Say what you want about Bruton Smith, you can’t accuse the guy of not speaking his mind. And you can bet when there are eager reporters around him the gospel according to Bruton is about to be preached.
Though it might have gotten lost in the noise about Carl Edwards and Brad Keselowski, Smith took time this past weekend to give his take on the state of the sport, and the changes he would like to see made.
Among his comments, Smith lamented his investment in Motorsports Authentics calling it the “worst decision I have ever made in my business life.” He also said he believes he can get a Kentucky Cup race on the schedule for next season (see stories here, here and here).
Always interesting though were Smith’s suggestions on how to improve the sport. He suggested:
I haven’t been the biggest advocate of moving the end of the year banquet to Las Vegas, but it clearly is a market that embraces the sport. Could they support two races a year? Probably. And why not finish the season in the place where you’re going to hold the banquet?
Smith said the health of the sport will be tied to the venues on NASCAR’s schedule. I think he makes an important point that the sport needs to stage events where the market is most likely to embrace the product. Unfortunately for Smith, NASCAR isn’t too likely to take dates away from the France family controlled ISC.
Another point Smith made was the need to remove the emphasis of points racing. Do you tune in every week to see your favorite driver run conservatively in order to maintain his points position? I’m guessing the answer is no. While I agree with him on that point I think altering the payout system penalizes those underfunded teams who do actually run full races (ex. Front Row Motorsports). I can’t say I have a better suggestion on how to get drivers to be more aggressive on track though.
On the topic of start and parks (though I could care less) I’m warming to the idea of making fields smaller. Maybe we need to go back to having the size of fields fluctuate depending on which track we’re at. It would redistribute the purses and give S+P’s less of an opportunity to participate.
I can’t say I agree with everything Smith said or suggested, but some of it made sense. For all his eccentricities I think he does a good job of understanding the wants and needs of fans. As one of the sport’s biggest stakeholders NASCAR ought to bring Bruton Smith to the table a little more often.
I know it’s a little early to start talking about the potential changes to the 2011 schedule, but why not? With California in our rear-view mirror and Atlanta now right in front of us, this season’s schedule presents us with two potential casualties for next year.
The ongoing saga of Kentucky Speedway looks to finally be coming to a close. After years of litigation and rulings in NASCAR’s favor, the former owners of the race track just had the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit turn down their request to reconsider the case. With that, the United States Supreme Court remains their last option for appeal. The court receives nearly 10,000 petitions to hear cases every year and selects generally fewer than 100 of those cases. That staggering number means this last ditch effort is a long shot.
Even still the group of former owners is fragmented (one side wanting to continue, the other not wanting to continue), so the process could continue. If that happens Kentucky Speedway will likely have to wait one more season, as NASCAR has held to not giving a race to the track so long as they are tied up in the court system.
Should this thing come to a close though, Bruton Smith and the rest of the folks at Speedway Motorsports are going to have a tough decision to make: which track loses its date?
From the get go it’s fair to assume Bristol, Las Vegas, Infineon, Charlotte and Texas probably won’t lost their dates. Smith has said in the past New Hampshire wouldn’t lose a date, but who knows. The other viable and perhaps most likely candidate is Atlanta. There was a lot of talk about this last year and I think it remains on top of the heap.
Not too far away from Kentucky is Kansas Speedway owned by the International Speedway Corporation. The track along with Penn Gaming is planning on building a hotel and casino on-site. Last week they gained approval for the project (and a gaming license) from the Kansas Racing and Gaming Commission. Now that the project is moving forward, ISC has to make the same decision SMI does: who loses that second date?
In January ISC’s Chief Operating Officer Roger VanDerSnick told USA Today the financial fortunes of Auto Club Speedway, Phoenix International Raceway and Michigan International Speedway would all be evaluated as they try to decided where Kansas’s second date would come from. In other words, they’re the most vulnerable. Martinsville, Richmond, Talladega and Daytona all also have two dates.
The specter of Martinsville losing it’s second date has been on the minds of everyone since Darlington lost its venerable Southern 500. I suspect though with NASCAR’s attempt to recapture the past, this move would not be their brightest. I picture fan revolt, the likes NASCAR has never seen.
So with that who should lose its date? Phoenix still does pretty well and certainly provides compelling racing. Michigan, though the racing isn’t always the greatest, does a great job packing the stands – that was quite evident last year. That leaves us with California, which has lackluster racing, ratings and attendance.
