Deborah Renshaw, who could become NASCAR’s first great female driver, was a little more than two years old when a mix of good luck and high drama turned stock car racing into a national sport. In February 1979, CBS Sports took a gamble and broadcast live the Daytona 500 stock car race, a premier NASCAR event. At the time, many people, especially in the press and along both seaboards, thought that stock car racing was something only white male Southerners dressed in torn jeans and Confederate flag T-shirts followed. That stereotype was not entirely outlandish. A generation ago, if you liked jazz or lived in the North or were a woman, you probably didn’t watch NASCAR and weren’t chummy with anyone who did.

A massive snowstorm canvased much of the country the weekend of that Daytona 500 in 1979, prompting many people to huddle indoors and gather around their television sets. Some of them decided to watch a car race for the first time.

Driver Donnie Allison, the less famous brother of Bobby, was leading the race most of the way when rival Cale Yarborough inched up on his bumper. In any contest of speed from a one-mile race to the Kentucky Derby, hovering closely behind in second place may actually be the best position of all. You become the hunter, able to cloak your every move until you’re ready to pounce and put away the prey for good. With less than a lap to go, Yarborough decided to strike and tried to slip past Allison on the inside lane. Allison ran his car down the track to try to block the insurgent Yarborough. According to an account of that race on Turner Sports Interactive, the two drivers exchanged a few love taps:

“They collided. And slid. And collided again. And slid again. Into the wall. Then back across the track into the infield.”

Proving the adage that it’s better to be lucky than good, Richard Petty drove by the fracas, edging out A.J. Foyt and Franklin’s Darrell Waltrip. Back in the infield, Yarborough and Allison emerged from their wrecked cars unhurt. Then, profoundly moved by their near-death experience, they began to discuss the many irreconcilable differences between Western philosophy and Eastern mysticism. Actually, they argued about who was responsible for the crash. Then Bobby Allison pulled into the infield and, by some accounts, ignited an already tense situation. An alert Associated Press photographer caught Bobby and Yarborough duking it out, with Donnie standing behind his brother, wielding his helmet.

A nation was hooked.

In his book, Daytona: From the Birth of Speed to the Death of the Man in Black, Ed Hinton writes that the brawl catapulted NASCAR and the Daytona 500 “into mainstream America’s consciousness.” It had all the elements of a popular spectator sport: red-blooded competition, suspense, intrigue and, well, fighting.

Today, NASCAR and its highest profile division, Winston Cup, is the fastest growing spectator sport in the country. According to Sporting News, NASCAR posted higher television ratings during the 2001 calendar year than the NHL and the NBA. An average race attracted 5.2 million viewers, up 41 percent from 2000. And even major league baseball—which, in addition to being indelibly labeled as our national pastime, has also provided the grist for at least 46 Kevin Costner movies—took a backseat to NASCAR in the ratings department.

And this once good ol’ boy sport that was strictly the province of the South now features some of its most popular races in California, Michigan, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.

Meanwhile, in Nashville at the Fairgrounds Speedway, Deborah Renshaw, a talented, 25-year-old racer with a made-for-television smile and a long, brown paintbrush ponytail, is threatening to take NASCAR to even greater heights. People who have watched racing for years say that Renshaw may well become the first successful female driver in Winston Cup, NASCAR’s highest level. If that happens, the sport’s appeal could explode. It would be like producing a summer movie combining the audiences from Sum of All Fears with those of Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.

No major sport in the United States features men and women competing on the same playing field. Absolutely none. Venus Williams never has to return a serve from Andre Agassi, Marion Jones never has to out-lean Maurice Green at the line, forward Chamique Holdsclaw—thank God for her—never has to post up against Shaquille O’Neal.

Even in motor sports, where brute strength, quickness and agility are seemingly of lesser importance, no female race car driver has ever beat the boys week after week. In NASCAR’s Winston Cup, no driver from the fairer sex has ever even won a race.

So if Renshaw rode well in NASCAR’s highest division, she’d become a modern day sports celebrity. The kind you see sitting in the front row of a heavyweight boxing match, wearing expensive shades, surrounded by a posse. Renshaw would have crossed a gender barrier that has yet to be broken. (Others are knocking on the door, however, including Indy racer Sarah Fisher). And armed with a college degree—in business no less—with an All-American look that television would avidly embrace, she’s a sponsor’s dream.

