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| Dodge to sponsor NASCAR Weekly Racing Series | DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- After a two-year sponsorship hiatus, the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) Tuesday announced that effective immediately, Dodge has become the presenting sponsor of the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series (NWRS), the nations premier grassroots stock car series.
The NASCAR Weekly Racing Series presented by Dodge is contested at nearly 90 weekly short tracks located across the United States. Events are held on dirt and asphalt tracks as weekly competitors strive to reach local, regional and possibly national recognition, and earn their portion of a $1.7 million point fund, the highest posted awards for any short track racing series.
The R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, through its Winston Brand, successfully grew the former Winston Racing Series from the early 1980s through the end of the 1999 season, when it had to drop its sponsorship. NASCAR continued the program in the interim.
NASCAR Weekly Racing Series
The NASCAR Weekly Racing Series is an integral part of NASCAR, NASCAR president Mike Helton said. The series provides an excellent starting point for NASCARs future stars as well as a home for thousands of competitors. The reach of the series is nationwide and offers Dodge, as a presenting sponsor, many tremendous marketing opportunities.
NASCAR Winston Cup driver Jeff Burton is one of many competitors in NASCARs national touring series that got his start in the NWRS, but he said the series is more comprehensively important for the future growth of NASCAR racing.
This is a really big announcement, in my opinion, Burton said while taking a break in a test session at Greenville-Pickens Speedway, a NWRS short track outside Greenville, S.C. Without the Weekly Racing Series we dont have a place -- not only for drivers to learn how to do what they do, but also mechanics and other officials.
In the Winston Racing Series I learned how to win and how to lose and all the other things you have to be able to do. We desperately need this grassroots program, which gives an opportunity for everyone in America to get started at a lower level. In my opinion I think it is vital for our continued success in the sport.
Dodge has renewed its involvement with NASCAR in recent years. Following several years in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, the manufacturer returned to the Winston Cup Series this year after a 16-year absence. This sponsorship is another important step in the manufacturers motorsports marketing involvement.
Any way you look at it, this is an ideal addition to our racing activities, said Jim Julow, vice president of Dodge Global Brand Center. On one hand, the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series provides Dodge dealer partners with additional race sponsorship, hospitality and promotional opportunities for their customers and employees.
And on the other, it opens the door to even more ways to leverage our return to the NASCAR Winston Cup Series and work with other NASCAR sponsors.
NASCAR vice president for corporate communications Jim Hunter said the deal with a manufacturer did not present a conflict of interest in the Winston Cup Series, where manufacturers DaimlerChrysler, General Motors and Ford stage bitter on-track and backroom battles.
I dont think there is any conflict at all, Hunter said. The manufacturers all participate in the weekly program at some level -- many of the tracks have participation with Chevrolet or Ford or some other manufacturer. This is the perfect way for our tracks to get with Dodges dealer network and for Dodge to increase its weekly level of participation. Their goal is to get more people driving Dodges.
This is a phenomenal grassroots opportunity, Bo Puffer, Dodge Communications Manager, said. We have 3,000 Dodge dealers who are excited about what were doing in racing and a lot of them dont have (major) facilities near them.
This gives them the chance to get with track operators who are near them and to work out promotions that work for both of them. We want to be able to talk to those fanatical fans about Dodge and send em back to the Dodge store to buy more vehicles and we want to be more involved with NASCAR.
We are going to survey the tracks and find out who their affiliations lie with, then go out and get the Dodge brand out there. The only way this is going to work for us is on the local dealer level. We need our dealers and our local track operators to get together on this or it doesnt work for us.
Many competitors in NASCARs three national series -- Winston Cup, Busch and Craftsman Trucks -- began their careers in the NWRS. That list includes last years national series champions: Bobby Labonte (Winston Cup), Jeff Green (Busch) and Greg Biffle (Craftsman Truck).
The NASCAR Weekly Racing Series presented by Dodge offers competitors throughout the nation many great opportunities, said Chris Boals, NWRS director. A competitor can begin to develop a solid career in the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series, eventually moving through our regional touring program and into one of the national series.
Competitors also have the opportunity to compete for a piece of the most lucrative point fund in weekly short-track racing. This seasons national champion alone will earn over $160,000.
The NWRS champions banquet is at the Peabody Hotel and Resort in Orlando, Fla., on Friday. Ted Christopher of Plainville, Conn., will be crowned the 2001 national champion.
Competitors accumulate track points each weekend throughout the season, beginning after Jan. 1. They are rated in the Competition Performance Index (CPI) against rivals in their respective regions until regional champions are decided in September, after an 18-week season. Regional champions then are recalculated against one another to determine the national champion.
Each champion receives a significant portion of the $1.7 million in posted awards as well as being honored on-stage at the champions banquet.
The NASCAR Weekly Racing Series presented by Dodge began its current format in 1982 when the first NASCAR Winston Racing Series national champion was crowned. Prior to 1982 state champions were crowned in the series.
In 1982, 30 tracks participated in the series with Tom Hearst of Muscatine, Iowa, winning the first national championship. 19 drivers have been crowned national champion, with the champions representing each region of the country and both dirt and asphalt tracks.
The 2002 season will be the 20th anniversary of the NWRS in its current format. Puffer said his company, through its Mopar performance brand, was also anxious to get more NWRS competitors in DaimlerChrysler products.
This is the seed of the sport, Burton said of the NWRS. We are to the point where we have a lot of people watching Winston Cup and Busch racing and Truck racing. To continue to have that and the quality of racing weve come to expect we have to have a feeder system to continue growing the sport.
You have to have that and you cant have it without the seed. It continues to show that corporate America, when times are tough still believes in motorsports -- and not only what we do on Sundays, but the grassroots part of it. Corporate America has done it for years, Winston has done a great job establishing it and Saturday night racing is part of our culture.
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