I had never been to a NASCAR race, but I had heard stories. I knew the reputation that NASCAR is a three-day beer fest interrupted by car races so loud you can hear them 10 miles away, and so dangerous you can almost feel the Grim Reaper in the grandstands.

To me, the idea of it seemed kind of like watching the fat lady walk across a tightrope at the circus: You admire her agility, but part of you wonders why the heck she would want to do that.

I mean, NASCAR comes down to 43 guys speeding around a track at 180 mph, all wearing fire-retardant suits and trying to edge each other out. That can't be good for their life expectancy.

As for the fans, watching this spectacle up close for four hours at a stretch in the blistering heat, with plugs shoved in their ears and vibrations shooting through their bodies, can't be good for their blood pressure.

The NASCAR experience is not likely to get the surgeon general's endorsement as a healthy pastime for drivers or fans.

NASCAR endorsements are for companies like Busch, Winston, Viagra and others that promote testosterone and the male ego. It's a formula that works. NASCAR races attract more live spectators than any other individual American sporting event. Dover International Speedway, where I was headed for my first race, holds 140,000 fans -- almost twice the crowd of the Ravens' stadium.

When I heard about the MBNA 400 Winston Cup Series race at Dover -- the closest NASCAR track to Baltimore -- I decided it was time to find out what the race scene is all about. My friend Liz, another NASCAR novice, agreed to go with me.

Car racing is big in Europe and South America, but NASCAR is a different animal. NASCAR has taken a collection of boys and their expensive toys and turned it into a multibillion-dollar industry that commands the reverence of working-class America. Where else but a NASCAR race could you find a guy sitting in $80 seats with his 9-year-old daughter who is wearing a hat that proudly advertises Viagra?

Clearly, there was more than beer, cigarettes and car crashes that brought 140,000 people in one weekend to Dover, population 35,000.

The state capital is mostly known for its tax-free shopping, Air Force base and surrounding Amish villages. But twice a year -- June and September -- the city's landscape is turned upside down when NASCAR comes to town.

"Racetracks are strange commodities," concedes John Dun-lap, a spokesman for the speedway. "NASCAR is truly a cultural event. It's a three-day carnival in America, and it attracts people who are salt of the earth."

NASCAR's appeal

At 6 a.m. on a Sunday in May, Liz and I packed her car and headed to the Dover speedway, also known as the Monster Mile because it measures one mile around. It was seven hours until race time.

I had a quote attributed to Ernest Hemingway firmly planted in my mind during the drive: "Motor racing, mountain climbing and bull fighting are the only true sports. All the rest are children's games played by adults."

The races better be good, I thought, or I'm going to give away my copy of The Sun Also Rises.

Liz and I approached the Bay Bridge about 7 a.m., bleary-eyed and yawning. The toll taker gave us a boisterous "Hello!" and asked, "Y'all going to the races?"

"How did you know?" I asked.

"Everybody coming through here today is going to the races," she told us.

After fighting traffic, we arrived in Dover at 8:30 a.m., a time most folks are tucked away in bed or just sipping their first cup of coffee -- unless they're at NASCAR.

Dover at 8:30 a.m. reminded me of the midafternoon infield at the Preakness. Liz and I had entered a mob of hootin', hollerin', beer-drinkin' cigarette-smokin' good ol' boys and girls from all over the region.

The first thing I saw when I got out of the car was a Confederate flag, a U.S. flag and a man holding a beer and wearing a shirt that read: "I'm not drunk, I'm just a race fan."

We had four hours to kill until the big race. We found an Applebee's restaurant because we heard they were serving breakfast, but we may have been the only ones ordering pancakes.

The bar was packed with sun-baked fans drinking beer and wearing T-shirts decorated with cars that looked like they were about to come to life and zoom off their chests.

Lots of the partiers had been here watching preliminary races for three days, which is customary at NASCAR events. There are dozens of NASCAR tracks across the country, many of which have been built or expanded in the past few years. In our area, besides Dover, there are tracks in Richmond and Martinsville, Va., and Long Pond, Pa.

NASCAR, which stands for National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, began in 1947, two years after World War II ended, when a racing enthusiast named Bill France Sr. organized a meeting of people who were prominent in the growing sport of stock car racing. The meeting, held in Daytona Beach, Fla., was supposed to bring some cohesiveness to the races. It did that, and created what would become a massive marketing machine attracting hordes of fans and corporate sponsors.

The Winston Cup Series began in 1949, and the sport took off. Racetracks started popping up across the country. Drivers became heroes.

NASCAR made its television debut in 1961, when the ABC network broadcast the Firecracker 250 race from Daytona as part of its Wide World of Sports.

Some fans were satisfied watching from their couches, but others were enticed into the grandstands. Today, some tracks, such as the one in Bristol, Tenn., are so popular that for the past six years, the only tickets available are in packs of four, starting at $265. And even then, you have to buy months in advance to get them.

