Are Looks Important in Nascar?

For those of you who missed it, venture forth to Google images and search for Carl Edwards and ESPN magazine. Yes, that's our dear backflipping Mr. Edwards, half naked on the cover. He's looking good!

All superficialness aside (and don't worry, it's still going on in my head), this picture of Carl brings about an interesting change in Nascar. With the exception of a scant few, Nascar drivers are fit and trim-in other words, athletes. Has the sport really changed so much that physicality plays so large a role?

The short answer is yes. More and more talented drivers are on the scene, and it's not enough to just be good. Every driver is looking for that edge, that little bit that makes him better than the next guy. Being in shape and able to negotiate the Coke 600 better than anyone else is certainly motivation for this generation's drivers.

It's not just racing, though. Nascaris a mainstream sport. The races are covered on network channels now, and with that brings a certain marketability. Think about it this way: if Jeff Gordon looked like James Gandalfini, would he have hosted Saturday Night Live? If Junior wasn't as cute as he is, would he be in so many commercials? If Kasey Kahne wasn't so beautiful, would those insurance commercials even exist? The deal is, Nascar is about profit, and profit is about marketing, and without the body and the face, marketing doesn't exist. Remember Jimmy Spencer's last commercial? No? There's a reason for that, and I'll let you connect the dots yourself.

What's the moral of the story? It's not what you think, that beauty is what's important. No, the moral is that Nascar is not the same sport it was 30 years ago. Yes, it's still about the driving, but it's also about the marketing, and don't think they're not two sides of the same coin. Younger drivers are being hired by the big teams, and they're being hired for a reason. Women are Nascar's current audience target, and attractive drivers will bring them in. Of course a driver needs to be talented. But with the number of potential drivers out there, the difference between being hired and being without a ride is less about wins and more about commercial appeal. We all want to see talented drivers on the track, and right now, we certainly are. We're just seeing a lot of them off the track as well, and as long as it's working towards making Nascar more of a universal sport, I'd say it's worth it.