Condolences
I want to send out my condolences to my good friend, racing buddy, and fellow veteran Richard over the passing of his wife Judy. Judy was an avid race fans for many years. When it came to calling things the way she saw them, Judy would tell you exactly what she was thinking, whether it was racing, politics, or living. It wasn’t until last year that Judy was diagnosed with brain, bone, and lung cancer and she fought it right up to the end. She had been admitted to the hospital for pneumonia and passed away. I’m going to miss Judy’s straight forward answers, humor, and honesty.
Official Ferrari Team Tested at Daytona
The official Ferrari team tested at Daytona on the 26th & 27th. Factory driver Jamie Melo was expected to be the lead driver in the test. Several of the new cars are expected to compete in the 50th anniversary of the Rolex 24 At Daytona on Jan. 28-29, 2012. I don’t know if they’re doing this just because it’s the 50th anniversary and they want the publicity surrounding it or if they’re going to compete as a regular competitor for the next several seasons. It’s my understanding that the Ferraris are being built to Rolex Series specs and won’t be a true Ferrari 458’s. Sort of like what we have with the Cup and Busch Series generic race vehicles only with actual working lights and more of a resemblance to the street version that what we have with the Cup and Busch Series cars. Ferrari won’t be fielding a factory team as such but will campaigned as “privateers”.
3rd Generation Daytona Prototype Cars
From what I’m hearing, the 3rd generation of the DP cars is becoming more generic. What I heard was the front of the DP was to more closely resemble the street versions. The aerodynamic front ends will have more upright fascia, meaning more drag. The rear ends will be generic. Currently there don’t seem to be any renderings of what the car will look like. The one picture of the current Ferrari being tested for Grand Am makes the car look about as wide as it is long. Grand Am is making a big mistake going in this direction rather than moving more towards something like the DTM-style cars. That would make them look more like their street counterparts and less like a generic vehicle, which seems to be what NA$CAR wants to do with all the racing series they sanction.
Murdock Phone Hacking Scandal
I have not heard it mentioned, but the phone hacking scandal could have big implications for NASCAR. Depending on lawsuits and regulations stemming from what occurred, Rupert Murdoch may have to sell off some assets. They could include Speed TV and could impact Fox’s ability to bid on NASCAR’s next contract. It could mean jettisoning the high priced booth bozos. And if Murdock takes a big enough hit financially from these lawsuits, you can forget about Focks renewing their part of the TV contract come 2014. It’s quite possible Focks & Speed TV could break their contract with NA$CAR.
Terry Checks In
Our man in the stands out West, Terry, checked in on the Kentucky fiasco and the JGR engine deal with this:
Only saw the last half of Kentucky and didn't find it much different than most 1 1/2 tracks. Feel sorry for the people who got screwed by the mess they had. Listening to NASCAR radio last week they really pissed off a lot of people. One other thing this summer is how Gibbs seem to get away with things, once again two sets of rules.
IndyCar Engines
The Leaders Circle in IndyCar has Chevrolet aligned with Penske. Honda is aligned with Ganassi's four cars and AJ Foyt. Expect an announcement soon on more Honda teams. Speculation is that Andretti Autosports, Panther, and possibly Sarah Fisher Racing will be in the Chevy camp. There is talk the KV (Lotus) is leaning towards Honda. Judd, which was to be badged as Lotus, may now just be Judd, if KV does lean to Honda.
IndyCar has limited the annual lease for engines to $690,000, actually far less than the current costs ($1.5 million a year). The manufacturers will be limited top supplying no more than 10 teams/cars.
Honda is furthest along, while Chevy is estimated to be 45 days behind, and Judd another 45 days behind Chevy. But all are expected to be ready for next year.
Women’s Soccer Vs NA$CAR Ratings
USA Today reported that the USA-Japan final drew 7.4% of U.S. households. NASCAR had a 2.9 rating (2.2 million), which was up 12% from last year’s comparable coverage. TNT’s NA$CAR ratings will finish up over last year, given its rating were already up 7% heading into its final race.
Now compare that to Focks which was down or just barely equal to its 2010 numbers. It speaks volumes about the poor coverage and commentary provided by Focks. Too bad Focks’ Hill does not wake up and drop Jabber Jaws, rather than putting him on more often.
Have at it…Unless You’re Mr Happy
Most folks have probably heard the comments made recently by Mr Happy regarding Mafia Mike telling him to stay away from Shrubbery on the track. You have to wonder exactly why Mafia Mike did this. Did Shrubbery’s manufacturer get upset that Mr Happy might keep Shrubbery from formally winning the Chase for the Chumps? Or maybe the team owner overheard something said in jest in the garage? If NA$CAR is going to “have at it”, then it needs to apply to everyone and not just certain drivers. Otherwise, get rid of it and go back to having a bunch of light weights on the track.
Federal Case Dropped
Faux King Brian has dropped his Federal case against his ex wife regarding her taping their phone conversations. My guess is his lawyers finally figured out that her taping their conversations was legal under NC law. As to the other lawsuit, I guess neither team of lawyers has figured out that since the divorce doesn’t involve an undercover officer, a police informant, or a sexually assaulted minor that the files aren’t supposed to be sealed. But that’s for another day in court.
Another NA$CAR Safety Fallacy
Over the last decade, Cup drivers have suggested time and again that some sort of device be put in the Cup cars to let them know when a caution is brought out and Mafia Mike and company have always laid out some lame excuse as to why it couldn’t be done. One of their favorites being about the technology not existing. Well, the technology does exist and has existed for a while. IndyCar has had a visible warning device in their cars, installed in the steering wheel itself, which shows visible yellow lights which flash and a red light installed on the back of the cars that flash which warns all of the drivers that there is indeed a caution in addition to the yellow flags, flashing yellow lights around the oval tracks, flashing lights on the pace car, and audible transmissions on the team radios that there is indeed a caution. So how hard would it to be to incorporate this same existing technology into all NA$CAR race vehicles? After all, if they can do it in IndyCar they can easily do it in NA$CAR and NA$CAR isn’t afraid to take somebody else’s idea and use it like they have with the generic race cars and play-off system. NA$CAR’s conjoined twin hasn’t has any problems with using the SAFER walls which were developed by IndyCar or making full-face race helmets and HANS devices which IndyCar made mandatory way before NA$CAR even considered it. So why don’t they do it if driver safety is supposedly of such a high concern to them?
