Which of these car companies will be racing in NASCAR tomorrow?
Okay most of you by now know that I am a NASCAR honk and that I love talking about the sport as much as following it. Seeing the Life Lock 400 this last Sunday I think proved what I said in a post back in February:
If you want an indication of how well the economy is doing right now or in the future, watch NASCAR.No, I’m not kidding.
More specifically, look at the grandstands at NASCAR events, especially after this weekend in Daytona. Most attendies at NASCAR events are the blue-collar workers that Conservative Republicans in Congress and on talk radio have expressed such a distain for. They are the NASCAR base that helps the sport thrive and if they have confidence that things are getting better, then they are going to be filling the stands in places like Bristol, Talledega, Martinsville and Dover. However if the economy is still not doing well and NASCAR is struggling to fill up places like Fontana, Atlanta, Texas and Pheonix, then the economy hasn’t started making it’s way back yet.
If you happened to look at some of the grandstands at Michigan International Speedway on Sunday, you’ll see that I was right. Michigan has been the state hit hardest by the troubles faced by the Auto Industry, and that result has shown up, or rather – hadn’t shown up, at the race a couple of days ago. If you watched the race from beginning to end like I did then you saw a lot of empty seats in the grandstands. That has to be a reflection of how bad Michigan has been hit.
And from what some of you are saying online, you want them to be hit even harder. If what I am reading as several sites is any indication then there are a lot of you out there who not only want the situation with GM, Chrysler and Dodge to get worse, you want them to go out of business altogether so that all of the cars that are driven in this country are made by Toyota, Honda, Mazda, VW, Mitsubishi and others so long as we don’t have a home-grown auto industry in this country. It is really starting to sound like some of you really want all of the people who work at GM, Chrysler and Ford, from the CEO to the guy who sweeps the floor at night, to lose their jobs, lose their homes and have their children go hungry because they have no food to eat.
I can only conclude that the people who are saying all of this are either:
a) working at one of the two BMW plants in South Carolina
b) working at the Toyota plant in Kentucky
c) working at either the Honda, Hyundai or Mercedes plant in Alabama
d) working at the Nissan plant in Tennessee
e) working in one of the offices of Senators David Vitter (D-LA), Mitch McConnell (R-Ky), Jim DeMint (R-SC), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Richard Shelby (R-Al) or Bob Corker (R-Tn)
f) an idiot
Personally, I think that the answer is f). Anyone who would wish that kind of hardship on complete strangers for their own personal or political gain or who would want that just for the pleasure of seeing other people suffer is not only an idiot, but a sadistic asshole who deserves no consideration from me or anyone else out there who is trying to do the right thing and get a job so that we can support our families.
But that’s not what I want this post to be about…
What I want to comment on is the possibility of other foreign car manufacturers coming into NASCAR to take up the slack being left by Chevy and Dodge. Before the race on Sunday we found out that GM was going to cut back on its support for the Nationwide Series and the Camping World Truck series. Three of the teams that race in those series, JR Motorsports, Kevin Harvick Inc and Rusty Wallace Inc are the teams that may be effected the most by the cutbacks. Now there is a possibility of Honda, Hyundai, Nissan, BMW and Mercedes-Benz making plans to enter NASCAR much in the same way that Toyota did a few years ago.
Yeah, I know – I really don’t like the possibility of a foreign company coming into NASCAR and beating a Chevy, Ford or Dodge either. And I can imagine that there are plenty of people in the Deep South who feel that NASCAR is their private domain and that it should just be American companies racing at the track. Some of them may even work on the assembly lines at one of those foreign car companies – they just don’t want to see them in NASCAR. I can understand that myself, but the problem is the economic landscape has changed and in order for NASCAR to thrive and in order for some of these racing teams to survive and employ people, some changes might have to be made. If that means bringing in another foreign car company to race in NASCAR then fine – its not like Rick Hendrick is suddenly going to switch manufacturers and Dale Earnhardt Jr. is going to be driving a Honda Civic!
There will be some drivers and teams who will stay loyal to a manufacturer if that manufacturer has been good for them. So Hendrick will stick with Chevy and by extension so will Stewart-Haas, Roushwill stick with Ford and Penskewill stick withDodge. Gibbs seems to have found a niche with Toyota and MWR is improving as well so they will be sticking there as well. Now as for Childress and Earnhardt/Ganassi, they may be a wild-card in this as both companies have fallen behind the other top teams this year. We have to face facts, neither of those companies has been the same since the passing of Dale Earnhardt, so they may look at a manufacturer switch to shake things up and bring them back. Richard Petty is already contemplating a move to Toyota from Dodge to join Gibbs and Waltrip in 2010, so having another foreign car maker in the mix that has a good history in racing might work to the benefit of some of the smaller teams like JTG Daugherty, Tommy Baldwin and Furniture Row.
The question is, who would have the best chance at coming into NASCAR and making an impact? Well, let’s have a look at some of the potential players:
Honda- Well this is a no-brainer because they have had a lot of success at the open-wheel level, and they are the main engine supporter for the IRL. However even though they have had much success and an engine supplier, they would have to “re-invent the wheel” as it were if they were to get into NASCAR. See the engines in NASCAR are all carburetedV8 engines, with cast iron blocks, and a pushrod valvetrainactuating two-valves per cylinder, and limited to 358 cubic inches (about 5.8 liters) displacement. However Honda has been producing a V8 witha dual overhead camshaft configuration with four valves per cylinder with 213 cubic inches (or 3.5 liters) displacement for the IRL. So Honda would have to produce engines to NASCAR’sspecifications if they wanted to participate. The question is will they? Would they want to put in the time and effort in R&D to produce and engine for NASCAR when they have a good thing going in the IRL? The answer is maybe, since their exclusive contract with the IRL runs out in 2010, so they may be looking for another racing league before that happens.
