Courage, Bristol, Conspiracies, Deleted Comments, Logano, Dinger, & Other Stuff

Bristol



That had to be the best Bristol race since the introduction of the much cursed Car of Turmoil. Folks actually had to use their skills to navigate around slower traffic and to pass their competitors. None of this “Waah I need a whole race track to be able to pass” stuff. You were able to tell who the racers were and who the drivers were. The racers moved forwards on the track while the drivers depended on attrition and pit stops to move forward. Sure there were some wrecks. Some from blown tires, others from a driver’s lack of skills in close quarters racing, and some from Murphy’s Law. But because the racing was better, you can expect to see the grandstands to be not quite as empty as they have been over the last several years. It was a far cry form the first Car of Turmoil race at Bristol when fans were actually falling asleep in their seats.



Now if NA$CAR would just go back to something that actually resembled a stock car or improved the handling of the current generic race vehicle, they might get some more exciting racing which means more butts in the seats.



You Gotta Laugh



The Queen of Hype’s fans are nearly as demented as the fans of another highly hyped driver. You talk about conspiracy theories? Some have said that Sorenson intentionally “brake checked” her which is why she ran into the rear of him causing her to wreck at Indy during the Busch Series race. When the BSPN analysts have nothing to say other than she was at fault, you know she was at fault. And after 10+ years of racing experience, she could’ve easily have missed Sorenson when his car slid back across the track. All she had to do was slow down. It might have cost her a few positions but she wouldn’t have wrecked her car. I’ve seen genuine rookies miss the same sort of wrecks by simply hitting the brakes. If I can miss a 26 car wreck on an icy, foggy autobahn in Germany simply by slowing down and using my brakes, she could surely miss a car on an closed circuit with sunny warm weather.

　

The infamous shoe “bombing” incident in Montreal is being said to be a concerted effort to keep her from winning. It sounds like Hillary Clinton’s “vast right wing conspiracy” statement. Apparently track security caught the person who did it and tossed them from the track. The fact that her spotter was telling her to be careful and to watch for debris on the track and she hit the shoe anyways makes me wonder if she has a hearing problem or maybe has trouble processing verbal orders or comments. Eury Jr had told her several times to take care of the transmission but that didn’t seem to work too well either. The fact that the track bar came loose tells me it either wasn’t tightened down properly or that she hit the “curbs” either too hard or hit them one too many times.



The shoe incident made for some great commentary during the IndyCar race at Sonoma. The commentators said they needed a caution and that Robin Miller was spotted wearing only one sneaker in the pits and wondered when he’d throw his sneaker out on the track to cause a caution. It was an obvious dig at the Queen of Hype and her inability to miss the sneaker that was on the track at Montreal.



Perfect Record



So far, the Queen of Hype has a perfect record in the Cup Series races she’s run in this season. She’s manage to wreck in every one so far. Not exactly the kind of perfect record you want to have.



Tony Stewart to Compete in 2016 Olympics



With the addition of a new event for the 2016 Olympics and a fine exhibition of his skills at Bristol, Tony Stewart has secured a position and will be team captain for Team USA in Rio De Janeiro in the Helmet Toss Competition.



Focks Snorts Deleting Comments



It seems that the wonderful folks monitoring the Focks Snorts web site doesn’t like comments that don’t praise NA$CAR. Here’s a comment that was deleted regarding the recent penalties:



Sure enough it is typical NASCAR fairness through and through. One team gets their hand slapped and another belted and whipped.





I'm sure it has nothing at all to do with car maker, sponsors and who makes the chase. Nope, nada, none.





Is it a Coincidence that ever since a Childress put a Black #3 back on the track he has been getting nothing but fined? Humm Must be me.





The frame rails pass pre-race inspection but then NASCAR decides to post-race inspect a 10th place car and amazingly finds a needle in a haystack. I proud of you NASCAR and your Due Diligence. Keep it up!





The frame rails are inspected and certified at the super secret R&D facility when the Car of Turmoil (COT) is submitted for the $22,500 certification process. So how could the frame rail be sanctified and blessed at the R&D facility and then fail a post-race inspection? That says a lot about the certification process and it’s reliability and questions the integrity of both the COT’s that have been certified and of NA$CAR and the folks doing the certification.



But leave it to Focks Sports to delete a comment which questions NA$CAR’s integrity and criticizes them.