Lack of Hype for Indy Race
Leading up to this year’s Cup race at Indy, there hasn’t been a lot of hype regarding the race. Ever since the Badyear tire fiasco, attendance has dropped by 50+% . But of course, the problem with attendance won’t be the poor performance of the generic race vehicle or the poor leadership of NA$CAR. It will be the economy or possibly even the current budget entanglement going on in DC.
Saving Money
If you’re active duty, reserve, or former military and have Farmer’s Insurance for your vehicles, be sure to show them your military ID or a copy of your DD-214. This could save you some money every month on your insurance. As tight as things are, we all need every penny we can lay our hands on and if you can save yourself an extra $50-$60 a month on auto insurance, it’s well worth taking the time.
Curtis Turner for 2016 HOF
Showing posts with label Speed TV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Speed TV. Show all posts
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Sponsors, Media, & Real Stock Car Racing
Yet Another Sponsor Heading for the Door
Sponsors seem to be heading for the door more and more often the last couple of years. It was recently announced that Red Bull was leaving as a team owner with no plans towards sponsorship of another team. And now Crown Royal is heading out the door.
Let’s go back to when Crown Royal first showed up. Roush Racing had lined them up as a sponsor for the 2004 season. But due to a major case of greed, Crown Royal was snagged by NA$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.
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.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
The Teleconference
Several things I gathered from Faux King Brian’s teleconference last week. One is to expect the broadcast portion to be “dumbed down” even more than it has been. Why? Remember the last time Faux King Brian talked about creating new fans? We got the massive invasion of the Short Attention Span Crowd.
“I look at the interest level of the sport, and that's growing after having peaked and maybe dropped back a little bit for some reasons a couple years ago. The general interest level is going up and that's what we're going to be working on, is creating new fans”.
And last year when he admitted that the “fans” have a shorter attention span than they use to. Gee, I wonder why? Expect to see more things aimed directly at the Short Attention Span Crowd, like repeating the same garbage over and over and over even more than they do now. A good example would be how many times per race we get an explanation of aero tight and aero loose.
Read the question carefully and then the answer.
Q. You have the races where you grow ratings and attendance, then you have the off week. Can you detail the reasons why you have this off week so early in the season? Are you going to change that for next year?
BRIAN FRANCE: Well, it's historically how many events in the calendar we want to run, regardless when they ran. Historically it has been around this time where we do have an off weekend. Arguably you would like to have that come down eight or ten races later. But that's just how the schedule and the climate issues that we face with certain markets and everything else has played out. The reason for changing it is mostly driven that the other sports calendars are going to change on us - not just the NFL, but maybe some other things. So we're trying to get into the right date. It also does accomplish, when we change next year, moving back the 500 a week, we'll eliminate the early schedule gap here. That will probably be a good thing.
The answer doesn’t answer the question. It’s like a politician speaking. Lots of hot air and words that mean nothing.
Q. Brian, a lot of feedback that we in the media get from fans is about the post-race show or the lack of a post-race show. There seems to be a sense of frustration that fans invest so many hours into an event, then they get under 10 minutes of reaction after from the drivers that they've been watching. Is that something that NASCAR is hearing from your fan council? Do you have any input with FOX to try to solve this dilemma fans are faced with?
BRIAN FRANCE: We do have a fair amount of programming that happens with the SPEED Channel throughout the post race, even into the evening typically. But, yeah, I think generally speaking we would agree, that it would be nicer to have a longer post-race. But if you think about it, most sports don't have a particularly long post end of a game, whatever else. The networks don't stick around for an additional half hour. It's not something FOX should be thinking about because, after all, that's just not the norm with network or even cable television. Once the game is over, there's typically a short post-race. You hope the rest of it, social media, NASCAR online, places to digest good post-race information is where they go.
Considering who really calls the shots on what will and won’t be shown, I’m rather surprised that Faux King Brian doesn’t appear to really care about putting the NA$CAR brand on the winner even more with more post-race exposure of the winner and getting in as many post-race interviews as possible to help extend the NA$CAR "branding" of his brand of racer-tainment. Plus he seems to forget that not everyone gets Speed TV. Folks who don’t have cable or satellite can’t watch it. And even some folks with cable or satellite don’t have it because it’s not included in their package or is considered an extra that cost them through the nose. So they can’t watch the post-race coverage Speed TV offers.
Q. What do you see as the biggest impact on television ratings? Sponsorship revenues you and the tracks can earn or how are they becoming more critical on the rights fees as you start negotiating in the next couple years?
BRIAN FRANCE: We spend a lot of time looking at obviously traditional broadcast television. Our cable partners are critically important. We spent a lot of time recently looking at the other media, which is social and digital media, where that's all going, where people are getting information, content and everything else. We have a plan. We have a robust plan in the long run. We'll try to capture both. But one of the ratings impact is people are getting their news, updates, their fix, if you will, in lots of different ways today. We're going to want to, as a sport, make sure that we're taking advantage of all of them.
If Faux King Brian and his cronies actually spent a lot of time watching the races on TV, they’d see what the fans are complaining about with poor commentary, poor coverage, and too many commercials and the need for split-screen coverage like IndyCar uses to show both the race and commercials at the same time instead of the current running of commercials being briefly interrupted by a lap or two of racer-tainment. “We have a plan”. I seem to remember Richard Nixon saying the same thing when it came to Vietnam only we never found out what the plan was.
“But one of the ratings impact is people are getting their news, updates, their fix, if you will, in lots of different ways today. We're going to want to, as a sport, make sure that we're taking advantage of all of them”.
Notice the word “fix”. Faux King Brian is making it sound like race fans are a bunch of junkies in desperate need of drugs. A Freudian slip on his part? As the TV coverage and commentary is God awful, fans who have the means use things like Track Pass or Race Buddy to actually watch the races and supplement that with radio coverage by PRN or MRN to help eliminate the highly biased commentators and shills. I don’t know how many folks have noticed it but a lot of effort is being put into advertising the sanctioning body’s official web site. They’ve sponsored a couple of trucks and if you look at the tracks you’ll see the web site’s name painted on the asphalt or on the grass. Of course, after the latest changes to that web site and how badly they screwed it up, I can see why they’re trying to lure fans in and advertise it. If they really wanted to get fans to that web site, they’d make it easy to navigate and use. Instead, they make it more complicated than trying to assemble an engine while blindfolded with one hand tied behind your back. Fans use Twitter, Facebook, and various blogs to stay up to date and to get reliable info which isn’t in the same cookie-cutter mold as is presented by the lamestream journalists.
