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As I write this it’s Monday and there still hasn’t been a Cup race, but that’s OK because I’m thinking about the trucks, Eastern North Carolina and next season.
ESPN first reported last week that Rockingham is poised to host the Camping World Truck Series in 2012 – its first NASCAR national touring series event since 2004 and first ever Truck Series event. The track is expected to announce the addition on Wednesday with North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue in attendance.
The move wasn’t a complete surprise as the track has been working to install SAFER barriers – another item reported by ESPN last month. Since Andy Hillenburg purchased the track from Speedway Motorsports in 2007, it’s played host to ARCA races, late model and street stock events and a whole lot of testing.
The addition of this race is no doubt a boost for the track. It lost its ARCA date this year after just two seasons and doesn’t have any other premier events. The Truck Series will give it exposure to new fans and what is sure to be solid attendance in at least the first couple of years.
The question for Hillenburg though has to be what the loss of all that testing will mean for the bottom line. Now that Rockingham is hosting a major NASCAR event, teams can no longer use the big facility. I suspect that was a major portion of Rockingham’s revenue. Certainly “Little Rock,” the half-mile test track behind the big track, is still open and available, but is it enough?
With higher sanctioning fees than other racing series and generally smaller crowds than the Nationwide and Cup Series, it’s going to take some work to make up the deficit.
Still, the thought of driving down Highway 74 towards Rockingham for a NASCAR event is exciting. It’s something no one has been able to do in years – I for one am glad NASCAR is taking the chance on the venue. We’ll see how everything turns out next year, but this is sure to be a bright spot.
Love it or hate it, fuel strategy is going to continue being the name of the game over the next few weeks. The last two Cup races and the most recent Nationwide Series race were all decided on late race fuel gambles, and the next three Cup races are all at tracks conducive to fuel mileage races.
Brad Keselowski, Kevin Harvick, and Justin Allgaier all picked up the most recent wins because they were able to stretch their mileage just a little bit more than everyone else. Their crews were able to squeeze every possible ounce of fuel into the cells during pit stops, and the crew chiefs and engineers burned up their calculators making sure they could make it to the end.
These races may not always be the most exciting to watch from the stands or on TV, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty of drama anyway. Those responsible for making the decisions and figuring fuel mileage are always holding their breath as the laps click away. Adrenaline is flowing and there never seems to be enough Tums around.
The next three Cup races are at Pocono, Michigan, and Sonoma. Pocono and Michigan are both big tracks that aren’t known for a ton of cautions. The cars get spread out pretty quickly, and there is plenty of room to race. That means we’ll see a lot of long green flag runs and situations like we’ve had at Charlotte and Kansas will happen again. Teams running further back in the pack will gamble on track position and we could see more first time winners.
At Sonoma, everyone works their strategy from the finish of the race backwards. The teams will figure out what the earliest lap is they can come in to pit and still make it to the finish, and work their strategy from there. Track position is always a big key, and fuel mileage plays a big part. Marcos Ambrose lost a chance to win at Sonoma last season because he could not get his car re-fired under caution after he’d been riding around with the engine off to conserve fuel.
We haven’t seen a ton of fuel mileage hate from the fans up to this point because we’ve had some exciting finishes. But that doesn’t mean the hate won’t make an appearance over the coming days. Just remember that sometimes the driver wheels a strong race car to the win, and sometimes clever strategy from those on the pit box rules the day.
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I get it. Kimi Raikkonen is a Formula 1 champion and believes he should be racing with NASCAR’s best. If there is one thing race drivers are often not short on, it’s confidence in their ability. It’s commendable that he wants to move up as quickly as possible, but if Raikkonen really wants to succeed, he needs to slow down. One Truck Series test coupled with a 15th place finish in a truck race does not qualify one for the Nationwide Series. And at this pace, when is he expecting to make a Cup attempt? Kansas?
You certainly would have hoped that Raikkonen and his advisers did a little research before they started writing checks. There are numerous examples over the last several years of other open wheel drivers thinking they can make a NASCAR career happen, only to find out that driving in circles isn’t as easy as it looks. Jacques Villeneuve, Scott Speed, Dario Franchitti, and Patrick Carpentier are all examples of of guys who’ve come and gone. And it could be argued that all were brought along too quickly. Juan Pablo Montoya and AJ Allmendinger experienced similarly quick paths to NASCAR, but it took both several years to be able to run well, consistently. Hopefully Raikkonen isn’t on his way to being the next flame out.
