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Suddenly everyone’s talking about NASCAR.

A media storm blew up last year when top F1 racer Juan Pablo Montoya defected to the American series.

It’s the second most popular sport of any kind in America, and plans are afoot to expand it around the world. But is it any good?

Trackside’s Keith Collantine tuned into the world-famous Daytona 500 to find out if it’s real racing or just a crash-fest.

“Boogity boogity boogity! Oh yeah boys, let’s go racin’.” After a pre-race build up longer than a football match, the American TV commentator is fit to explode as the Daytona 500 finally gets underway.

This is motor racing American style, which means exactly what you’d expect: it’s much bigger, and much louder.

But is it any better?

NASCAR fans react to ‘European’ style racing like Formula One with a mixture of derision and incomprehension. The two disciplines are different in almost every way.

Technology

If Formula One car technology is years ahead of what you find in your own car, NASCAR is decades behind.

A NASCAR chassis would have been out of date in F1 back in the early 1980s. Each car is built from sheet metal wrapped around steel tubes.

The cast-iron V8 engines are based on a construction from the 1960s, still use carburettors instead of fuel injection and have only two valves per cylinder.

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Although the cars are branded differently – Dodge Charger, Toyota Camry etc… - they are in fact all built to an identical template.

Racing

But most fans don’t care what’s under the bonnet (sorry – ‘hood’) – what matters is how exciting the racing is.

As the Daytona 500 thunders into life the commentators hoot and holler about the ‘three wide’ racing around the three-turn oval track.

It’s impressive to begin with but after a few minutes the cars fall into single file with the leader remorselessly hugging the inside line so there’s no room for anyone to go around him.

This surprised me – based on what I’d heard from NASCAR fans I expected wall-to-wall overtaking thrills.

But in fact it’s a lot like Formula One – the order of the race only really changes during pit stops.

In NASCAR’s high-speed procession, overtaking moves are rarely anything to get excited about. In F1, the very fact that overtaking isn’t happening all the time is what makes the best moves so special.

The show

If F1 must learn one thing from NASCAR, it’s how to get the TV coverage right.

ITV does a decent job of F1 in Britain, but they can only broadcast the footage that Formula One Management provides them – and that product simply isn’t up to scratch.

Fox Sports broadcast the Daytona 500 in widescreen, high-definition with 3D replays and graphics that point out what speed individual cars are doing. F1 has none of this.

They had 90 cameras filming a race on a track that only has three corners.

But, as you’d expect with an American sport, the show is also a cavalcade of advertising. NASCAR has an official pace car, pizza, beer, telephone network – the lot.

At one point a commentator was so busy talking about AT&T’s latest ‘phone he didn’t notice that a car had hit the wall…

But is it sport?

One of the biggest criticisms NASCAR faces is whether it’s actually physically demanding enough to be called a ‘sport’.

Several NASCAR drivers are older than 50, and many more well into their forties – not when a person is expected to be in their athletic prime.

In F1 the average age of a racer this year is 28 years, 12 weeks – comparable to Chelsea’s starting line-up in last weekend’s Carling Cup final (27 years, 9 weeks).

The physical demands of Formula 1 racing are greatly underestimated by the average sports fan. Red Bull driver Mark Webber keeps himself in shape running an annual ‘Tasmania Challenge’ – a 600km trek over six days to raise money for cancer charities.

When 73 year-old James Harvey Hylton can race competitively in NASCAR-sanctioned series, you have to question how challenging it really is.

Controversy

The NASCAR promoters understand the publicity value of controversy. The build-up to the Daytona 500 was packed with sensationalist stories of teams caught ‘cheating’.

Of course, none of these teams were thrown out of the race – making you wonder how serious the crimes they committed really were.

NASCAR is less keen to debate its more serious controversies – particularly the issue of ‘restrictor plate’ racing which hardly seemed to figure in Fox’s marathon Daytona 500 coverage.

NASCAR introduced ‘restrictor plates’ on its cars at faster circuits a few years ago to reduce engine horsepower and make the racing safer.

But a consequence has been to create races where the cars are permanently bunched together, meaning that when one car crashes it triggers an enormous shunt.

Many feel NASCAR are not too worried about the high frequency of crashes at high speed venues such as Daytona and Talladega – because crashes get more TV coverage.

International NASCAR?

It was to no one’s surprise that the Daytona 500 ended in controversy.

While the victorious Kevin Harvick crossed the line a clutch of cars smashed into each other in sight of the flag – just two laps after a similar multi-car accident.

NASCAR is expanding its portfolio of races to Canada and Mexico this year, and is already eyeing more distant markets.

But, like baseball and the NFL, it’s doubtful whether the ‘World Wrestling Entertainment’ of motor sport can win a fan base abroad.

Have you watched NASCAR? What do you think of America’s favourite motor sport? E-mail us now…

Racing round-up

Germany’s Nico Hulkenberg stormed to yet another double win in A1 Grand Prix on the streets of Durban, South Africa.

Briton Robbie Kerr finished a strong second in the feature race, but Germany are now dominating the championship.

F1 on a plate

F1 fans scooped up a range of F1 number plates auctioned by the DVLA.

Birmingham-based businessman Stuart Ross bought ‘F1 PRO’ for his Ferrari F40 for £10,200.

‘F1 FAN’ and ‘F1 NUT’ sold together for £70,000 and Michael Andrew Drury appropriately scooped ‘F1 MAD’ for £6,000.

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Trackside Video

The Daytona 500 gets underway. Boogity boogity boogity!