Stars and Cars Align
Stars of Hollywood and NASCAR converged this week at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre for the premiere of the Will Ferrell movie, “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” a comical look at the stereotypical Southern good-ole-boy stock-car driver.
But while dimwitted Ricky Bobby is held up for laughs, the reality is this: After moving far beyond its Southern roots years ago, NASCAR continues to soar in nationwide popularity and is on the verge of spreading to an even broader, international audience.
NASCAR, once derided as a passion mostly for “rednecks,” is now a sophisticated, multibillion-dollar enterprise that claims about 75 million fans -- including many of pop culture’s glitterati -- and ranks among the nation’s most popular sports in attendance and television viewership.
NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt Jr., who has a cameo in the Ferrell movie, was among the celebrities, along with Bruce Willis and Tim Duncan, who strolled across an asphalt-black carpet into the premiere as hundreds of fans cheered. NASCAR has become a show that Fortune 500 companies have been clamoring to tap into by committing millions of dollars to sponsor cars, drivers, teams and tracks. The sport’s top-tier series is called the Nextel Cup. U.S. corporate spending on auto-racing sponsorships will reach $2.9 billion this year, more than double the $1.35 billion spent in 2000, mostly because of NASCAR’s popularity, said William Chipps, senior editor of the IEG Sponsorship Report, a research firm in Chicago. “As companies have seen NASCAR expand outside of its Southeastern stronghold, and as they’ve seen it draw higher television and attendance numbers, they didn’t want to get left behind.”
Hollywood wants in too. The recently released Disney/Pixar animated movie “Cars” had a NASCAR theme. “Talladega Nights,” named after a NASCAR track in Alabama, is another attempt to attract the sport’s burgeoning fan base, one NASCAR happily embraced.
NASCAR and Ferrell’s movie also became a classic case of life imitating art.
In the film, a French driver leaves the elite Formula One racing series, which mostly competes in Europe and drips with international glamour, to join NASCAR and knock off the champion, Ricky Bobby.
A Formula One driver leaving the streets of Monte Carlo to run at places such as Talladega and Fontana, site of the California Speedway? That had never happened. Until now.
Juan Pablo Montoya, a Colombian-born Formula One driver who also won the Indianapolis 500, stunned the racing world this month by announcing plans to join NASCAR next year.
Days later, Danica Patrick -- who became an overnight sensation last year when she nearly became the first woman to win the Indy 500 -- said that she too was mulling a future in NASCAR.
“It’s so big it’s hard to ignore,” she said. Patrick, 24, decided Tuesday that NASCAR will have to wait awhile; she will stay with the Indy Racing League next year.
But another Formula One driver and former Indy 500 winner, Canadian Jacques Villeneuve, said this month he also might move to stock cars and “would not consider it a step down” because it’s “the most exciting race series in the U.S.”
All of which illustrates how NASCAR’s popularity is feeding on itself. Montoya and the others are drawn to NASCAR because its form of auto racing is thriving, and its top drivers, such as Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon, have legions of devoted fans.
In turn, Montoya and the drivers from other racing series would provide NASCAR’s popularity with another leap; Montoya alone is expected to give the sport a bigger presence in Latin American communities.
“This will be a huge boost for NASCAR on the international side, and I’m sure they’re glad to have him,” said Mario Andretti, whose career included winning the Indy 500, the Formula One championship and the NASCAR Daytona 500.
NASCAR -- formally the National Assn. for Stock Car Auto Racing -- is still controlled by the family of the late Bill France Sr., who formed the sanctioning body in 1947 in Daytona Beach, Fla., home of the sport’s premier event, the Daytona 500. Bill Jr. handed over management of the business to his son, Brian, in 2003; both are billionaires, according to Forbes.
The family has expanded NASCAR in the last two decades by launching races in California, Indiana, Texas, Kansas, Illinois and Nevada. A race in New Hampshire earlier this month drew more than 100,000 spectators.
Even the sport’s second-tier circuit, the Busch Series, draws tens of thousands of spectators and a TV audience to each race.
As it expanded, NASCAR’s marketing skills became the envy of sports. It blends old-fashioned patriotism with modern pop culture in an effort to generate fan-friendly races that appeal to a cross-section of Americans, young and old. Air Force jets fly over the track during the national anthem, and hard-pounding rock groups such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers often provide the entertainment.
The California Speedway, which plays host to its next NASCAR race during the Labor Day weekend, is building a multimillion-dollar addition that will include a restaurant run by celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck.
“NASCAR itself has done a remarkable job of driving fast toward becoming a sports superpower,” said Paul Swangard, managing director of the Warsaw Sports Marketing Center at the University of Oregon.
Tie-ins with Hollywood, corporate sponsors and non-racing celebrities shape the image that NASCAR is hip.
“The way NASCAR has created cultural relevance to the sport has greatly expanded its audience, like getting ‘Entertainment Tonight’ to cover a NASCAR event because a popular artist is singing the national anthem,” Swangard said.
