The only way this story starts is with an Elvis impersonator singing "The Star-Spangled Banner" at a NASCAR race in France. If there's a better illustration of stock-car racing's latest foray into Europe than a small, pompadoured man awash in rhinestones and belting out "ze hommme of ze braaave" in a perfect French accent, I didn't find it.

That scene took place last July at the American Tours Festival, a raucous stars-and-stripes celebration in Tours, France, the centerpiece of which was an honest-to-God sanctioned NASCAR race. They love America and NASCAR so much in Tours that they built a 0.37-mile oval speedway outside a metro area of around 500,000 people. Locals come to watch in their Chevys and Dodges, or riding choppers and wearing wide-cuffed Levis.

"It's either ooh-lalalala or it ain't."

Except I'm not in Tours. It's 14 weeks later, in October, and I'm at Le Mans. Rainy, gray, bone-cold Le Mans, arguably the world's most famous track, the high holy ground of European sports-car racing. The finals of the NASCAR Whelen Euro Series take place here, on the track's Bugatti Circuit, over the course of two days. The Whelen is sharing time this weekend with Euro Trucks, which is tractor-trailer racing but without the trailers. The famous gold Rolex clock that surveys start-finish at the 24 Heures du Mans is gone, replaced with a no-name railroad-station timekeeper.

With years of declining attendance and television ratings at home, NASCAR may not be looking to conquer Europe. It might need the continent for long-term survival. If the Whelen series can produce just one international driver who makes the jump to the big show in America, international interest may take care of itself. Consider how the Argentinian and Chinese markets swarmed to the NBA when stars like Manu Ginóbili and Yao Ming hit.

So, yes, NASCAR may need Europe—but does Europe want NASCAR?

Looking for a fan's perspective on that frigid first morning, I approach a guy in a fleece jacket with a friendly nod and a "parlez-vous anglais?" His eyes go wide, he yips a high-pitched "no!" and skitters off with his small son in tow. As he leaves, he glances over his shoulder, as if I might give chase and force him to conjugate. A handful of grandstand dwellers smoke in silence while the semis rumble off into the morning fog. Elvis, it seems, has left this building.

Although few in America know it, NASCAR has had an official presence in Europe since 2012. The Whelen Euro Series has brought stock-car racing to famous old-world tracks like Brands Hatch, Monza, and even the Nürburgring. The series began as the brainchild of former rally driver Jérôme Galpin, a wiry Frenchman with glasses and a buzzed head of thinning hair.

"I was born in racing. My parents raced since before I was born," he says. "We had the opportunity to go to the U.S., and if you're a race fan in the U.S., you go to NASCAR. We discovered NASCAR isn't just the Sprint Cup, but many different levels, and at each level there are all these great people, all this passion. Great cars, a lot of fun, powerful, and on par with what we pay for our rally cars. So I thought, there's definitely something to do in Europe with that."

Galpin found a company in Ontario that produces chassis for NASCAR's Canadian Tire series. He gave them a build spec that would comply with regulations set by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), which oversees all European motorsport. The new car was ready in May 2008, and soon after, Galpin announced the launch of a new French series, Racecar Euro, for 2009. At the time, there was no official partnership with NASCAR, or even the FIA directly (Racecar Euro wasn't approved as an international series until the end of 2010). But there was interest enough to put 17 drivers on the starting grid in April of 2009.

"The first view was, 'There's no carbon fiber, no paddle shifters, no electronics! What is this big, heavy thing with the 15-inch tires?' But we said, 'Forget what you see, just drive it.' And it didn't matter if it was a beginner or a world champion—and we had Michael Schumacher, Sebastian Vettel, Jenson Button drive the cars—they all came back with a big smile and said, 'Ah, this is real racing! This is a lot of fun!'"

NASCAR noticed the work and took interest early, albeit in an unofficial advisory role. But the partnership was confirmed by the 2012 season, and Racecar Euro became the Euro-Racecar NASCAR Touring Series. In 2013, the cars returned with a new format, a new trophy, and a new name: the NASCAR Whelen Euro Series.