NA$CAR Integrity



I know, they have none. You look at the penalties for Paul Menard’s team and that of Shrubbery. Menard’s team get’s fined, suspensions, and docked points. Shrubbery didn’t have any points docked. Why not? All they got was a fine and probation for the crew chief. Menard on the other hand lost his crew & car chiefs until October 3^rd, his crew chief was fined, and the team got docked 25 driver & owner points for a frame rail which didn’t meet specs.



The frame rails have to be certified along with the rest of the Kit Car at the super secret R&D center. So if the frame rails were certified by NA$CAR and were later found not to meet spec, what does that say about the certification process and NA$CAR? You have to wonder if NA$CAR intentionally lets cars that won’t make spec through just so they can nail them later to put money into the NA$CAR Foundation in which NA$CAR only pays out 30% to charity.



Dinger Still in Talks



During the broadcast of the IndyCar race at Sonoma, one of the announcers stated that AJ Foyt was still in talks with Dinger about driving for him next season. I know Dinger’s heart was set on returning to NA$CAR next season but as I’ve mentioned before he’ll be treated like damaged goods. So it would be a much better career move to go to IndyCar next season and maybe return to NA$CAR at some point down the road.



Logano to Penske



By now it’s been announced that Joey the Giraffe is going to Penske. I’m not sure what car he’ll be driving. More than likely it’ll be a 3^rd team car. Why is that? Because Pennzoil has a clause in their contract which states that a champion will drive the car with their sponsorship. The only top tier champion on the Penske team is Sam Hornish Jr. with 3 IRL/IndyCar championships. Logano won the Camping World Series East Championship in 2007. Not quite the same thing or same level as Sam’s championships.

The interesting thing about that is Sam had Pennzoil on his IRL car when he was a champion in the IRL. So there’s already a relationship established between Sam and Pennzoil. Who will Joey’s sponsor be? That remains to be seen.



Using Illegal Parts



Bad Brad said that The Felon’s teams were using illegal parts on the rear end of the car which allow the rear end to “turn”. If true, you have to ask yourself why didn’t NA$CAR’s crack team of officials catch it? When you’ve got Mr Magoo as your head official and the team owner is BFF’s with Faux King Brian, it’s easy for illegal parts to be missed during inspection.



Smoke Retracts Threats



Smoke retracted remarks he made after the race at Bristol about taking out Matt Kenseth every chance he (Smoke) got. Now why would he do that? When you announce to the world ahead of time that your going to take out another driver during a race, that’s considered to be pre-meditated and NA$CAR frowns on that. That’s a big Bozo No-No. Even if an incident occurred that wasn’t intentional, NA$CAR would take immediate action such as parking the driver, like they did with Mr Happy a while back, or bringing them into the pits and make them sit there for a number of laps. So will Smoke actual wreck Kenseth? Definitely. But he’ll probably use Iron Head’s rule. Wait about 4-5 races then take him out.




Courage



If you want to find out what courage really is, you need to read about Danny Pollock, who races sprint cars.

 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10150691199195838&id=86077500837


http://www.dannypollock.com/

Tony Bought Zippy A Corvette by John "Dawg" Chapman

As a thank you, after his second NASCAR Championship in '05. Tony bought
then Crew Chief, Greg Zipadelli a Corvette. A nice gesture indeed.

For his third, & perhaps his finest he gives Darien a pink slip. I'm not talking about a pink slip, as in car title. This pink slip as in the kind every worker dreads finding in his pay envelope. Oops, kind of dated myself, in this day of direct deposit didn't I? Trust me, you didn't want to find one. The more I learn about this deal, the less I understand. There has to be more to this than meets the eye, & we may never know the whole story.

Earlier this season Bobby Hutchens was let go from his job as director of
competition. With the season that Stewart-Haas had to that point, I can kind of
understand this move. We all know that Steve Addington has come on board as Tony's new Crew Chief. As of now, no announcement has been made about the director of competition.

Normally in sports, when someone gets fired. The next person brought in has some time & latitude to turn things around. The St. Louis Cardinals won the world series about the same way Tony won his Championship. Pretty average to below average season. Killer post season. Tony La Russa elected, (as opposed to being fired) to retire on top. Both La Russa's retirement, & Darien Grubb's firing, are fairly unprecedented.

