SOUTH BOSTON, Va. -- Tiffany Daniels of Smithfield, Va., got an early start in racing. Her dad Charlie, who got hooked on NASCAR at Richmond Fairgrounds Raceway as a kid, bought his first race car in 1985, the year his daughter was born. The girl grew up at the race track and quickly got a job. When Tiffany was 2, she became the rear-window cleaner for Charlie's team racing at Langley Speedway in Hampton, Va.

"It was real tight back there, and Tiff with her tiny arms was the only one who could reach those hard-to-get-to spots," Charlie explained.

Twenty one years later, Tiffany Daniels tore around South Boston Speedway in her home state, chasing an increasingly realistic racing dream with 25 women and minority drivers being scouted for a ride in NASCAR's Drive for Diversity program.

NASCAR likes to call the try out "American Idol on Wheels." This "combine," as it is known, has become one of the most dramatic and high-stakes auditions in racing. Simon and Paula aren't on hand; instead, the drivers show their stuff to representatives from teams such as Dale Earnhardt Inc., Bobby Hamilton Jr. Racing, Total Velocity Racing, Golden State Racing, McAnally Racing, DMT Motorsports, BBD Motorsports, RTD Motorsports, Addis Motorsports and Position One Motorsports.

Fourteen drivers who have what it takes to succeed on and off the track will be chosen to race in the 2009 season -- 10 in the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series and four in the NASCAR Camping World Series.

The addition of six additional rides in 2009 demonstrates a five-year-old program still creating opportunities and gaining momentum. What's striking is the impressive crop of female drivers -- young women with guts and moxie, dreams of stardom and the body scars to show for it, girls who have proven they can go fast in different forms of racing in all corners of the country, competing against men often twice their age. Common to nearly every single one of these budding athletes is the powerful and lasting influence of their fathers on their racing careers and lives.

Phoenix high school senior Cassie Gannis, 17, was Arizona Champion in the Bandolero Series in 2003 and Rookie of the Year in the INEX Legends Series in 2005. She scored four top-five finishes in 15 Whelen All-American Series events at Tucson Raceway Park this season. The reserved teenager's dad turned her on to racing while running at Manzanita Speedway, a dirt track outside of Phoenix.

"I grew up around the track helping out on the cars," Gannis said. "I kept bugging my dad and finally got a Quarter Midget car when I was 10."

Today, when a girl wants a pony, it's probably not a horse. She'll ask for a pony car with the biggest engine possible.

For some on Monday, like Kortney Kosiski of Lincoln, Neb., the Combine was a high-pressure opportunity to make an impression on a bigger stage. Kosiski comes from a storied racing background: Her father and uncle are both former NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champions and her grandfather competed in the 1960 Daytona 500.

Kristin Bumbera of Sealy, Tex., has been driving since the age of 8, when she drove a dirt-track go-cart. She moved up to become the only female competitor in the Super Mini-Cup division at Houston Motorsports Park before temporarily hanging up her helmet to join the crew of her dad's Super Late Model race team.

"I've learned a lot from my dad," the 21-year old Bumbera said. "He's told me to stay patient out on the race track and to have a plan for each race. After each race, he would go and sit down and help think things over; he's taught me never to lose my head in racing."

They were lessons learned well: Bumbera won two races this year in the NASCAR Whelen All-American series, and previously was the first female to win a late model race at Houston Motorsports Park in 2006.

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Natalie Sather of Fargo, N.D., listens to Drive for Diversity program mentor Wendell Scott Jr. during Monday's combine.

Laura Hayes' dad met her mom at a west coast short track. The sport brought them together, and their daughter, who started competing at 8 years old, has won 10 championships in Quarter Midgets over a ten-year racing career. Hayes, who lives in Wilton, Calif., finished sixth in the standings in the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series with Golden Gate racing in 2008.

Ashlee Lancaster has a higher understanding of the meaning of the Beach Boys' song Good Vibrations. She's been at the track since she was nestling in her mom's belly. Ashlee grew up on the race tracks of Mid-Missouri, where her dad wrenched cars for Carl Edwards when the Sprint Cup Series star was starting out on dirt. (Edwards often refers to the leaner years, handing out business cards in search of a ride; Ashlee Lancaster was trudging through the grandstands, helping out.) Driving late model dirt cars at Callaway Raceway in Missouri and now auditioning for a ride in NASCAR's developmental series seems a natural progression to the 19-year-old from Columbia, Mo.

"I've always been around racing through my dad, and have always wanted to race cars," she says. "My dream is to make it to the Sprint Cup Series."

That's where Arizona's Caitlin Shaw has set her sights, following a projected stop in the Craftsman Truck Series. Shaw, 19, got into racing when she was 9 years old, after restoring a car with her dad.