Here's what a NASCAR scene at Le Mans looks like: The weekend's driver list is full of names like Stéphane, Didier, Frédéric, Romain, Philippe, Jérôme, Jean Luc, Guillaume, and Sailesh. A team of local kids in American-football pads and helmets roams the grounds, occasionally launching quavering long balls or breaking into slant routes. They are joined by a squad of young, teenaged French girls dressed as cheerleaders, who snap into the same pom-pom-shaking dance routine to Rihanna's "Shut Up and Drive" every 30 minutes or so. (For a Yankee, this mainly serves to highlight how little the piston-like movements of American cheerleading resemble actual dancing. The local men don't seem to notice or care.)

"Even if the european Fans don't take to NASCAR-style competition, the bet is that they'll still come running for good old American marketing face."

About 20 minutes before the afternoon race, I glimpse a craggy, tanned gentleman driver with salt-and-pepper hair, sipping wine from a plastic cup and smoking. His exhalations are long and luxuriant. The crowd is wrapped against the damp in motorsport-liveried hats and jackets, but the colorful NASCAR logo is fleeting; the only American writing that appears is the sort of official-sounding nonsense you'd find in Abercrombie & Fitch. ("Teddy Smith Authentic, Finest Quality since 1989.") Most of the beer being poured in the series hospitality tent is served over two ounces of strawberry-, pear-, or banana-flavored syrup. It tastes like the Kool-Aid man got sick in your pilsner.

But the racing is phenomenal. If European open-wheel competition is akin to a fencing duel, NASCAR on a road course is a speakeasy knife fight—mean-looking heavyweights slamming into everything while 400-hp Chevy V-8s rip massive tears in the ozone. Whelen Euro has two divisions, Open and Elite, semi-pro and professional, respectively. In a cost-saving measure, two drivers, one from each group, share a single car over the course of four races per weekend—one Saturday and one Sunday race each, per division. Drivers qualify once, on Saturday, and the driver with the fastest lap in Saturday's race takes pole position on Sunday.

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Professional or not, even the most experienced driver here has just a few years' seat time in American-style stock cars. Yet everyone pushes like mad. Ander Vilariño, the 2012 Euro-Racecar Touring Series champion, gets a terrible start in Saturday's Elite race, stuttering off the line in his No. 2 TFT-Banco Santander Chevy SS and dropping quickly to eighth place. The 34-year-old Spaniard is being bird-dogged in the points race by Frédéric Gabillon of France, who jumps out to an early lead; Vilariño wastes no time climbing back to seventh, then sixth. He needs this, as points are worth double in the final two races of the season. Plus, there's no time to waste: Races here are 30-minute sprints, so pit strategy is nonexistent, and anything less than ten-tenths is pointless.

Amid a near-constant assault of car-to-car contact, spins, runoffs, and barrier impacts, Vilariño climbs to fifth, while Gabillon stretches his lead to 10 seconds, then 12. Less than 24 minutes after the green flag drops, Gabillon takes the checker. Vilariño finishes fourth.

NASCAR's promotional materials for the Whelen Euro promise "door-to-door" action in the American style. It's an understatement. These are low-tech, high-powered machines piloted by drivers new to them. Throw in tight road courses, and you end up with something like bumper cars crossed with an orgy.

George Silbermann, NASCAR's vice president of regional and touring series, is on hand for the weekend. He believes that while the novelty of the NASCAR name can draw a crowd, the action will bring them back.

"The fact that this is America-themed, the American origin, helps us differentiate," he says. "But we're ultimately selling the American style of racing. Beating and banging, fender to fender, having it all come down to the last lap. That will speak for itself."

But during the second race of the first day, the pockets of spectators at Le Mans don't seem to be listening. The reticence stands in stark relief to the high-volume, Jumbotron-and-beer experience that occurs most weekends in places like Bristol and Indianapolis. The atmosphere is more tennis match than motorsports. But then loud, crunching action on the track causes the crowd to jump to its feet. The stands let out a breathy, synchronized exclamation: "OOH-lalalala!" Excited chatter follows. Then more silence.

NASCAR's pinnacle, the stateside Sprint Cup, has name recognition in Europe, though it's difficult to gauge how much interest that generates. One thing is for sure: Everybody knows Jeff Gordon. A 32-year-old Open division competitor from the Philippines name-drops him as inspiration; so does a 23-year-old Elite driver from Switzerland. "Jeff Gordon" is the only thing I understand while talking with a middle-aged Paris Métro technician—covered in NASCAR logos and speaking not a word of English—before a translator steps in. The most reasonable explanation I get is that the European media created a parallel between Gordon and Michael Schumacher; as a young, ambitious German driver was stringing together masterful Formula 1 seasons, a baby-faced American was exhibiting similar dominance driving in circles across the ocean.

