Longtime NASCAR driver Bobby Hamilton -- winner of the 2001 Talladega 500 and champion of the 2004 Craftsman Truck Series -- died Sunday of cancer. He was 49.

Hamilton was diagnosed with head and neck cancer in February 2006 after a malignant growth was found when swelling from dental surgery did not resolve.

Despite his diagnosis, Hamilton went on to race in the year's first three events, with a best finish of 14th at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

"I love what I do; I love this business," Hamilton said. "NASCAR has been good to me, and I just don't feel comfortable when I am not around it."

Hamilton did turn over the wheel to his son, Bobby Hamilton Jr., for a short time while undergoing chemotherapy and radiation -- and then he was back to the races in August when CAT scans revealed he looked healthy.

But he learned all too quickly that microscopic cells remained on the right side of his neck.

"Cancer is an ongoing battle, and once you are diagnosed you always live with the thought of the disease in your body," Hamilton said. "It is the worst thing you could ever imagine."

Hamilton, who drove in all of NASCAR's top three divisions, had four wins under his belt in what is now the Nextel Cup series. His wins came at Talladega, Phoenix, Rockingham, and Martinsville, and his best ever season was in 1996 when he finished ninth in the points standings. Also winner of 10 truck races and one Busch Series race, Hamilton boasted earnings of $14.3 million, raced to 20 top-five finishes, and became a full-time driver-owner in the truck series in 2003.

Another NASCAR favorite, Benny Parsons -- 1973 Winston Cup champion -- was diagnosed with lung cancer in July. He was admitted to intensive care last week at a North Carolina hospital.

Ford has been very active in the race for a breast cancer cure with its Warriors in Pink campaign -- which has raised 87 million dollars and counting -- for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.

One of our favorite sibling blogs, Autoblog has posted Ford Bold Moves - Episode 16: The Warriors (and one wicked crash) including video of the Ford Bold Moves web-based documentary series 16th episode which features race car driver Katherine Legge during her recent race at Road America behind the wheel of Warriors in Pink race car. She crashed during the race but was able to make it out without injury and returned to racing as a Warrior in Pink five days later.

After the crash, and the return to racing as a Warrior in Pink, Legge said, "You have to keep trying. You never give up. Basically, I am a firm believer if you want something bad enough you make it happen. So you just keep plugging away. Determination is the name of the game I reckon."

Legge definitively symbolizes the attitude of a warrior.

For more on Warriors in Pink, we have these related posts:

• Warriors in Pink: enter to win new car help create virtual quilt
• Grey's Anatomy cast become Warriors in Pink
• Warriors in Pink: believers survivors fighters
• Ford's Warriors will bang their drums on ABC's The View
  

Thanks to Joel Arellano for alerting us to this story and John Neff for blogging about it!

Australian pop star and breast cancer survivor Kylie Minogue has lost her close friend and chauffeur Nigel McCarroll to cancer. McCarroll supported Minogue through her cancer struggles into cancer survivorship. Attending the funeral, she laid a wreath in the shape of his favourite Audi car at the crematorium service, according to Movie & Entertainment News provided by World Entertainment News Network.

A friend is quoted as saying, "Kylie was devastated that the disease Nigel helped her fight took his life."

Being a cancer survivor is bittersweet, when some of those you are close to, or become close to during cancer treatments and recovery, do not make it with you. There is always a lining of sadness to the celebrations of being alive, of beating cancer, of knowing you survived cancer. You do not forget the ones who are lost to cancer.

In honoring the memory of those who walked with you, you do not allow yourself to forget. And in those times, when you lose someone close who journeyed along side you in the fight to live, being a survivor holds little in triumphant feelings when you know that someone else fighting the same disease did not make it. You question the fairness of life -- and realize it is not fair at all.

Former New York City cab driver and NASCAR Winston Cup Series champion Benny Parsons said in an interview that when people find out he has been diagnosed with lung cancer, the first question they ask is, "are you a smoker?" At one time, yes he did smoke, but he quit in 1978. Parsons says since quitting he grew to dislike smoking so much that he prohibits his golf buddies from smoking around him.

Parsons is a Daytona 500 and Coca-Cola 600 winner in addition to being a NASCAR champion. Today, he works as a NASCAR television and radio commentator. He was diagnosed with lung cancer after he developed trouble breathing and went in for a checkup. He plans to keep working as an analyst on NBC and TNT's coverage of Nextel Cup racing and hosting Fast Talk with Benny Parsons on the Performance Racing Network while undergoing cancer treatments.

In 1989, Parsons won the CableACE Award for the best sports analyst on cable television in his first year in broadcasting with ESPN. In 1996, Parsons won an NASCAR Emmy for his NASCAR racing telecasts is called The Professor because of his humorous remarks and relaxed personality.