Bill Lester made his return to the sport on Saturday, racing in the NASCAR Truck Series Fr8Auctions 200 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
The longtime NASCAR driver hasn’t raced in 14 years, and by his own admission, he “really had no itch to scratch” when it came to getting back behind the wheel.
“I need to find out how I feel behind the wheel,” he told USA TODAY. “Do I still love it like I remember I loved it? Or is it something it’s like, ‘OK, I did it. It was cool. But I have no more burning desire, [and] the flame is extinguished’? I don’t know, and I am just as excited and encouraged to find out.”
Things did not turn out well for him as Lester found himself being booed by the crowd.
Bubba Wallace reacted to it on Twitter.
“To some we all look the same…probably thought it was me,” Wallace, the only Black driver in the Cup Series, tweeted.
How social media reacted:
Lester is a big fan of Wallace.
“For young, Black youth or youth of color, they have to see more athletes that look like them in this sport, right?” Lester said. “They need to see more Bubba Wallaces or Bubba Wallace having more success. It’s going to come. I believe, honestly, that it’s going to come with that program. But you know, folks are expecting way too much too soon. It’s not going to happen overnight. …
“But as soon as somebody like Bubba starts winning and more folks from the Black community start seeing that and realizing that’s something that they can do — because they see that, they have that exposure — then that’ll be something they start trying to do.”