Q. Brian, can you address the ethanol situation and what challenges have you faced with the implementation to the new fuel in the three top series?
BRIAN FRANCE: Well, the fact that we haven't had a discussion is evidentiary proof of how well it's working. We couldn't be happier with it. From the early testing, we got good performance numbers. The teams certainly think it's working well. It obviously takes us another step. Especially now that you see energy prices going where they're going, it takes us a way down the road with a real biofuel that we're using in the car. They've just been a really good partner so far and it's going well.
“The fact that we haven't had a discussion is evidentiary proof of how well it's working”. Obviously you didn’t hear the profanity-laced dialogue between Biffle and his crew chief at Vegas regarding the new fuel and the fueling system. It isn’t working well. You might be happy but that’s only because you’re getting paid to be happy about it. Just what are you going to do when Congress cuts off the funding for ethanol because it’s actually a farce? You want a real bio-fuel? Try running the algae-based gasoline. Or convert to diesel and have the teams run oil from some hamburger or chicken joints and fill the stands with the smell of French Fries or fried chicken. That’s true bio-fuel.
Q. What do you think of Danica's run last week, historically what that did, the highest finish by a female in any NASCAR national series?
BRIAN FRANCE: I think that elevated her. There was some discussion, did she have the right stuff to compete in the Nationwide Series. You know, I think she dispelled a lot of that. There's always circumstances in the start of a new career. But sometimes things are out of your control, people can crash in front of you, a hundred other things. I think she elevated herself quite nicely. That's nice to see. She's a very competitive person. She's always said she's here to compete, not just happy to be here. That fits my criteria.
Anything that makes you a buck fits your criteria. Danica’s finish is not the highest finish by a female driver in NA$CAR. She finished 4th in a fuel mileage race in NA$CAR’s AAA series equivalent. Sara Christian finished 5th in NA$CAR’s top series in 1949 at Pittsburgh. Janet Guthrie finished 6th at Bristol in 1977 in NA$CAR’s top series. So until she runs in the Cup Series and gets a 4th place finish she isn’t the highest female finisher in NA$CAR.
There were more questions asked and Jayski's got the transcript posted for all to read. Check it out, read it very carefully, read what's said, what's omitted, and how the questions are really answered versus what the question asked.
“I look at the interest level of the sport, and that's growing after having peaked and maybe dropped back a little bit for some reasons a couple years ago. The general interest level is going up and that's what we're going to be working on, is creating new fans”.
And last year when he admitted that the “fans” have a shorter attention span than they use to. Gee, I wonder why? Expect to see more things aimed directly at the Short Attention Span Crowd, like repeating the same garbage over and over and over even more than they do now. A good example would be how many times per race we get an explanation of aero tight and aero loose.
Read the question carefully and then the answer.
Q. You have the races where you grow ratings and attendance, then you have the off week. Can you detail the reasons why you have this off week so early in the season? Are you going to change that for next year?
BRIAN FRANCE: Well, it's historically how many events in the calendar we want to run, regardless when they ran. Historically it has been around this time where we do have an off weekend. Arguably you would like to have that come down eight or ten races later. But that's just how the schedule and the climate issues that we face with certain markets and everything else has played out. The reason for changing it is mostly driven that the other sports calendars are going to change on us - not just the NFL, but maybe some other things. So we're trying to get into the right date. It also does accomplish, when we change next year, moving back the 500 a week, we'll eliminate the early schedule gap here. That will probably be a good thing.
The answer doesn’t answer the question. It’s like a politician speaking. Lots of hot air and words that mean nothing.
Q. Brian, a lot of feedback that we in the media get from fans is about the post-race show or the lack of a post-race show. There seems to be a sense of frustration that fans invest so many hours into an event, then they get under 10 minutes of reaction after from the drivers that they've been watching. Is that something that NASCAR is hearing from your fan council? Do you have any input with FOX to try to solve this dilemma fans are faced with?
BRIAN FRANCE: We do have a fair amount of programming that happens with the SPEED Channel throughout the post race, even into the evening typically. But, yeah, I think generally speaking we would agree, that it would be nicer to have a longer post-race. But if you think about it, most sports don't have a particularly long post end of a game, whatever else. The networks don't stick around for an additional half hour. It's not something FOX should be thinking about because, after all, that's just not the norm with network or even cable television. Once the game is over, there's typically a short post-race. You hope the rest of it, social media, NASCAR online, places to digest good post-race information is where they go.
Considering who really calls the shots on what will and won’t be shown, I’m rather surprised that Faux King Brian doesn’t appear to really care about putting the NA$CAR brand on the winner even more with more post-race exposure of the winner and getting in as many post-race interviews as possible to help extend the NA$CAR "branding" of his brand of racer-tainment. Plus he seems to forget that not everyone gets Speed TV. Folks who don’t have cable or satellite can’t watch it. And even some folks with cable or satellite don’t have it because it’s not included in their package or is considered an extra that cost them through the nose. So they can’t watch the post-race coverage Speed TV offers.
Q. What do you see as the biggest impact on television ratings? Sponsorship revenues you and the tracks can earn or how are they becoming more critical on the rights fees as you start negotiating in the next couple years?
BRIAN FRANCE: We spend a lot of time looking at obviously traditional broadcast television. Our cable partners are critically important. We spent a lot of time recently looking at the other media, which is social and digital media, where that's all going, where people are getting information, content and everything else. We have a plan. We have a robust plan in the long run. We'll try to capture both. But one of the ratings impact is people are getting their news, updates, their fix, if you will, in lots of different ways today. We're going to want to, as a sport, make sure that we're taking advantage of all of them.
If Faux King Brian and his cronies actually spent a lot of time watching the races on TV, they’d see what the fans are complaining about with poor commentary, poor coverage, and too many commercials and the need for split-screen coverage like IndyCar uses to show both the race and commercials at the same time instead of the current running of commercials being briefly interrupted by a lap or two of racer-tainment. “We have a plan”. I seem to remember Richard Nixon saying the same thing when it came to Vietnam only we never found out what the plan was.
“But one of the ratings impact is people are getting their news, updates, their fix, if you will, in lots of different ways today. We're going to want to, as a sport, make sure that we're taking advantage of all of them”.