Hyundai- A South Korean company that is the second largest auto manufacturer in Asia, and the 5th largest in the world. Hyundai has had success in Rally racing starting in 1998, including a championship in 2002. However after the 2003 season they pulled out of Rally racing and haven’t come back since. They are trying to develop an entry into Formula 1 racing for the 2010 season, but it has been slow going and may depend on the health of the Asian auto industry. Hyundai appears to be a long-shot at best for entry into NASCAR.
Nissan- Nissan used to be a huge manufacturer in the Sports Car Racing circuit from 1966-99 when executives at the company decided that it was no longer economically feasible to participate any more and pulled the plug on the program. Based on that alone the company may not have the desire nor the will to enter NASCAR.
BMW- The parent company of Rolls-Royce and engine supplier for championship race teams for decades. BMW has participated in Formula 1, Sports Car, Touring Car and Rally Car racing since 1938 and has a long and storied history in racing – except in the U.S. They did enter into the Rolex Sports Car Series in 2008, and they came in 5thin the manufacturer standings for both DP and GT engines beaten out by Pontiac, Ford, Chevy, Porsche, Lexus and Mazda that year. There’s been no indication that they are interested in making the foier into NASCAR, but stranger things have happened.
Mercedes-Benz- According to Wikepedia: Mercedes-Benz is currently active in three forms of motorsport, Formula Three, DTM and Formula One. In Formula One, the company part owns Team McLarenand has supplied the team with engines engineered by Ilmor since 1995. This partnership has brought success, including Drivers Championships for Mika Häkkinenin 1998 and 1999 and for Lewis Hamilton in 2008, as well as a Constructors Championship in 1998. The collaboration with McLaren has been extended into the production of roadgoing cars such as the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren. A Mercedes-Benz engine was the powerplant used by Al Unser Jr. to win the 1994 Inianapolis 500, and the 1994 CART Championship for Unser. There’s no word if they are even interested in NASCAR as of yet, but they, along with Honda and BMW might be the logical choices.
Then there are other manufacturers that we haven’t heard about:
Porsche – Porsche has a long and storied history in auto racing. Porsche has over 28,000 victories in sports car racing, Cam-Am, GT, Rally, and 14 makes and Team World Championships since 1964. Unfortunately they do not have a manufacturing facility here in the U.S., so unless they started making cars here they would not be eligible to enter NASCAR.
Mazda- They’ve had success at the Sportscar level, but they would have to come up with a different engine design if they wanted to have their engines driven by NASCAR’s finest. Somehow I don’t think their rotory engines would be a hit at Daytona or Talladega.
"Luigi follow only the Ferrari's"
Ferrari – Other than Porsche, Ferrari has had the most success on the race track than any other manufacturer in the world – or at least they are the most well-known. 15 World Drivers Championship titles, 16 World Constructors Championship titles, 209 Grand Prix victories, 4925.27 points, 622 podium finishes, 203 pole positions, and 218 fastest laps in 776 Grands Prix contested in Formula 1. So they certainly have the pedigree – just not an American manufacturing plant – to compete in NASCAR.
Mitsubishi- Mostly known for its off-road racing, they dominated endurance rally racing in the 1970′s. They are the most successful manufacturer in the history of the Darkur Rally, but they may not have the desire to enter into NASCAR.
Renault – A French manufacturer that is mainly interested in Formula 1. Besides they have no factories here in the U.S. so its kind of a moot point.
Suzuki – They were mostly involved in rally racing before they dropped their program in late 2008.
So there you have it folks. Out of all of those foreign car manufacturers only three of them have a real shot at entering NASCAR and having any kind of success so it’s hardly the invasion that some of you are afraid of. Besides it’s not as if GM and Chrysler are going to pull out of the sport completely like Ford did in the mid-1960′s – and look at what happened there – they came back after only a year!!! Before Toyota there hadn’t been a foreign manufacturer competing in NASCAR since 1963 – and that was a British car!!! Look at all the foreign auto makers that raced in NASCAR back in the early days – Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, Austin Healey, Jaguar, MG Motor, Porsche, Triumph and Volkswagen – yet the sky didn’t fall and the world didn’t end…so calm down already!!!
Out of the three American manufacturers, GM has won the most championships. They have as storied a history in NASCAR as Porsche or Ferrari have on the European circuits so I don’t think they are going anywhere. Besides maybe some fresh blood will help take some of the pressure off of the smaller teams so that they can survive to race another day.
After all, isn’t that what we all want to see? Don’t we all want to see these guys (and maybe gals) out there at places like Bristol, Lowe’s, Daytona, Talladega and Martinsville doing what they do best. In this economy where so many people are out of work and are looking for someone or something to give them hope that isn’t a politician, does it really matter what name is on the front of the car?
At this point, we are all taking help where we can get it. So let’s not fault NASCAR for doing the same.
