DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- As stock cars roared around the track, a small black Volkswagen Jetta made a slow crawl through the Daytona International Speedway garage and pulled up to the NASCAR hauler.

Bill France Jr. climbed out and gingerly walked the 10 steps toward the truck.

	NASCAR Chairman Bill France, right, jokes with four-time Winston Cup champion Jeff Gordon.

At least a dozen crew members stopped and waved. A handful of officials asked if he needed any help.

Nope, NASCAR's chairman is just fine after recent health problems and back at work keeping a watchful eye over the family business.

"I'm feeling better, a lot better,'' the 69-year-old France said in an interview with The Associated Press. "My hip's a little sore, that's it. But the way I see it, things are good because I'm on the right side of the grass.''

France, the oldest son of NASCAR founder Bill France Sr., broke his right hip in August when he fell after misjudging a step in a Daytona restaurant. Before he could be treated for that injury, doctors insisted he have heart bypass surgery.

The long recovery and a setback -- one lung filled with fluid in early December -- kept him away from most NASCAR functions and led to speculation that the cancer he beat in 2001 was back.

A recent checkup, though, gave him a clean bill of health, he said.

"As far as I can tell, the genie is still in the bottle,'' France said. "She was playing in the sand right close to the bottle. We had to grab her and put her back in.''

That's France -- quick with a smart remark to lighten the mood or sugarcoat a serious situation. But he pulls no punches, freely sharing his opinions, and spending all his time and energy working for the advancement of NASCAR.

Now he's back in his office each day, a wheelchair folded up against the wall and an oxygen tank shoved in the corner.

He doesn't need either -- at least not in public -- and is determined to look his best when he plans to make his first official appearance of the 2003 season next week at a NASCAR function at the annual media tour.

France will be there to support the new garage-access guidelines, a policy he helped shape with ideas on limiting autographs.

At his suggestion, the sanctioning body is considering establishing a time and place each weekend for drivers to sign autographs for fans with garage passes. Aside from the area immediately surrounding the team hauler, drivers would be prohibited from signing anywhere else in an effort to reduce congestion.

He's already secured support from Winston Cup champions Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon, proving that even though NASCAR President Mike Helton now runs the day-to-day operations, France still has his hand in everything in the family owned business that some have called a "benevolent dictatorship.''

He's not shy about discussing some of the problems that face the 55-year-old stock-car organization, including the lack of minorities in the sport.

"We had (black driver) Wendell Scott in the sport in 1956 before diversity and integration was even (in) vogue,'' he said. "We get zapped all the time about this, but we've got a program to bring minorities in, not just African-Americans, but it's not that easy.

"It's not a sport that you can take in school. You can't play it on the college level. An African-American can't just walk into (car owner) Rick Hendrick's office and ask for a job. Rick Hendrick is going to want to know what kind of racing he's done, and there is the problem. He needs to have some seat time on some level.''

France points to NASCAR's long history of allowing women to compete -- Shawna Robinson ran in the Daytona 500 last season -- as a sign that his sport is actually ahead of others.

	“	We get picked on about everything. That's the price of being in the big league. ”
		— Bill France

"We've had women drivers racing cars for years, and right now everyone is talking about women at Augusta,'' he said. "Nobody is on our back about women.''

On the topic of driver benefits, France brushed aside criticism that NASCAR's stars put their lives on the line every time they get behind the wheel, yet don't even get a pension from the circuit.

France insists that NASCAR has no obligation to the drivers, that each is an independent contractor working out his own deal with his car owner. It's up to the driver to save for retirement and work out a 401k plan, he said.

"If a driver like Tony Stewart races in smaller series all over the country in his free time, why doesn't anyone ask those series what they are doing for Tony Stewart's future?'' France said.

He adds that unlike other sports, where proceeds from the sale of hats and jerseys go to the league or the team, NASCAR allows drivers to retain their licensing rights and cut their own deals.

"You look at a Jeff Gordon, from all his souvenir sales and endorsements, put his income up against any other top players in any other league, and I think you'll see he does pretty well,'' France said.

Documents filed last month in Gordon's divorce showed he made $18 million in 2001.

France pointed to the NFL's weekly injury list and says NASCAR drivers don't have nearly as many ailments as football players. In addition, veteran drivers aren't suffering from lingering side effects the way former NFL players are.

"Crashes we have, and some of them are pretty violent,'' he said. "And I'm the first to admit an NFL player rarely gets killed on the field. But there are plenty walking around with broken knees, guys in their 40s and 50s with all kinds of problems. We don't have any of that.''

He adds that the big revenues the sport enjoys are "not going straight in Bill France Jr.'s pocket,'' and that NASCAR has an enormous operating budget to maintain.

"We get picked on about everything,'' France said. "That's the price of being in the big leagues."