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You’re 41. You’ve got four NASCAR wins. You’ve worked for the same people for the most of the last decade. And now you’re out of a job with just three weeks until the end of the season. What do you do?
This is the question David Reutimann has to to answer right now. What does he do? He’s not young, he doesn’t have money or sponsorship to bring (that we know of) and he’s not miraculously going to be anything more than what he is. What you see is what you get.
Reutimann’s first foray into NASCAR came in 2002 with Joe Nemechek. After sporadic runs through that season and 2003, he was hired by Darrell Waltrip Motorsports. He eventually moved full time to the Cup and Nationwide Series with Michael Waltrip Racing in 2007.
During his time with the Waltrips, Reutimann has four wins, and points finishes of second and third in the Nationwide and Truck Series’. His best Cup season to date came in 2009 when he finished 16th in the points after one win, five top-fives and 1o top-10s.
Only Michael Waltrip has more wins in his equipment than Reutimann – and to date Reutimann can claim all two of the team’s Cup wins.
What’s more, this season he’s only a little worse than teammate Martin Truex Jr. – average of finish of 22.9 compared to 18.4 – and is four spots behind Truex in the points.
Reutimann’s release on Thursday was a stunning turn about. He had been granted a three year contract extension just last year and was a consistent force with the team. To his credit, Reutimann did a lot with sub-par equipment. Apparently it wasn’t good enough though.
The worst part of all of this is that Reutimann faces pretty bleak prospects on the market, especially given the timing. Teams are cutting back, have already filled spots or are only looking at drivers who are bringing something to the table. Like David Ragan, Reutimann will be hard pressed to find anything worth while or competitive, especially at the level he’s at now.
As they say, it’s not show friends, it’s show business. Thank you MWR for making that painfully clear.
We got another stark reminder last week about how a weak economy and soft sponsorship market are affecting NASCAR teams. UPS announced they would be moving from full primary sponsorship at Roush Fenway to one race as a primary sponsor with a full season as an associate sponsorship. Ouch.
The move likely means just three teams for RFR in 2011 – and David Ragan out of his ride. Add to their woes the closure of Kevin Harvick Inc., possible downsizing at Turner and Germain, less than full sponsorship for Matt Kenseth and Clint Bowyer and you have a tough market for teams and drivers.
That is, if you’re a driver without money behind you. If you have sponsorship, or dollars to throw around, the world is truly your oyster.
Nelson Piquet, who’s losing his ride at KHI at the end of the year has been on the hunt and talking to multiple potential suitors. He told WSB Radio:
“It’s down to Turner [Motorsports], Penske [Racing], Kyle Busch [Motorsports], and Eddie Sharp [Racing]… Maybe a little bit less Eddie, because he doesn’t have [a] Nationwide [team] and we are planning on doing part of the Nationwide Series next year.”
Not a bad group of teams to be deciding from – especially since they’re courting him, not the other way around. Piquet, a former Renault F1 driver – involved in a 2009 scandal – came to NASCAR in 2010. The driver has quickly acclimated, scoring three top-tens in five starts during the 2010 Truck Season and four top-fives and eight top-tens so far this season.
Piquet is a good prospect. Even better, he brings money with him. Truly a win-win for any team.
Consider too Brendan Gaughan, the son and grandson of legendary Las Vegas casino owners. The Gaughan’s have a lot of money and just like Piquet, Brendan’s pretty good.
According to internet reports Gaughan has been in negotiations for a ride with Richard Childress Racing. The team is competing for a championship in the truck series and will have a renewed Nationwide Series program next season. RCR has, of course, made recent forays into the pay-to-play side of NASCAR with Paul Menard, Tim George Jr., John Wes Townley and Joey Coulter, so this isn’t completely surprising. This potential deal gives Gaughan his best opportunity for success since he left Penske years ago.
It’s truly a buyers market right now. If you can bring money to the table and you have signs of talent (and in the case of some drivers a personality that can be managed) where you end up is up to you.
Superspeedway racing tends to bring out the worst in everyone and this weekend in Talladega was no different. We had accusations of team orders, then subsequent denials, crew chiefs telling drivers to wreck on purpose, blatant cheating and complaints from everyone on track about the driving. There has been shock and outrage from the NASCAR press corps and the sport’s fan base. After all, who knew any of this went on?!
We’re Shocked Someone May Have Been Cheating
SBNation’s Jeff Gluck posted a story yesterday with audio from #48 crew chief Chad Knaus. Knaus is heard telling Jimmie Johnson to “crack the back of the car” if they win. Presumably they were beyond the allowed tolerances for whatever reason.
Knaus admitted the intention saying he was, “ Just being proactive, I just told Jimmie, ‘Look, man – we’ve just got to make sure there’s a tire mark or some type of visible damage.’ Just because cars do move when you race them like that.”
This ended up being the story du jour on Wednesday. It was unbelievable that a team could be working in the gray area – no one does that! Of course we already knew Jimmie Johnson and Chad Knaus were cheaters…
The Roush Team Orders
Jack Roush telling his drivers to stick with Ford teams!? Ridiculous.