Despite Gillian Zucker’s best efforts at propagating the great things about her track, it just isn’t resonating. Check out NASCAR.com writer Joe Menzer’s take on California and Zucker’s “optimistic” attendance figures.
We still have time for time for things to change and NASCAR is a ways from creating the 2011 schedule, but changes could very well be upon us. With that said what do you think? Should Kentucky and Kansas get dates? Where should they come from?
I’ve been watching in anticipation the last few days as the showdown between the Formula One Teams Association and the FIA (Max Mosley) played out. Today we learned FIA President Max Mosley would give in to the teams’ demands to not impose the spending cap and he also agreed not to stand for re-election to the FIA. Surprise, surprise.
I got to thinking about what would happen if teams in NASCAR banded to together and attempted to stage a similar coup. The conclusion I came to was that this could not and would not ever happen.
Beyond the cars, the most pivotal part of a race is the race track. In the United States the only tracks really capable of accommodating NASCAR events are owned, for the most part by two companies: Speedway Motorsports Inc. majority owned by and controlled by Bruton Smith and International Speedway Corporation majority owned by and controlled by the France family. The France family of course owns and operates NASCAR.
Should NASCAR teams break away Bruton Smith’s SMI is certainly an option but ISC is not. What this means is the break away series loses the marquee Daytona 500 and only has eight tracks to race at. I doubt the Mattiolis would turn their back on the France family, so Pocono is probably out. There are a few other tracks that could add to the hypothetical break away series, but that is assuming they aren’t already with NASCAR in some capacity.
With F1 this isn’t the case. Because this is not just a regional sport there are tons of tracks that don’t currently host F1 events that would be capable of hosting them.
Another issue with NASCAR is the lack of control wielded by the teams. In F1 the teams are king, especially with the fans. Ferrari fans are Ferrari fans. Renault fans are Renault fans. The driver is often secondary. In NASCAR just the opposite is true. The teams are very much secondary to the personalities. If you want proof of this look to Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s departure from DEI.
All it took for Max Mosley to back down was eight teams (mind you eight very large teams) threatening to start a breakaway series.
Another thing working in NASCAR’s favor is their lock on TV contracts. In the United States we only have a handful of networks capable of producing and carrying large sporting events like a race. ESPN/ABC, Speed, Fox and NBC/TNT are all out of the question. Maybe the break away series could go on Versus?
Around the world there are countless companies and stations capable and likely very willing to produce and broadcast F1 races. There are a world of possibilities.
Lastly I don’t see any NASCAR team owners capable of funding another series. Sure they’re all wealthy guys, but none can afford what these F1 owners can. It is widely believed Ferrari spends/has spent in the past upwards of $500 million on their F1 program. That is insane and well more than the entire worth of most of NASCAR’s owners. Obviously large auto manufacturers can afford to fund this sort of thing, but a former Ford engineer, a football coach and a couple of auto dealers likely would have a much harder time. I guess what I’m saying is this sort of thing isn’t worth their time or money and they would have to know that.
In the end the FIA and F1 are just very different from NASCAR. The FIA is a consortium (though F1 is not), NASCAR is a privately owned and held company. The teams are allowed to organize in F1 and in the FIA, and in NASCAR the teams throughout the history of the sport have been strongly encouraged not to organize. Where F1 has a global presence and global opportunity, NASCAR is confined to just the United States and continental North America.
For better or worse NASCAR is the king of American auto racing. This is their game and we’re all just playing it. So don’t expect Roush, Childress, Hendrick and Gibbs to band together and threaten NASCAR anytime soon.
The big three NASCAR series all shared the same track this last weekend in Dover, but they all split up this weekend. The Truck Series is in Texas, the Nationwide cars take to Nashville, and the Cup cars head to Pocono. But before the weekend kicks off, it’s question and answer time! If you don’t know what this post is, until further notice, we will be answering any and all reader questions every Wednesday, right here. So if you’ve got one, click on the ”Ask the Insiders” tab at the top of the page and send one to us. On to the questions…
1. From Jason:
Hey guys, I love the blog - keep up the great work!! In various interviews with drivers and crew chiefs from all of the big teams, they all keep talking about continuing to work hard to refine their bodies for the COT. Even though NASCAR and the mainstream media claim that teams can’t mess with the bodies due to such tight specs in the rule book to conform with “The Claw”; I am starting to get the impression that there is actually significant grey area that engineers can tweak around with. Can you provide any more color on this topic and where on the body that engineers may be making tweaks within the rule book.
