NASCAR is off to a fast start according to Chief Executive Officer, Brian Z. France.
In a teleconference, he said “In general with a very dynamic Daytona 500, having a really young star born, having the iconic 21 Wood Brothers team in Victory Lane, with 74 lead changes, very interesting way the competition played out during the Daytona 500. We started there and then on to Phoenix, getting Jeff Gordon back in Victory Lane, record lead changes again there, attendance up across the board.”
The only speed brake is the early off-week in the young season with only three races run. By moving the Daytona 500 back one week next year France is confident that the momentum won’t be lost going forward.
“In my view, all things being equal, we'd probably like to be racing this weekend. But I don't believe that to be a significant challenge for us because we happen to have an open week. We have a long season, we're going to have some open weeks.”
“In the long run, with the 500 moving, it will by definition take care of that. Our schedules are year-to-year, but you typically can see we have a lot of continuity.”
Speaking of schedules, the NASCAR CEO doesn’t see a significant change in the future.
“I don't think you're going to see a lot of changes. We'll see how some of the new dates, their new time on the calendar works out. But I don't think there will be as much as there was, say, in 2010,” France said.
Turning to some other issues France commented on the two-car draft first seen in Daytona in February.
“To tell you the truth, we were curious, too. It was a phenomenon. We'd never seen anything like that. We were curious going into Sunday. I remember talking to Mike in the tower. We didn't know how that was going to play out,’ he said.
“But 74 lead changes, dramatic racing all the way through, although it looked a little bit different, the competition level went up. We look at a lot of things to come to that, but we like it. It's different. But, generally speaking, if competition goes up, the races are exciting, we're going to like it,” he added.
Finally, the one area where NASCAR has not broken through into the mainstream is to have minority drivers at the top levels.
France said “we're going to have a breakthrough in that area. It's going to be on my watch, and I'll be very proud of that when that occurs.”
 |
| Photo: Chris Graythen/Getty Images for NASCAR |
In a teleconference, he said “In general with a very dynamic Daytona 500, having a really young star born, having the iconic 21 Wood Brothers team in Victory Lane, with 74 lead changes, very interesting way the competition played out during the Daytona 500. We started there and then on to Phoenix, getting Jeff Gordon back in Victory Lane, record lead changes again there, attendance up across the board.”
The only speed brake is the early off-week in the young season with only three races run. By moving the Daytona 500 back one week next year France is confident that the momentum won’t be lost going forward.
“In my view, all things being equal, we'd probably like to be racing this weekend. But I don't believe that to be a significant challenge for us because we happen to have an open week. We have a long season, we're going to have some open weeks.”
“In the long run, with the 500 moving, it will by definition take care of that. Our schedules are year-to-year, but you typically can see we have a lot of continuity.”
Speaking of schedules, the NASCAR CEO doesn’t see a significant change in the future.
“I don't think you're going to see a lot of changes. We'll see how some of the new dates, their new time on the calendar works out. But I don't think there will be as much as there was, say, in 2010,” France said.
Turning to some other issues France commented on the two-car draft first seen in Daytona in February.
“To tell you the truth, we were curious, too. It was a phenomenon. We'd never seen anything like that. We were curious going into Sunday. I remember talking to Mike in the tower. We didn't know how that was going to play out,’ he said.
“But 74 lead changes, dramatic racing all the way through, although it looked a little bit different, the competition level went up. We look at a lot of things to come to that, but we like it. It's different. But, generally speaking, if competition goes up, the races are exciting, we're going to like it,” he added.
Finally, the one area where NASCAR has not broken through into the mainstream is to have minority drivers at the top levels.
France said “we're going to have a breakthrough in that area. It's going to be on my watch, and I'll be very proud of that when that occurs.”
 |
| Photo: John Harrelson/Getty Images for NASCAR |