NASCAR Racing: gettin paid, pit crew members, manual laborers

Question
 how do drivers in nascar get paid?  if you look
at the amount earned beside their name on nascar
.com  some drivers with less wins and less points
earn more money than drivers winning more and more
points.   also do pit crew members get any pay?
if so how? do sponsors generally pay for all upkeep on cars?
       also,why is so many people a dale jr fan
  he seldom wins and has set no records is it just because his dad died in the sport?

                    thank you very much!
              gary
       runrunningmarathon@yahoo.com


Answer
If you are talking about the money that is paid to the driver/car at the end of the race (which I'm sure you are) this is not what the driver gets paid. Each driver has his own contract with the car owner that has absolutely nothing to do with that dollar amount you see at the end of every race. What they are paid is a closely guarded secret. Most get a percentage of purses (that dollar amount you see at the end of the race and an annual salary along with performance bonuses. Crew members are paid usually through sponsorship money.
It is hard to say exactly how much of sponsorship and race winnings go to where. It is all put together by the owner and paid out according to contracts for salaries and the rest goes to the car building and the owners pocket. It's not cut and dry as to who makes what or how much from what goes where. Sorry if this sounds confusing but it's no different from any big corporation. How much goes to advertisers, the CEO, the manual laborers...where does the money come from to pay each...etc I know, clear as mud but like everybody, they don't talk about personal money in NASCAR.
As for Jr....well there were a ton of DE fans when he died so the majority started to pull for Jr. Kind of an overflow thing.