Josh Wise and the NASCAR Doge Car (2014)

In May 2014, the Dogecoin Reddit community raised over $55,000 in DOGE to sponsor NASCAR driver Josh Wise. His #98 car was painted with a giant Doge meme — Kabosu’s face surrounded by red Comic Sans text. He raced the car at Talladega Superspeedway, reaching speeds of 200 mph with a Shiba Inu on the hood.

Wise made it through the entire race without crashing. He even won the NASCAR fan vote for the Sprint All-Star Race, earning a spot in the prestigious event. The Doge car became one of the most photographed vehicles in NASCAR history. For a community that operated almost entirely online, seeing their joke literally racing around a Southern American speedway was surreal. Crypto memes had crossed into physical reality.