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I think it is pretty simple, actually. Trout fishing has a long and storied European history as the sport of Kings, not because it was a Kingly Sport (which it is) but because only royalty and landed gentry were allowed to partake. In the US many took it up because of that Mentality, the hanging with royalty rush. Into the late 1800's and ear;y 20th century and prior to the introduction of the Brown Trout most of the productive Trout watrers in the US were privatized, owned by a few of the very rich and reserved for them alone. Think Upper Beaverkill, only for every trout stream you know. These were men not only of means but also of liesure, with college educations and a tradition of writing bad prose. They were also a lot like our current Hollywood crowd, very much interested in telling the world how wonderful they were. They were pretty much transplanting the European private preserve mentality into the US. The introduction of the Brown Trout changed that and probably saved trout fishing for the rest of us. It so vastly increased the number of trout waters available that the Robber barons simply could not buy it all up. It made trout available to pretty much everybody, who, being human, equated their new found freedom to once again chase the Trout to the upper class society that had monolpolized it for so long. We see that continue to this day, in many respects. Just look at any Orvis or LL Bean catalog, or the older Abercrombie and Fitch catalogs. House of Hardy holds much of its allure because of its history with British Nobility (and they make a pretty decent line holder).

Bass, on the other hand, was what was left over for the common rabble, and with a few noted exceptions, was held in some contempt, kinda like carp (and I know a few proffesional Trout and Steelhead guides who consider Carp on the fly the toughest, most difficult to catch and hardest fighting gamefish out there, preferring them over Salmon!!). That blue collar reputation continues. That being said, all of the great fly fishers of the 50's, 60's and 70's all raved about bass (Bergman, McClane, Brooks etc.), but wrote almost exclusively about trout. As to the Nascar aspect, so what? There is competitive Trout Fishing as well, just no boats. There is also about 17,193 times as much bass water as there is trout water and only 861 times as many Bass fisherman as trout fisherman, any way you do the math there are FAR FAR fewer bass fisherman per square foot of water than there are trout fisherman. If you only count wild trout waters, that ratio skyrockets. I have said it before, but lets make the comparison. Over 90% of the members of this board live within a 30 minute drive of at least one (most will be close to several several) stream, river, lake or pond where they can reasonably expect to hook and land a Bass of over 5 lbs every time they fish. How many here live within that distance of water where they could catch a Wild Trout of half or even a quarter that size? And I stuck in wild for a reason. ALL bass fishing is for wild fish. And while smallies do live in pretty warm water, they prefer cold running water, and are found in river systems well up into Canada.

So for me, it has always been Trout in Spring, Bass all summer and Fall. If I had to count days, even though I am an avid trout guy and live close to some nice wild waters and tailwater systems, i probably fish for Bass 8 to 10 times as often as I do trout.