Across the country, the races have become a weekend-long event with concerts, parties, hero worship of the drivers and preliminary races leading up to the big event.

I missed the preliminaries Friday and Saturday in Dover, which were the Busch Series -- similar to the Winston Cup -- and the Craftsman Truck Series, where souped-up trucks tear around the speedway pretending they're little cars.

Sunday is the biggest draw. A minority of the fans who are lucky and have some cash to blow will rent some of Dover's 1,500 hotel rooms. But almost all the rooms go to teams, car sponsors and the working press. They cost as much as $400 a night and tend to sell out a year in advance.

Many NASCAR overnighters spend $35 to park their trailers in a field near the speedway in case they need an occasional shower or catnap. Trailer placement is competitive, and some come two weeks early to drop off their trailers to make sure they get a good spot.

Others pitch tents on nearby campgrounds to be close to the festivities, which some liken to Mardi Gras. And like Mardi Gras, men bring beads and women are willing to bare skin to earn them.

A few people told us that on Saturday night, the crowd worked itself into such a frenzy from beer and bare-breasted women that it managed to tip over a car.

For those who wanted to repent for their sins the next morning, there was NASCAR church. The Delaware-Maryland Baptist Raceway Ministries held a Sunday service at 9 a.m., advertising with a huge sign.

After breakfast, Liz and I walked around the grounds and encountered lots of shirtless men and women in bathing suit tops toting binoculars and coolers and showing off their tattoos.

We decided it was not unlike walking by a construction site filled with workers on break. We, and most of the other women there, were at times greeted by groups of men clapping, whistling and thanking us for just being alive.

It was three hours until race time.

Smokers and hawkers

Around the speedway, we spotted people with clipboards in their hands and wearing polo shirts that read, "Welcome smokers. Let's talk." I thought they were collecting signatures for a petition, but they were taking personal information from people and giving them three free packs of Winston cigarettes.

That explained why everyone, even the people directing traffic on the street, was smoking cigarettes. NASCAR, and especially the Winston Cup, is a smoker's paradise.

NASCAR is also the land of the brand name. The racecars and their drivers are veritable billboards, covered in logos.

There is also an area around the Monster Mile referred to as Skid Row, where lines of booths hawk sponsors' wares. There are endless purchasing possibilities, including T-shirts, hats, visors, shot glasses and key chains and toy cars. Liz and I bought $2 earplugs.

One of the most popular items on Skid Row was headset radios that tune into the communication frequencies of the drivers and their pit crews during the race. That way, fans can know what's going on inside the car while the deafening clamor of the race drowns out all other noise in and near the grandstands.

The headsets cost $35 to rent for the day, and $40 for the weekend. If you want to buy, they run from $75 to $250.

Glen Aikenhead, who owns Track Scan, attends 52 races a year and says he loves renting radios to fans and being in the race atmosphere each week.

"The energy off the crowd is unbelievable," he says.

Next to Aikenhead's booth is an enormous pile of neatly stacked worn tires. They were used in the preliminary races, and people buy them for $20.

What do you do with a used NASCAR tire?

"Put it in my racing room," says Jeff Czupta, who lives in Agawam, Mass., and is camping with his wife, Angela, in Dover for the race weekend. "There's the option of a coffee table. Or I could put it on my wall."

Angela has a different idea. "It's a tire," she says. "Eventually it will sit in front of my house with flowers in it."

Two hours until race time.

Rooting for wrecks

We make our way to the trailer park village and talk to an extended family of 17 from Middletown, Del., who have been here since Thursday.

Lee Emerson, who owns the trailer, dropped it off two weeks earlier. He says others were already parked there when he showed up.

We asked him what is it that keeps him coming back year after year.

"The parties," says Emerson, holding a Budweiser. "It's my favorite weekend of the year."

"You can go from trailer to trailer and party," adds Ron Hickey, Emerson's brother-in-law.

They figured it cost them about $400 a person for the weekend, including race tickets, which cost $34 on Friday, $42 on Saturday and $90 Sunday.

Winston Cup tickets range in price from $47 in the grandstands to $165 in the VIP lounge.

Emerson says that even though he adores the sport, he can tire of it by the end of the weekend, and he sometimes sneaks back to his trailer for a rest during the four-hour race.

"If I drink a lot and get out in the sun, I'll go nap for 30 or 40 laps," he says. "But you always wake up for the end."

You also wake up if there's a crash -- seldom is there a race without one, and they are invariably crowd-pleasers.

"My favorite part is the accidents," says Rob Murray, 35, who lives on Kent Island. "You never know what's going to happen."

Apparently the only time fans don't like wrecks is if it involves their favorite driver, or if someone dies, which has happened six times in the past few years.

"You don't want nobody to get hurt," says Hickey. But apart from that, he adds, "the wrecks are the best part, the most action."

When a driver does die, fans mourn like they've lost a family member. The most revered deceased driver was Dale Earnhardt Sr., No. 3, who was killed in a crash at the Daytona 500 last year.

