By Bristol Hardman
Madison County High School
For many people, Nascar is just a group of drivers making endless left turns around a track. But spending a few minutes inside a race car — traveling nearly 200 miles per hour, enduring extreme heat, split-second decision-making and hours of physical strain — and that opinion quickly changes. The belief that Nascar isn’t a real sport ignores the athleticism, mental toughness, and skill required to compete at the highest level. If sports are defined by physical ability, strategy, training and competition, then Nascar deserves a place alongside football, basketball and every other major sport.
Brad Keselowski is a 42-year-old Nascar Cup Series Champion. All throughout his Cup Series career, he has had major injuries like a broken femur and fractured ankle and he has had to recover through physical therapy. But he still got in the race car and raced.
On March 2, 2025, Brad Keselowski’s cooling-suit failed and he was sent to the infield care center to be hooked up to an IV to get the fluids he needed. The race car he was in got up to 150°F and his body heat was 130°F, so in total the race car felt like 280°F. Athletes in other sports do not have to experience what 280°F feels like, but these racers feel that heat every time they step into a car to race.
Christopher Bell is a 31-year-old All-Star Race winner. Bell is one of the younger drivers and he is a little smaller than the other drivers. On June 7, 2026, he was racing for the lead at Michigan and he collied with Chase Elliot and hit the wall at 200mph and demolished his car and Elliot’s race car as well. His injuries were a fractured wrist. He did not speak with broadcasters after to get his side of his story.
Nascar drivers have to go through extreme practices to get their bodies to even be able to stand the heat and exhaustion that goes into racing. They go through cardiovascular conditioning, extreme heat training, hydration protocols, and extensive mental and stimulator practice. During their cardiovascular conditioning they tend to cycle, run and swim to learn how to keep their heart rate down under stress. While doing heat training, they sit in warm environments like hot yoga to get their bodies used to the high temperatures in the race cars. They also work on their strength and flexibility, which focuses on neck strengthening and upper-body stamina to withstand the weight of the helmet and the steering force.
People tend to say that these drivers aren’t athletes because they think the machines do all the work and that the drivers don’t do the standard athletic movements. Nascar doesn’t change anything major in the race cars unless there is a major injury or death so until something physically happens, the rules stay the same. That is not right. They should be changing the race car every time a driver enters it because the safety of these drivers should be the first priority.
Yes, fans do not like the changes that the teams do because it could make the race car slower, or that it is not the same as the 1980 stock cars that everyone fell in love with. But in this day and time, you can’t have those cars because of the competitiveness and how light these cars are, and that can result in more injuries and flips.
If the fans of Nascar would actually think about these driver’s safety instead of just thinking about their experience and how fast the car can go, there wouldn’t be as many injuries, deaths or malfunctions happening to these drivers. Athletes get in these race cars because this is what they love to do, even if there is a chance that it is their last, because anything can happen in a split second.
Rock Star Writers Blog 