MY LIFE IN THE PITS

An exuberant introduction to stock-car racing, from muffler bearings to personalities to track mystique, by former racing reporter and publicist Rich (What Southern Women Know, not reviewed).

This overview of the NASCAR scene is underpinned by a wealth of personal stories, thanks to the fact that Rich has been a fixture at the tracks for nearly 20 years. She began as a reporter covering the old short tracks and witnessed the transition to the big motor speedways. She has lived to see a sport once treated with regal condescension rise to unrivaled popularity, and she has known the men (and the few women) who got it there. Rich traces the roots of stock-car racing back to the Deep South moonshiners outrunning the law with their contraband and then challenging each other as to who was the fastest. She is able to convey to readers the brains and strategy involved in this sport; winners, she reminds us, are rarely the guys with the biggest engines. Rich cut her teeth writing about Bill Elliott's exploits, and she grew immeasurably in her understanding at the feet of Alan Kulwicki. She excels at bringing to life the big players: Richard Petty, Bobby and Davey Allison, Dale Earnhardt, Tim Richmond, and other superstars. Rich has plenty of storytelling verve and insider's knowledge; she keeps her anecdotes short and sweet—or sad, for there is plenty to be sad about in speed-driven NASCAR. She stumbles only when doubling as an advice columnist, dishing out tired clichés like “it takes only one success to wipe out a thousand failures” and “always remember that somebody's money somewhere makes your livelihood possible.” Even these, it should be noted, are of a piece with the direct, personal tone of her prose throughout.

Though NASCAR hardly needs any more fans, Rich's enthusiastic voice will likely draw an additional crowd of the curious to the track.