It’s ridiculous to think that a guy like Raikkonen would be able to come in and immediately be competitive against guys who’ve been on circle tracks their entire lives. I’m fully aware of Raikkonen’s pedigree, and his immense talent behind the wheel, but it takes a completely different skill set to be successful in a stock car. Not only that, but it would appear the young Fin isn’t even aware of NASCAR’s rules. Crew chief Rick Ren had to explain the “lucky dog” rule to him mid-race last Friday night.
I don’t want this post to come off as me hatin’ on Kimi. Worldwide interest is great for the sport, and drivers like Raikkonen open up NASCAR to new fans. I think it also helps NASCAR when guys from around the world want to come race here. It does nothing but add to NASCAR’s legitimacy. And how cool would it be to see a guy put a Cup Series championship on his resume next to his F1 title? Raikkonen could be the first. But it won’t happen if his development is rushed.
A few years back I heard a story about an open wheel driver I won’t name. In an early test session in his career, this driver supposedly told his guys over the radio that stock car racing was “child’s play.” Needless to say, he would find out later that this wasn’t the case. Hopefully Raikkonen isn’t under a similar delusion. He’s got plenty of talent and the resources to be here for a long time, but Kimi just needs to give himself the chance to learn how to be successful.
Do you notice in every sport how quickly the complaining starts when said sport’s hall of fame nominees and then inductees are announced? Unfortunately the status quo has been maintained in NASCAR. And as such, last week when the five new nominees were named for the NASCAR Hall of Fame, the usual brain trust set forth in complaining about why another driver, owner, crew chief etc. should have been nominated instead.
However minor, some amount of controversy has surrounded the last two classes to our Hall of Fame. As I’m sure many of you recall, in the first year it was that David Pearson got passed over for the likes of Dale Earnhardt, Bill France Jr. and Sr., Richard Petty and Junior Johnson. This year, Pearson got in, but it was Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip who didn’t (and some argued should have).
So inevitably when the Hall announced the nominees for the 2012 class, there was going to be someone, somewhere, unhappy with who was selected, or as was the case, not selected. And this year it was the question of why Wendell Scott wasn’t nominated over H. Clay Earles, Bobby Isaac, Cotton Owens, Les Richter and Leonard Wood (all, incidentally, men who contributed a great deal to the sport).
The inherent problem with a hall of fame selection process is that deserving people are going to get left out year in and year out. At this very early stage of this particular hall of fame, deciding who contributed most is nothing short of difficult. Take the Junior Johnson, David Pearson debate. While Pearson is arguably the best driver ever to wheel a racecar in NASCAR, Johnson’s folk hero status (not to mention winning ways) did an immense amount of good in bringing the sport into the mainstream. It was the Silver Fox vs. The Last American Hero. How do you decide?
Currently waiting to be selected are 25 guys who did a lot for this sport – that’s not to say though that there are 25 or 50 or 100 others who aren’t on the list who didn’t do just as much. It’s just going to take time to assure all those who should be inducted, are inducted.
I ask you, be patient, be respectful of those in the nomination process and enjoy these moments to relive the history of our sport through some of our sport’s biggest names. Your guy’s time will come.
Should NASCAR be doing a better job protecting its brand? I think we all probably know the answer to this question, but humor me.
Consider these news stories from yesterday: NASCAR is being sued by a company who attempted to affiliate themselves with the “NASCAR Performance” program; there are new owners of the NASCAR Plaza tower; and losses at the NASCAR Hall of Fame have been trimmed.
Now consider the common thread. They’re all stories where NASCAR’s bottom line has gotten in the way of them maintaining the integrity of their brand – and resulted in a ton of unnecessary and unneeded negative attention.
If you’re not from Charlotte, or aren’t familiar with the building, the NASCAR Plaza is a 20-story office tower attached to the city owned NASCAR Hall of Fame in Uptown Charlotte. NASCAR occupies about 118,000 square feet of the building, but it isn’t owned by NASCAR (or the City of Charlotte for that matter). It was built, and until recently, owned by Lauth Property Group. For the last several months the building’s lien holders, Wells Fargo and Regions Bank, have been locked in a legal battle over foreclosure of the tower. Trinity Capital just bought the building from the two banks.