For now, though, as she toils in her black number 12 car in the sport’s backwater trenches, a few divisions below the Winston Cup, Renshaw is trying to remain focused. Sweet, endearing and yet not afraid to stare down a rival driver in the wake of a race-ending crash, Renshaw has one singular mission in life: to make it to the Winston Cup. She doesn’t have a boyfriend, a social life or hobbies. She has racing.

“My ultimate goal is definitely Winston Cup,” says Renshaw, who works at one of her father’s car dealerships in Bowling Green, Ky. “I don’t do anything else other than try to pursue this dream.”

For the last two summers, Renshaw has spent her Saturday nights racing in the Late Model Stock Car Division at the Fairgrounds Speedway, formerly the Nashville Speedway USA. Famous among racing insiders for helping to propel young upstarts to the big-time, including Sterling Marlin, Darrell Waltrip, Bobby Hamilton and Casey Atwood, the Fairgrounds is a lot like Frank Sinatra’s New York—if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere. Even with last year’s much-heralded opening of the Nashville Superspeedway in nearby Wilson County, the Fairgrounds Speedway still features some of the most competitive short track racing in the country.

It has it all: intense rivalries and colorful drivers with devoted fans against a backdrop of frantic finishes, high-speed collisions and infield shouting matches. Then there are the cars that occasionally catch on fire.

To some, the Fairgrounds is to NASCAR what the minor leagues are to major league baseball. But on any given Saturday night, there are a handful of drivers motoring around a half-mile oval in South Nashville who could race alongside the Dale Jarretts and Jeff Gordons of the world. Drivers like Franklin’s Joe Buford and Clarksville’s Mark Day, who know how to make a 358-cubic-inch engine sing, even if they may be too old ever to perform on the sport’s loudest stage.

Still relatively fresh behind the wheel with only a few years of racing experience, Renshaw can’t yet drive a car like Buford or Day. But even though they were racing before she even had her learner’s permit, Renshaw can hold her own against any driver in Nashville. Earlier this spring, Renshaw took over the points lead at the Fairgrounds, which she earned after a string of high-ranking finishes. That feat etched her a spot in racing history, making her the first woman ever to lead a division in NASCAR’s Weekly Racing Series. Renshaw has since slipped to ninth in the overall standings and has yet to win a race. But she has been remarkably consistent for a young driver, finishing in the top 10 in eight out of her first 12 races this year and in the top five in five of them.

Longtime observers of the sport say that, based on her track record, talent and obvious marketability, Renshaw could well achieve her goal of making it to the Winston Cup.

“I think she has a very good chance of achieving the dreams she has,” says Andy Hillenburg, who has worked with Renshaw. Hillenburg is the chief instructor at North Carolina’s Fast Track, a driving school for Winston Cup cars. “She’s very competitive, has a very good feel for the race car and is very personable off the track, which will help her later on as far as sponsorship is concerned.”

“If she keeps doing what she’s doing, there’s no reason why she couldn’t move up,” says Dennis Grau, the well-regarded track promoter at the Fairgrounds Speedway. “NASCAR is looking for that female to come in and compete with the guys.”

And to do that, Renshaw will need to be more than talented. She’ll have to be tough, because the other drivers won’t be treating her like a lady. In early May, racer Mark Day and Renshaw wrecked after she tried to slip her black Chevy Monte Carlo past the veteran driver on the inside around a turn. The crash knocked both drivers out of the race, and when they retreated to the infield, an irate Day howled to everyone in earshot that Renshaw couldn’t control her car. A few days later, he blasted her to The Tennessean’s Larry Woody. “Deborah is so star struck she can’t focus on racing,” he said. About her then status as the overall points leader at the Fairgrounds, he said, “She’s a sinking ship. Or a crashing ship.”

And finally, about Renshaw’s notoriety as a female racer, he said, “I think there is a mystique about woman drivers. I’ve got a 17-year-old daughter and I’d never let her race. But I’m not upset at Deborah because she’s a woman; I’m upset at her because she’s a bad driver.”

Ironically, Renshaw had cited Day in the past as one of her role models. And yet, to her credit, she wasn’t afraid to give it right back to the Clarksville driver. “I don’t know what Mark’s problem is, but he’s not going to intimidate me,” she told the morning daily. “Maybe he just has trouble believing that a woman driver can be successful.”