Notice the word “fix”. Faux King Brian is making it sound like race fans are a bunch of junkies in desperate need of drugs. A Freudian slip on his part? As the TV coverage and commentary is God awful, fans who have the means use things like Track Pass or Race Buddy to actually watch the races and supplement that with radio coverage by PRN or MRN to help eliminate the highly biased commentators and shills. I don’t know how many folks have noticed it but a lot of effort is being put into advertising the sanctioning body’s official web site. They’ve sponsored a couple of trucks and if you look at the tracks you’ll see the web site’s name painted on the asphalt or on the grass. Of course, after the latest changes to that web site and how badly they screwed it up, I can see why they’re trying to lure fans in and advertise it. If they really wanted to get fans to that web site, they’d make it easy to navigate and use. Instead, they make it more complicated than trying to assemble an engine while blindfolded with one hand tied behind your back. Fans use Twitter, Facebook, and various blogs to stay up to date and to get reliable info which isn’t in the same cookie-cutter mold as is presented by the lamestream journalists.
Q. Brian, can you address the ethanol situation and what challenges have you faced with the implementation to the new fuel in the three top series?
BRIAN FRANCE: Well, the fact that we haven't had a discussion is evidentiary proof of how well it's working. We couldn't be happier with it. From the early testing, we got good performance numbers. The teams certainly think it's working well. It obviously takes us another step. Especially now that you see energy prices going where they're going, it takes us a way down the road with a real biofuel that we're using in the car. They've just been a really good partner so far and it's going well.
“The fact that we haven't had a discussion is evidentiary proof of how well it's working”. Obviously you didn’t hear the profanity-laced dialogue between Biffle and his crew chief at Vegas regarding the new fuel and the fueling system. It isn’t working well. You might be happy but that’s only because you’re getting paid to be happy about it. Just what are you going to do when Congress cuts off the funding for ethanol because it’s actually a farce? You want a real bio-fuel? Try running the algae-based gasoline. Or convert to diesel and have the teams run oil from some hamburger or chicken joints and fill the stands with the smell of French Fries or fried chicken. That’s true bio-fuel.
Q. What do you think of Danica's run last week, historically what that did, the highest finish by a female in any NASCAR national series?
BRIAN FRANCE: I think that elevated her. There was some discussion, did she have the right stuff to compete in the Nationwide Series. You know, I think she dispelled a lot of that. There's always circumstances in the start of a new career. But sometimes things are out of your control, people can crash in front of you, a hundred other things. I think she elevated herself quite nicely. That's nice to see. She's a very competitive person. She's always said she's here to compete, not just happy to be here. That fits my criteria.
Anything that makes you a buck fits your criteria. Danica’s finish is not the highest finish by a female driver in NA$CAR. She finished 4th in a fuel mileage race in NA$CAR’s AAA series equivalent. Sara Christian finished 5th in NA$CAR’s top series in 1949 at Pittsburgh. Janet Guthrie finished 6th at Bristol in 1977 in NA$CAR’s top series. So until she runs in the Cup Series and gets a 4th place finish she isn’t the highest female finisher in NA$CAR.
There were more questions asked and Jayski's got the transcript posted for all to read. Check it out, read it very carefully, read what's said, what's omitted, and how the questions are really answered versus what the question asked.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Sam Ard's Birthday, Daytona Repaving, Media Surprise, More Ethanol Stuff
Sam Ard’s Birthday Approaching
I know times are tough right now for everybody and I know I‘m going on about the situation with Sam Ard. Like Sam, my grandmother had Alzheimer’s and luckily she passed before it had reached the point where she required constant care. Seeing what was happening to her was definitely sad. She was a strong-willed, hard-headed, out-spoken woman who had taken care of herself most of her life. Although I was appreciative of her neighbors and my relatives who were taking care of her, it was a heartbreaker to see her like that.
So if you could please send Sam Ard a birthday card with a $25 Walmart card in it, you’d definitely brighten both his and his wife’s day as they’re trying to make it on Social Security, which is no easy feat. If you can’t send the Walmart card, just send a birthday card. They’ll appreciate it just the same. Sam’s birthday is on Valentine’s Day so if you want to send him a card, here’s the address:
Sam Ard
1237 Bass Rd.
Pamplico, SC 29583
Daytona Track Repaving - The Lost Section
It seems that although they repaved the tri-oval part of the track, they did nothing to the road course section. From what I heard from some folks who were there, some of whom were racing on it, the road course section is in really bad shape and they wonder why it too wasn’t repaved. I guess that’s what happens when you spend millions of dollars on an infield amusement park and zoo instead of what‘s really their bread and butter. The track itself.
Growth Energy & The Switch to Ethanol by NASCAR
I’ve been doing some research on Growth Energy. I’ve been going through their Form 990’s that they have to file with the IRS. The PR release from NA$CAR is a bit misleading. Growth Energy isn’t an advocacy group. Growth Energy itself holds the 501c6 status, which is for trade groups not environmental and research efforts. It turns out the trade group is specific to Midwest ethanol sources, and cuts out support for the Virginias-and-Carolinas biomass-to-cellulose-ethanol programs that were investigated when big tobacco started moving overseas. Two of the paid consultants are former Army General Wesley Clark and former Iowa Congressman Jim Nussle.
Two companies are operating with names similar to American Ethanol (a la standard stock scam and con-man practices) and the one Growth Energy claims as a business partner is missing a LOT of contact info! I wonder why?
I am Surprised by Some of the Media
Some of the lamestream media has actually surprised me over the off-season with articles regarding the changes to the Shoot-out, the points system, and even the play-off system. And they’re pointing out things I have over the last 7 years, like the dumbing down of NA$CAR and how the continuous changes are driving fans away. When the lamestream media starts to turn on NA$CAR, that’s when you know they’re in big trouble.
Daytona 500 & First Half of the Season Coverage
I don’t know how many of you read the Daly Planet article about how David Hill said the coverage will be but if you thought the coverage in the past was bad, it’ll be worse this season.
"What this sport is all about is the driver. Everything else in NASCAR is an afterthought. People follow the sport because the drivers are heroes because that’s what the fans want to hear, superheroes that can do things that only very, very few people can or will. Anyone can be a crew chief. Anyone can be a tire changer. Anyone with the technical ability. Just think about what it takes to drive a car 200 miles an hour. ee sports: Mountain climbing, bullfighting and auto racing. All the rest of the games."
