Some people might argue NASCAR isn’t a real sport, mainly I think because it’s cars racing around the track and not people running around one.
I think it’s a sport, albeit one I don’t have a lot of knowledge about lately. In my opinion if competitive eating of hot dogs is now a sport, automotive racing surely is.
I define it as a sport due to the nature of being competitive the same way fishing is a sport. You have what are supposed to be stock cars, all being equal, with the variable being the driver and all the things that could go wrong out there.
I was watching the older Tom Cruise movie “Days of Thunder” the other night and the drivers were repeatedly bumping into Cruise’s character Cole Trickle’s car. When he complained, they told Trickle it wasn’t crashing it was rubbing and rubbing is racing.
I know there are a lot of people out driving in the streets who must have this mindset. Have you ever bought a new car and tried to keep it from getting a dent? If you have kept your new car pristine for 4 years, I want to know how you do it.
It might be my bad luck I don’t know. I bought almost the smallest car in the world. How someone could rub and ding me is a mystery but it has happened several times. Maybe I bought too small a car and people can’t see me. I hope that’s not it. If so, no wonder motorcycle drivers are scared.
For example, I stopped by a fast food joint and was waiting for my order when … rub, a truck bumps into me from behind. It just bumped me a wee bit, just a little spot you could barely see, but the driver said she thought I was going to pull up to the waiting line. Well, my order was coming up at the window and I wondered why someone would assume I was pulling forward and go without the car in front moving at all.
Another day, I turned on a road off Spring Valley, and there was a car in front of me that stopped in the middle of the road – no driveways or streets to turn into – and started backing up. Well I laid on the horn and backed up as far as I could without going into traffic but, you guessed it, another ding. The driver was older than the can of evaporated milk in my cupboard. So I felt bad and said don’t worry about it.
Then there’s the assorted side dings from car doors from the parking lots of stores.
It all started years ago when I bought my very first new car, a Nissan pickup at Fort Bragg, N.C. I went to get gas for the lawnmower and dinged my tailgate putting the gas can in.
Well I guess I have to just accept, a little rubbing is to be expected in this life. What can you do?