Thanks Jason, we are glad you like the site! While there are certainly more templates for the COT body, there is still some area to work with. There are places where templates don’t go, and between those places and the tolerances allowed by the rules, teams will find ways to make the cars better. The gains made just happen to be much smaller. - T.C.
2. From mert7878:
We all know that at the Sprint Cup level the drivers are among the best in the business. What I’d like to know is, putting aside the differences in equipment and team support, what separates the truly great drivers from the merely very good drivers in Sprint Cup?
That is a good question and one I don’t know if I have a good answer to. A truly great driver knows his equipment, he can feel every little thing right or wrong with his car and he knows how to communicate that. He also knows where he has to be and where he can be on the race track at all times. And perhaps most important he knows his abilities. This sport is all about situations and tendencies and if you know either through instinct or experience what do and when to do it (and how to do it) you will have the makings of being a great driver. - Journo
3. From Walt:
Two questions who determines the placement of the decals on the cars and how do the drivers and owners split the purse?
NASCAR has fairly specific rules about the placement of decals, which is why everyone has numbers, sponsors, and contingency decals in the same places. And the purse split is determined by a driver’s contract. From what I understand, the norm is for drivers to get around 40%. - T.C.
4. From Bill:
When it rains why is there a yellow flag instead of a red flag? It seems to me that the people up frount have no choice but to pit while the people in the back don’t lose much by continuing. It makes the losers the winners.
There are no guarantees that once it starts raining, that the rain will continue long enough for NASCAR to warrant a red flag. If it’s a quick passing shower that doesn’t make the track unraceable, then no red flag would be needed. NASCAR will run under yellow until conditions force them to throw the red. And the decision of whether to pit or not in these situations is really a throw of the dice. Some will stay out to try and gain that advantage, and others will pit thinking maybe the race will get restarted. - T.C.
5. From Susan:
I want to go to one Sprint Cup race this season. What track would you consider to be the best for a fan (esp since the COT)? In other words, I want to see passing. Thanks.
You will see passing at what ever track you attend. There is a misconception right now that the COT doesn’t allow for passing, and that just isn’t true. Personally, some of my favorite tracks include Bristol, Martinsville, the Superspeedways, and Dover. Maybe the readers have some thoughts? - T.C.
6. From Kenny:
T.C., yesterday, on “NASCAR Now,” Tim Brewer did a story about a supply depot used by the teams. He showed a pile of metal strips and said they were used to make lug nuts. I’m wondering if he was joking. Are lug nuts fabricated by the individual teams or are they bought in bulk from a major supplier?
He was not joking. Teams do not manufacture their own lug nuts. There are several suppliers the teams buy from, including KRC and ARP. - T.C.
7. From Lynn:
How many laps did the jet dryers drive for the Coke 600?
That’s a good question that I unfortunately don’t have an answer for. A lot is my best estimation. Jayski normally has goofy stats from races, but that one he did not have. - Journo
8. From T-Dawg:
I have been to several races where it has rained and had to watch the time consuming process of watching the track being dried. Are the tracks responsible for the jet dryers? And if so, why doesn’t NASCAR take over this responsibility? It seems that nowadays with modern technology they can predict when it is likely to rain during the weekend. Sure would be nice to see NASCAR have a “rain team” on standby at each track with ten or twenty jet dryers instead of the two or three that the track provides.
Yes the tracks are responsible for the jet dryers. SMI has a team of them and so does ISC. You’ll notice there will be trucks from say Texas at Las Vegas. As far as why NASCAR doesn’t do this I can give you two reasons. First, the cost to do this would be astronomical. I don’t know what a jet dryer truck goes for these days, but I can’t imagine they’re cheap. Assembling 10 or 20 of them would likely cost millions of dollars. Not to mention the cost of jet fuel. It just wouldn’t be worth it. The second reason they don’t do this is because NASCAR doesn’t own the tracks. It is essentially a maintenance issue and that is for the track to handle, not the sanctioning body. - Journo
9. From Dragonfly:
Can you please explain what exactly is a “start and park”? And what is the point? Is there any money in it? Thank you for doing this for us NASCAR fans every week!
