Detroit Puts the Microscope on NASCAR

The economy. It's looking rough from many angles, and NASCAR is catching it. Of recent times, the Detroit manufacturers have been dissecting their involvement in NASCAR with a fervor trying to determine where best their advertising / sponsorship monies can be used.

We know cutbacks are coming and they let NASCAR know in a series of meetings that were held in Indianapolis and it's a good guess that NASCAR now understands that Detroit's involvement may not be an automatic 'gimme' in the future for anyone involved.

Over on the web magazine Autoextremist, they've got a pretty interesting article about some of the presures Detriot is going to start squeezing NASCAR with.

Here's a list of some of the issues put on the table for NASCAR to evaluate:

1. Pony cars on the track in Cup, not Nationwide, by 2010 to help sales in the showroom, like it used to be.
2. Get fuel injection under the hood, rather than NASCAR's head under the tech sand.
3. They want to skip the unleaded fuel and go to E85.
4. They want to see more road courses in the schedule with specialized road course cars.
5. Cut the schedule back to save development money.
6. With the decline in truck sales, the manufacturers wouldn't mind if NASCAR's truck series went bye-bye.
7. They want the Nationwide Series to be strictly a driver development series.

According to this article, they're saying toss out the CoT, catch up to technology, use alternative fuels, add road courses when they're already questioned, cut back on some tracks double visits, dump the truck series and restrict the Cup drivers to the Cup series.

I don't have any real problem with items 2 & 3. Cutting back the schedule has also been something I've wondered about. This could allow more down time, or sponsor commitment time for everyone involved.

But the other items seem rather drastic or dramatic. Have we ever known NASCAR to let anyone else call the shots with THEIR sport? Or watched as a track entity sat quietly by while it's dates get threatened? Or toss out all the work put into the CoT by NASCAR development while reintroducing the weekly banter about fender shapes and wing angles. And to think about removing the Truck series is nuts, even if it's rumored that one of the manufacturers is done with it. (Per the article.) That's been some of the best racing out there.

This is a drastic list at best and I don't know how it's going to pan out.

The article is a great read and I urge you to go check it out for all the details I've left out.

Source: AutoExtremist