Before I get too far into what is happening in the Sprint Cup garage, I wanted to let everyone know what is happening in NASCAR’s other two national touring divisions — and it doesn’t look good for one of them.
Things seem to be shaping up OK for the Nationwide Series, primarily because of the Sprint Cup teams that drop down and run the races as a practice or testing session. There might be an occasion when the field is a little bit short but, for the most part, I expect to see 43 cars take the green flag in every Nationwide Series race.
I have noticed that there are more companies sharing space on the cars. One example was announced on Tuesday whereby SFP, an agriculture products company, announced that it would be a 10-race primary sponsor for Peyton Sellars beginning at Texas Motor Speedway in April. Another example is GoDaddy.com’s 20-race deal with JR Motorsports and Hendrick Motorsports. Obviously, the economy is wreaking havoc on auto racing but many companies are scrambling to find enough money in their ad budgets to at least stay in the Nationwide Series.
Over in the Camping World Truck Series, it’s another story. Only 36 trucks start each race in the series but I am hearing that NASCAR will be lucky to have a full field at even half of its events. Sure, there have been some announcements of drivers signing trucks deals for the 2009 season but sponsorships have been hard to come by. I am proud to say that my old team at ThorsSport Racing (I was the PR guy for the No. 13 truck a few years ago) has signed Johnny Sauter as its driver in 2009. Team owner Duke Thorson has deep pockets and has personally funded the No. 13 at least part of the time for several years. I haven’t heard if they have sponsorship for 2009 but I’m sure Menard’s, which sponsors ThorSport’s No. 88 truck, will have partial interest.
I will say this, if someone has a medium-sized or regional company, they could get a really good deal on sponsoring a truck series team.
Things aren’t looking so great in the Sprint Cup garage, either. It is unlikely that the sport’s top series will have a full field at every track in 2009. And the latest team mergers show that the money these teams were used to getting has dried up. Like I said last week, some of this is deserved because I think the teams were so used to getting mega-dollars that they got spoiled. They burned through wads of cash and when the bottom fell out, they were dumbfounded and near broke.
Ironically, it’s the smaller teams that may come out smelling like a rose in the 2009 season. I liked Tommy Baldwin’s comment last week when he said the smaller teams aren’t used to having unlimited bank accounts so they can better handle the downturn in the economy.
And teams like Michael Waltrip Racing are buying equipment that will help them save money and increase productivity at the same time. On Tuesday, I receiveda an announcement from MWR about a new hydro-cutting tool the team purchased to help fabricate its parts.
“These days we’re all looking for ways to save time and money, and Jet Edge’s X-Stream pump does both,” said MWR technical director Nick Hughes. “We couldn’t ask for anything more.”
The new device, which uses a 90,000 psi stream of water instead of a cutting blade or die, helps fabricate parts much faster than traditional milling technology.
In others news, NASCAR.com has reported that Bobby Labonte will drive the No. 96 car in a partnership deal between Yates Racing and Hall of Fame Racing.
Despite NASCAR’s ban on testing at sanctioned tracks, there was a tire test this past week at Texas Motor Speedway. The test was attended by Kurt Busch, David Reuttimann, Jeff Burton and Travis Kvapil.
And speaking of testing, if you are heading to College Station, you might want to check with the folks at Texas World Speedway. Since the track is no longer sanctioned by NASCAR, it is available for testing. And the track owners have completed its initial renovation of the asphalt there and look forward to hosting any teams that might want to test in 2009 and beyond.
On a final note, if you have ever wanted to attend a race at Bristol Motor Speedway, you better pick up the phone. The track announced last week that it has a number of season ticket packages available. This is the first time in years that there hasn’t been a waiting list for season tickets. I was in Bristol this past year and any seat is a good one, so this is a great opportunity.
Well, that’s about it for this week. I have been working on a schedule of the races that I will cover this season at www.kickinthetires.net and, so far, it includes the Las Vegas race in March, the fall Atlanta race, the May race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway and all events at Texas Motor Speedway. And, as always, we will be hosting our NASCAR Weekend Getaway Contest, but this year we are doing something that we have never done before. That’s all I can say for now but we will be making a major announcement in a week or two.
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