A start-and-park is when a team shows up to the track with no intentions of completing the event. They qualify, and then park their car early in the race. The point is to make money, as they will collect the winnings for the lowest positions. At Dover, David Gilliland and the #71 TRG car used this strategy, and won $78,000. - T.C.
10. From Measure:
Watching theCoke 600, the worst rain-affected race since Fontana in spring of 08, the broadcast mentioned that with 7 jet dryer trucks, they could dry a soaking-wet track in 2 hours…. the no-rain window was often much smaller than that. With all the money NASCAR has, why don’t they come out to every race with 14 or even 21 jet dryers ready, just in case, so they can get the track dry in under an hour?
As I said above to T-Dawg in question eight, the cost to assemble that many jet dryers would be astronomical. And then you have maintenance, transportation and fuel costs. It just isn’t worth it. And to be honest there really aren’t any guarantees that you would use them. There is a chance, all be it a slim one, that there won’t be rain at any race. - Journo
11. From Kenny:
What is the consensus around Gasoline Alley regarding Tony Eury, Jr.’s ability as a crew chief?
I think everyone acknowledges that Tony is a good crew chief, but I think everyone also sees that the chemistry on that team just wasn’t right for whatever reason. The crew chief swap at Hendrick should not be seen as a knock against Tony, but things just weren’t working and obviously they aren’t going to switch drivers. He is the obvious first move. It will be interesting though to see if he stays at Hendrick past this season. - Journo
12. From Neon:
For both TC and Journo-Do you hear comments, criticisms, applause, intrigue about your website around the garage area (TC) and media arena (Journo)? Like the saying goes “I’d like to be a fly on wall….”. Do you get a kick out of what you see and hear under your anonymous cloak?
I’ve never heard anything said first hand at the track, but I have been told about people making comments about us through other folks. It usually centers around who we are and how we know what we know. I love hearing about it, because it means people are actually reading us. - T.C.
I actually have heard it first hand (I was eavesdropping). I laughed a little about it and of course told TC as soon as I could. - Journo
13. From Tom:
Gentleman, I enjoy your website. Would you please explain exactly what the “7″ car did wrong? “rear axle housing exceeded the maximum specified toe of plus or minus one degree” What does that mean? I know a little about drive trains, but that has me stumped. Did it give them some competitive advantage, or was it technically just splitting hairs?
Thanks Tom! With the rear axle housing, teams are allowed to toe the rear wheels in or out, up to one degree. From what I understand, they do this by bending the axle tubes on the rear end housing. In Robby’s case, the axle tubes were toed too far. For a good explanation of toe, click here. - T.C.
14. From Jim:
Well, You’re there to see it. Where did they put all the Haulers at Dover?? By my figures there was 122 parked somewhere since the Cup, Nationwide, and Trucks were there all on the same day. I’m not sure if there’s enough empty real estate inside a mile track.
Don’t worry, there is enough room. The Cup haulers and garage are situated in turns one and two, the Nationwide haulers were in their garage area in turns three and four, and the Truck Series haulers were pretty much in the middle of the infield. - T.C.
15. From Newracefan:
We’ve all seen the PR girls you know, the ones that hand the driver that all important Coke or what ever is sponsor appropriate. Are there any PR boys? Who do they really work for, the driver, the team, or?
Of course (though I wouldn’t call them PR boys to their faces ;))! On the NASCAR media list I counted 16 in the Cup Series. Just to name a couple, Tony Stewart has been with Mike Arning for ages, Martin Truex was with Blair Minton (a male) and now Jarrod England, Clint Bowyer works with Rory Connellan and Carl Edwards has been with Randy Fuller for the length of his Cup career. A lot of the heads of the communications departments at the teams are male too. Jonathan Gibson at Penske, John Olguin at Ganassi (EGR), Ben Schlosser at RCR; the list goes on and on. As far as who the PR people work for, it really just depends. Some of the teams provide PR people; at other teams the sponsors or drivers hire people at agencies to represent them. Some drivers hire a person in addition to the sponsor or team provided person. - Journo
16. From Melissa:
How are the NASCAR officials assigned to the teams each week? I can think of a few number of ways, but I’m trying to get out of the speculation business.
You know, I don’t have any clue how they do that. I looked through my rule book as well and didn’t see anything. I’ll have to get back to you on that one. - T.C.