That building’s literal connection to the NASCAR Hall of Fame (we’re all well versed on the issues there) has made that block of Uptown the source of a lot of around town snickering. The problem with these two buildings is that NASCAR wanted them, wanted their name on them, but didn’t want to pay for them. So with the benefits of getting their Hall and the vanity of their name on a high-rise in the Uptown skyline, they also got all the baggage that came with that.
This brings me to the lawsuit NASCAR is facing from Advance Lubricants. The company claims NASCAR illegally terminated a contract they had signed to be part of the “NASCAR Performance” program. Not speaking to the veracity of the lawsuit (I really couldn’t care), why does NASCAR even have a performance program? Obviously I know the answer to this, but do they not get how this stuff cheapens their brand?
My point is, NASCAR does these things that probably look great on paper, and are probably making them a good deal of money (or in the case of the tower and the Hall not costing them a lot of money), but they end up doing damage to their brand by the constant negative attention.
For instance, with the NASCAR Plaza, there were probably a dozen or more stories between the Observer and the Business Journal saying “NASCAR tower in foreclosure.” That doesn’t reflect poorly on Lauth, it reflects poorly on NASCAR.
The same thing with the NASCAR Hall. If it were privately owned by NASCAR they wouldn’t have to release attendance figures. Instead as they announce their inductees for the year there is a front page story in the Charlotte Observer talking about how bad attendance is, and how big of a deficit the Hall is going to run.
It’s true we live and operate in an environment that’s completely dominated by ads, sponsorships and 43 rolling billboards – and to the Hall, we’re in a sports environment where public financing of sports related projects is the cool thing to do. But you would think the behemoth at least partially responsible for creating this environment would have a little more sense when it came to maintaining their very valuable brand. I have my doubts.
The NASCAR Hall of Fame took center stage a couple of weeks ago as they announced their second class of inductees. The morning after the announcement though the Charlotte Observer’s front page story about the Hall wasn’t concerned with the class, instead, its focus was the money problems the Hall is plagued with.
For the last several weeks the Hall of Fame has been a popular topic in Charlotte. There is talk of budget cuts (to the tune of $3 million), layoffs, reduced hours, and delayed royalty payments to NASCAR. Things are so uncertain the editorial board of the Observer in recent weeks has taken to slamming the city and the Charlotte Regional Visitors Authority (CRVA) over the Hall.
“What’s built is built. Let us hope the hall builds attendance over time, and that fading fan enthusiasm for NASCAR revives. Otherwise, Charlotte will have to figure out what to do with a huge, white elephant building in a very prominent spot.”
As a recent Charlotte Business Journal article asked, “NASCAR Hall of Fame party’s already over?” Ah, yeah.
Chalk it up to what you want – bad economy, waning interest in the sport etc. – the fact is, the Hall couldn’t have opened at a worse time. On top of that NASCAR is contending with this public-private partnership that they really don’t have any control over.
I don’t think the Hall is headed toward a terrible fate, but this conversation is really not good for the long term health of the project. I have to wonder at what point NASCAR steps in to make sure this doesn’t turn into a ‘white elephant building’ in Uptown Charlotte. Surely they won’t let their Hall of Fame fail. Then again I wouldn’t have thought they would have allowed the conversation surrounding their hall be so negative (not that they really have a choice in the matter).
I understand the desire to build this thing with someone else’s money ($200 million worth), but the noise that has surrounded the Hall of Fame and the uncertainty that now surrounds the project begs the question, what is NASCAR’s role going to be? What is their commitment beyond what was initially agreed upon?
One thing I think we all can agree on is that the NASCAR Hall of Fame deserves better than this.
You know that old adage, “you can please some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all the people all the time”? Well, welcome to the selection process for the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
This year’s inductees were announced on Wednesday – and as with last year there was disappointment and disagreement. It’s hard to argue David Pearson, Bud Moore, Ned Jarrett, Lee Petty, and Bobby Allison don’t deserve inclusion into the hall.
Still, some were questioning today why Darrell Waltrip and Cale Yarborough weren’t included this year. Waltrip has 84 wins and three championships to his credit and Yarborough has 83 wins and three championships. Waltrip was quite upset. Their time is coming – just not this year.
The fact is, these two aren’t the only ones who could have been included in the second class. What about Raymond Parks? If he had lived another four months would he have been included in this year’s class? Or how about Dale Inman?
