Black History Month: Lester keeps trucking (cont'd)

That prior professional life was one of white collars and big paychecks. With a degree in electrical engineering and computer science from UC-Berkeley, Lester landed a job at Hewlett-Packard where he worked for 16 years. He dabbled in road-course circuits and spent his weekends racing part time. But memories of his dad taking him to a race when he was 8 years old multiplied, and Lester gave it all up for a shot at full-time racing.

That eventually led to him becoming the first black driver to run a Busch Series race in 1999, and later land a full-time Truck Series ride with Bobby Hamilton Racing and then Bill Davis Racing.

And that took him to Atlanta Motor Speedway last spring.

"I've always aspired to race with the best, and when it came time to race my way in I knocked the ball out of the park, so to speak," Lester said of his Atlanta qualifying run. "Taking the green flag with those guys was something I always wanted to do because that's where it's at."

"In this day in time, for him to go out there in a one-off deal and make the race, he had to have tremendous support," Ballew said. "When you qualify for a Nextel Cup race, you are definitely a racecar driver. And he achieved that."

In the 48 hours between Lester's qualifying for the Atlanta race and the dropping of the green flag, his PR staff said more than 300 stories were written about him by media across the world. Fans and cameras swarmed him.

According to Ardy Arani, president of the Championship Group marketing team that gave Lester a sponsor for the race, so did sponsors.

"There's a couple of full voicemail boxes back at the office," Arani said last year between Atlanta qualifying and the race, referring to potential sponsors for Lester. "All of this is pointing toward 2007 when the game plan is for [Lester] to be a Nextel Cup driver without a second job in the Truck Series."

But the alleged calls from sponsors never got to Lester, who finished 38th after the rain-delayed event was run on Monday.

"I don't know who started those rumors or where they came from, but I was never involved in a discussion like that," Lester said about a spike in sponsor interest.

They never reached team owner Bill Davis, either.

"We didn't have any interest from sponsors on our end," Davis said. "We didn't see the attention fall off [after Atlanta] because it wasn't there."

Three months later, when Lester again qualified for a Cup race at Michigan, the hoopla didn't follow. He finished 32nd and on the lead lap in the rain-shortened event. (Continued)