AWESOME BILL FROM DAWSONVILLE: My Life In NASCAR
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Throughout this "great American success story," Elliott shares numerous anecdotes and thoughts that only a NASCAR insider could provide. Highlights include:

• Elliott describes in exciting detail how he won the Winston Million and helped bring NASCAR into mainstream media. "My 1985 season can actually be traced to a dinner in New York City late in 1984." At a gala dinner for drivers it was announced that in the coming season Winston was going to pay a million dollars to any driver who could win three out of NASCAR's four major races: the Daytona 500, the Winston 500, the World 600, and the Southern 500. Bill went from only having won four races in eight years to winning eleven in the 1985 season concluding with the inaugural Winston Million. Bill's career would change from that point forward. He was now in the NASCAR limelight as "Million Dollar Bill" and became the first ever NASCAR driver to make the cover of Sports Illustrated. NASCAR itself was even propelled into a new era as it finally began to be accepted by sportswriters nationwide.

• "Richard Petty kept telling us that if you've got an advantage, don't flaunt it, don't run away with things." Elliott had such a superior car in his 1985 season that he finished some races up to 37 seconds faster than the second place driver. Critics said that Bill should've eased off -"sandbagged"- at the finish to make everybody else and NASCAR look good. They said the Elliotts were "stinking up the show." Bill says that it's not like a football game where you can control the time and not run up the score. One tire blow out and suddenly you're in last place. Having a big lead gave Bill insurance and he felt it was also true to the nature of racing.

• "To this day I take some pride in the fact that I stopped taking Dale's crap." Elliott devotes a chapter to "The Intimidator," detailing their differences and their rivalry, which culminated in his ramming Earnhardt during his victory lap following the 1987 Winston in Charlotte. Elliott goes on to talk about Earnhardt's savvy manipulation of the officials and media, as well as his aggressive driving style that angered ma ny drivers. But before Earnhardt's death at Daytona in 2001, Elliott describes the two old rivals as "quite close."

• "Shame on NASCAR for letting a handful of good men die before finally addressing the problem after Dale died." Earnhardt's death caused some serious safety changes in NASCAR, but Elliott thinks the changes should've happened sooner. It took Earnhardt's 2001 death to get the sport to go "full bore, head-over- heels on safety." Elliott goes in to detail how he would change safety and medical services at the track.

• "Daddy was on the cutting edge of a generation of southern young men who propelled stock car racing from its roots in prohibition to its glory days of Winston Cup." Elliott shares a brief history of NASCAR. He says drivers looking for a cheaper way to race and the growth of the state of Florida helped lead to the formation of NASCAR in 1947 and the first race in Charlotte in 1949. Elliott also discusses the growth of sponsorships and the sport as a whole through the first live nationally televised NASCAR race in 1979.

• Elliott describes how Junior Johnson was the model for the moonshiner-turned- NASCAR driver. "Junior will proudly tell you that when he was young, his family was among the largest still operators in the business. Junior would say, 'Some guys liked to (run the moonshine) at one time and some guys liked another time, but starting about midnight they'd be coming out of the woods from every direction. Some nights the whole road was just full of bootleggers. It got so some nights there'd be somebody following you going just as fast as you were and you didn't know who it was the law or somebody else hauling whiskey.'" The NASCAR novice will enjoy Elliott's look at what it takes to run a racing team week in and week out. He provides insight into everything from a description of the car to details about the pre-race inspection of each ride to what the typical race day schedule is like, all the way down to bathroom breaks and pit stops. AWESOME BILL FROM DAWSONVILLE provides fast action play-by-plays of Bill's most exhilarating races. Readers learn about the turns and strategic car adjustments that allowed him to win races and become one of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers of all time. Fans won't want to miss this quintessential autobiography by one of NASCAR's finest.

AWESOME BILL FROM DAWSONVILLE: My Life In NASCAR
By Bill Elliott with Chris Millard
HarperEntertainment Hardcover Original
Publication Date: October 10, 2006
ISBN: 0061125733
Price: $24.95

ABOUT CO-AUTHOR CHRIS MILLARD:
Chris Millard is a founding partner of a publishing, copywriting, and creative consulting firm and the author of "Golf's 100 Toughest Holes" (Abrams, 2005). He lives in Atlanta with his wife and two children.