Gordon's talent aside, it seems a shallow connection. The Europeans don't seem to know the sport's romantic origin story of bootleggers hauling moonshine through the hills of North Carolina. There's no Tom Wolfean subtext of the liberated good old boy giving a candy-colored finger to those old burghers in the name of Progress, yes! NASCAR sold its outlaw spirit the moment it decided to morph into a family-friendly corporate juggernaut, so there's no real mystique to peddle, just racing. Beating and banging, all coming down to the last lap. In other words, it's either ooh-lalalala or it ain't.

But there's another strategy at work, one that becomes clear over a NASCAR lunch of baguettes, sausage, and vin ordinaire in Galpin's Team FJ tent. I sit across from Norbert Walchhofer, senior president of DF1 NASCAR Racing. An expansive man in the mold of the actor Albert Finney, with a mane of gray hair and a deep, booming voice, Walchhofer has just announced that he'll be fielding a team in 2014. I ask whether he thinks the Whelen Euro Series should stay on road courses, like the Bugatti Circuit, or move to traditional ovals like Tours. Walchhofer argues the debate doesn't matter.

"You have six weekends, you race two ovals and then the four infields, or three-three, whatever—this is not important!" he thunders. "You must treat the spectators more American-style. That is what they're looking for!"

Once I hear the phrase "American-style," I start to notice it everywhere—drivers, owners, executives, spectators, everyone has a version of those words. The idea seems to encompass the kind of fan-first treatment—families in the paddocks, drivers and team managers glad-handing the kids, all the merchandise you can shake a wallet at—for which NASCAR is famous, and which Europe famously disdains.

"We try to share passion, make contact with the fans," Galpin says. "Sprint Cup drivers are superstars, but if you're a kid on the track and want to meet Carl Edwards, you can get an autograph. If you want an autograph from Räikkönen or Alonso, you'd have to escape security and dig a tunnel to the pits!"

Geoffroy Lettier, who runs us-racing.com, a French website dedicated to American racing, says there's a lot of spectacle in NASCAR—"a lot of passing, sometimes crashes"—but emphasizes that the ability to "go to the paddock, chat with the crew chief, the team manager, take pictures with the drivers" is what really appeals to the European fan. Silbermann is more blunt.

"Let's be honest," he says. "Race fans are race fans, doesn't matter [where]. They're thrilled by exciting racing, but they also want to get to know the stars. If it's personal for them, I think it's much more meaningful."

The great nonsecret of European NASCAR seems to be that, even if the fans don't take to American-style competition, they'll still come running for good old American marketing.

And they do come. Tables are set up in the Team FJ tent, and the drivers assemble to chat and sign autographs for a good 40 minutes. There's a crowd, and I spot the occasional Sprint Cup logo on a hat or jacket.

I get the sense the spectators don't actually recognize most, if any, of the drivers—they line up at one end of the table and collect autographs methodically, in assembly-line fashion. But they look like they're having fun, and the drivers seem to be having a ball. I even spot the man in the fleece jacket who ran from me the other morning; his son, who looks about five, is hovering around one of the tables, not ready to commit. Finally he darts in between several pairs of legs. A few seconds later he emerges, beaming, with a Sharpie-covered glossy of Yann Zimmer. America's great export, customer service, seems to have worked its magic.

Tiff Needell thinks the idea is bollocks. He's running in the Open division this weekend for a segment on his British TV show Fifth Gear. I bump into him in the hospitality tent not long after the autograph session, shortly after a collision shredded his host car's tires. Needell dismisses the idea that American novelty can actually pull European crowds.

"It's the track that brings the people, the name 'Le Mans,' not 'NASCAR,'" he snorts.

And the cars?

"Well, they're very simple cars," he says, pausing to blow into his hands. Then that trademark conspiratorial wink: "But there are plenty of tricks to making them go fast! It's good racing!"

