There are some people who have spoken to me and questioned the huge amount of money spent by the armed services to purchase NASCAR sponsorships. I have not seen the studies, nor have I seen the figures, but I can guess that the money spent is in the millions. What these people do not understand is that the armed services have advertising budgets for the purpose of recruiting. Dozens of large corporations have discovered that a NASCAR sponsorship offers a lot of exposure for the money. Thus they are willing to shell out the big bucks. The same is true for the United States Armed Services. The money spent is well worth it as far as advertising success is concerned. I feel there is no need to try and block this program at a time when this nation needs all the military might it can muster.

John Ross Hendrix climbs out of the car, painted with Sam's Club logo and colors and walks with an unsteady gait to the pit area staked out by the Jeff Gordon / Mario Andretti Racing School. After piloting the Nextel Cup racer around the massive facility for eight hot laps, he is visibly shaking with adrenaline pumping through his veins. Sitting on the pit wall under the spring sun, the oven like helmet finally off his head, he wonders what on earth possessed him to do such a thing.

Am I a NASCAR fan? Well, maybe. I'm certainly not a fan(atic) although I have had fan(tasies) of racing for more than 50 years. I can remember my Father's Packard parked on the sand at Daytona Beach, me sitting on the fender, eating a gritty peanut butter and jelly sandwich, drinking a coke and shivering each time the sand would screech between my fingers and the cold, wet bottle. A speck in the distance would grow along with an unearthly roar as the car would appear from the sea mist and blast by, a mere ten yards or so in front of my feet. Little Johnny was impressed.

My stepson, Mike, handed me an envelope saying it was a Father's Day present. I opened it to find a brochure for the Gordon / Andretti Racing School. With it was a certificate good for their "Qualifier" experience. Mike had won this as a door prize at a company sales convention. He, not being a NASCAR fan, knowing that I was, at least a little bit, presented it to me. I thanked him profusely, got on the school's website to check the schedule, and made the reservation.

On Sunday, I drove from Cary to the Speedway in Concord. Following the signs, I proceeded past the guard, laying a signature on his clipboard, and drove through the tunnel to the infield. "Dang, this place is huge." I thought. More signs led me to a couple of trailers, with the Gordon / Andretti Racing School logo on their sides, and a crowd milling about. This was the place. I parked and checked in where the signs told me to. After I signed a few more papers, medical questions, waiver of liability, blah, blah, blah, the young lady at the counter handed me a racing suit with lots of patches and logos stitched all over. I posed for the "official" photo beside the famous #24 Chevrolet.

The drivers gathered for an orientation, half of which I could not hear, because at that time the Richard Petty School was taking their laps, the noise drowning out much of what our instructor had to say. I believe I caught enough to do this thing safely and properly. Each of us would follow an instructor around the track 4 to 6 car lengths behind. Each lap the instructor would increase the speed according to his and the spotter's judgement of our ability to handle the car and drive the right line. After the orientation, we split up into groups and gathered around several cars, lined up for us. The instructors showed us how to enter and exit the car,quite a physical feat in itself. They showed us the safety features and other points about the controls. They then loaded us into vans and treated us to a couple of laps around the track, showing us the proper line to take and landmarks we could use.

Then we got down to business. An instructor called out our names and assigned us the various cars according to our physical sizes, each car being fitted for a different sized driver. When my name was called, another instructor fitted me with a hood and helmet and led me to the car. I climbed in, doing quite well, I thought, and allowed a crew member to buckle me in and affix the steering wheel. Entry and exit would have been impossible without the removable wheel.

An instructor's car pulled in front of me and started moving slowly down pit road. The crew member, assuring himself that I had the clutch pedal all the way down, flipped the ignition switch and the starter switch. The beast roared to life under me. I blipped the throttle once while the crewmen fastened the safety net in my window and pointed down the track. I blipped the throttle once more, eased out the clutch and I was rolling down pit road; no jerk; no choke out; no tire squeal. "Pretty smooth for a rookie." I thought to myself.

The tachometer, which I had only given a passing glance while sitting in the car, had a four thousand RPM redline set. I reached that point long before the landmark which the instructor had said was the place to shift into second gear. The rev limiter kicked in and the engine sputtered and misfired. I could feel my face redden and just knew that everyone at the track could hear my mistake. I depressed the clutch all the way and shifted, being rewarded with a loud clang as the gears engaged. I accelerated more, and the same thing happened going into third gear. At least I was still moving.

I exited pit road and stayed on the low apron of the track, trying desperately to catch up to the instructor who was pulling away. Before the same embarrassing misfires came on, I jammed into top gear and went pedal to the metal. The engine noise was not as loud as I had expected, at least inside the car. Offensive to some, maybe, the sound was sweet music to my ears. It was sort of like the low grumbling of an African lion that slowly built up to a deafening roar.

I realized right away was that this machine was built to turn left. On the back straight, I had to consciously steer the car to the right in order to keep it on the track. As we entered the third turn, speed still building, I relaxed my hold on the wheel a little and the car took itself around the high banked turn without much help from me. The front stretch was just as easy, with the banking only slight, the car seemed to steer itself toward the first turn. I looked up as the flagman gave me the green flag and gave the gas pedal another stab. About that same time I consciously reminded myself to breathe. I think I had been holding my breath all the way through that first circuit.

With each circuit of the track, we built more speed. We had been instructed to keep a constant throttle position all the way around the track. The temptation to lift off of the gas going into a turn was tough to resist. Soon, I was feeling myself pressed down in the seat as we went through the turns. I couldn't believe the g forces at that speed. The car stuck to the turn like the wide tires were made of super glue.

I made a couple of discoveries in the middle of all this. The first is that the driver of a Nextel Cup racer can't see anything except what is directly in front of him. The seat, window net, roll cage all conspire to limit visibility. A skinny little wide angle rear view mirror gives some visibility out the back, but not much. When in a turn, the driver is not looking straight ahead. The driver has to look up because of the high banks. The second discovery is that circling the monstrous facility that is Lowes Motor Speedway, at high speeds, makes it become awfully small. Once, we passed another pair while I wondered if there really was enough room to do so. Once, in a turn the instructor moved down low, me following as a car flashed past us. This was one of the ride-along two seaters with a professional driver and a passenger whom I thought was surely scared out of his wits. I thought briefly of Governor Easley.

The Nextel Cup racer I drove was a strange beast. The five to seven hundred horsepower under the hood was not readily apparent as I began the drive. I have owned some high powered vehicles in the past, capable of doing at least 150 mph. Being the law abiding person that I am, we know that I would never have tested those limits. Right? My impression is that at least three of them were capable of out accelerating the thoroughbred racer. But then there is the almost effortless way the racer drove at any speed I asked of it. Even in my fastest lap, averaging 131 mph, my knuckles white on the steering wheel, the sound of the engine was as if it were loafing along a country highway on an afternoon cruise. I could feel the potential if only I had the chance and the courage to use it.

I looked up at the flagstand to see the checkered flag waving. Over already? I was just getting the hang of it. We accelerated hard through turns one and two as a follow through, and then backed off the throttle to coast down the back straight and onto pit road. I eased to a stop where the crewman was waving at me, blipping the gas once more to remember the sound.

From the Flock brothers on the beach at Daytona to Jeff Gordon dodging beer cans at Talladega, I have found a new respect for them all. No longer do I envy their careers in the least little bit. Will I do this fantasy experience again? You betcha, if it's free. Would I want to race in NASCAR for real? On a circle track? In a crowd of other cars? No, thank you. I'll confine my racing career to settling hundred dollar bets on moonlit nights somewhere along the Blue Ridge Parkway.