NASCAR is as much about entertainment as it is about racing. Many of its drivers are household names, a familiarity honed by the drivers’ countless hours of signing autographs, glad-handing sponsors and appearing in TV commercials.
“What’s cool about it there are 43 cars in a race, so everybody has their favorite, and there are all these different side stories each week,” said fan Mark Krajeck, 40, of Camarillo. Krajeck saw his first NASCAR race several years ago and “ever since then I was hooked,” he said.
NASCAR fans are intensely loyal (and, it says, 40% female). They proudly wear shirts and caps with the logos of their favorite drivers and are rewarded with close, high-speed racing and with frequent theatrics among the stars.
On the track, fans often see drivers banging into each other at 190 mph, exchanging harsh words or even shoving each other, and then apologizing before they reach the next race.
Even two of the drivers’ girlfriends joined the fray last April in Texas. After the drivers collided, the women were caught on TV in a heated argument -- a moment replayed on the news across the nation.
Last Sunday, two of NASCAR’s top drivers, reigning champion Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards, were involved in wrecks that prompted Edwards to threaten Stewart with a bloody nose and Stewart to give Edwards an obscene gesture, all in front of 100,000 fans at the Pocono Raceway in Pennsylvania and a national TV audience.
To be sure, NASCAR’s popularity had outside help. Before the 1990s, NASCAR was still largely a regional sport overshadowed by “open-wheel” racing. Those were the cars that competed in the Indy 500, as opposed to the full-bodied NASCAR stock cars that bear a vague resemblance to the Fords, Chevrolets and Dodges bought by the public.
But in 1996, open-wheel racing split into two competing series: the Indy Racing League and Championship Auto Racing Teams, or CART, which is now called the Champ Car World Series.
The split left both series weakened and their fans frustrated, prompting many to look at NASCAR.
Now the drivers are doing the same. Montoya, 30, is an open-wheel veteran who won the CART championship as a rookie in 1999, won the Indy 500 in 2000 and then moved to Formula One, where he has won seven times.
Montoya’s arrival also could spur more spending by international companies looking to exploit his global following, giving NASCAR an additional boost.
Toyota Motor Corp. already has raised the corporate ante. The Japanese carmaker plans to start racing its Camry in the series next year, a move that unsettled many NASCAR fans accustomed to mostly seeing cars from General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co.
NASCAR has its warts. A cheating scandal by the crew chief of California driver Jimmie Johnson at this year’s Daytona 500 rocked the sport. Not every race is a sellout. Despite its wider appeal, the series also is still criticized for being too slow to diversify from its white roots, and some fans still fly Confederate flags at races.
NASCAR has diversity programs to place more women and minorities behind the wheel, in NASCAR offices and with race teams and speedways. Montoya could help accelerate the shift.
“Juan Pablo Montoya’s entry into NASCAR is historic,” said NASCAR President Mike Helton. “Juan Pablo is someone who touches not only the Hispanic fan base, but also is a driver with an international following.”
That was evident when Montoya made his first appearance on NASCAR’s weekly driver teleconference with the media earlier this month. Spanish-speaking media crowded the call to ask him about NASCAR, with Montoya replying in kind for Spanish-speaking fans.
“For me to be able to come here and work with NASCAR with the diversity program and bringing new fans into the sport and help promote the sport, I think it’s a huge thing,” Montoya said. “We’re all going to benefit out of this deal.”
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Fast pace
NASCAR’s audience continues to grow and the stock-car racing circuit is now among the nation’s most popular sports:
ANNUAL REVENUE FOR MAJOR SPORTS*
(In billions)
Major League Baseball: $4.7
National Football League: $3.3
National Basketball Assn.: $3.2
NASCAR: $2.0
**
THE RACE CARS
* NASCAR stock cars are bigger and heavier than “open-wheel” cars used in other forms of racing, but stock cars typically run closer together. Here’s a comparison:
RACING SERIES
*--* Weight# Top speed# NASCAR 3,400 lbs. 200 mph IndyCar Series 1,600 lbs. 230 mph Formula One 1,250 lbs. 220 mph
*--*
# -- Approximate
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POPULARITY RACE
* An ESPN poll last year asked: What’s your favorite spectator sport? The results:
Sport U.S. population
NFL...23.30%
MLB...12.97
NBA...8.03
College football...7.61
NASCAR...4.40
College basketball...4.24
NHL...2.89
Football (general)...1.99
Soccer (general)...1.66
High school football...1.47
Ice/figure skating...1.26
Tennis (general)...1.15
High school basketball...1.15
Volleyball/beach volleyball...1.14
Basketball (general)...1.13
Boxing...1.10
PGA Tour...1.05
Golf (general)...0.83
Baseball (general)...0.82
Major League Soccer...0.79
*Combined revenue of all teams in baseball, football and basketball. NASCAR is combined revenue of the three largest operators of NASCAR tracks, which might include revenue from other types of racing, together with the combined revenue of the top 15 NASCAR race teams.
Sources: Forbes, ESPN, company reports