First off, he got it wrong about this being a sport and I refer once again to the sworn affidavit from NA$CAR’s VP of Racing Operations who said that “NA$CAR is family oriented sports entertainment”. Where he did get it right is that everything else is an afterthought. The marketing takes precedence over the actual racing. The promotion of drivers takes precedence over the racing. So the racing isn’t important but serves as a backdrop to marketing NA$CAR’s sponsors and promoting the drivers into cult hero status. Anyone can be a crew chief? Then let’s see Mr. Hill get on top of Dale Jr’s pit box and see how long he last. Anyone can be a tire changer? Then let’s see Mr. Hill sling those tires around and try to do it in under 14 seconds. I don’t know what it takes to drive at 200 mph but I do know what it takes to drive at 160 mph. Which is more dangerous? 200 mph on an enclosed banked race track with only 42 other cars competing or 160 mph on the German Autobahn with thousands of cars? And not everyone who’s technically oriented can be a crew chief, mechanic, or tire changer. Ryan Newman, who has an engineering degree, can’t exactly get out there and sling tires around or handle a dump can. He might be able to do some mechanical work in the garage though. And as NA$CAR is sports entertainment, that means it’s a game and not a sport.
"Fox is going to concentrate on the driver, too. Right across the board. We’re putting the emphasis back where it belongs on the driver. We probably haven’t utilized Darrell (Waltrip’s) inner knowledge enough. Darrell is the only one on our (announcing) team, in reality who is a champion. He understands the motivation and what goes on. I don’t know. Is it instinct or is it skill? This is something that I’ve talked to the Alain Prosts about and the Jackie Stewarts. What is it? There’s something that drives them. What we’re going to be doing at Fox and what we’re going to be doing at SPEED is telling stories of drivers.
So it’s going to be a lot like last season where they only show the usual Chosen Ones and Jabber Jaw’s favorites, plus whoever ponies up the most mention money that doesn’t fall into those categories. It’ll also mean more in-car camera shots. That means they’ll be so locked into promoting the chosen drivers, using the in-car cameras and gimmick shots, and cluttering the screens up with graphics that we’ll more than likely miss the wrecks, the beating and banging at Martinsville and Darlington, and some of the pit road action. And if you weren’t happy about the amount of jaw-jacking Jabber Jaws did before, Mike Joy and Larry Mac aren’t going to be able to get a word in edge-wise with this new “coverage”. On the plus side that should mean less Moe Ron Myers and Hollywood Hambone.
Appearance is Reality
That is a term used by Vince McMahon of the WWE and later by Mafia Mike of NA$CAR. And it definitely applies to the new points system, especially when the play-offs start. By making it appear close, the master marketing genius in Daytona thinks people will be fooled into believing that the points race will be close. Unfortunately for him, the fans who have been following the sport for a while and don’t have an attention deficit already know it’s nothing more than smoke and mirrors. The same smoke and mirrors that have been used since the play-off system was implemented, continued when the generic car was introduced, and still continues to this day in an attempt to fool the fans. Unfortunately, the only person being fooled is the head fool himself.
Continuing Promise 2011
The USNS Comfort, a Navy medical ship, will be undertaking a 4 month mission of providing humanitarian assistance and training to a number of Caribbean island nations and countries in Central and South America. Both the Comfort and her sister ship the USNS Mercy have been used in a number of humanitarian missions as well as for their designed mission of providing medical support to combat operations. The Comfort’s 4 month mission starts in April and will be made up of both military and volunteer civilian personnel. So to the crewmembers of the Comfort and the volunteers of Continuing Promise 2011, my thanks for doing what others are unwilling to do.
I know times are tough right now for everybody and I know I‘m going on about the situation with Sam Ard. Like Sam, my grandmother had Alzheimer’s and luckily she passed before it had reached the point where she required constant care. Seeing what was happening to her was definitely sad. She was a strong-willed, hard-headed, out-spoken woman who had taken care of herself most of her life. Although I was appreciative of her neighbors and my relatives who were taking care of her, it was a heartbreaker to see her like that.
So if you could please send Sam Ard a birthday card with a $25 Walmart card in it, you’d definitely brighten both his and his wife’s day as they’re trying to make it on Social Security, which is no easy feat. If you can’t send the Walmart card, just send a birthday card. They’ll appreciate it just the same. Sam’s birthday is on Valentine’s Day so if you want to send him a card, here’s the address:
Sam Ard
1237 Bass Rd.
Pamplico, SC 29583
Daytona Track Repaving - The Lost Section
It seems that although they repaved the tri-oval part of the track, they did nothing to the road course section. From what I heard from some folks who were there, some of whom were racing on it, the road course section is in really bad shape and they wonder why it too wasn’t repaved. I guess that’s what happens when you spend millions of dollars on an infield amusement park and zoo instead of what‘s really their bread and butter. The track itself.
Growth Energy & The Switch to Ethanol by NASCAR
I’ve been doing some research on Growth Energy. I’ve been going through their Form 990’s that they have to file with the IRS. The PR release from NA$CAR is a bit misleading. Growth Energy isn’t an advocacy group. Growth Energy itself holds the 501c6 status, which is for trade groups not environmental and research efforts. It turns out the trade group is specific to Midwest ethanol sources, and cuts out support for the Virginias-and-Carolinas biomass-to-cellulose-ethanol programs that were investigated when big tobacco started moving overseas. Two of the paid consultants are former Army General Wesley Clark and former Iowa Congressman Jim Nussle.
Two companies are operating with names similar to American Ethanol (a la standard stock scam and con-man practices) and the one Growth Energy claims as a business partner is missing a LOT of contact info! I wonder why?
I am Surprised by Some of the Media
Some of the lamestream media has actually surprised me over the off-season with articles regarding the changes to the Shoot-out, the points system, and even the play-off system. And they’re pointing out things I have over the last 7 years, like the dumbing down of NA$CAR and how the continuous changes are driving fans away. When the lamestream media starts to turn on NA$CAR, that’s when you know they’re in big trouble.
Daytona 500 & First Half of the Season Coverage
I don’t know how many of you read the Daly Planet article about how David Hill said the coverage will be but if you thought the coverage in the past was bad, it’ll be worse this season.
"What this sport is all about is the driver. Everything else in NASCAR is an afterthought. People follow the sport because the drivers are heroes because that’s what the fans want to hear, superheroes that can do things that only very, very few people can or will. Anyone can be a crew chief. Anyone can be a tire changer. Anyone with the technical ability. Just think about what it takes to drive a car 200 miles an hour. ee sports: Mountain climbing, bullfighting and auto racing. All the rest of the games."
