Economics and Sponsorship
Everyone is feeling the effects of economic strife these days and NASCAR is no different. As you know, it takes a ton of money to field a NASCAR team these days, especially in the Sprint Cup series. Look at Robert Yates Racing. They brought back the famed No. 28 only to have no sponsorship, and RYR is barely able to field two cars these days. While it takes between $12 to $18 million to run a full time Cup ride, the Nationwide Series is struggling even more. This weekend, the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 20 will run its fourth sponsor in four races, and that's with the premier Sprint Cup drivers of Tony Stewart and Kyle Busch behind the wheel. We're talking about the car that won the manufactures championship in the series a year ago. If that doesn't tell you about the fragile economic state of the series, consider they don't even have enough sponsorship to field the No. 18 car in all the races. When one of the sports premier teams is unable to garner the necessary financial support to compete, imagine what the future holds for the smaller operations in the series. I've heard rumblings that someday NASCAR may consider shortening races in order to save money and cut ticket prices to make the races more affordable. That may not be such a bad idea as we've seen over the sport's history that shorter races tend to be more exciting anyways. Look at the Bud Shootout and the All-Star races. Maybe the excitement is due to the fact that they are more exhibition races than anything, but the fact still remains, changes may be on the horizon. The answer may be in diversification. More and more teams are following the trend Roush Racing set when they added a financial partner when they formed Roush-Fenway Racing. Evernham Motorsports has since joined forces with George Gillette and JGR turned to Toyota for corporate support in order to gain the advantage they feel will keep them competitive going into the future. It is unknown as to whether these economic struggles are temporary, and many feel like this is just a cyclic transgression in the sport. But the fact remains, money is short, and the costs, even with the advent of the car of tomorrow, are rising. Only time will tell. But they way it stands, even the power teams are scratching their heads, and the marketing gurus are working overtime.
Posted: 3/7/2008 10:58:00 PM
Comments:
Shorter races would be good, and it would make Nascar look better.  I love racing but i hate to think about how much gas they waste on a weekend when I am paying 3.50 a gallon.  The economy is what it is, some sectors are slow but some are booming.  Nascar is on a downward trend and the sponsorship deal doesn't help.  I really like to see short fields and hope that continues so Nascar may see their errors and what they need to do (drop the top 35, fastest cars get in).
Posted On: 3/7/2008 10:58:00 PM

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