This was the outrage of the weekend after word seeped out that Ford and Roush had, at the very least, made it clear that their teams should stick together at Talladega.
Ford and Roush both denied “orders” were issued, but it was pretty clear what the expectation was.
The way the talk was this weekend though you would have thought Roush was the only one that made this expectation clear. Of course anybody with two eyes and a basic understanding of the sport could see every other team on track had done the same, and why wouldn’t they? As I wrote on Monday, you draft with who brought you.
You Feel Double Crossed?
Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon were both beside themselves after the race Sunday. They had committed dancing partners who they felt abandoned, or sabotaged them in favor of teammates. It’s a cruel world.
Stewart told SB Nation:
“It’s a shame, because I’ve never seen more politics in a race go on in my life than what I saw this weekend…I think the car owners are to blame, the manufacturers are to blame and the fans don’t deserve that.“
Gordon echoed Stewart, saying after the race:
“I don’t think [Trevor Bayne] really ever had any intentions of pushing me, and if he did, the Ford folks told him to do something different. It’s politics, that’s part of it.”
As they say, it’s business, it’s not personal. And of all people I would expect Gordon and Stewart to know that. It’s true it’s unfortunate for the fans, it stinks for those who got the shaft, but the fact is it’s reality. Welcome to NASCAR boys.
Hey Trevor, Cool It With The Hyperbole
Speaking of distraught, Trevor Bayne. He’s young and apparently doesn’t know when to go light on the hyperbole. In an interview with SceneDaily he said:
“I was caught in the worst situation I could have ever been in.”
Devastating. I’ll bet there was some cringing at Roush after that interview.
He did go on to say that he wasn’t forced to switch drafting partners but felt it was his role as Kenseth’s teammate. Either way, nobody can fault him for making the decision he made – not even Jeff Gordon. He’s in a precarious position at Roush and needs to do what he has to do to keep the bosses happy and his butt in a ride.
A lesson though (not for our interests but his own) when you’re trying to make a good impression, toe the company line.
This whole week has left me shaking my head and rolling my eyes. While we don’t necessarily get to be witness to some of this stuff on a weekly basis, it happens that often. No one should be surprised about ANY of this. Consider this week a window into NASCAR reality.
Now on to Martinsville and a decidedly less controversial setting.
The death of IndyCar driver Dan Wheldon and questions about safety led the collective motorsports news this week. Wheldon was laid to rest Saturday in a private ceremony in St. Petersburg, Fla. NASCAR’s Jimmie Johnson drew ire this week after saying the IndyCar Series shouldn’t race on ovals. After criticism, Johnson clarified that he meant high-banked ovals. In other news, NASCAR confiscated windshields from all three Michael Waltrip Racing and affiliated teams at Talladega. Potential penalties would be announced early next week. This is the NASCAR week that was, October 16 to 22, 2011.
NASCAR takes ‘really big step’ with fuel injection
NASCAR Limping Toward Convergence
How things are quite different for one Cup team a year later
David Gilliland acknowledges Ford discourages drafting with Tony Stewart
Spouses find ways to deal with risks of racing
Vintage Insiders
It Was Time For Kahne To Go
In NASCAR, As In Life, Nothing Is Certain
**Remember if you have a NASCAR blog or website and would like a recent article you wrote featured in this section email me and you could be part of next week’s NASCAR Week That Was. Please only send stuff you have written.**
This week NASCAR’s at Langley Speedway in Hampton, Virginia for the annual Drive for Diversity Combine. The event brings together some of motorsports best young female and minority drivers to compete for a small number of spots in NASCAR’s D4D program. This year the class includes 26 drivers from 10 states, Mexico and Puerto Rico.
The drivers, according to NASCAR:
“will be evaluated by a select committee on multiple fronts including on-track performance, marketing and media aptitude, physical fitness and personality.”
The ultimate goal for the drivers is of course a ride, in this case for the NASCAR backed Revolution Racing, while for NASCAR it’s to attract more minority and female drivers and fans.
This season the program has been among the most successful with prospects Sergio Pena and Darrell Wallace Jr. winning a combined six Pro Series races. It’s the most NASCAR wins of any D4D class to date.
Even with the success, NASCAR is now finding the limits of the program. Pena and Wallace, both in their sophomore year of the program, are reaching the end of what they can do in the series. Both are conceivably ready for opportunities in ARCA or the Nationwide or Truck Series but with a stagnant sponsorship market and shrinking teams, finding a ride independent of NASCAR is no easy feat.
Continuing as it is under the direction of Max Siegel and John Story at Revolution Racing, the D4D program is… what it is. It’s true that it’s a great opportunity to identify and cultivate talent. But if there is nowhere for these drivers to go once they’ve grown out of the program, has it really been successful? Has it really accomplished anything?
It was a step in the right direction when NASCAR put more resources and more emphasis into the program a couple of years ago. It had, up until then, been pointless. Even now though, after eight years, the program has yet to produce a regular competitor in a national series.