As neither of these teams need turning around. Both Mike Matheny, the Cards new manager, & Steve Addington are stepping into Championship spots. They better hit the ground running.

Speaking of thank you gifts, kind of makes me wonder what Tony's going to give to Jeff Burton. In the closing laps at Phoenix, as Carl was trying in vain, to run Kasey Kahne down for the win. Tony was also trying to catch Jeff Burton for 3rd. The announcers made reference to this, but it wasn't shown on screen. On the crawl at the conclusion we could see that Tony was able to move into 3rd, thus maintaining the 3 point separation he had going in.

From writers who were there, we later found out that Jeff, loyal Chevy team member that he is. Had allowed Tony to get by, thus gaining what ultimately proved to be the Championship winning point.

I'm not going to rag on this, it's up to each fan to decide how they feel about it. Ford kind of opened this door at Talladega, so I suppose it was tit for tat. I must admit to being a little uncomfortable with the way things came down at Talladega, as well as Phoenix.

The manufactures have their own Championship. Chevy won again, this time clinching at Kansas. I do wish they'd stick to their own Championship, & leave the drivers Championship, to the drivers, but I suppose that's too much to ask in the $$$ charged world of NA$CAR. Oh well, I can always dream.

At Talladega, the maneuvering certainly didn't help Jeff Gordon, but it didn't cost him the Championship either. At Phoenix Jeff Burton's help, or interference, depending on your outlook. Most definitely cost Carl the Championship. Tony still needed to win, & to his, & Darien's credit he did. But given Carl's finish, without that all important point, winning wouldn't have been enough.

Either way, it was by far the best Chase that we've seen. As good as it was, it still wasn't enough to win me over.

You can contact Dawg HERE.

Homestead Press Conference Transcript

For those of you who missed Faux King Brian’s Homestead press conference, here are the official transcripts regarding the press conference. You’ll notice that instead of getting to pat himself on the back for the poor job he’s done this season, he spends a good chunk of his time being questioned about the Double Secret Probation Fines that have been issued and does a poor job of defending the the Double Secret Probation Fines. One little fib. he states there has been nothing in place to punish people saying bad things about NA$CAR. There has been something in place since the days of his grandfather Bill France Sr. It's called "blackballing" somebody. More recently, when KuBu made some comments about the officials when he was driving the #97 car, his hard card was pulled which meant KuBu had to sign in every time he went to a track. A member of the television media questioned some decisions of NA$CAR and was KuBu's sign-in buddy as his hard card was also pulled.

So put on your hipwaders and have your air sickness bags at the ready.

　

BRIAN FRANCE: Good afternoon, everyone. I would say a couple of things that I've said before in previous get-togethers with the media. That obviously we think the season has gone very well. TV ratings, attendance, still some issues, depending on what market you're talking about.

Obviously, the economy continues to weigh heavily on the sponsorship component of our sport. We rely more on sponsorships than anybody in sports, so that obviously has an effect on us.

But the quality of racing throughout the year, the emphasis on winning that we keep adjusting to, I think is undeniably it is paying dividends. I would also say one thing about that. There was some wisdom or conventional wisdom some time ago that if you put more on the line, you put more emphasis on winning in Motorsports, that that wouldn't make a big difference because they're all out racing as hard as they can every lap, and it wouldn't make that big of a difference. And that's not true. We now know that's just not true.

When there is more on the line, you're seeing every weekend Tony Stewart and Carl, and everybody elevate and their entire teams are elevating their performance and the competition gets better when that happens. You saw that last year with Denny and Jimmie.

So naturally we're going to continue to look at the point system in a way that -- and the other portions of how we regulate and conduct the events, with an emphasis on just that.

But one more thing as this weekend unfolds, and naturally we're all excited because we're fans too, to watch and see what happens on Sunday. But the other thing that is happening in the marketplace is some really, really good things.

We held a Green Summit for the first time in Miami Beach yesterday. Had a number of companies that are doing some really, really great things in our industry - they're environmentally smart and productive - share their experiences. And we had a lot of new companies that were interested in what NASCAR was up to in the space where their technologies and their emphasis is. So they joined us as well.

My hope is that we'll continue to march down that road and get better and smarter and we'll attract more companies as a result of that.