First off, he got it wrong about this being a sport and I refer once again to the sworn affidavit from NA$CAR’s VP of Racing Operations who said that “NA$CAR is family oriented sports entertainment”. Where he did get it right is that everything else is an afterthought. The marketing takes precedence over the actual racing. The promotion of drivers takes precedence over the racing. So the racing isn’t important but serves as a backdrop to marketing NA$CAR’s sponsors and promoting the drivers into cult hero status. Anyone can be a crew chief? Then let’s see Mr. Hill get on top of Dale Jr’s pit box and see how long he last. Anyone can be a tire changer? Then let’s see Mr. Hill sling those tires around and try to do it in under 14 seconds. I don’t know what it takes to drive at 200 mph but I do know what it takes to drive at 160 mph. Which is more dangerous? 200 mph on an enclosed banked race track with only 42 other cars competing or 160 mph on the German Autobahn with thousands of cars? And not everyone who’s technically oriented can be a crew chief, mechanic, or tire changer. Ryan Newman, who has an engineering degree, can’t exactly get out there and sling tires around or handle a dump can. He might be able to do some mechanical work in the garage though. And as NA$CAR is sports entertainment, that means it’s a game and not a sport.
"Fox is going to concentrate on the driver, too. Right across the board. We’re putting the emphasis back where it belongs on the driver. We probably haven’t utilized Darrell (Waltrip’s) inner knowledge enough. Darrell is the only one on our (announcing) team, in reality who is a champion. He understands the motivation and what goes on. I don’t know. Is it instinct or is it skill? This is something that I’ve talked to the Alain Prosts about and the Jackie Stewarts. What is it? There’s something that drives them. What we’re going to be doing at Fox and what we’re going to be doing at SPEED is telling stories of drivers.
So it’s going to be a lot like last season where they only show the usual Chosen Ones and Jabber Jaw’s favorites, plus whoever ponies up the most mention money that doesn’t fall into those categories. It’ll also mean more in-car camera shots. That means they’ll be so locked into promoting the chosen drivers, using the in-car cameras and gimmick shots, and cluttering the screens up with graphics that we’ll more than likely miss the wrecks, the beating and banging at Martinsville and Darlington, and some of the pit road action. And if you weren’t happy about the amount of jaw-jacking Jabber Jaws did before, Mike Joy and Larry Mac aren’t going to be able to get a word in edge-wise with this new “coverage”. On the plus side that should mean less Moe Ron Myers and Hollywood Hambone.
Appearance is Reality
That is a term used by Vince McMahon of the WWE and later by Mafia Mike of NA$CAR. And it definitely applies to the new points system, especially when the play-offs start. By making it appear close, the master marketing genius in Daytona thinks people will be fooled into believing that the points race will be close. Unfortunately for him, the fans who have been following the sport for a while and don’t have an attention deficit already know it’s nothing more than smoke and mirrors. The same smoke and mirrors that have been used since the play-off system was implemented, continued when the generic car was introduced, and still continues to this day in an attempt to fool the fans. Unfortunately, the only person being fooled is the head fool himself.
Continuing Promise 2011
The USNS Comfort, a Navy medical ship, will be undertaking a 4 month mission of providing humanitarian assistance and training to a number of Caribbean island nations and countries in Central and South America. Both the Comfort and her sister ship the USNS Mercy have been used in a number of humanitarian missions as well as for their designed mission of providing medical support to combat operations. The Comfort’s 4 month mission starts in April and will be made up of both military and volunteer civilian personnel. So to the crewmembers of the Comfort and the volunteers of Continuing Promise 2011, my thanks for doing what others are unwilling to do.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Time for Somebody to Lend a Helping Hand
There’s an old saying about charity beginning at home. And that’s what needs to be happening right now in NASCAR. We’ve got some racing greats who gave their all for the sport of stock car racing who are having some hard times getting medical care, paying the doctors’ bills, and meeting their everyday needs.
Recently, we found out that former racing great Fred Lorenzen was living in a nursing home as a result of his Alzheimer’s and that he was forgetting things, is beginning to forget names, was getting injured from falls at home, and that he pretty much wasn’t able to take care of himself. This is a far cry from the Golden Boy who wheeled his #28 Holman-Moody Ford around the track and winning. Fred gave his all for stock car racing and for the NASCAR under Bill France Sr. And how is Fred and his family being repaid by the France family for the sacrifices he made? They’re not. The Frances continue to hide behind the “independent contractor” clause. Despite the fact that NASCAR has a multi-million dollar charity which could easily assist Fred, it doesn’t. There are also a number of drivers who have charities who could step up and help Fred out. But they don’t.
Two time Busch Series champion Sam Ard was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson‘s Diseases several years ago. Sam and his wife Jo had to sell off Sam’s trophies, Martinsville clocks, championship rings, and other valuable memorabilia to try to keep up with the staggering medical bills of both Sam’s diseases and Jo’s blindness. The Old Timers Racing Club, through their Medical Hardship Fund, has been holding the Legends Helping Legends Fundraisers to assist drivers like Sam and other racing folks from the glory days of NASCAR. I attend them and was at the one they held for Sam. Racing greats like Rex White, Ned Jarrett, Bobby Allison, and others turned out to sign autographs for the fundraising event. All of those drivers, who like Sam, have no sort of medical help or pension fund to fall back on because of NASCAR’s continued hiding behind the “independent contractors” clause.
Both Mr. Happy and Dale Jr. stepped up and made donations to Sam’s care. Mr. Happy donated a van which was used in one of the Shell commercials he was in. The shocker was when Kyle Busch donated $100,000 to help with Sam’s care. Still, this is only 3 high profile drivers out of a how many? And where is NASCAR and the Frances in all of this? Neither the Frances, NASCAR, nor their “foundation” have donated a penny. There was a fundraiser at Richmond which raised $36,000 to help the Ard family out which had some fancy PR spin put on it to make it appear it was NASCAR making the donations but it wasn’t. For a supposed charity which pulls in untold millions and only donates $9 million to various charities, all of which benefit NASCAR and/or the France family either directly or indirectly, not to donate to former greats like Sam who helped put NASCAR on the map is almost criminal. All it takes is adding one sentence to the charter or rules to make it happen.
And what about all the high profile drivers who were shocked by Busch’s donation? What happened to the one-upmanship that drivers of old use to engage in? Drivers not wanting to be bested by their competitors? We didn’t see any of Busch’s vocal rivals step up and match his donation or try to beat it. Only Mr happy and Dale Jr. stepped up.