Still, I think it more important than ever for the sport find ways to build diverse audiences and fields. I’m just not sure, even with the added emphasis and added resources, the current model is going to work.
It was officially announced today at Charlotte Motor Speedway that Dollar General would move it’s sponsorship from Turner Motorsports and Sarah Fisher Racing (IndyCar team) to Joe Gibbs Racing for 2012. The retailer is upping it’s NASCAR spending from just a single, full time Nationwide Series car, to 12 Cup races as a primary on Joey Logano’s #20, a full NNS season with Brian Scott, 10 more NNS races to split between Logano and Kyle Busch, and ten Truck races with Kyle Busch Motorsports. It’s a significant jump for Dollar General, and while that is good, it isn’t all positive.
From a state-of-the-sport standpoint, seeing companies starting to commit more dollars to NASCAR is very good. Having new sponsors come in like Farmers Insurance, and existing sponsors like Dollar General stepping up is what the sport needs moving forward. We are still experiencing some contraction, but hopefully moves like these show better things are ahead. Companies need to know that NASCAR is still a great vehicle to reach millions of very brand loyal consumers.
What hurts in this deal though, is seeing an independent Nationwide Series team in Turner Motorsports lose out to Cup stalwart JGR. Those independents are what we need to keep the lower series going, and it seems we lose more and more of them every year. But, in the end NASCAR is a business, and JGR did what was necessary for the future of their organization. You certainly can’t blame them for that. And Dollar General is free to do with their marketing dollars what they wish. Like they say, it’s not called “show friends,” it’s called “show business.”
The other part of this deal that stands out to me, is the reduction of Home Depot’s involvement with JGR. They have been associated with the Coach’s race team since the 1999 season, and have not shared the #20 very often. With this deal, they are giving up 12 races to Dollar General, or almost a third of their involvement (figuring in all events).
As J.D. Gibbs would have us believe, he went to Home Depot and asked for them to allow space for Dollar General. But is that really the case though? During the Carl Edwards sweepstakes, rumors would have us believe that Home Depot wasn’t happy with Joey Logano, and wanted Edwards to replace him. So was this move made to make the Home Depot sponsorship cheaper, and satiate their executives, or is J.D. telling us the truth? We will probably never know for sure.
I also want to point out that this is now two possible homes for Clint Bowyer (JGR, RCR) that had sponsorship deals in the hopper, but chose not to sign the veteran driver. You have to think that Bowyer’s 5 Hour Energy money, combined with this Dollar General sponsorship would have been more than enough to run a fourth car at JGR. And Childress admitted in a story at SceneDaily.com that they had a car for Bowyer completely sponsored, but couldn’t make a deal. Both situations make it fairly clear what these teams think of Bowyer and whatever he was asking for.
As we move ever closer to Homestead, expect to hear a few more of these types of announcements. We still don’t know what the future holds for several drivers and teams, and we are getting into crunch time for making these deals happen for 2012.
For NASCAR it’s been three tough seasons. Ratings have fluctuated, mostly to the negative, sponsors have downsized and in some cases moved on and organizations at every level have pulled back or closed completely. Nowhere has the bad economy and changing sponsorship market hit harder than in the Nationwide and Truck Series.
NASCAR Chairman Brian France made himself available last weekend to the media. The economy and economic situation was a popular topic among the press corps. Asked about the economy, France said:
“Look, I’ve always said I’m not an economist, but I know what you know, and it’s very, very difficult out there for companies and for people in the general economy. That has impact on us, and it will continue to have some impact on us.”
He went on to talk about the future viability and strength of the Truck Series and ended by talking about how the sanctioing body is taking steps to lower the cost of the sport.
“It’s a core principle at the R & D center that there’s a group of people that are looking at safety, performance and cost all the time. You don’t see them, you don’t need to see them, they’re not going to come to the events very often, but that’s what they’re trying to do.“
One way NASCAR appears to be looking at cost savings is with fewer dates and more dates closer to home. We’ve of course heard announcements about the addition of races at Rockingham and Iowa, but while the Cup Series schedule has been out for several weeks we’ve yet to see a finalized version for the Truck and Nationwide Series.
The rumor is that both could be down one race beginning next season. This of course means one less week to pay people, feed people, put them up in hotel rooms and more – on the downside, it’s one less race to sell to a sponsor.
One interesting potential addition to the Truck schedule is one or more road course events. Certainly entertaining, but like the super speedway races it means more purpose built trucks that could only be used for one or two weekends a year. Not exactly a good use of resources.
As I talked about a couple of weeks ago with the truck series, NASCAR has a problem with its model. Right now it’s not feasible to do business like teams did just a few seasons ago. Sponsorships need to be cheaper to attract new outside investment but in order to do so the cost of participation needs to come down.
It’s great to see NASCAR knows the quality of the product they have and that things are not easy right now. Admitting the problem is a big step. Fixing it without damaging the product could prove a little more challenging. We’re waiting to see how things work out.
What would you be willing to see in the lower series? No more pit stops? Shorter races? Mid-point breaks? Fewer races? Spec engines?