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THE lawsuit: Read it here

If you haven't heard about it yet, you were going to soon so you might as well hit some of these links and understand what people are going to be asking you about your sport. The story about the $225 million racial discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuit filed Tuesday against NASCAR has exploded into the mainstream media.

An African American woman who used to work as a trackside official in NASCAR's technical inspection division, traveling with the Nationwide (formerly Busch) series has claimed she was the victim of outrageous abuse by fellow NASCAR employees. We are talking major knuckle-dragging, redneck behavior here.

As a news reporter with many years covering courts, I have written about lawsuits like this and I can assure you this isn't going to be pretty.

NASCAR has been trying with little visible success to diversify. Mauricia Grant was part of that effort. But, as Kansas City Star columnist Jason Whitlock wrote, "Damn! If you're looking for confirmation of NASCAR stereotypes you can pretty much find them all in Grant's $225 million lawsuit."

NASCAR President Brian France held a press conference Wednesday to say the claims are all news to NASCAR because Grant never complained as required in the employee handbook. She said she did and nothing happened -- except she got reprimanded and eventually fired.

The company reaction sounds a lot like the workplace sensitivity movie my bosses made all of us watch. I suspect you've probably seen that one too.

These cases usually come down to "he said, she said" battles with the defendant employer trashing the plaintiff employee's veracity and honor not only in front of a jury -- but also with a public relations smear campaign before the trial. Trouble is, no matter how many people you get to say, "Oh, she went along with the jokes," this behavior, if true, still is against the law.

Grant has already tipped over this trash can so you can read her claims in this link to her court pleadings. They are graphic and, if true, revealing of some outrageous racist opinions and behavior not only involving blacks but about every other minority on the planet as well.

As Whitlock suggests, no matter who is right, NASCAR might want to get out the checkbook and settle this one quickly and avoid losing all the progress the organization has made at modernizing the image of the sport.