The Daytona 500: The Thrill and Thunder of the Great American Race

by Nancy Roe Pimm

Overview

Who won the first Daytona 500? What do teams do to prepare their cars for 500 miles of hard, high-speed racing? Who gave the Daytona 500 the nickname the "Great American Race"? Learn all about stock car racing's biggest event and the drivers and crew who make it possible in this fascinating, fact-filled book. You will join in the excitement of forty-three cars running nose-to-tail and side-by-side at almost 200 miles per hour. You'll also discover the rich history of stock car racing and find out why it's one of the most popular sports around.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781467737470
Publisher:	Lerner Publishing Group
Publication date:	11/01/2013
Series:	Spectacular Sports
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	64
File size:	27 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	10 - 14 Years

About the Author

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Nancy Roe-Pimm spent a lot of time reading books and fantasizing about living on a horse farm in Montana. She married a rodeo cowboy who soon became a professional race car driver. After working in the pits for ten years on the Indy and NASCAR circuits, Nancy wrote children's books on the Indy 500 and the Daytona 500. Due to her love of animals and her affiliation with the Columbus Zoo, she has two nonfiction books about gorillas, The Heart of the Beast: Eight Great Gorilla Stories and Colo's Story: The Life Of One Grand Gorilla.

Editorial Reviews

"Pimm effectively blends history, statistics, and NASCAR lore into an engaging, satisfying story of one of the most famous car races in the world. Chapters detail the birthplace of the Daytona 500, memorable wins by Allison, Earnhardt, and McMurray, and information about stock cars themselves. A well-chosen collection of archival and contemporary photographs enhance the volume." —The Horn Book Guide

From the Publisher

Gr 5–7—The granddaddy of NASCAR racing gets a spit-and-polish treatment in Pimm's clear, readable text, nicely embellished with plenty of photos. First black-and-white images from the sand days on the beach itself, then the candy-apple reds and panther blacks of today's aerodynamic racing machines spill across the pages. Liberally sprinkled with checkered-flag info boxes on a wide variety of topics ("Dueling at Daytona," "Ditching the Lead," and "Ladies of NASCAR," among them), the text follows the development of NASCAR racing in general and at Daytona in particular. The changing rota of drivers, the rivalries, the tragedies, and the evolution of the simple stock cars to the sleek machines seen on TV are included. A special chapter puts readers behind the wheel with John Andretti as he describes his sensations and actions during a race. While not as heady as the scent of hot engine oil or as dramatic as a 10,000 rpm engine at full throttle, this colorful entry should still have young race fans wheedling for a "Speedweeks" vacation and dreaming of a place in a pit box.—Patricia Manning, formerly at Eastchester Public Library, NY

School Library Journal