Motorsports

Friends recall France as hard-nosed and huggable

By BRANT JAMES
Published June 8, 2007

DAYTONA BEACH - Bill France Jr. would likely have appreciated being surrounded by so many friends. But he might not have liked them giving away secrets that showed the softer side of a man who projected and wielded absolute power.

NASCAR's vice chair and the man responsible for pulling the organization into the modern age with an iron will was eulogized before a crowd of nearly 2, 000 - including most current drivers and owners - as a man of great power and vision Thursday at the Mary McLeod Bethune Performing Arts Center. He died Monday at age 74.

Those who learned with penalties on the racetrack or coercion at dinner tables the consequences of crossing France found charm in a man who never held grudges.

"He liked to play games, " said former series champion Darrell Waltrip. "He liked to pick on you and pick on you, and we had a lot of fun doing that."

Team owner Felix Sabates once spent a four-day fishing trip in the Bahamas with France without discussion of the harsh penalty the then-chairman had imposed the previous race.

"He would chew you out in 16 different languages, but at the end of the day, he would hug you, " Sabates recalled. "I was probably kicked in the butt more by him than any owner in the history of NASCAR, (but) I was pretty honored when I was asked to be a pallbearer. With all the people in the world he could have chosen, I will always cherish that the rest of my life."

Among the secrets shared Thursday: France was technologically savvy, cataloguing favorite Mexican restaurants and hot dog stands in his PDA. His favorite song, Tom T. Hall's The Year Clayton Delaney Died, was always on his iPod.

The ceremony underscored France's presence as not only a major sports figure but as one of Florida's richest and most influential men, and a philanthropist rooted in Daytona Beach, where his family moved when he was 2. His casket was flanked by deputies at attention before the ceremony because he was an honorary member of the Volusia County Sheriff's Office. Singer Edwin McCain, who befriended France after playing numerous functions at his home, performed his 1998 hit I'll Be.

Rick Hendrick, whose six-time Nextel Cup championship team is the sport's standard, introduced himself as "a NASCAR team owner and a fishing buddy of Bill France Jr." and shared not only stories of France's discipline but his humanity. Hendrick related a story of when France and wife Betty Jane visited him in 1996 when he was suffering from leukemia. Hendrick returned the favor in 1999 when France was diagnosed with lung cancer. Thursday was the first time anyone had ever said publicly what type of cancer had afflicted France. He always just called it "the bug." France, sick and barely able to walk, came by again in the fall of 2004 after 10 people, including Hendrick's brother, son, and two nieces, died in a plane crash.

"He said, 'I just wanted to see that you were okay, ' " Hendrick remembered. "He was a bear of a man, but he had a teddy bear heart. I'm sure he's up there holding court right now. And I'm sure they're listening."

[Last modified June 8, 2007, 04:20:47]