Then just this morning, we awarded a $250,000 check to the Homestead Hospital in the Neonatal Care Center, trying to invest in the hospital as part of our NASCAR Foundation, and my mother and so on was there to present that.

In addition to an exciting weekend, the industry is really celebrating the fact that they're here in South Florida and doing some great things. So, with that, I'll be happy to take some questions.

Q. Brian, in particular light to your comments about the winning. Eight years ago Matt Kenseth won the championship before the Chase, had one win for the season which seemed to cause an uproar, and thus the Chase format was developed. Carl has an opportunity on Sunday to again win a championship with only one race week win in the entire season. Why should that be looked on any different as what Matt Kenseth did in 203?

BRIAN FRANCE: Because we didn't change the point system because somebody had one win or a few wins. That was never the emphasis. The emphasis was that we could create bigger moments if we had a more playoff style atmosphere as opposed to a complete consistency model in the years past. And we've achieved that goal, not all the time because it's obviously out of our control.

I would tell you the one win that Carl had might make the difference though. He only leads by three points. The one win in Las Vegas may well make the difference tomorrow. I don't know.

Clearly we cannot make winning the only thing. There are 43 teams racing at every weekend. So this is not -- however, we can make sure that we emphasize that. We can make sure that we reward that. And we're pretty happy that that translates into better racing.

Q:Not taking anything away from Jimmie's great accomplishments of five straight there. How much do you think an uptick of interest that there's been to have a new face fighting out for the championship this year?

BRIAN FRANCE: I don't know. But I do know that this will mark the end of one of the historic runs in all of sports with five consecutive championships. I would have never thought I would witness that.

Jimmie it's just a marvelous achievement, and Carl and Tony both are very popular, so they're creating new moments and we'll have to see how it all plays out.

Q. There's been an uptick in the television ratings. I'm wondering is that what you expected? Is that a slow surge to what you think will be more? Is it less than you thought it would be? What are you working on in the off-season that would be your main goals for next year?

BRIAN FRANCE: We've always said that ratings go up and down because of many, many things. The things we can control are showcasing the racing, telling our story, and giving the drivers some big moments to race for. That will help us. You never know how it all percentage- wise what really matters the most.

But we know that that's the NASCAR we want. We want to see these elevated performances, and they're just fun to watch. We want to see what's happened. I'm confident if we do that, and do a lot of other things, we will have better ratings and better attendance.

Q. NASCAR has fined, at least four times that we know of, drivers for disparaging remarks they've made, and NASCAR did not go public with those fines. Other leagues do. They do publicly say you can't talk about the officials. You can't talk about this or the league. Why does NASCAR take the position that these matters should be private and not public? Are there others that we don't know about?

BRIAN FRANCE: There could be. That's why they're private, right? Well, let me tell you what we've done in the last couple of years. In the last couple of years we've taken a position that drivers are going to be able to speak their mind and criticize the sport way more than any other sport would allow. So let's start with that.

However, there have to be some limits. We thought those limits were being exceeded in the last couple of years because you can't denigrate the sport. You just can't do that. We're not going to accept that.

You know what is interesting, almost every driver has come up to me at one time or another and said I'm glad you did that, because I don't like it when somebody just says something that is irresponsible about the sport.

Let me say one other portion of this. They are perfectly fine to criticize anything we do, any call we make. They can say they don't like it, they disagree with it. We didn't make the right call. That's fine. But we're not going to let anyone denigrate the sport, and that's going to continue.

Whether we make the fines public or private, we didn't see a benefit to making them public. If there is some benefit to that, we'll take a look at it. But that is the reasoning behind the penalties.

Q. But don't you think there is harm when it comes out after and fans take the stance of why did they do this in secret? What else are they doing in secret? In fact we're talking about secret fines today instead of your big game seven moment?

BRIAN FRANCE: That's up to you to what to write and be interested about. I can only tell you that I take every question. I never say no comment. I've explained it. If there's a better way -- sort of this idea that there are a bunch of things going on behind the curtain. We've never been more transparent. We've never had more of anything, and that is the way it should be.

If there's a benefit to announcing them to the public and the media, we'll take a look at them. We just didn't see a benefit at the time. Maybe there is a benefit.

Q. How much did the Kyle Busch situation at Texas concern you? How do you balance boys-have-at-it in retaliation with what appears to be a non-definitive line?

