A Fan's Look at Hendrick Motorsports in Concord, North Carolina

Ask anyone about my taste when it comes to NASCAR and they'll tell you right away that I don't like anyone who drives for Hendrick Motorsports. They have great drivers, but I've never been a fan. Yet every year when we're in the Charlotte area we take a few minutes to stop by Hendrick Motorsports. The reason is that their racing complex is something that you have to see if you're a NASCAR fan.

The Hendrick Motorsports racing complex covers a fairly large area in Concord and it's located fairly close to the track of Lowe's Motor Speedway. In fact they have a number of signs that direct you right to the complex so you don't even need directions. Once you get there, there's enough parking that you can find a spot right away. During race week they even have police on hand directing traffic because of the number of visitors.

The first building you encounter at the Hendrick Motorsports complex is the museum and gift shop. Here they have a number of different displays and cars sitting out, including cars driven by the Cole Trickle character in Days of Thunder. They also have fire suits and helmets out as well as a large display that shows every diecast made relating to the team.

The museum also shows a real car and a car seat. They encourage visitors to climb inside and try out the car seat for themselves. Each of the drivers have their own section in the gift shop area, which makes it easy for fans to find exactly what they're looking for. In each section there's different cars out such as the car Jimmie Johnson drove to win the Daytona 500.

Up the hill from the gift shop are the two race shops that house the Hendrick Motorsports teams and cars. The first race shop is home to Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon. They have two of their cars out on display along with hundreds of different trophies. The race shop itself is fairly disappointing because the work is done far back in the shop so you can't see very much. They run a continually loop of Johnson and Gordon victories, but it's still disappointing.

The other building open to the public contains the race shop for Dale Earnhardt Junior and Mark Martin. This one also has memorabilia on display from past drivers including Kyle Busch and Casey Mears. This race shop is more open and they're often working on cars right in front of the large windows. This year when we were there, they even slid open the glass windows so fans could take better pictures. There was a Mark Martin team member on hand who answered questions from fans too.

The Hendrick Motorsports complex is very impressive, even for those of us who aren't fans. Fans have the chance to see a lot and they can even spend a couple of hours just looking through things at the museum. It's easy to see why so many people return here year after year.