based on your email address. No one other than website adminstrators will see your email address, not other posters. If you post without a valid email address, your comment (whether postive or negative) will be deleted. � TeamCDB