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Why So Many Men, NASCAR?
Sep 19 2007 by Emily Hansen
9/19/2007
Women Find Niche in Other Motor Sports, But Not Here
There are several aspects of the whole NASCAR craze that I find mystifying, but this one tops them all: Where are the women? Female drivers are very visible in other forms of racing, yet NASCAR remains testosterone-heavy. It hasn't always been that way; there have been more than a dozen female NASCAR drivers over the past 50 years, but none since the 2001-02 season.
To be honest, no form of racing had ever really held my interest in the past, but after attending the Indianapolis 500 earlier this year, I have a new appreciation for open-wheel racing...the sounds, the smells, the speed. I'm drawn to the precise, technical nature of Indy and Formula One cars, but I'm not attracted to NASCAR in the same way. The sponsorships create a dizzying visual barrage, and all those bikini-clad hotties make me want to hurl. Add to that the abundance of races (more than 1,500 this year, according to NASCAR.com) and more than a dozen "series," and the sport just seems too overwhelming for me to understand.
If that's too nit-picky, I have a more substantial complaint: From my pedestrian perspective, the cars participating in NASCAR use old technology (i.e. carburetors and pushrods). After a great deal of research, I have drawn a major conclusion about why that is: This is a driver-against-driver sport, so technical advantages are flattened by the rules to allow driver skill (and maybe a little luck) to be the determining factor in who wins the race. This cutthroat-competition aspect is probably the reason NASCAR fans are fiercely loyal to their favorite driver, and why they seem willing to buy any product that driver advertises on his car.
Really, though, all that is secondary to my main problem with this massively popular sport: Why aren't more women involved? I'm not talking about the bikini-clad variety that are ubiquitous in motor sports, or even the female fans, who are as fervent as their male counterparts. I'm talking about women drivers. Indy racing has Danica Patrick, Milka Duno and Sarah Fisher. Why the difference in NASCAR? If this sport challenges drivers to test their skills against other drivers, I would think those drivers would want to compete against all the best, not just the ones with man parts. Also, NASCAR is famously family-oriented, which would seem to open the sport up to even more female drivers. Where are the moms, the sisters, the daughters?
NASCAR has millions of fans, and I'm trying to understand it, but I'm not sure I'm with you yet. Help me in my quest if you can. Am I missing something about the appeal of NASCAR?