BRIAN FRANCE: That's not accurate. It was very concerning to all of us. There was a swift and very is he penalty on that as you know. There is a line and the drivers, and they may walk around and say sometimes that they're not clear about it, but they know the line.

We have these conversations with them all the time. What you've got to remember is this is a contact sport. So you're going to -- we thought a couple years ago that we were overregulating the events. We wanted to give more authority back in the drivers' hands, and that's been good for NASCAR.

But there is always a limit. You can't do anything you want. We will look at it. We talked to the drivers. If they're close to the line, we have a conversation that day. If they go over the line, we'll deal with that too.

So this idea that there is no -- nobody knows where the line is, not true. Not accurate.

Q. Brian, corporations all across the United States have been raising funds for the last years or so while you guys are looking for sponsorships. What is NASCAR doing to get corporate treasurers to open up the purse strings and become sponsors at a time when NASCAR really needs the employment?

BRIAN FRANCE: If the President of the United States is not getting them to do that, I'm not sure what we're going to be able to do to figure that out. But having said that, obviously we just held a green summit. We were doing things that attract new companies, new technology to validate in our sport. We're renewing a lot of companies, and some companies -- and it happens all the time, every year for us, will pull back their sponsorship or commitments or leave all together.

That is just the reality of having hundreds of companies involved in this sport. But we're working harder than ever with the teams and their business groups to tell the NASCAR story and the value that it brings to sponsors. We're having success with that.

I think if you ask the individual team owners, we've never had a more offensive strategy doing it together to bring in as many new companies as possible.

Q. After the test you ran this week in Daytona, what are the goals you're looking for for Daytona in February, and is one of them a virtual complete elimination of the tandem drafting? Is that one of the things you're after?

BRIAN FRANCE: It is one of the things we are after. We would prefer to eliminate tandem racing in the manner it exists today. There is no question about that. We are working on rolling back the clock to traditional Daytona, Talladega races. We'll have to see how that goes. I think the majority of fans would like to see that and so would we.

Q. You mentioned that you answer every question and you don't duck anything. There was a time when your grandfather and your father attended every race. They did these press conferences almost every Saturday or Sunday behind the hauler or whatever. We don't see you very often. We wonder why is it that you think the sport that you're not needed at every weekend or just why are you not around more often for these press deals?

BRIAN FRANCE: I frequently say, and I've said this before, if I thought that I was the last one out of every event and I turn the light off on the way out that that would grow the sport in some way, I would do it.

What we have is a different sport than it was 10, 15 years ago, and that's real clear. I don't publish my schedule, but it's pretty busy. We feel like we're managing the sport. We know we're managing the sport the best way that we need to to grow the sport.

Q. Could there come a time in the future where all the penalties are transparent? That they're all black and white so it can be reported as normal rather than just finding things out on the internet secondhand? Secondly, Bob earlier mentioned the Kyle Busch incident. Can you explain to me other than Brian Vickers' situation last week where he was not under caution as Kyle Busch was with Ron Hornaday at Texas, why Brian Vickers, something wasn't done about him when he, in fact, just came out of nowhere and plowed into Matt Kenseth for no apparent reason other than retaliation?

BRIAN FRANCE: Well, there is something being done about that. We're having a conversation about that, and they are very different circumstances. One was on a mile and a half track, a lot faster. One was under caution, which is very significant different.

Racing accidents under green are always subjective. Even though you may say this one wasn't, but typically there is always a debate about who went where. Ron Hornaday was racing for a championship, and you know we value that greatly.

So there are lots of differences. It doesn't mean though that we didn't think the line was almost met or somewhat close, whereby, we would have a conversation to explain that. We will be having a conversation with both Brian and Matt regarding really what happened in Martinsville the week before, which is a short track.

A lot of contact happened in that particular race. Like I said earlier, there is a line. The drivers know where the line is. If we should be guessing about that for some reason, we're happy to sit down and walk them through it.

Q. Ricky Stenhouse is probably going to win the Nationwide championship tomorrow. The decision NASCAR made to limit drivers to one championship run, has NASCAR gotten what they want out of that or is that policy going to be reviewed at any point?

BRIAN FRANCE: All policies are reviewed, but I think it's worked the way we want it to. We want to showcase the young drivers in their own series and still have the participation with drivers with a lot of experience. That's exactly what we've gotten.

