Racecar Rivalries Heat Up Track, Excite Fans Nationwide

Amanda Weatherford, ad/graphic designer

During the past few semesters, I have written about local bands, sports issues and how I became a fan of sports in the first place.

It is finally time to put my pen aside and pick up the slack on my computer graphic talents. Before I am finished, I have one more installment to write.

For most of my life, I have lived and breathed sports. I cheer for the Cleveland, Ohio, teams, half of the NASCAR teams and some of the Texas teams. (Yeah, I know. I’m a loser.) Not only do I cheer, I jump around. I scream and shout and put on one heck of a show. I have fun with sports, and somehow it helps others around me to have fun as well. I have had my whole life to perfect my cheering technique, though some would call it downright hilarious. I’ve even had some of my friends tell me to calm down, not realizing how big a sports fan I really am…

I wrote an article during my first semester at SPC about why women love NASCAR. Those of you that were here in the fall of 2003 might remember it. Most women may like NASCAR for the cute drivers (because there are definitely more of them today than there were in 2003), but some, like me, like NASCAR for the thrill, the danger element and the speed.

I know most people will say that NASCAR is “just cars going in circles.” Whatever. Say what you will, but NASCAR is an amazing sport. Where else can you see people beating and banging cars together at 200 miles per hour, flipping them up into the air only to crash back down on top of another person’s car? Nowhere that I can immediately think of.

This last article is to be about the rivalries that races in the big Nextel Cup circuit have brought out. Not only have drivers such as Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon, or Stewart and Robby Gordon, gone at it on the tracks and in the garage, but NASCAR’s lesser-knowns are starting to get in on the action as well.

Some of you might have heard of the recent fireworks that went on between Kurt Busch’s fiancé, Eva Bryan, and Greg Biffle’s girlfriend, Nicole Lunders, a few weeks ago at Texas Motor Speedway. Lunders, angered at Busch for wrecking her boyfriend’s car, slammed her water bottle down, stormed over to Busch’s pit stall and scaled the crew’s pit box halfway, where she flung heated words at the unsuspecting Bryan.

Not only did this action infuriate NASCAR’s sanctioning body, they may just end up yanking Lunders’ pit pass…permanently. Because, well, that’s what they used to do in “the old days.”

It is almost aggravating that NASCAR thinks that every little thing that happens on or off the track that they don’t think is proper needs to be penalized. Maybe they should just leave things alone for a bit, because, after all, it was just a little bit of venting on Lunders’ part.

I have seen drivers take each other out on pit road after the race, take each other out during a race or throw punches in the garage area. Yes, that stuff needs to be fined, but don’t fine anyone for exchanging words. I think that if I was someone within NASCAR’s reach, I might just be broke.

So…another semester comes to a close, and I am turning to the graphics world. This has been fun while it has lasted, and thanks to everyone for listening. Have a great summer.