All drivers are superstars to the fans. But Earnhardt's name and image have been elevated to Elvis status in the racing world. The number 3 with wings attached can be found tattooed on skin, painted on car windows, embroidered on shirts and worn as earrings.

Last year at every third lap during a NASCAR race, there was a moment of silence for him. I saw a trailer with his likeness all over it, along with the phrase, "Forever The Man."

His son Dale Earnhardt Jr., No. 8, was racing at Dover Sunday. There were No. 8's and No. 3's everywhere I looked.

At about noon, it was time to file into the grandstands.

Loud excitement

We marched in with the throng, which seemed like an army of ants. From the top of the stands, you could see lines stretching as far as the eye could see.

Fans were bringing in coolers -- no wine or liquor is allowed, only beer. Liz and I ended up sitting next to 35-year-old Matt Clifton, who lives in Bel Air.

He was with his 9-year-old daughter Maddie, who was wearing a blue hat emblazoned with the word Viagra, because her favorite driver is Mark Martin, No. 6, and Martin's sponsor is Viagra.

Clifton said he also has a No. 6 sticker on his truck. He's been going to races around the country for 20 years, and has seen his share of beer drinking and rabble rousing.

"This sport came out of the South," he says. "I guess we're a bunch of rednecks."

Then he explained some of the intricacies of the sport.

The cars, which are all American-made, are so loud because they have no mufflers. Mufflers would restrict the motors and cut down on speed. The cars have no speedometers because the drivers don't care how fast they're going, as long as they're dusting the next guy.

The average driver will clear a mile lap in 22 seconds, he says.

During the race, technicians can change four tires and dump in two cans of gas (22 gallons) in 16 seconds. (Hearing that made me wonder why I have to leave my car at the mechanic for a full day just to get the oil changed.)

Clifton also says there's a lot more sophistication to racing than meets the eye.

"Everybody thinks it's just a bunch of hillbillies going left," he explains, "but those are $200,000 to $300,000 cars out there with multimillion budgets."

It was 15 minutes until race time. We heard a woman singing the national anthem, and when that was over, jets from the local Air Force base soared over our heads; the force of it shook the stands, foreshadowing what was to come.

There were a few introductions. Then the green flag was raised, and the tiny-looking, colorful cars shot out and blasted around the first turn while fans screamed and cheered. Everyone was standing, including me, as I craned my head to see what suddenly struck me as an amazing sight.

"The need for speed," Clifton says, and I understood what he meant.

After about 20 minutes, the deafening sounds and vibrations made me retreat from the grandstands for a while. I don't know how people do it for three days or even four hours. Maybe it's the beer.

Who knows -- one day I might become a true NASCAR fan. My day at the races taught me that I am not immune to gawking at the fat lady on the tightrope, and admiring it for what it is: great theater.

An ideal day

6:30 a.m.: Get an early start to avoid traffic.

8:30 a.m.: Park in one of the many $10 or $20 lots at the speedway. Stop by Applebee's restaurant for a breakfast of pancakes and eggs, or beer if you desire.

10 a.m.: Walk around the speedway to get your bearings. Visit Skid Row to look at memorabilia. Rent $35 radio headphones so you can tune into the drivers and their crews when the race starts. (They are also necessary to block out the noise; trust me on this.)

Noon: Make your way into the grandstands with 140,000 other fans. If you have coolers, remember that you can bring only one, and be prepared to open it for security personnel. You can bring in beer but no wine or liquor.

1 p.m.: The race starts. Brace yourself.

2 p.m.: Walk around the grandstands, take a break from the races.

4 p.m.: The race ends. Either get on the road immediately and head home, or wait around for an hour or two to avoid traffic.

When you go

Getting there: Dover is about 100 miles from Baltimore. You can either drive from Baltimore, taking the Bay Bridge to Route 13 in Dover, or take Amtrak Monster Mile Express. The train makes stops in New York, Newark, Trenton, Philadelphia and Wilmington. From Baltimore, take a train to Wilmington for a connection. The Baltimore-Dover round trip costs $133. For information, call Amtrak at 877-835-8725, or visit www.amtrak.com

Dover International Speedway, P.O. Box 843, Dover, DE 19903

800-441-7223

www.doverspeedway.com

* NASCAR races in Dover are in June and September. The next races are the MBNA America 150, 200 and 400, on Sept. 20-22.

* Winston Cup tickets range in price from $47 in the grandstands to $165 in the VIP lounge.

Lodging: If you have an RV and want to park for the weekend, it costs $35; grounds open two weeks before the races. There are also campgrounds next to the speedway. Dover has 1,500 hotel rooms ranging from basic to luxury; most fill up a year before the race, and run as high as $400.

Information:

* Delaware State Visitor Center: 302-739-4266; www.destatemuseums.org / vc

* Kent County Tourism Convention and Visitors Bureau: 800-233-5368; www.visitdover.com

* For more information about NASCAR racetracks and races: www.nascar.com