I think it's been good for the young drivers to get some different notoriety. The honor and prestige of winning a championship and the money that comes with that and all the rest has been a good thing.

Q. Going back to the driver fines things. When you say you don't see a benefit to that, can you explain why there is no benefit to that? It would seem like if you're punishing somebody for disparaging the sport, you would want to let people know we're punishing this guy because we don't like what he said. In this room, you're monitoring social media, all the fans want to know more about it and want to understand why. It just feeds to the perception that you're an autocratic regime that doles out punishment in a capricious manner. Why would you not want to tell people here's why we're doing it?

BRIAN FRANCE: Sure. I'll explain it. We went for 50-something years and never had a system to fine anybody for disparaging remarks in the sport. We're the only sport on the planet that had that. So we simply really in the last couple of years changed that policy because we thought we needed to.

. So it's a new policy. It's not something that's been around for a long time. But like I said, we're happy to look at that in the off-season. See what benefit there would be. When it comes to social media, nobody is investing more, doing more, encouraging the drivers and everybody in the industry to participate on social media. Say what you want and all the rest.

So, you know, we ought not look at one policy and try to define how NASCAR approaches things.

Q. What's the primary benefit to not telling people? BRIAN FRANCE: The way we looked at it, what would be the benefit? The drivers know exactly what we're after. We have these annual meetings with them, right? And then we have semi-annual meetings with them, and we meet with them every weekend at the track. We have formal meetings in the off-season.

So they know exactly what we expect out of them. When they don't handle that, the only way we can control that is obviously a fining system. But look, don't panic over this. We'll look at it in the off-season, if we need to change it, we'll change it. Not a big deal.

Q. You mentioned earlier about the Chase format and that you're always adjusting. Is there a good chance that the Chase format will be tweaked yet again for the following season?

BRIAN FRANCE: It's possible. I don't know. We take those ideas throughout the year. We really look at them as carefully as we can. Then what we do is we run them past the team owners and drivers and other -- everybody else in the industry in the off-season before we would do anything, and that's exactly what we did last year going into this year.

We looked at all kinds of things and settled on this as a nice step forward to simplifying the point system. Hopefully getting what we have, which is a more competitive Chase, and we'll look at it again. I don't know where we'll end up.

Q. As far as the Chase goes, it's been a really exciting Chase. As far as when you came up with the idea of the chase and then you tweaked it. Did you expect that kind of result what do you feel about the future?

BRIAN FRANCE: I actually expected more years like this, frankly. I couldn't imagine somebody as incredibly dominating as Jimmie has been in a five-year run, so you have to give him an enormous amount of credit.

But our expectation is that given the balance of things that we have 43 cars at every event and given the nature of auto racing and how it unfolds and some of the traditions that you have to obviously respect, I think the current system and more tweaks will always come and we'll just have to see what they are.

Q. We're here for the first time actually, so we're growing interesting in NASCAR covering, and I would like you to talk about the growing of NASCAR in other countries than the USA, like Brazil with Nelson Piquet and Miguel Paludo?

BRIAN FRANCE: I think it's great. I was in Mexico City Wednesday and Thursday working on that very issue. We've got an Hispanic driver from Mexico running in the truck race this weekend. Our diversity program focusing on that.

So any time we are able to attract a talented driver, Juan Pablo being an example or anyone else, I think that broadens up the sport. Makes us more relevant to whatever home country that they're from, and we view that as a very good thing.

Q. Specifically in terms of what Brad said as far as EFI goes, what was it about that that NASCAR thought crossed the line? It wasn't a case of what Denny did in impugning the integrity of the sanctioning body, but more or less expressing opinion on the technological direction of the sport at that particular point. Could you at least elaborate on that?

BRIAN FRANCE: I can't elaborate on that because we didn't issue a public fine on that. You can read into what people say just like I can. When you cross a line that denigrates the direction of the sport or the quality of the racing, we're not going to accept that. Not going to accept it.

Happy to have any other criticism, any other complaint, happy to hear them all. If I own a restaurant and I say you know what, the food in my restaurant is not very good, we're not going to accept it. It's as simple as that.

Q. In light of that, will you be issuing a secret fine to Jaime Allison of Ford Motor Company for saying almost the exact same thing as Brad Keselowski did this week?