To demonstrate the point, Vilariño walks in out of the drizzle, and he and Needell immediately begin discussing the finer points of racing a car with a Detroit Locker. The lanky Brit and the slight Spaniard spend a few lively minutes in a corner, gesticulating and nodding and ultimately shaking hands. Whatever falling attendance numbers are driving NASCAR's push into Europe, whatever the continentals think of stock cars, race drivers just want to race.

And in Europe, NASCAR may be a good place to make that happen. For drivers who can't find, or afford, a seat elsewhere, or for those who want to get in on the ground floor of a small operation with a big name, European NASCAR means opportunity—especially when you consider the potential windfall for those who can make the leap to the Sprint Cup. Whelen Euro Series cars can be put on the grid for about $500,000, a pittance compared with the average European sports-car budget. Teams here can field a top car for the cost of running a backmarker in the DTM, Germany's wildly popular, high-tech touring-car series.

That's a huge draw for potential owners, and new teams have seats that need filling. This attracts drivers like Josh Burdon, a 20-year-old Aussie who's leading the Open division going into Sunday's final race. Burdon parlayed national karting championships in Australia into a Formula 3 career before making the jump to Whelen Euro. He's now focused on hitting the big time in America. His first step will be clinching the championship, which would score him a drive at the UNOH Battle At The Beach at Daytona International Speedway, the week before the Daytona 500.

"When I was a kid my focus was V8 Supercars," Burdon says. "But when I first got out internationally, I saw that Australian motorsport is the size of a coin. America is the big apple, where we all want to end up. We just need to win the championship this afternoon and take the next step as it comes."

A few hours later, Burdon loses the championship in the final race, finishing 14th. He won't be going to Daytona. In this, Euro NASCAR mirrors motorsport everywhere: throw a rod or put two tires in the grass, and your future hangs in the balance.

"These are are fast, low-tech machines piloted by inexperienced drivers in all-out sprints. The result is like bumper cars crossed with an orgy."

Vilariño comes in fourth in the final Elite division race; Gabillon again finishes first. But with four points to spare, Vilariño earns his second straight NASCAR title. Someone hands him a Spanish flag, and he sprays dirt with a series of donuts on the infield. Vilariño walked a long road to get here—French Formula Renault, Spanish Supertoyota and Formula 3, European Hill Climb, European Endurance Challenge—and NASCAR should be thrilled to have him as the face of its European efforts. During the awards-ceremony interviews, Vilariño switches fluently between Spanish, English, and French. He's humble and forthright, thrilled with his championship, quick to joke and laugh. He even bears a striking resemblance to Jeff Gordon. And unlike a lot of younger drivers, he's happy exactly where he is.

"I would like to go racing in America, but under the right conditions," he says, his arm around his large silver trophy. "Sponsorship is so hard. If I were a kid, years ago, I'd get a cheap apartment and then ..." he waves his hand. "But I'm not 19 anymore. My wife and children are here. I have to go where the conditions are good."

Sweet, fruity beer is being handed around the tent. Outside, French kids in American-football uniforms are table-dancing to Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe." The sun pokes out of the clouds.

The night before my flight home, I have dinner in a Paris bar. One scene from the weekend replays in my head: The football players are tossing the ball around in a circle, and a compact, fortyish guy in one of those floppy-eared hunting caps jumps into the middle with a big grin, snagging the ball in midair. He cocks his arm to throw but can't get a grip. He seems to know what quarterbacking is, but the ball is unfamiliar to him. He feints a couple times and gives a dispirited chuckle before handing the ball back to the nearest player. Then he walks off, hands in pockets.

Seen just so, that's the kind of scene that passes judgment on the whole enterprise. But European NASCAR isn't silly or cynical. It's a hell of a good time. What more do you need to recommend it?

Yet I can't stop thinking about that man with the football. At the bar, I end up telling the story to a trio of pilots for Air Tahiti, two Frenchmen and a New Zealander, who sit down next to me for beers. They know what NASCAR is, sort of; the Kiwi thinks he saw a race in California, though we later figure out it was actually Formula Drift. They nod politely as I tell my tale of cultural export and the uncanny valley of almost-but-not-quite cheerleaders. Then I pull out my phone and show a video from that afternoon, of a low-slung monster charging around a corner, crunching off another car and into the grandstand, momentarily climbing the fence.

The New Zealander whistles. The Frenchmen cluck their tongues and breathe that low affirmation with which I've become so familiar.

It's either ooh-lalalala or it ain't.

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