Race Weekend Central

Frontstretch Fantasy Insider: Taming the Lady in Black

There aren’t many places where every driver, not just the rookies, is told “race the track, not the pack.” But that’s the only means of survival at Darlington Raceway, a unique combination of rim-riding and abrasive asphalt that’s among the most grueling 500-milers on the Sprint Cup circuit. The track itself may be Too Tough …

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Fan’s View: The Joys of Watching NASCAR’s Wayback Machine

Ah, the good old days. You know, when things were better. I’m not even talking about the wayback machine. Sometimes the good old days are as recent as last year, before we handed billions of dollars to greedy bank executives. More importantly, I’m speaking of those thoughts that bring a smile to our faces and …

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Bowles-Eye View: At Phoenix, out With the Old, in With the Who?

For so many millions of us, favorite athletes become so much more. Role models for our kids, our communities, ourselves; they’re put on a pedestal of success we can only wish to achieve. Through them, we choose to live our wildest dreams, placed in a fantasy world in which a larger-than-life persona can show us …

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The Yellow Stripe: Drought Busters – Who’s Gone the Longest Without a Trip to NASCAR Victory Lane?

In the 1930s an epic drought, caused in part by primitive farming techniques, triggered a unique weather phenomenon called the Dust Bowl. It was a period of severe dust storms that blackened the sky, wreaked havoc on the land and reduced visibility to only meters in some instances. These storms reached as far as New …

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Racing at the Beach: Tragedy, Triumph & Controversial Finishes at Daytona, 2001-07

Editor’s Note: With the 50th running of the Daytona 500 just days away, we’re proud to present Frontstretch Senior Writer Matt McLaughlin’s “History of Daytona” series. McLaughlin has profiled all 49 Daytona 500s – and whether it’s Pearson and Petty spinning through the grass or Earnhardt finally getting the monkey off his back, he’ll have …

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Voices From the Heartland: In This Age of “Perception,” DEI is in Intensive Care

In this ever increasingly mixed up world, a world where perception seems to be valued over truth, the entity known as Dale Earnhardt Inc. (DEI) is in dire need of serious medical attention. Pronto. The biggest wound that DEI has suffered in 2007 is, of course, the well-documented divorce and subsequent family tiff that ultimately …

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Fanning the Flames: 1 NASCAR Team’s Folly is Another’s Fortune

What a typical NASCAR vacation: The circuit takes a one-week hiatus from on-track action only to turn up the volume away from it. The Ginn/DEI merger not only shuffled the driver deck and taught prospective owners a thing or two about life in the bigs, it opened a spot in the owner points standings for …

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