"That was great, but I really wanted to get into the seat," she said. Caitlin's dad, who drove in Albuquerque's short tracks, got her involved in Quarter Midgets. Shaw hopes to assemble many racing memories over a long career; for now, her fondest moment in the sport is catching the overjoyed look on her dad's face as she crossed the finish line to win a Midget race.

Some girls build cars with their dads. Many are coached by their dads. Others beat them on the track.

Jessica Wood, 21, hoofs it as a postal carrier by day. But put her in a Super Street Stock car, and she can pass you on either side. Jessica raced against her dad (as well as her uncle and brother) at Langley Speedway, where she began her career in 2002. The personable young lady has earned the rare honor of being able to say she was faster than her dad.

At South Boston Speedway, on a sunny, warm October afternoon, Charlie Daniels watched his daughter's time trials from the top row of the grandstands with lips pursed and jaw clenched. Daniels has been around the sport for some time. When he says, "Tiffany has worked as hard at being a race car driver as anyone I've ever seen," it's a flatly stated fact, absent the expected hyperbole of exaggeration from a proud father. Charlie has been Tiffany's mentor, coach and crew chief since she started racing Legends cars in 2001, then moved to running Late Models at Southern National Raceway and South Boston Speedway.

"Tiff and I are very hard on one another. If the car is not right, she'll get awfully frustrated. And if I see she's not performing to what she's capable of, I can get pretty hard on her."

Both father and daughter were moderately satisfied with Tiffany's laps in the stock car on loan from the Richard Petty Driving Experience, even though they were among the best of the day. But merely good is not enough for the highly competitive Daniels family, which includes brother Cliff, born three years after Tiffany and quick at Langley Speedway as well. Father and daughter each independently dissected her runs, suspected the exact locations on the 10-degree front stretch and 12-degree turns where a few tenths of a second could have been gained with slightly different braking and turn strategies, and both wished she could get back in the car for a few more laps.

Charlie Daniels wonders if women in the sport, his dear daughter included, put a restrictor plate on themselves. "Girls generally want to follow directions and rules," he observed. "They don't want to make a mistake -- not because they're afraid of crashing or fearful of injury, but because they're hesitant to take a risk. They don't want to be seen as the girl 'messing up' out there."

Tiffany, who had laid down a series of solid laps, is quick to point out her "24/7 commitment to racing" is hers alone, not the ambition of a father who wants to stay connected through his child to a sport he used to compete in. "I wasn't pushed into this," she says. "If anything, my dad knew how tough it was, and always wanted me to understand that."

Father and daughter cut a deal. An enormous amount of time would be required to succeed in racing. The hours sacrificed could never affect her grades, and she would attain a college degree. Tiffany kept her end of the bargain, earning a degree in mechanical engineering at UNC Charlotte. She now works as a support engineer for Ganassi Racing's No. 42 car, driven by Juan Montoya. She's at South Boston pursuing a dream to out run Juan and the tops stars of NASCAR.

The elder Daniels has been inside a car that's gone sideways. He is familiar with retaining walls from an intimate distance. Playing word association, the term "t-bone" doesn't first mean a juicy steak. Charlie Daniels knows all that can go wrong on a crowded race track filled with impatient drivers with full tanks of Sunoco and testosterone. Charlie's wife -- who sat on pins and needles watching him walk away from plenty of wrecks and eventually grew comfortable with the notion that "rubbin' is racin'" -- is actually the parent less anxious about the prospect of their only daughter running hard in NASCAR.

"Maybe I'm more anxious because I know Cliff and Tiff are in the sport because of me, and if they ever got hurt ..." His voice trailed off.

"But neither has been in a bad wreck. Today's equipment is good and safe, and they know what they're doing," he said.

Down below in the asphalt infield, Tiffany is giving an on-camera interview. She's going to be featured during the sports report on the NBC station in Washington, D.C. She speaks effortlessly about being a female racecar driver in a sport desperate for a female star, just the right mix of confidence and cockiness, about her hopes and dreams. A photographer is leaning on a knee in a military pose, his lens trained on Tiffany, snapping off rapid-fire pictures of the telegenic college graduate in her shiny driver's suit. The golden afternoon sunlight bounces off Tiffany's long eyelashes and broad glossy smile.

Whether or not Tiffany Daniels earns a ride in a NASCAR developmental series is beside the point. She and the 16 other young women patiently waiting in their fire suits to rip around a half-mile oval on a hot afternoon on the Virginia-North Carolina border are cruising a road of enormous possibility. Even if it's a long road, fraught with sudden turns and hidden speed bumps, it's doubtful any of these courageous young ladies barreling into the future will ever use the brake pedal.

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Twenty-five minority and female drivers from across the country participated in the Drive for Diversity combine at South Boston Speedway.

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