Mark Martin

He is equal parts enigma and race car driver. Even when we put him under a microscope, the way we do professional athletes, there isn’t a whole lot we truly know about Mark Martin.

If life were a game show and we asked the real Mark Martin to please step forward, we would be left with a 5-foot 6-inch, 150-pounder with arms crossed and a what-am-I-doing-here look on his face.

The Mark Martin we know is steady and consistent, keeper of a rock-solid psyche that we can pin prick, and poke, and prod, and still not penetrate. Sure, he’ll be forthright and speak his mind, but beyond a burning desire to race, do we know the real Mark Martin?

Even last year, when he slipped down the Winston Cup charts, finishing 12th in points, the public persona never cracked or never let the media or the public wrestle it down. If ever we were to catch Mark Martin with his guard down, with his soul bared so we could figure him out, surely last season would have been the time.

For 11 consecutive years, Martin’s career path and pattern of success were board straight, never veering below sixth in the final Winston Cup rundown. From the 1989 season through the ’99 campaign, he was runner-up three times in the battle for the championship, and four times he was third. He won 31 races during that stretch, including a career-high seven in ’98. Then in 2000, he slipped to eighth in points and won just one race. Those numbers grew weaker last season, when he was winless for the first time since ’88 and dropped even further in points.

Twelfth in points? Most stock car drivers can only dream of reaching that level of success in Winston Cup. But Martin is a racer in the purest sense. Racing is all he’s ever known, really. That and trucking, the profession his rowdy father, the late Julian Martin, chose. So 12th was not up to Mark’s usual level of success.

“It’s not the kind of success that I’ve had for 20 years,” he says. “No matter what kind of racing I’ve done I’ve been a contender, ever since I started in dirt racing in ’74. I didn’t feel like I was a contender in 2001, but I tried just as hard as I ever had.”

Beyond that, 2001 is not something Martin dwells on. “I keep my eye on the target and keep looking ahead,” he says.

It’s that laser focus that helps him deal with the highs and lows of a professional athlete’s life, and he’s experienced both extremes. He first gave Winston Cup a try in the early ’80s, but then packed it in and returned to the American Speed Association circuit for four years, running just six Cup races during that time, including none for two seasons. The practical, calculated side of Mark Martin led to that unusual U-turn.

“You know, I gave up on it and just went where I could make a living,” he says. “That’s what I do, is race, and I went where I could go and make a living racing and win races. After three years of that I grew anxious to go back and try another shot at the highest level.

“I found out after being married with four kids that I was going to have to live a pretty lean lifestyle on what I could make ASA racing. There was a motivation for me to do better for my family and there had always been the motivation to be the best ....”

Role Models

To be the best. There’s the drive and determination coming through, something he got from his father, Julian, the one who helped the teenage Mark build race cars and helped nurture his career.

Julian Martin was a rough-and-tumble sort; a man who had built a successful Batesville, Arkansas, trucking business from scratch; a man with a fierce temper and the intense determination needed to succeed in a tough business—racing or trucking. Where Mark is practical and calculated, Julian, who died in a plane crash in 1998, was impetuous and more seat-of-the-pants.

“I’m not a carbon copy of my dad, thank goodness, or we would have lots of problems in my career and personal life,” says Mark. “He was my hero and is the ultimate example of what the word ‘man’ means. But I’m a lot more calculated. I think things out a little more and have a lot more self-control than he had. There are things that don’t measure up to him, either. Like everybody else, I have qualities that are positive qualities over where he was. Then there’s qualities that, even though I want to, I can’t measure up to him.”

Stock car racing is a sport built on wild, reckless men, free spirits and individualists with more color and more personality than a Hollywood casting director could ever capture. Men like Julian Martin, in fact. So where does Mark Martin fit into the picture?

He’s like Gregory Peck in “To Kill a Mockingbird:” an upright man of duty and moral fiber. He possesses the complexity and intrigue of a Jimmy Stewart character. The regular guy appeal of a Harrison Ford. Consistent. Unflappable. Well grounded.

Martin is to blue collar, lunch bucket, show-up-on-time America what Dale Earnhardt was to beer-drinking, hell-raisin’ good old boys. Martin represents the part in all of us that doesn’t worry about the things we can’t change, nor hide behind the things that are. He shows up, punches the time card, does his job, and goes back home at the end of the day—day after day—without pretense, excess emotion, sentimentality or regret.

There is a directness about Martin’s manner, a take-it-or-leave-it persona that comes across as a shield blocking the public’s view. There are, on the other hand, several clues that lend themselves to creating a portrait—albeit a pencil sketch—of Martin.

