NHRA will sell pro drag-racing series

The National Hot Rod Assn. agreed Wednesday to sell its professional drag-racing series and certain other assets for $109.5 million to a group led by the pioneer developer of the DirecTV satellite-television company.

The NHRA, based in Glendora, will remain the sport’s nonprofit sanctioning body and focus on its amateur drag-racing activities.

But its high-profile professional league, the Powerade Drag Racing Series, will be acquired by HD Partners Acquisition Corp., a Santa Monica investment firm led by Eddy Hartenstein, who launched DirecTV in the 1990s.

The Powerade series conducts 23 national events a year, featuring top-fuel, funny car and pro-stock dragsters that reach speeds in excess of 300 mph on quarter-mile tracks. Its ninth event of the season is scheduled this weekend in Topeka, Kan.

The sale should allow the series to reach a wider audience through expansion and added media exposure and by attracting more corporate sponsors, officials said.

“It’s a shot in the arm for the Powerade series,” said NHRA President Tom Compton, who will move with the series and become president of a newly formed HD Partners subsidiary called NHRA Pro Racing.

Hartenstein said that once the Powerade series leaves its nonprofit status and becomes part of his firm, which is listed on the American Stock Exchange, “we can literally take off the gloves on marketing and awareness” for the Powerade series.

That might include “additional national events that hit parts of the country that are underserved” by NHRA drag racing, he said.

The NHRA was founded in 1951 by Wally Parks, now 94. He revolutionized drag racing by moving competition from city streets and dry lake beds to safer, organized venues.

The first official NHRA race was run in 1953 on a strip of the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds parking lot in Pomona, and the NHRA still opens and closes its season in Pomona.

“Today’s announcement represents a monumental milestone in the 56-year history of the NHRA,” Parks said in a statement. The sale, he added, would position the Powerade series “for great future growth and success, while at the same time assuring the long-term vitality of the NHRA.”

Hartenstein, who grew up in Alhambra, called himself “a huge fan” of drag racing and said “I just love stuff that goes fast.”

A Caltech graduate and aerospace engineer, he developed the DirecTV idea while an executive of Hughes Electronics Corp.

Hartenstein left DirecTV in late 2004 and organized HD Partners last year.

Another major motor sports figure, billionaire O. Bruton Smith, previously had said he wanted to buy the NHRA, but the NHRA had insisted it wasn’t for sale.

Smith is chairman of Speedway Motorsports Inc., which owns NHRA drag strips at Las Vegas, Sonoma and Bristol, Tenn., along with several tracks used for NASCAR stock car racing.

“I want what’s best for [the NHRA] and if this is what’s best for the NHRA then that’s good,” Smith said after being told of the proposed sale. “It’s also important for my operation that they retain and have a good owner.”

Under the agreement, Hartenstein’s firm will acquire not only the Powerade series, but also all related sponsorship, licensing and media rights. Also included are the NHRA’s headquarters building and its four tracks -- in Atlanta, Indianapolis, Gainesville, Fla., and Columbus, Ga. -- along with its long-term lease in Pomona.

HD Partners will pay about $100 million in cash and $9.5 million in HD Partners stock for the assets, and assume about $11.5 million of NHRA debt.

james.peltz@latimes.com