The Mark of a Champion: Bristol Will Be Mark Martin's 1,000th Career NASCAR Race

The very first time that Mark Martin ever strapped himself into a NASCAR Winston Cup racing machine, was in 1981 at North Wilkesboro where he would finish 27th out of the 31 drivers who competed on that historical day.

Richard Petty would go on the win the race, with Bobby Allison finishing second as the driver who led the most laps.

Now here we are 28 years later, and Martin, who raced against some of the greats such as Harry Gant, Terry Labonte, Dale Earnhardt, Tim Richmond, Benny Parsons, and Ricky Rudd just to name a few, is about to reach another milestone this Saturday night.

Mark Martin will become only the third driver in NASCAR history, to officially start his 1,000th career NASCAR race.

Martin will join Richard Petty and Michael Waltrip as the only drivers who have ever started 1,000 races.

Milestones such as these only come around once in a lifetime, and Martin had no idea just how special this Saturday night would be.

“I honestly didn’t know this milestone was coming until I had a few reporters bring it up lately,” said Martin. “Wow. That’s a lot of races. I didn’t realize that I was even close to that many.”

This comment alone shows the true and honest character that Martin has within himself.

There are not enough words in the English dictionary to describe what Martin has meant to the series.

Martin has exemplified what the phrase, “a true sportsman” actually means.

He has not only brought with him a true desire to always be the best on and off the track, but you can also add to the fact that he is one of the classiest drivers that has ever graced our beloved asphalt tracks.

Throughout the years Martin has shown how to be competitive without letting his emotions get the best of him.

And for a driver to race this many races and still be able to compete at this high energy level is testament of just how hard he works to keep in shape.

Martin is no longer the young gunslinger that he was at one time, but the way he handles his Hendrick Motorsports race car you could never tell the difference.

At the young age of 50, Martin has found his share of success in the top three NASCAR racing series.

Martin, who has four wins while leading the Sprint cup series in wins so far this season, has won a total of 39 Sprint Cup races.

Martin has also won 48 Nationwide events and seven Camping World Truck races for a grand total of 94 NASCAR victories.

So with numbers like these, it’s easy to see just how versatile of a driver he actually is. With all that versatility, Martin has also seen his share of the changes that NASCAR has gone through in the last three decades that he has been around the sport.

“There’s so much,” he said. “I think the driver’s themselves are one of the biggest differences that I have personally seen.

The competition has gotten much more difficult. Back then, there were about 12 really good teams. Now, there are probably 40.”

For those of us who can still remember back that far, the sport has come a long way since before the Internet was even invented, and the media grabbed a hold and ran with it.

The Internet alone opened up a lot of doors as well as helped to boost the sport's ratings into the second-most watched sports in the country.

“The attention that the sport has gotten has grown about 10 times over. The media coverage, the fan support,” added Martin.

“Everything has grown so much, and of course now there are more responsibilities than just on-track.

A lot has changed. I can’t pick any one thing that was bigger than another. For me, personally, I’ve had a lot of important wins,” he noted.

“I’ve said all along, and I’ll still say, that you don’t get to choose the races that you win…if you’re lucky, you just get to win."

"I’ve given my best to all 999 races and made decisions in each of those that I thought were the best at the time. I wouldn’t change a thing.”

So when Martin takes the green flag in the Sharpie 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway it will be his 746th Sprint Cup race.

Throw in the 231 Nationwide starts along with the 23 Camping World Truck races and Saturday night will mark his 1,000th start.

Not bad for a driver who just four years ago, was already sitting in a rocking chair looking retirement straight in the eye.

But once that eye started twinkling, he jumped out of the chair and back behind the wheel of his No. 6 Roush Racing AAA-sponsored Ford, and it’s easy to say that, “He is still making history.”