17. From Ric:
I have noticed that during yellow flags the driver will sometimes have his left hand holding on to the safety net, or his hand / fingers just sticking out the window. I do know that the driver will stick his hand out to signal he is slowing down when he has car trouble, to pit, etc. but this doesn’t look like this, beside it’s a yellow flag everyone is going slow. Thought maybe he’s just trying to be in a different position to relax the muscles, but I don’t ever recall seeing them drive with the left hand and do something with the right. Any clue on what they are doing?
In many cases they are trying to get some fresh air into the car. Kind of like when you stick your hand out of your passenger car’s window while driving. - T.C.
18. From Ric:
Does the pit crew prepare and/or practice differently depending on what TYPE of track (superspeedway, short track, etc) is next? Do you prepare and/or practice differently for any certain track(s)?
Many teams will set up their practice pit stalls to the size they will encounter at the race track, so they can get a feel for when to jump off the wall and how much room they have to work with. And smaller or larger stalls create issues, such as how the driver comes in and out, which teams will go over. Also, at Superspeedways, the fenders are much tighter to the wheels, so teams will close up the wheel openings on their pit practice cars. Other then that, the only track that warrants special practice is Watkins Glen, because pit stops are backwards. - T.C.
19. From Mike:
I would like to know where SK motorsports is located.
I believe SK Motorsports is in the old Fitz Motorsports shop in the Lakeside Park in Mooresville, NC. - T.C.
And that brings yet another “Ask The Insiders Wednesday” to a close. Thanks to everyone who sent in questions. And remember, if you’d like to be a part of next week, click on the ”Ask the Insiders” tab at the top of the page and send your question in!
I think I should probably just start a problem series. I have been writing about it a lot lately. But I digress…
At the beginning of the season many in the media would have had you believing the world was crashing in on us. They were predicting empty race tracks, fleeing sponsors and failing teams.
Well six months into the year and four months into the season, things aren’t quite as bad as many predicted. Sure a couple teams have folded (the No. 8 car and No. 28 car), the independents are starting to struggle, and sponsors aren’t quite clamoring to spend tens of millions of dollars in the sport, but are things really that bad?
For the last several months everyone has been screaming about television ratings. Yeah they’re down, but if you look at them compared to other sporting events and programming, the sport really isn’t doing too bad. I unfortunately don’t have easy access to the Nielsen ratings, so I am working with what I can find online, but consider this: an average NASCAR race (not the 500 or another big race) does just as well as the NBA Finals did last year. They averaged about 9 million viewers.
That number is also big enough to beat a lot of primetime programming on major networks (not including Greys Anatomy or CSI of course). It also beats the hell out of the top rated cable programming.
Take a look at some older Nielson ratings and compare it to NASCAR this year. They’re down, but they’re no means bad.
The Chicken Littles are also pointing to the down attendance at the tracks. Now if you take the track estimations and subtract 30 to 40,000 (which is probably closer to the truth at some of these places) they are still nothing to scoff at. Any sport would give anything to have 100,000+ fans at their events every week. NASCAR is crying about it.
Sure it’s not the sell-out crowds we got just a few years ago, but still it is very good. The Super Bowl this year had just over 71,000 in attendance. With the exception of some of the smaller tracks, NASCAR easily beats that week in and week out.
Now I know what you’re saying, if there was a football stadium big enough (the new Cowboys stadium perhaps) they would have NASCAR-like attendance for the Super Bowl and that’s probably true (NASCAR couldn’t hope to have the TV viewing audience though), but the fact that NASCAR does that good every week is a very good thing.
So now that we’ve established things really aren’t that bad, I ask you, what is different between this sport and others?
The answer is the negative media attention on the sport.
Baseball attendance has been down and NHL and IndyCar TV ratings have been mediocre on Versus, but you don’t hear their respective press corps bashing the sport. In fact it’s quite the opposite. I have read several stories about how positive everyone is about the Versus ratings despite the fact the ratings have been cut in half for some events and how MLB is looking forward to a jump in attendance once the summer hits.
I feel like this sky is falling mentality has created a very negative perception of the sport by not only the general public but by the fans. I think much of the anxiety fans are feeling and another reason why they aren’t tuning in is the fabricated negativity. When you are reading every other day about how bad things are, or how bad things are going to be you’re going to start to believe it. I know NASCAR is attempting to combat this, but they can only do so much.
Things aren’t quite as great as they have been in previous seasons, there is no denying that, but are things really that bad?