Chutzpah, Sponsorship, ALMS, & Rex White

Way To Go Jennifer Jo Cobb
　
While we only heard part of the story, it takes a lot of chutzpah to do what Jennifer Jo Cobb did. It reminds me so much of Ted Musgrave and the #75 car at Homestead back in 1999 when he parked the car and walked away because it was junk. She doesn’t want to sacrifice her self-esteem, self-respect, or her reputation and apparently Rick Ware seems to think she’s got the sort of brass it takes so he’s putting her in a car at Fontana.
　
Finally, USA Today Woke Up
　
It seems that the folks at USA Today finally woke up to the fact that there’s more than just one female driver in NA$CAR. They did a decent article on Jennifer Jo Cobb. To me, she’s a more complete driver than the female Messiah NA$CAR’s been touting. She comes from a racing family, came up through the ranks, is more mature, actually likes being around race fans, signs autographs without muttering or mumbling or complaining, and doesn’t make excuses for a bad race or poor performance. Danica could learn a thing or two from Jennifer Jo Cobb.
　
Sponsorship Rumors
　
I’m hearing that Jay Robinson Racing has got some sponsorship lined up for Fontana. MAXELENCE will be the Primary Sponsor of the #28 car and All American Sports Pouch Beverage will be the Primary Sponsor of the #70. Looks like JRR has been doing some serious searching into various avenues of going green with their sponsorship quest.


Key Motorsports got Preval as their Primary Sponsor at Bristol. Hopefully this will turn into a full-time sponsorship deal for them so fingers crossed.
　
Why No ALMS on TV?

Has anyone been paying attention to what’s happening with Speed TV? How often do we see an ARCA race any more? Or an ASA race? Or any series that the France family doesn’t have some sort of influence over besides Formula-1, Aussie V-8, or German Touring Series? Since ALMS is the main competitor to the Rolex Series and the Rolex Series is suffering financially and fan-wise, simply use the same control on Speed that’s used on them to control just what all is put out there about NA$CAR. You eliminate the competition. Then folks are forced to either watch what’s provided or go elsewhere. In the case of ALMS, fans are watching it on the web. Wow, fewer commercials than on Speed, something like Race Buddy to watch the race, and no special cable or satellite packages to buy. Sounds like a dream.
　
Why No Outrage Over Bristol Tire Situation?

