NEW-LOOK NASCAR CAN THANK GORDON.

Byline: Kevin Sack The New York Times

If there was any concern for the well-being of the driver, even for an instant, it never registered on the faces in the grandstand as Jeff Gordon's rainbow-painted Chevrolet Monte Carlo slammed into a backstretch retaining wall at the Goody's Headache Powder 500 here in August.

Strangers exchanged high fives in the aisles. Potbellied men hugged their wives, really hugged them, perhaps for the first time in months.

Longtime fans of stock-car racing love to hate Gordon, who at 26 has become the winningest driver on the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing's Winston Cup Circuit. They hate him because he has won too many races and too much money at too young an age. They hate him because he has Charlie Sheen's looks, no noticeable bad habits and a stunningly beautiful wife who tapes Scripture verses to his steering wheel on race days. (``I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.'' - 2 Timothy 4:7.)

But they also hate him for reasons that have less to do with Gordon than with the remarkable transformation of NASCAR from a peculiarly Southern institution, with its roots in moonshining, into the country's fastest-growing sport.

To the old-timers, who prefer their drivers with a thick drawl and a wad of chewing tobacco between their lips and gums, the clean-cut, California-bred Gordon represents everything objectionable about the new NASCAR. Even if they were still racing, it is doubtful that yesterday's heroes, like Richard Petty and Bobby Allison, would advertise their personal Web sites on the backs of their jumpsuits, as Gordon does (www.jeffgordon.com).

It is also doubtful, of course, that Gordon's forerunners could have generated enough disdain to inspire nine Web sites against them. Gordon is mocked daily on home pages designed by groups like the Jeff Gordon Haters of America Club and NASCAR Fans Against Jeff Gordon, which features a doctored photograph of Gordon looking very much like Billy Idol, with spiked green hair and an earring.

Gordon, who is booed lustily when he is introduced before each race, attributes much of the antagonism to the tendency of racing fans to cheer against whoever happens to be beating their favorite drivers at the moment.

``They boo the guy that is doing what you're not supposed to be doing in this sport, which is winning a lot of races,'' Gordon said in an interview before a rare 35th-place finish in the Bristol race. ``This sport is supposed to be where everybody has a fair share of wins.''

But Gordon, who was not hurt in the crash here, also acknowledged that his new-NASCAR image, more Hollywood than hillbilly, may have something to do with the fans' animosity.

``You know, I like country music but I don't wear a cowboy hat, cowboy boots and a belt buckle,'' Gordon said. ``I didn't grow up chewing tobacco. That's just not what I'm about. And I think it's a stereotype that is really being put off to the side nowadays because there are a lot more drivers coming in here that give more of a clean-cut image.''

NASCAR's growth had been heady before Gordon, of course, but officials credit his image with helping to convert a new generation of nontraditional fans to the sport. Women are lured to the track by Gordon's looks. Christians like his wholesomeness. Yuppies see him on Letterman, then tune in to ESPN.

Those new fans, in turn, have helped drive a 60 percent jump in Winston Cup attendance from 1990 to 1995, similarly impressive increases in television ratings and huge growth in race purses.

The largest purse this year - $4.9 million at the Brickyard 400 in Indianapolis - is twice as large as the largest purse five years ago. Race tracks all around the country are expanding by tens of thousands of seats and are selling out.

All 32 Winston Cup points races are now nationally televised, as are a number of exhibition races, including one in Suzuka, Japan. NASCAR's Internet Web site is the 15th-most-popular site in the news, information and entertainment category. And this year, NASCAR began branching out into theme restaurants and merchandising outlets in suburban malls.

Unlike his predecessors, who shilled for Skoal and STP, Gordon is winning lucrative endorsement contracts from mainstream advertisers. His sparkling teeth illuminate cartons of Close-Up. He wears a milk mustache.

``He's taken this sport to a different level just by being so marketable,'' said Chris Powell, a Winston Cup spokesman for the RJR Tobacco Company's sports marketing division. ``He might well be the most popular racer out there, and the least popular. You've got to be successful to be disliked.''

For better or worse, the response to Gordon's success has exposed the tensions created by NASCAR's high-velocity growth. In an egalitarian sport, Gordon has utterly dominated the competition. And in his success, many fans see the ultimate demise of an era when the sport was more intimate and less corporate, when it was more about cars and less about cash.

``When the Yarboroughs and Allisons and Pearsons came along, there wasn't any money,'' said Petty, who is now 60 and owns the NASCAR record for career victories (200) but who won far less money in 35 years of racing ($8 million) than Gordon has in five ($14 million). ``They did it strictly for the love of driving a race car. If they happened to be paid at the end of the week, that was good.''

In the first 26 of this year's 32 Winston Cup points races, Gordon had won 10 races and nearly $4 million. By winning the Southern 500 at Darlington, S.C., on Aug. 31, he became only the second driver in history to grab the $1 million bonus awarded to any racer who wins three of NASCAR's four most prestigious events.

Gordon remains a leading contender for this year's Winston Cup points championship, which carries additional prize money of about $2 million. In 1995, he won the championship, along with seven races and $4.3 million in earnings. Last year, he finished second in points to Terry Labonte, despite winning 10 races - more than any other driver - and $3.4 million.

Gordon's racing team, which consists of 26 people who maintain 11 cars worth about $100,000 each, is owned by Rick Hendrick of Charlotte, N.C., who is one of the largest car dealers in the country. Hendrick recently pleaded guilty to federal mail fraud charges related to his business, saying he wanted to focus on his battle against leukemia.

Gordon began racing quarter-midget cars, essentially modified Go Karts, at age 5 in California. His stepfather, an auto-parts manufacturer, sold his business and moved the family to Indiana when Gordon was 13 because rules there allowed drivers to race professionally at a younger age.

Although he joined the NASCAR circuit at only 21, Gordon's extensive childhood experience left him with lightning reflexes and an intense drive to win. On the track, he is known for his precision timing and his aggressiveness. ``He's not a wuss,'' said Ray Evernham, Gordon's pit-crew chief and a major partner in his success. ``He'll put the bumper to you if he needs to.''

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PHOTO Jeff Gordon's early success has created deep resentment with some race fans.

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