The Weekend Starts on Wednesday: True Stories of Remarkable NASCAR Fans Book

Foreword Tony Stewart 9

Introduction: You Hungry? 11

Part I Fans For Life

A Moment in the Sun 18

The King and I 26

Decades at Darlington 36

Part II Remembering Dale

The Lucky Penny Girl 42

A Purple Heart and a Titanium Leg 49

America's Anchor Finds His Slice of Heaven 56

Part III Flirting With Fame

There's Nothing Flat About Tire Man 64

Toasting a Hero 71

NASCAR's Candy Man 79

The Fathead Guy 87

Jeff Burton and the World's Fastest Grandmother 92

Friday Night Lights Lead into Saturday Night Racing 96

Part IV Aligned With The Stars

Spencer Roy Sees the Other Side of Smoke 104

Ryan's Hope 109

A Bad Case of NASCAR Disease 115

Nursing Junior to a Championship 123

Paying It Forward 129

Part V Stupendous Feats of Over-The-Top Fandom

The Summit of Fandom 136

Houston, We Have a Fan 143

Bob's Party Bus 148

Hearts Big and Brave 154

Always in Victory Lane 161

Moments Missed, Encased as Indelible Memories 164

The Big Apple's Biggest Fan 170

Part VI Famous Faces

Cookin'on the High Side with Mario Batali and Rachael Ray 176

Tom Cruise's Days of Thunder 183

No Fan Is Finer than Miss North Carolina 192

Jim Cramer Is Mad About NASCAR 197

Walking to the Pacific, George Martin Sees America in NASCAR 204

Kevin Costner: Mixing Dreams with NASCAR Gasoline 209

A Black-and-White Sport Goes Technicolor 214

Part VII Ladies Loving Nascar

Good Vibrations 222

NASCAR is a Thing of Beauty in a Boise Salon 227

Cold Steel, Cow Farts, and the Science of Speed 233

A NASCAR Alien in New York 240

Part VIII Chasing A Racing Dream

Brad Daugherty Measures His Own Success 248

This Girl Wants to Be Jeff Gordon in a Skirt255

Gunning for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with a Little Help from His Friends 261

Miss Sprint Cup 270

Part IX I'M A Fan Too

My Doctors Only Want to Talk NASCAR 278

Wardrobe Malfunctions 285

A Fact Check with Peter Jennings 290

Epilogue: A Matter of Life and Death 294

Afterword Kyle Busch 296

Acknowledgments 299

Index 302