It’s frustrating for drivers when they are forced out of a race.

Some angrily blame the actions of rivals for their misfortune. Others dismiss being sidelined as a law-of-averages occurrence.

Ryan Newman, driver of the No. 12 Penske Racing Dodge, eases the pain of a tough day at the track by going fishing.

In March of 2006, Newman wrecked at Atlanta Motor Speedway in a Nationwide event. After conferring with teammates, he went to his motorhome, gathered up some fishing tackle and took off to a nearby lake.

Then, in one of the best catches of his life, he reeled in an 8-pound largemouth bass.

“I can’t get enough of it,” Newman says of fishing. “I’m close, I guess, to being a fishing fanatic.”

You can say that again.

Newman’s motorhome, which accompanies him to every race, is always stocked with fishing tackle. He has also scouted out places to fish at practically every stop on the circuit.

His new North Carolina home has a small lake out back and boasts a room dedicated to Newman’s favorite pastime. It is meticulously organized, as one might expect from an engineering graduate of Purdue University.

One row of cabinets holds crank baits. Others hold skirted spinner baits, top-water lures and artificial lizards and worms.

The walls are covered with old-time fishing posters and photos of some of Newman’s finer catches — such as a 40-inch northern pike that he rates as his favorite angling accomplishment.

How did Newman’s fervor for fishing develop? He traces it to his grandfather, Gerald Newman.

“I’ve loved fishing since I was a little boy,” Newman says. “My granddad took me fishing and taught me how.

“My granddad and I fished mostly for bream, bass and walleye, but we were excited when anything hit.”

High on the list of Newman’s best catches is a 6-pound, 2-ounce largemouth that he outfought in South Carolina. It’s special not only because of its size, but because of where he caught it.

The bass was pulled from a large pond just outside Turn 4 at Darlington Raceway. That body of water holds a unique place in NASCAR lore.

When developer Harold Brasington was building the speedway in 1950, he made it egg-shaped to protect the pond, which was owned by a friend. Because of that “pointy end,” Darlington has confounded many racing teams for well over half a century.

Newman is a devotee of light spinning tackle, which enhances the challenge while fighting fish. He also likes light casting tackle, which requires the use of the greatest anti-backlash device known to man, the human thumb.

In 2004, Newman got a chance to try fishing with a fly rod for mountain trout. He joined a film crew from Charlotte to shoot a segment for the Outdoor Life Network television series, “NASCAR Outdoors.”

The setting was a headwater stretch of the North Toe River in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Newland, N.C. Newman caught several 20-inch trout. Included was a brown trout of especially vivid color.

Wanting to catch Newman in his element, I recently spent some time fishing with him at his lake.

He chose to go with a “buzz bait,” a surface lure that is reeled rapidly. At times, it is irresistible to largemouth bass.

Newman had told me that a few days earlier he and his wife, Krissie, had taken some super-sized crappie from their lake for a fish-fry.

I wanted to catch a big crappie, so I went with a small, white jig.

Wrong choice for me.

Newman lapped me several times with his buzz bait. However, I did reel in a stick.

While I didn’t catch any fish, it dawned on me that fishing with Newman was nonetheless a lot of fun. It reminded me of one of my favorite Buddy Baker stories.

Back in the 1960s, Baker was fishing on the bank of Lake Lloyd, the infield body of water at Daytona International Speedway, trying to catch a fish or two to pass the time.

“Fred Lorenzen drove up and made fun of me,” Baker recalls. “He said fishing was the biggest waste of time that he ever had seen.

“At that very moment, I got this great strike and hooked a huge bass, which jumped several times before I got it to the bank. It must have weighed 8 to 10 pounds. Freddie was stunned at what he saw.

“The next morning I went out there early to fish again, and Lorenzen was in my spot.

“Best I remember, he never got a bite.”

The moral of this story, decades later, is for non-angler racing rivals not to go fishing with Ryan Newman.

Like Baker with Lorenzen, he will get them hooked.

This story first appeared in the July 2008 issue of NASCAR Illustrated.