While I’m not surprised none of the lamestream media is saying anything about what happened with the tires, where’s the outrage over the sense of fair play? The teams practice with one tire compound most of the weekend then get issued a different compound for race day. Of course, had somebody been able to do some actual testing at Bristol like a couple of years ago, NA$CAR might have had some feedback on the tire compound and have made changes well in advance. Now that they’ve used about half the tires for the upcoming Sleep Lab 400, brought to you by United Insomniacs Inc., at Otto Klubb Speedway, what excuse will be offered up when they don’t have enough tires for there? The economy? High cost of hotel rooms? High gasoline prices? Fans shopping under the grandstands?
　
Why Are There So Many Unsponsored Busch Series Cars?
　
Lord only knows the Busch regular teams don’t get enough recognition for the efforts. Did anyone happen to notice that when a Busch regular team announces they have a sponsor you’re lucky to hear about it but when a Buschwacker announces a sponsor, it’s splashed all over the front page repeatedly and mentioned relentlessly by the talking heads during the various racer-tainment shows? Or how about the coverage of the Busch practice sessions? Anyone happen to notice who BSPN was locked in on? It wasn’t folks like Scott Wimmer, Derrike Cope, Blake Koch, or Morgan Shepherd. It’s folks like Dale Jr, Mr. Happy, and Cousin/Crazy Carl who are shown. So whomever might possibly step up to sponsor a Busch regular team isn’t going to sponsor a Busch regular team or even a Buschwacker team for $10 million for a whole season when they can put that same $10 million into a sponsorship on a Cup team which stands a better chance of being shown. Sponsors don’t get the Return on Investment (ROI) on a Busch Series team that they can on a Cup Series team. How many folks have rushed out and bought DuPont paint just because they advertise on the 24 car? How many folks have rushed out and bought a Caterpillar bulldozer just because it’s on Mayor McCheese’s car? How many folks know what green effort Jay Robinson Racing has on the C Post of their cars? Not many. So despite the name recognition of the drivers and the lack of coverage and mentions, especially with a Busch regular team, the sponsors aren’t getting back in sales what they had hoped to achieve through sponsoring a team. Why do you think the Navy, Marines, Gain, Red Baron Pizza, Bob Evans, Nesquik, Schneider National, and others have left the sport? They’re not getting back their ROI plus the strong-armed tactics used by the networks and NA$CAR to get them to advertise or be the official product/service/partner/provider of NA$CAR.
　
Just Why Are the Sponsor Mentions Down?
　
I really had a good laugh about this. It’s pretty simple really. Remember at the beginning of the season Focks said they’d be concentrating more on the drivers? That’s one part of the reason. Another part of it has to do with the economy. Sponsors are having to cut back on just how much money they’re laying out. It’s not just a matter of them laying out $20 million for a race team sponsorship, they also are subject to the strong-armed tactics of NASCAR and Focks to buy air-time for commercials or to be the official sponsor of some sort of segment during the race broadcasts which can cost them up to an additional $8 million. Or to be an official product/service/provider/partner of NA$CAR. So that $20 million sponsorship just jumped up to costing them $28 million or more. Who do you think pays for “The Five Knuckle Shuffle” brought to you by Mr Stiffy or the Exlax “Smooth Move of the Race”? Why do you think one car manufacturer is so heavily advertised and shown on so many sponsor graphics during the racer-tainment and we have both Jabber Jaws and The Human Shill yammering away about that one car or truck make so much? Then there’s also the cutback on “mention money”. That’s money paid to the networks to ensure that a team gets mentioned on-air. You don’t pony up any mention money you don’t get mentioned. With all these revenue sources drying up and the unwillingness of sponsors to fork over what almost seems like extortion money to get shown and mentioned on the air, it’s no wonder sponsors aren’t getting shown or mentioned as much. Take a good look at who buys air time during the commercial programming segments which is interrupted briefly by the weekend racer-tainment and how many times that team sponsor’s is shown to include the hood and quarter panels. You’ll see a lot more of the 48 and 24 cars than you will of the 7 or 92 cars. Why? Because the 7 & 92 sponsors don’t buy commercial programming time. It’s really that simple. You pay “protection money” you get taken care of as they say in La Costa Nostra.
　
IndyCar Heading for Trouble?

First there was the announcement that fans would be losing a lot of their internet access to IndyCar. Then came the recent announcement that they’d be using the Free Pass and Double File Restarts that is used by NA$CAR. Obviously, they didn’t learn from NA$CAR’s mistakes. Right now the long time fans are in an uproar, just like the long time NA$CAR fans have been with all of the changes that have been forced down there throats by Faux King Brian. I had high hopes for IndyCar but if they’re going to go down the same road which took NA$CAR from being a multi-billion dollar industry to a multi-million dollar industry, you have to wonder if maybe their new leadership needs to look at some history. Like I say, those who fail to learn the mistakes of history are doomed to repeat them.
　
Upcoming Rex White Appearances
　
Rex will be appearing at the 5^th Annual Legends Helping Legends Fundraiser on March 26^th at the Memory Lane Museum in Mooresville NC. The first weekend in June, Rex will be at JB Days for the annual Raymond Parks birthday celebration. Then in August, Rex will be appearing at Lynchburg City Stadium on August 18^th from 6:00 pm-7:15 pm. So if you want a chance to meet one of the class acts of the Grand National circuit and the 1960 Grand National Champion, you’ve got several upcoming opportunities to do so. And tell him I said “Hi”.