BRIAN FRANCE: Jaime Allison doesn't participate in NASCAR. I mean, he does in his corporate role, but come on.

Q. Sort of following up on that. One of the problems with the EFI, the electronic fuel injection topic, I think is the economy's bad and it's going to be expensive or be another expense. I think that's what Brad was talking about and we've been talking about in here and engine builders have been talking about. It is an extra expense at a bad time. Is it something that could be postponed for another year or so? Does it have to be right now?

BRIAN FRANCE: Well, we announced it several years ago. These are not the things that you can just pull off the shelf and put them back on and off. We have agreements with suppliers that have to be met.

You've got to remember why are we doing that? Because we want to be more relevant to the car manufacturers and other green technologies as well. We always said that we will do that in a balanced way. We're not going to be like some other divisions around the world that are heavily emphasized on that on technology.

But we're going to have to do more than we did in the past. It's not because we feel like doing it or want to put additional costs on anyone, but because they're accepting a lot of money from the car manufacturers, and that's what's under the hood on cars today, and we have to be mindful of that as we make policy.

Sponsors, Media, & Real Stock Car Racing

Yet Another Sponsor Heading for the Door
　
Sponsors seem to be heading for the door more and more often the last couple of years. It was recently announced that Red Bull was leaving as a team owner with no plans towards sponsorship of another team. And now Crown Royal is heading out the door.
　
Let’s go back to when Crown Royal first showed up. Roush Racing had lined them up as a sponsor for the 2004 season. But due to a major case of greed, Crown Royal was snagged by NA$CAR and its incestuous twin I$C as the official liquor of their tracks and milked for sponsorship money for a full season before being allowed to continue on as a Roush sponsor. They had the reigning Cup champion as their spokesman in the #97 car in 2005 but got some bad publicity (guilt by association) from the Phoenix reckless driving incident and the residual dislike of the 2004 champion from his incident with Jimmy Spencer in which Spencer was forced to sit out for a week. The champ was released early by Roush, the car renumbered to the #26, and Jamie Mac took over the sponsorship. McMurray’s ride at Roush was pretty lackluster overall which didn’t do much for Crown Royal. McMurray left for DEI after the forced downsizing by NA$CAR and the sponsorship was moved to the #17 car, who had a previous sponsorship of another alcohol company. Matt Kenseth hasn’t exactly had a lot of shining moments since the Crown Royal sponsorship was put on his car. This is due in part to the network bias and coverage of the Japanese automaker and their drivers by Focks rather than covering all the cars and drivers. Plus it didn’t help that one of the commentators during the first part of the season has a problem with Ford and that he is “owned” by the Japanese automaker and is their head cheerleader. So even if Kenseth did good, his performance tended to be ignored by the commentators from Focks.
　
Another part of the problem is that NA$CAR’s blue collar fans, who made up the bulk of the fan base, were primarily beer drinkers so Crown Royal didn’t get the Return on Investment (ROI) they had hoped for. Crown Royal isn’t exactly allowed to be carried into the track whereas beer is. Plus the size of the Grand Am crowd, even though they might be more prone to drink Crown Royal, doesn’t make up for the loss of ROI on the Cup side of things. So farewell Crown Royal. Maybe you can find a sport which will give you the ROI you need and not be forced into various side deals by the sanctioning body of that sport.
　
Will the Queen of Hype Be Without a Sponsor?
　
Patrick's good run came on the same day as her sponsor GropeDaddy.com announced the company had been bought by a group of private equity firms for a reported US $2.25 billion.
　
While Patrick did get pushed around the track well until her teammate pushed her, the future has just gotten murky. Despite what’s being said publicly by the former owner, investors generally do not spend money on racing. There are not many teams that want her in IndyCar. The Andretti gig was related to the money she brought, first with Motorola, next with Grope-Daddy. Her hope is that she has not worn out her NA$CAR welcome, so she can maybe get something put together there. However, if the new owners move in a different direction with their advertising campaign and marketing money, this could very well leave the Queen of Hype (QoH), JR Motorsports, and Slick Rick without a major sponsor. Which leads to the question of will any race team actually hire her without a major sponsor? There have been great drivers with 100 times the driving abilities and skills of the QoH who couldn’t find a ride because of the lack of a major sponsor. So will anyone hire her without a sponsor? We’ll have to see what unfolds with the sale of Grope Daddy.
　
Real Professional Stock Car Racing Returning to America
　
It was announced that the Australian V-8 Supercar Series will be racing at the Circuit of the America’s in Austin Texas in a 5 year deal. For folks who enjoy seeing stock cars racing and not just generic race vehicles, here’s a chance to actually see cars which resemble their street counterparts racing each other. While the NA$CAR TV audience has been shrinking over the last several years, the V-8 Supercar Series audience has been growing. This is the same series where Marcos Ambrose got his start and won back to back championships bringing Ford back to life in competition down under. And you’ll even recognize some of the sponsors. Jack Daniels and Jim Beam are just two that NA$CAR fans are familiar with that sponsor Aussie V-8 Supercar teams.
　
Just How Big is the Fan Base?
　
Based on some info from one of my sources, the fan base isn’t anywhere near the highly touted 75 million fans Faux King Brian likes to go on about. The fan base is closer to 7 million fans. This would go a long ways towards explaining why the normal TV ratings don’t get much above 1.5 million viewers during the majority of the season and why so many sponsors have cut back or left completely. This would also explain why so few folks go to the Hall of Fantasies in Charlotte.
　
How Desperate is Daytona International Speedway?
　
This is off of the speedway web site:
　
Girl Scout Summer Slumber Party