And what about Sam’s current condition? This is from a friend of the Ard family:
Sam is now a totally bed-ridden invalid. He is cared for at home by his wife 24/7. His request was and still is not to be placed in a nursing home.
It has been draining physically, emotionally, and financially. They are in desperate need of help at this time.
As you can see, Sam’s condition isn’t improving and the physical, mental, emotional, and financial drain on the family is still there. I know the toll it can take as I’m taking care of someone who was has been suffering with a seizure disorder for over 3 years.
Right now, Jo spends app. $300.00 a month for items which the VA does not provide. She struggles and juggles to make ends meet each month on his social security check. Any help would be appreciated, even gift cards to places like Walmart and grocery stores. There is a hole in her roof which she can't afford to have repaired. She is in need of a cooking stove, washer and dryer as theirs are about shot.
If this isn’t the perfect opportunity for Lowe’s or Home Depot to step up and help them out, I don’t know what is.
And how much did the Frances pay towards Bobby Allison's medical bills from his terrifying crash at Pocono that nearly took his life? Zip. It took Bobby over 20 years to pay those medical bills off. It would've taken the France family one check to pay off Bobby's medical bills. But no, they preferred to hide behind the "independent contractor" clause.
So, here’s what I’d like to see happen. I know the folks from NASCAR are reading this along with some team PR and marketing people. Get off your duffs. Set up a charity to help out drivers and other folks who were in the racing business who need medical assistance or help with their medical bills or their medical care. NASCAR, ISC, and SMI could have a “Sam Ard Day” at one of their tracks and take the ticket money and donate it to help Sam out. Or they could take 10% of their ticket sales for all NASCAR events and donate it to the Racing Legends Medical Hardship Fund since it already exists. You team PR and marketing people, hit your drivers, team owners, and sponsors up for donations and services that they can provide to help these ailing former greats. Home Depot and Lowe’s could donate materials and personnel to help make houses wheelchair accessible or makes repairs that are sorely needed or donate things like washers, dryers, stoves, ovens, or fridges. The Big 3 could donate vans that are configured to transport a wheelchair-bound person. UPS and FedEx could ship medical supplies and medications to these ailing folks for free. Drivers could donate 10% of their race earnings or souvenir sales for the year to help out. If a driver got the testicular fortitude, he could donate his entire race winnings to help out. Team owners could pass the hat in their shops for donations or make their own donations separate from that of the teams and drivers. The ones who own vehicle dealerships could even help out by doing what I suggested the Big 3 do. Or they could modify a vehicle to be donated.
And how about some of you TV network people? How about donating some airtime to promote fundraisers like the Legends Helping Legends Fundraiser events? Or even send a camera crew out there to cover them? Speed’s got the personnel to do it and it’s just up the road in Mooresville. Or blocking off a day and instead of showing those fluff and reality shows that few people watch, how about running a telethon to raise funds? This would be the perfect event to put the Motormouth Brothers to work. Have them shill for the fundraisers like they do for everyone else that owns or sponsors them. You could get some current drivers in there to help out or answer the phones and get some former greats like Buddy Baker, Rex White, Junior Johnson, and others to tell some stories about the good old days of racing and get their opinions on the current state of the sport. Get Wanda Lund on there to talk about some of her recipes and some of her stories about her husband Tiny and some of the other racing greats. It could be a fundraiser and a history lesson in one.
And why should the current day drivers and crewmembers get involved with something like this? Because if it wasn’t for the likes of Sam Ard, Suitcase Jake, Rex White, James Hylton, and others, there wouldn’t be a NASCAR or a job for them. These folks pioneered the way for them to be able to do what they do today. They kept NASCAR from going under when it looked like it was going to fold several times. Think about James Hylton. He got his start as a crewmember on Rex White’s team before he became a racer and was the 1966 ROY. Rex was a pioneer of using jackscrews and using camber to turn the cars. He wasn’t just a racer, he was also a mechanical genius. Rex got his start turning wrenches for Frankie Schneider. Suitcase Jake was probably one of the most famous names in the garage outside of the drivers because of his mechanical and crew chief abilities and for his moving from team to team.
Think about today’s drivers. How many of them have come up through the ranks of being a mechanic first? How many crew chiefs started out working for free on somebody’s car as part of a volunteer crew? Or how about some of the great practical jokes that were played like those done by Curtis Turner, Joe Weatherly, and Tiny Lund? These are the things which took a regional racing series and turned it into a national brand name. These are the people who worked 2-3 jobs and sacrificed so much to be able to have a racing career. If not for these folks, today’s drivers would still be running in some lower level racing series trying to scrape together a couple of bucks to buy tires, parts, or gasoline to run their next race. Just like these racing pioneers had to do. So maybe it’s time for these big buck, high profile racing folks to remember these former greats and help them out since the sanctioning body that they sacrificed everything for won’t. After all, these drivers, team owners, and crewmembers wouldn’t be where they are today if it wasn’t for the likes of Sam Ard, James Hylton, Rex White, Suitcase Jake, Junior Johnson, and others too numerous to name from the history of the sport.
Recently, we found out that former racing great Fred Lorenzen was living in a nursing home as a result of his Alzheimer’s and that he was forgetting things, is beginning to forget names, was getting injured from falls at home, and that he pretty much wasn’t able to take care of himself. This is a far cry from the Golden Boy who wheeled his #28 Holman-Moody Ford around the track and winning. Fred gave his all for stock car racing and for the NASCAR under Bill France Sr. And how is Fred and his family being repaid by the France family for the sacrifices he made? They’re not. The Frances continue to hide behind the “independent contractor” clause. Despite the fact that NASCAR has a multi-million dollar charity which could easily assist Fred, it doesn’t. There are also a number of drivers who have charities who could step up and help Fred out. But they don’t.
Two time Busch Series champion Sam Ard was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson‘s Diseases several years ago. Sam and his wife Jo had to sell off Sam’s trophies, Martinsville clocks, championship rings, and other valuable memorabilia to try to keep up with the staggering medical bills of both Sam’s diseases and Jo’s blindness. The Old Timers Racing Club, through their Medical Hardship Fund, has been holding the Legends Helping Legends Fundraisers to assist drivers like Sam and other racing folks from the glory days of NASCAR. I attend them and was at the one they held for Sam. Racing greats like Rex White, Ned Jarrett, Bobby Allison, and others turned out to sign autographs for the fundraising event. All of those drivers, who like Sam, have no sort of medical help or pension fund to fall back on because of NASCAR’s continued hiding behind the “independent contractors” clause.