He’ll tell you that Jack Roush is someone he looks up to. Roush gave Martin his second chance in Winston Cup, in ’88. The pairing had a classic story line: Driver on the comeback trail; team owner and automotive genius looking to conquer new territory. The mix proved effective, with Martin finally making it at the sport’s highest level and Roush, with Martin as his flagship driver for several years, finding success in a new venue.

“All through my life I’ve had people who were influential in my life,” Martin says. “Today, it happens to be Jack Roush, because he’s the one I come in contact with the most. My dad’s gone, and I don’t come into contact every day with a lot of people I had been in closer contact with. Jack is just so driven and dedicated and so brilliant, so smart. He has an ability to analyze situations and problems and really understand them and understand how to address them.”

Martin’s own ability to handle adversity might be his most distinguishable trait. He’s faced his share of personal and professional problems but has the ability to deal with each crisis. He credits his Christian faith with giving him that ability. Although he became a Christian in the early ’80s, Martin says it was a decade later when he really began to seek spiritual growth. He now participates in weekly Bible study and is a regular at infield chapel services during race season.

“Being a Christian, there’s so much in the Bible, so many teachings in there about how you should live your life and how you should handle situations,” Martin says. “The cool thing about the Bible is that even though it’s a very old book, it’s still very up to date and teaches you how to handle things today. That does have something to do with (handling adversity). Another thing is that I can’t change 2001, but I can change 2002, so I don’t waste any time on 2001. That’s not where it’s at for me. 2002 is where I can make a difference, and I try to focus on things that I hope will make a difference in 2002.

“That’s how I answer your question: One of the ways I handle and deal with the fears and anxiety and frustrations that I have is through the teachings of the Bible. Other parts of it are just self-preservation. Sometimes, when things get bad, they could be worse if I slashed my wrists. Then things would be worse than they were, so I can’t do that. Even though you might think about it, you can’t do it.”

A Racer’s Life

Martin’s life clearly revolves around racing. One of his hobbies is weightlifting; another directly involves racing, as he has helped his son Matt, 10, begin racing quarter midgets and Bandoleros.

Even the hobbies reflect the racer in Martin. He helps his son race the way his dad helped him. The weightlifting and staying in top physical shape help Mark endure the rigors of 500-mile races and a cockpit that often reaches 130 to 140 degrees.

Where Martin chooses to live, however, has everything to do with racing and it has absolutely nothing to do with racing.

Many NASCAR drivers live in or around Charlotte, North Carolina, the acknowledged center of the stock car racing universe. The Martin family lives in Daytona Beach, Florida, several hundred miles from Charlotte, and light years away from what Martin calls the “mania” of Charlotte’s race culture.

While others may bask in the limelight, Martin seeks protection from it.

“The distance between myself and the (stock car) ‘hub’ is something that’s really, really good for my family and me,” Martin says. “The folks here in Daytona are different and they treat me different than the mania of the Carolinas. We’re sort of outside the mania and hysteria that goes along with the sport.”

Martin simply has not sought to create a marketable “image” one way or the other, nor has he openly sought the adulation that often accompanies public figures.

“What you see in the public eye is pretty much what you see in me,” he says. “I’ve always been a straight shooter. I do not and will not give whitewashed, paper answers. I don’t give answers that people want to hear. I don’t agree with that sort of thing. I’ve always been pretty honest, pretty straight up. I think that I’m the same, inside and out. I just have never been one to kiss up, and I might be further along in my career if I was.”

At 43, Martin is nearing the twilight of his career. His contract with Roush Racing runs through 2005. As the end of the contract approaches, he says he’ll evaluate his situation and decide then what he wants to do.

Meanwhile, the man with the laser focus and a remarkable record of consistency lacks the one thing that would give his career a crowning jewel—a Winston Cup title. He’s been close, but he hasn’t quite earned the sport’s premier driving championship.

A Winston Cup title is not something Martin dwells on or even something he set out to earn, but the specter of it is there. When you’ve fallen down the ladder, climbed your way back up, reached the top, made a good living, and have the wins and momentos to show for it all, then that, perhaps, is enough.

“My dream was to be able to win races,” says Martin. “And you know what? I did that a bunch. Nobody ever guaranteed me anything. The day I was born I didn’t get some certificate dropped down in my little hospital bed saying I was going to be the best race car driver that ever lived. All right? Nobody ever told me that. I never expected that. I just expected to be the best I could, and I have. I’ve done the best I could.

“I’ve put every ounce of life in me into my career, and I don’t regret that. That’s how I do things. No matter what I did with my life, that’s how I would have done it. I’ve made sacrifices and compromises along the way, but I have a very full trophy case, and I’ve been very successful and very fortunate with my career. I won’t get a chance to change anything, and I won’t get a chance to do it over again. I did it the way I am. Who I am and how I am is how I’ve lived my life. There really ain’t much changing that.”