July 30, 2011
　
Calling all Girl Scouts! Enjoy a fun slumber party inside the DAYTONA 500 Club at the “World Center of Racing,” Daytona International Speedway.
　
Since when are the Girl Scouts interested in stock car racing? This has got to be a joke. If it's really true then they really are desperate!!
　
And BTW, the Boy and Girl Scouts of Volusia County receive donations from the NA$CAR Foundation as do troops near Michigan Speedway. Not to the national headquarters where the money can be even distributed but only to these local troops.
　
Blocking
　
Wasn’t it Tony Stewart who blocked Regan Smith at Talladega and forced Smith to go below the yellow line to keep from wrecking and costing Smith the win?
　
The is No Truth in Pravda and There’s No News in Izvestiya

This is an old saying from the Cold War which reflected the view of the average Soviet citizen. Pravda is the Russian word for truth. Izvestiya is the word for news. Pravda and Izvestiya were also the newspapers approved and run by the Communist party and were mandatory for businesses, factories, and the military. Both newspapers were used to announce official policy and policy changes. And back then, the Soviet Union was pretty much a dictatorship between a front man or actual Premier, the KGB, who controlled some leaders from behind the scenes, and the Army being the “swing vote” as it were should either the Premiere or KGB become too strong.


Now, let’s look at the NA$CAR controlled media. NA$CAR is a dictatorship controlled by one man. The “official” NA$CAR media only reports what NA$CAR allows them to report, just like Pravda and Izvestiya. The NA$CAR controlled media announces official policies and policy changes, just like Pravda and Izvestiya. And while there’s some truth in the form of fluff pieces and standardized interviews (which both Pravda and Izvestiya had for factory supervisors who reached 5 Year Program quotas), there’s more smoke and mirrors and propaganda than factual information. Some folks will take offense to this, as is their right, but folks who can think for themselves will do a little research and find the comparison quite valid.
　
Control of the media covering NA$CAR is nothing new. It started when Big Bill formed NA$CAR according to the late Jack Flowers. Big Bill would wine and dine members of the press in order to get positive publicity and print and for those who didn’t go along with it, they were blackballed. The same control of the media has gone on through succeeding generations of the France family to include not just NA$CAR but also court proceedings regarding other members of the France family. You won’t find much in the way of Amy France, Brian’s cousin, and her violating the custody & visitation agreement of her child by the child’s father. The most recent examples of the Frances trying to control the media regarding the courts is with the lawsuit in Charlotte of Megan France by her former husband and the heavy hand of NA$CAR censoring the Jeremy Mayfield interview by Steve Byrnes on Speed TV several months back.
　
Then we have the continuing saga of the Double Secret Probation Fines that have been slapped on folks like Hamlin, Newman, and others which eventually see the light of day. Organizations that have to use secrecy, threats, and intimidation in order to promote a positive image in itself isn’t very positive. And even with the “happy happy joy joy” message the controlled media tries to send, the fans who can think for themselves and have longer than a 5 minute attention span know that something is very wrong with the sanctioning body and their messengers.