A week after their crash, Renshaw still wasn’t backing down. “Obviously, he is stuck in the 1960s,” she told the Scene, an obvious dig at his age.

The spat between Day and Renshaw wasn’t particularly unusual. When you have drivers racing $50,000 stock cars around hairpin turns at 120 m.p.h. banging into each other like a pair of crash cymbals, tempers are going to flare. After all, this isn’t shuffleboard. But for Renshaw, her showdown with Day revealed that she won’t be pushed around, on the track or off.

“When the boys criticize her, she needs to hold her own,” her father Danny says.

Nearly two months after the crash, Day, who is well respected in the racing community, has a different take on Renshaw. “For what experience she has got, she’s doing a fine job,” he says. “I think early in the year she was overwhelmed with all the media attention she was getting, but now I think she has calmed down a little bit.”

That’s not to say Day is going to join her public relations team. “I still don’t totally trust her as far as racing with her. There have been some times since the crash where I have been the aggressor and had to pass her and we haven’t had a problem,” he says. “But if there is a situation where she is the aggressor, I would allow her to go on by unless it’s in the late stages of a race.”

Day says that it’s nothing personal. “I’m not just dogging her out; she’s only been racing three or four years. It’s just an experience issue,” he says. “There are some situations where she might get in a little over her head.”

Growing up in Madisonville, Ky., with two older brothers, Renshaw fell into competition at an early age. Renshaw and her brothers raced whatever they could get their hands on—bikes, jet skis, four-wheelers. When she was 3 years old she ran a motorbike into the side of her home. Rather than cry, she pulled herself up and tried to ride again. When she was 8, her father Danny would let her steer his car, putting her on top of his briefcase so she could see the road.

“None of the guys in the family ever said you can’t do this because you’re a female,” says Deborah’s mother Vickie. “She did everything they did.”

As a teenager, Renshaw played tennis and basketball and also accompanied her father to the Nashville Speedway, where he had a racing team. Renshaw fell in love with the sport.

“Joe Buford was one of my role models,” she says of the Franklin driver who has won more races in Nashville than anyone in history and is the top driver at the track this year. “I looked up to him, and when I watched him race I said, 'Wow, I really want to do that.’ ”

But her mom thought differently. “I said, 'No way, you go to college, you get your degree in four years, then we’ll see,’ ” she recalls. “To be honest, I thought that once she went to college, she’d forget about it.”

Renshaw did attend college, graduating from Northwood University with a bachelor’s degree in business in 1998. But she never did forget about racing. She went to driving schools in Atlanta, Ga., and Charlotte, N.C. And after a brief stint at the Lee Strassberg Acting School in New York—she left when she quite logically began to think that everybody in Manhattan wanted to be an actress—Renshaw returned to racing. From 1999-2000, she competed in the Late Model Division at Highland Rim before taking her act to Nashville.

At the beginning of last year, Renshaw was clearly intimidated racing against the boys. She would always start each race at the back of the pack, even if her qualifying times placed her further ahead. “I wanted to gain the respect of the older drivers,” she says.

Today, Renshaw starts where she qualifies. While she might have been overly deferential at first, Renshaw is hotly competitive to the core. Earlier this year, another driver was awarded the pole position over her even though he failed to abide by one of the rules of the track. When she heard about that, Renshaw cut off a conversation with a reporter and immediately stormed off to find out why he seemed to be receiving preferential treatment.

“She is very, very competitive,” says Jan Seibert Richey, who has known her since high school. “She wants to do everything perfectly. She has always been like that.”

After a moderately successful first run at Nashville last year, Renshaw redoubled her commitment to stock car racing. She tested cars for Dodge Motorsports and attended a weeklong racing program in Indianapolis that dealt with everything from nutrition to media relations. Now, she’s probably one of the most dedicated drivers competing in Nashville, even if her nightlife is about as exciting as a retired librarian’s.

Each week, she reviews all 75-100 laps of her previous race on videotape and makes three two-hour treks to her shop in Columbia. Renshaw also stays in shape. In fact, unlike the stereotype of a meaty race car driver, she actually resembles an athlete. Renshaw hones her tough physique through push-ups and sit ups, kick-boxing and stationary biking to stay toned for the very physical maneuvering that goes on inside the cage of her car during races.

