An Alternate Outlook For The Sport Of NASCAR?
        A Demented Look Into The Future....Part One

By Larry Van Zandt

Since there are around 891,564,112 articles on who won the NASCAR Sprint Cup on Sunday, who won the Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, blah, blah, blah, I am going to completely ignore what happened, and instead go into a completely different direction.

What am I going to do?

I am about to give a satirical look into the future of NASCAR, and what might happen if the economy tanks even further. Given what is occurring with team budget cuts, sponsorship woes, automobile manufacturers possibly going bankrupt and pulling their financial support.....and NASCAR's refusal to publicly address those concerns short of 'everything's great!', what lies ahead might not be too different than the bizarre future that I am about to reveal to you, the viewing audience.

This future will be presented in a sort of 'timeline' format, and please remember, this is sort of a dark comedy, not what I ‘really’ think is going to happen, although some of it might actually occur….

2009: Dodge and GM pull out of NASCAR, as Dodge is absorbed by General Motors.....and General Motors, due to insane 'legacy' costs (pensions, healthcare programs, uncompetitive sky-high wages), no longer being able to compete with Toyota, and a much-slimmed down Ford Motor Company.....goes bankrupt. Reorganization efforts ensue, but the racing budget is slashed, as GM (along with what's left of Dodge) can no longer afford to spend $125-$140 million (each) a year on NASCAR programs. Being that Dodge was spending the same amount....this amounts to somewhere between $250-$300 million being taken away annually from NASCAR.

Ford and Toyota are the only manufacturers left to compete in NASCAR. With Roush being the dominant team, now that GM will have abandoned Hendrick Racing, Roush easily sails to the 2009 Sprint Cup championship. However, since there are only maybe 3-5 cars winning every one of the races this season, viewership drops WAY off, and sponsors announce plans to shift sponsorship dollars to Golfing, Competitive Solitaire, and Full-Contact Laser Tag. 25-30 teams announce plans to either merge, or close their shops.

Die-cast car merchandisers, however, smell a financial goldmine as they can now do "End Of The World!" paint-schemed versions of everyone's favorite NASCAR ride. And, as teams can no longer afford paint, there will also be a horde of primered 'Special Edition' die-cast cars that will bring upwards of $300-$400 each on Ebay, as the 2009 season nears its end.

In addition, fake reports of ‘Dale Sr.’ sightings around Graceland (generated by those same Die-cast merchandisers) send DEI merchandise sales through the roof, as DEI reverted to a ‘Dale’ museum when GM left the series. DEI then works with a prominent Hollywood movie studio to produce their version of ‘300’, where the hero of DEI, a resurrected Dale Earnhardt Sr., must run 300 laps around ancient Persia, which obviously has nothing to do with Dale Sr., but fans will go flock to see the movie anyway, because ‘300’-themed die-cast cars will be for sale at the snack bars of participating theaters…..A record year for the merchandise sellers.

2010: Ford and Toyota return to NASCAR…but with their racing budgets drastically reduced. Sprint withdraws from sponsoring the series right before the start of the 2010 season, claiming ‘financial hardship’, leaving NASCAR to scramble for a series sponsor. Camping World, seizing an opportunity to ‘go upscale’, leaves the NASCAR Truck series to sponsor NASCAR’s main attraction.

The Truck Series, unable to find a sponsor….and since GM and Dodge are long gone, Ford and Toyota pulling their funding, 2009 was the final year for NASCAR Truck Racing, Camping World will move over to sponsor NASCAR stock car racing, since it’s a natural fit. Of course, since the France Cartel won’t admit that they screwed up, announce that they are planning to have a ‘Spec’ series that will be the COSHAT powered entirely by Toyota engines for the 2011 season, as Ford will announce that they are leaving NASCAR at the end of the 2010 season, but leave by as early as the Bristol race, which remains the only track to continue to sell out, every other track now struggles to sell tickets to 25% of capacity.

Being that not too many NASCAR fans are that fond of Toyota, and their absolutely sleepy Camry, Ford’s exit signals the final death knell for the sport. Reruns of Martha Stewart’s ‘Living’ TV show, and even Hungarian-subtitled reruns of ‘Hogan’s Heroes’ now generate higher TV ratings than almost every race on the NASCAR circuit. DEI announces plans to sell 'Dale Sr.'-themed Golf Clubs, Playing Cards, along with Laser Tag guns and protective gear, as DEI also wants to get involved in Golfing, Competitive Solitaire, and Full-Contact Laser Tag.

GM will try to return to racing, but can only afford to put GM-car-styled bodies on ¼ midget cars, and pick up the beer tabs of the parents of the child racers who are competing under the GM banner. Ford has moved onto something more fruitful, trying to out-Honda Honda again, and stick with more home-grown race series, such as SCCA ,and the NHRA professional ranks, where they only have to worry about coming up with a competitive body for funny cars, and their top-fuel nitromethane Boss motor. Ford also moves into sponsoring Golfing, Competitive Solitaire, and Full-Contact Laser Tag. Roush Racing is now down to one car, sponsored by ‘Depends’ undergarments, as now only old people in nursing homes are watching NASCAR.

Why?

Due to the departure of almost all of the sponsors and manufacturers, along with the TV networks renegotiating, and moving races to late-nights, or not covering certain duds (Phoenix, for example) at all, the bulk of NASCAR fans move onto other racing series. When NASCAR is asked, at a press conference, about their dire financial straits, loss of viewers, and how they are going to solve their current problems for the race teams, Lisa France-Kennedy responds with, “Let them eat Sunoco Race Fuel, the official fuel of NASCAR!”……slapping away the hand of one of her aides, who was trying to quietly remind her that Sunoco also left at the end of the 2009 season, with now some third-rate kerosene supplier now being the ‘The Official Fuel of NASCAR’.

2011: NASCAR is now the new CART. Nobody is watching the races, and they are now struggling to get even 20 teams to show up to the events. The cars that the teams are using? Leftover 2008 and 2009 models, patched up enough to try to run the entire series. 12 races are dropped from the schedule, with tracks such as Atlanta Motor Speedway, Phoenix, and Loudon going forever silent; Atlanta had a total of 4100 people show up for both 2010 races, with the racing surface being marred by shoddy repair jobs. NASCAR now shows up in the ‘Daily Sun’, you know, the same tabloid where Elvis and BatBoy sightings are reported; Headlines read, “Fan spotted at NASCAR event!”, with a picture of an aged Elvis wearing a '#3' hat, sitting in the empty grandstands.

The best talent that used to line the ranks of NASCAR’s driving elite now show up routinely on the Speed Channel, and Animal Planet game shows. The Camping 'Town' Cup awards ceremony (the sponsor is losing money, also, and has to downsize from 'Camping World' to 'Camping Town'), instead of being held at the Waldorf-Astoria, is now conducted at an undisclosed Motel 6 somewhere in South Jersey, so nobody’s car will be stolen from the parking lot outside. Toyota? They remain the ‘spec’ engine supplier of NASCAR, but slowly begins to shift NASCAR R&D funds into…you guessed it…Golfing, Competitive Solitaire, and Full-Contact Laser Tag. The Official 'Drink' of NASCAR, for the 2011 season?

Tap Water.

2012…..to be continued next Wednesday....it only gets worse.

You can contact Larry Van Zandt at Insider Racing News.

The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.