The question is at this point, what gets valued over everything else? Should on-track tangibles and intangibles be more important than off-track tangibles and intangibles? Certainly Bruton Smith (who by the way has been inexplicably left off the list of Hall candidates for the last two years) and T. Wayne Robertson did/have done just as much, if not more for the sport as Bud Moore and Lee Petty.
And then comes the prestige factor. Do you allow Cup guys in before considering prolific winners in lower series like Jack Ingram, or Richie Evans? After all this isn’t the Cup Series Hall of Fame (as I’ve seen some suggest), it’s the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
I think we all know this isn’t an easy process, and the questions I’ve posed don’t really have yes or no answers. Right now, we as observers of the sport struggle with who to induct because there are so many great candidates – if Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip had been inducted this year over say, Bobby Allison and Ned Jarrett, people still would have been screaming about it. ‘Why didn’t they induct Ned Jarrett and Bobby Allison this year?’ It’s just the nature of the beast.
I think this process has been run about as well as it possibly could be. Still, it’s not, and never can be a perfect process with a perfect outcome. I find it very disappointing that some have taken to questioning the integrity of the voters. It’s disrespectful not just to them, but to those who have been selected for induction.
As I said at the start, in this process “you can please some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all the people all the time.” Welcome to NASCAR.
It seems that everywhere you go in Mooresville, or really the entire Charlotte area for that matter, you always seem to run into somebody who works in racing. Those of you who read this blog that live in and around Charlotte will know what I’m talking about. And maybe it is something that shouldn’t surprise me with as big of a community as NASCAR is and how concentrated the area is with racing people, but it always does.
I was out with my significant other recently, and as we walked into the restaurant for a nice dinner, I spotted a very well known Cup Series crew chief. He was out with his family and blending in quite nicely. Shockingly enough , he wasn’t decked out head to toe in his race gear (we do have normal clothes too), so I doubt anybody even recognized who he was. I wonder though, if certain folks were out and about in other cities if they would be recognized.
After thinking about this, and wondering about these guys being recognized, I’ve come to believe there are probably two types of people in Charlotte. There are those who are into racing, recognize people, but leave them alone and let them be normal people. And the rest aren’t into racing and are clueless to those around them. I guess maybe there is a third group who do approach these guys, but I’m guessing it’s small.
In Mooresville specifically, it seems that you run into or see somebody all the time. From seeing NASCAR officials in the Target store, to filling up at the gas station next to a driver, or running into another crew buddy at a bar. Even when we are away from the track, we can’t stay away from one another!
I would imagine that being in certain places in Los Angeles would warrant similar sightings for actors, as would hanging out in Nashville for country singers. If you want to be in or around NASCAR, Charlotte is the center of the Universe.
So if you don’t live here, and happen to make it once to attend a race or visit some shops, here is some advice. When you are out and about, keep your eyes peeled, because you never know who you might see or run into! Just remember to be respectful.
In other sports, home games happen just as often as away games. But racing is different. We spend almost the entire season at away games. The sport as a whole only gets two home weekends a year; the 600 weekend in May and the October night race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. Both offer a welcome respite from the usual grind of the season.
I can’t speak for everyone, but I always enjoy the chances to go racing here in Charlotte. It’s like every other weekend in that I still get to do what I love, but it always seems to mean a little more getting to do it close to home.
One thing you always notice about the Charlotte races is the amount of people roaming around the garage area and on pit road during the race. Besides the usual suspects, the proximity to home allows many friends and family who don’t normally get to see what we do to come out and spend the weekend with us. The credential lists for these weekends always end up full because of the extra requests.
On top of that, it’s nice to not have to travel to a far away race track. Instead of long plane rides or crowded van trips, it’s only a short drive for most to the track. And it’s nice at the end of the day to be able to go home and sleep in your own bed.
And I don’t know if you happen to notice a difference, but to me it seems like the racing action is always a little more amped up. I think everyone wants to be able to win in front of a home crowd, so teams bring their “A” games and drivers are a little more aggressive. Charlotte races don’t usually disappoint.
To top it off, the facility at Charlotte really is a great one. The garage and pit areas are nice, and you can’t beat having a half mile dirt track and the greatest drag strip on the planet all in the same complex. Bruton (and Humpy) really did a great job.
For high school and college sports, those homecoming games are always a big deal. The fans come out to support the team, there are a ton of festivities, and you know the games will be hard fought. Racing is not different. Our homecoming weekends mean just as much. There really is no place like home.