“Racing is her dream, and she makes sure she puts it first before anything else,” says Richey. “She is so determined.”

Even if that means forsaking the kind of social life that most twentysomethings enjoy. Renshaw is so driven to make it to Winston Cup, she sometimes seems like she has no sense of balance. Of course, you could probably say the same thing about most athletes trying to make it to the highest levels of their sport.

“A lot of my friends hang out in bars and stay out until 1 or 2 in the morning, but as an athlete I can’t do that,” she says. “If I choose to go out and drink and smoke, it would hinder my career path.”

With her sights set on loftier venues, Renshaw says that this year will probably be her last in Nashville. Already, she has cut a deal to run up to eight races in the ARCA series, which is independent from NASCAR but will provide some of the same racing challenges as Winston Cup. It’s a definite step up from the Fairgrounds. Soon you may see her racing in the Busch series, which is only one rank below Winston Cup. With her father helping to fund her racing career, plus her ability to market herself to potential sponsors, Renshaw is positioned to ascend the ranks faster than some of the Fairgrounds drivers who regularly outrace her.

Despite its populist roots, car racing is an expensive sport. Even to run a single full Busch season, a driver needs anywhere from $2 million to $5 million to be competitive. A sponsor can pick up most of the tab, but some self-financing also helps.

And some of that will come from her father. A former foreman in a coal mine who lost his right leg in an accident with a shuttle car, Danny Renshaw now owns several car dealerships in and around Southern Kentucky. One of the friendliest people you’ll see around a track, he now helps finance his daughter’s career and helps guide her through some of the sport’s tougher moments.

“She has had a lot of money put behind her by her dad,” says Terrell Davis, publisher of Middle Tennessee Racing News. “That’s not unusual. But she has also worked her tail off learning how to drive.”

In a way, NASCAR has become a lot like country music. Talent still matters, but so does marketability, appearance and image. Watch any post-race interview with any of the younger NASCAR drivers and you’ll see a clean-cut and well-spoken athlete. That’s what the sponsors and racing teams want.

“It used to be that whether you made the big time depended on how well you drive,” Davis says. “Now marketability is as important as driving. You still have to be able to drive, but if you’re the best driver in the world and you can’t talk in front of a television camera, you’re not going to make it to the big time.”

Sponsors also want young drivers, even if that means passing on more qualified racers who had the gall to be born before the 1970s. Joe Buford has won 60 races at the Fairgrounds, which actually is 60 more than Renshaw. Recently, he won four straight races, one of the most impressive streaks in recent memory. And yet because of Renshaw’s age, marketability and funding, she will likely compete in Winston Cup before he does.

“It’s frustrating as hell, to be quite honest with you,” says Buford, who admires what Renshaw has done on the track this year. “If she makes it, she makes it, but I know what I can do given the opportunity. Getting to the next level takes money. If I could just find somebody to give me a chance, I think I could make it.”

Mark Day says that, in NASCAR, money makes the cars go 'round. “You either have access to money or you don’t,” he says. “Guys like me and Joe, we’re not hurting at the local level, but we’re not going to Busch or beyond because it takes millions of dollars. A lot of the up-and-coming drivers come from wealthy families or got in the right doors at the right time.”

Day says that Renshaw’s imminent rise is based solely on her funding, but that at some point she might prove that she is as good as anyone. “Obviously her family has money, and that’s why she’s moving up,” he says. “But she might go up there and open eyes at the right time and it wouldn’t have anything to do with her daddy’s money.”

To her credit, Renshaw knows that her sport isn’t always fair. “You look at Joe Buford, Mike Reynolds and Mark Day—they are great race car drivers and they could do as good a job on the Winston Cup level,” she says. “I don’t know why they are not there. It takes a lot of sponsorship money and maybe they haven’t had good luck getting those sponsorships.”

It’s doubtful that Renshaw will have that problem. And the fact that she’s a woman could make her more appealing to potential sponsors and team owners. “If she will spend the extra time she needs to get the experience, it will be a whole lot easier for her to attract a Winston Cup owner than some guy,” Davis says. “She’ll also be able to attract a major sponsor.”

But Renshaw may well be good enough to make that luck count for something. Local racing observers were startled to see how much she improved in the last year. If she continues that trajectory, she soon may be a household name. “A race car doesn’t know who’s driving it,” she says. “And I think a girl is as capable of driving it as a guy.”