Both Mr. Happy and Dale Jr. stepped up and made donations to Sam’s care. Mr. Happy donated a van which was used in one of the Shell commercials he was in. The shocker was when Kyle Busch donated $100,000 to help with Sam’s care. Still, this is only 3 high profile drivers out of a how many? And where is NASCAR and the Frances in all of this? Neither the Frances, NASCAR, nor their “foundation” have donated a penny. There was a fundraiser at Richmond which raised $36,000 to help the Ard family out which had some fancy PR spin put on it to make it appear it was NASCAR making the donations but it wasn’t. For a supposed charity which pulls in untold millions and only donates $9 million to various charities, all of which benefit NASCAR and/or the France family either directly or indirectly, not to donate to former greats like Sam who helped put NASCAR on the map is almost criminal. All it takes is adding one sentence to the charter or rules to make it happen.
And what about all the high profile drivers who were shocked by Busch’s donation? What happened to the one-upmanship that drivers of old use to engage in? Drivers not wanting to be bested by their competitors? We didn’t see any of Busch’s vocal rivals step up and match his donation or try to beat it. Only Mr happy and Dale Jr. stepped up.
And what about Sam’s current condition? This is from a friend of the Ard family:
Sam is now a totally bed-ridden invalid. He is cared for at home by his wife 24/7. His request was and still is not to be placed in a nursing home.
It has been draining physically, emotionally, and financially. They are in desperate need of help at this time.
As you can see, Sam’s condition isn’t improving and the physical, mental, emotional, and financial drain on the family is still there. I know the toll it can take as I’m taking care of someone who was has been suffering with a seizure disorder for over 3 years.
Right now, Jo spends app. $300.00 a month for items which the VA does not provide. She struggles and juggles to make ends meet each month on his social security check. Any help would be appreciated, even gift cards to places like Walmart and grocery stores. There is a hole in her roof which she can't afford to have repaired. She is in need of a cooking stove, washer and dryer as theirs are about shot.
If this isn’t the perfect opportunity for Lowe’s or Home Depot to step up and help them out, I don’t know what is.
And how much did the Frances pay towards Bobby Allison's medical bills from his terrifying crash at Pocono that nearly took his life? Zip. It took Bobby over 20 years to pay those medical bills off. It would've taken the France family one check to pay off Bobby's medical bills. But no, they preferred to hide behind the "independent contractor" clause.
So, here’s what I’d like to see happen. I know the folks from NASCAR are reading this along with some team PR and marketing people. Get off your duffs. Set up a charity to help out drivers and other folks who were in the racing business who need medical assistance or help with their medical bills or their medical care. NASCAR, ISC, and SMI could have a “Sam Ard Day” at one of their tracks and take the ticket money and donate it to help Sam out. Or they could take 10% of their ticket sales for all NASCAR events and donate it to the Racing Legends Medical Hardship Fund since it already exists. You team PR and marketing people, hit your drivers, team owners, and sponsors up for donations and services that they can provide to help these ailing former greats. Home Depot and Lowe’s could donate materials and personnel to help make houses wheelchair accessible or makes repairs that are sorely needed or donate things like washers, dryers, stoves, ovens, or fridges. The Big 3 could donate vans that are configured to transport a wheelchair-bound person. UPS and FedEx could ship medical supplies and medications to these ailing folks for free. Drivers could donate 10% of their race earnings or souvenir sales for the year to help out. If a driver got the testicular fortitude, he could donate his entire race winnings to help out. Team owners could pass the hat in their shops for donations or make their own donations separate from that of the teams and drivers. The ones who own vehicle dealerships could even help out by doing what I suggested the Big 3 do. Or they could modify a vehicle to be donated.
And how about some of you TV network people? How about donating some airtime to promote fundraisers like the Legends Helping Legends Fundraiser events? Or even send a camera crew out there to cover them? Speed’s got the personnel to do it and it’s just up the road in Mooresville. Or blocking off a day and instead of showing those fluff and reality shows that few people watch, how about running a telethon to raise funds? This would be the perfect event to put the Motormouth Brothers to work. Have them shill for the fundraisers like they do for everyone else that owns or sponsors them. You could get some current drivers in there to help out or answer the phones and get some former greats like Buddy Baker, Rex White, Junior Johnson, and others to tell some stories about the good old days of racing and get their opinions on the current state of the sport. Get Wanda Lund on there to talk about some of her recipes and some of her stories about her husband Tiny and some of the other racing greats. It could be a fundraiser and a history lesson in one.
And why should the current day drivers and crewmembers get involved with something like this? Because if it wasn’t for the likes of Sam Ard, Suitcase Jake, Rex White, James Hylton, and others, there wouldn’t be a NASCAR or a job for them. These folks pioneered the way for them to be able to do what they do today. They kept NASCAR from going under when it looked like it was going to fold several times. Think about James Hylton. He got his start as a crewmember on Rex White’s team before he became a racer and was the 1966 ROY. Rex was a pioneer of using jackscrews and using camber to turn the cars. He wasn’t just a racer, he was also a mechanical genius. Rex got his start turning wrenches for Frankie Schneider. Suitcase Jake was probably one of the most famous names in the garage outside of the drivers because of his mechanical and crew chief abilities and for his moving from team to team.
Think about today’s drivers. How many of them have come up through the ranks of being a mechanic first? How many crew chiefs started out working for free on somebody’s car as part of a volunteer crew? Or how about some of the great practical jokes that were played like those done by Curtis Turner, Joe Weatherly, and Tiny Lund? These are the things which took a regional racing series and turned it into a national brand name. These are the people who worked 2-3 jobs and sacrificed so much to be able to have a racing career. If not for these folks, today’s drivers would still be running in some lower level racing series trying to scrape together a couple of bucks to buy tires, parts, or gasoline to run their next race. Just like these racing pioneers had to do. So maybe it’s time for these big buck, high profile racing folks to remember these former greats and help them out since the sanctioning body that they sacrificed everything for won’t. After all, these drivers, team owners, and crewmembers wouldn’t be where they are today if it wasn’t for the likes of Sam Ard, James Hylton, Rex White, Suitcase Jake, Junior Johnson, and others too numerous to name from the history of the sport.
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