Posts Tagged ‘lumberton’

A History of Speed: Stock Car Racing

Monday, December 22nd, 2008

One of the most popular sports in the United States is stock car racing. In terms of viewers and ratings on television, there is no form of auto racing that is more popular in America. There are also significant followings for stock car racing in the United Kingdom and in other parts of Europe as well, but many people consider it to be an almost exclusively American form of entertainment.

Stock car racing is usually done on oval tracks with cars that resemble production cars. They are not single-seater vehicles, although there typically only one driver in the vehicle during a race. The name “stock car” racing came from the notion that the cars more closely resembled production cars and were actually driven to the race. Now that cars are more likely to be put in a trailer and driven to the race by a truck or other vehicle, the name “stock car” racing isn’t necessarily applicable.

The most popular form of stock car racing is, of course, NASCAR. The Sprint Cup Series is the most popular “series” in NASCAR, with the most famous race being the Daytona 500 or the Brickyard 400. 

Along with NASCAR, ARCA Racing at Lumberton and other tracks uses stock cars and stock car racing regulations during its racing season.

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Understanding Racing Flags Part Three

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

After discussing some of the various racing flags, we thought it would be a good idea to round out our miniseries on the practicality of the aforementioned flags. If you’ve attended a racing event, you know that racing flags are essentially used to tell the crowd what is going on on the track. With the advent of radio communication between a driver and his or her pit crew, it is no longer imperative to have a flag explain to the driver what the track’s conditions are or what stage the race is in.

Historically, however, racing flags were used to tell drivers instructions. It was the only way that drivers could communicate with the track’s race officials. Any failure in communication with the flags would result in incidents that could be dangerous.

Some lower level tracks use racing flags to tell drivers what is happening. Flags are also good for this purpose in the event that radio communication fails and race officials have no other way to communicate with drivers. It makes for a good backup safety measure and can prevent serious problems with communication.

If you’ve ever been to an ARCA series race at Lumberton or other tracks, you will have noticed the flags in full operation. They can be a compelling sight and represent the number one way for racing officials to communicate with spectators. Racing flags may not be as interesting as other aspects of ARCA Racing, but without them a race would be nearly impossible to conduct safely.

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