Not a big NASCAR fan - but was curious. It was a good read. ( )

[He crashed me so I crashed him back] by [[Mark Bechtel]]

Frankly, my expectations for this were pretty low. First off, the bar is set at a similar height--pretty low--when it comes to popular sports books in general. Second, there's the title: "He crashed me so I crashed him back: The true story of the year the Kind, Jaws and the rest of NASCAR's feudin', fightin', good ol' boys put stock car racing on the map" sounds as if it should have been written by the Messrs. Duke, not a senior editor from "Sports Illustrated."

But the fact of the matter is that when Bo and Luke do show up in Mark Bechtel's recent look back at the historic NASCAR season of 1979, they're part of the author's attempt to set those events in their proper sociocultural context.

The problem is, if you're the kind of person who enjoys that sort of stuff, along with an analysis of how the decline of the Carter presidency and the rise of Reaganism paralleled the growing importance of NASCAR racing in popular culture, you're likely to wish Bechtel spent a bit more time on the subject. After all, 1979 was a busy time, pop-culture-wise: As Bechtel points out at various places in the book, this was the year that 53 Americans were taken hostage in Iran, that Sid Vicious overdosed, that ESPN first came on the air, that Magic played Bird in the NCAA championship game and that Fleetwood Mac recorded "Tusk."

On the other hand, if you were hoping for an in-depth look at what it's "really" like to pilot a few thousand pounds of vintage Detroit iron at speeds of 200 mph and distances of 500 miles, you're going to wish Bechtel spent more time on the racing. Although he provides some tantalizing glimpses of the mind games between Richard Petty, going for his record seventh NASCAR championship in 1979, and rookie Darrell Waltrip, the "Jaws" of the book's title, racing for his first, Bechtel's perspective always seems to be that of an outsider.

Despite being an Alabama native who specifically covered NASCAR for SI, the author doesn't seem to show much passion for his subject. In fact, if I hadn't read the book-flap copy, I might have guessed that Bechtel worked for "Entertainment Weekly."

Part of the problem here is actually diagnosed by Bechtel in the book's acknowledgements, where he writes that, "Originally my plan was to focus solely on the 1979 Daytona 500, but the more research I did, the more sprawling the idea became."*

I mean, that's exactly the way the book reads: as if he changed his mind about what the topic should be part way through, but then didn't go back and re-edit that first part. Also disappointing is the way Bechtel glosses over the story of Wendell Scott, the first black driver to win a NASCAR event, and the racism he faced in the sport right up through the 1970s. (For that, see [Hard Driving] by [[Brian Donovan]]).

But all that being said, this tome is well worth reading, and many of the nits I pick here were exacerbated by the quality of the rest of the book.

*The 1979 Daytona 500 was the first NASCAR race shown live on TV, and featured a last-lap crash between race leaders Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison, who then continued their battle on the track's infield once their cars stopped spinning, joined by Donnie's brother Bobby. Many consider it the most exciting NASCAR event ever, and it's generally acknowledged as the race that kicked off NASCAR's explosive growth in popularity. ( )

I'm not a huge NASCAR fan,nevertheless I enjoyed He Crashed Me, So I Crashed Him Back. Mark Bechtel writes about the blizzard of 1979, which caused people to watch the Daytona 500 on television for the first time. Because people finally experienced a NASCAR race on live tv,NASCAR's popularity exploded and garnered a popular culture phenomenon. He Crashed Me, So I Crashed Him Back also focuses-- albeit, briefly--on politics: how the Iranian Revolution and the oil embargo affected NASCAR, how the 1980 election affected NASCAR and vice-versa.

Bechtel's strong writing helps to deliver a clear image of the rising popularity of NASCAR and an athletic mindset (drivers are athletes, full of testosterone). ( )

As a fan of NASCAR in its current corporate incarnation, it is very interesting to step back only a quarter of a century (31 years to be precise) to see where all of this tactless plugging came from. Bechtel takes us through the 1979 season of races with delightful observations and insights into both NASCAR'S personalities and America's recent history. Fans will enjoy this book and non-fans will find enough to comprehend the influence NASCAR has had on our society in recent years. This an genuinely comprehendable look at the path we have travelled. It is recommended to all! ( )

I'm not a NASCAR fan. In fact, I don't know if I ever have watched a race. However, I still enjoyed this book. When you put some fast cars in the hands of good ole boys, add in competition, some prize money, pride, pistols, a shark with a dead chicken in its mouth, and you've got the sport that is now so popular. I loved some of the stories in this book about the things some of the drivers did! ( )