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The 64-car NCAA stock car racing playoff field
EDITOR'S NOTE: The following excerpts are from a sports almanac published in 2057 that chronicles topics from the past 60 years. Look for it in five decades from the shelves of Wal-TargetMart for $199.99.
Since 2018, NCAA stock car racing has surged in popularity. Its broadcast ratings and ad revenue have long since lapped college football, college basketball and college Guitar Hero. Every year when MayMotorfever rolls around, you can be sure that work at office environments across the North American Collective comes to a halt as management and wage slaves fill out their 64-car brackets.
It is estimated that advertising revenues will surpass $3.26 trillion for broadcaster YouTubeFoxNetMicrosoftBlenderMagazine in 2058. There is talk the network is so flush with cash it will attempt a takeover of GoogleChipotleMexicanGrill.
But it wasn't always this way. As opposed to more than a century and a half of heritage when it comes to college football and basketball, the NCAA only sanctioned college stock car racing for the first time in 2011.
Differences between pro and college stock car drivers
The first and most obvious difference is in a winning drivers' gestures of appreciation. In a professional winner's circle, the cliché is that the professional driver will gush with praise by reciting a list of his or her principal sponsors. "I'd like to thank Gatorade, Wal-TargetMart, Stephen King's Broasted Chicken and Dick Cheney BioFuel Corps."
A typical NCAA stock car winner will say: "I'd like to thank my professors, my tutors, my academic support team, my dorm's resident assistant and my intern pit crew."
The birth of NCAA stock car racing: 1990s-2011
It is well-chronicled that the birth of professional stock car racing can be traced to the illegal transportation of moonshine in the American South.
Similarly, the birth of collegiate stock car racing can be tied to a clandestine activity in the American South. In this case, the activity was tied to college football and basketball recruiting.
Recruiting has always been the lifeblood of college athletic programs. But the NCAA places many restrictions on it, especially when it comes to non-contact periods.
Starting in the mid-1990s, various Southeastern Conference schools would secretly send assistant colleges from small town to small town, driving modified rental cars under cover of night to escape the notice of NCAA investigators. Soon, coaches from other conferences had to learn the rules of the road. Though all parties involved deny it to this day, the most famous car race between college football recruiters was in January 2003 when Florida coach Ron Zook raced Southern California assistant coach Ed Orgeron from Metairie, La., to Palatka, Fla. With the cars fueled by premium unleaded and the recruiting gurus fueled by Red Bulls and Slim Jims (and a few bucks set aside to take care of speed trap bribes), the 584-mile distance was said to have been covered within four hours and 52 minutes. Just as no one has ever come forward with proof that this race happened, those who breathlessly retell the yarn have yet to come to a consensus as to which coach won the race. But apparently the recruit they pursued ended up at Notre Dame.
