I am a Nascar newbie so be nice.
I went to my first race over Memorial Day and i think its a fun sport to watch. As i am learning about everything i learned that CINTAS is fighting NASCAR right now. They want their race track included in the circuit, but NASCAR passed them over. Their response? They’re trying to get the courts to change the way tracks are selected. This could mean people’s favorite tracks (Poconos, Talladega, Richmond, etc) left off in favor of shiny new tracks. Now being a new fan and all that just doenst seem right. Seems like NASCAR needs to stand up to this and fight. Any avid NASCAR fans have any sort of opinion on this?
http://action.unitehere.org/campaign/thetracksuit
Ehh, NASCAR and ISC have always been a little closer than they should. I doubt the Kentucky Speedway lawsuit accomplishes much, personally. Speedway Motorsports fought this same battle with Texas, and NASCAR only caved when it became obvious that it would be cheaper to settle than fight it.
Kentucky Speedway doesn’t have nearly the same legal fund that SMI had, and they’re almost shooting themselves in the foot by demanding a date. Kentucky is one of the primary testing sites because it’s not on the schedule.
That said, there’s a draft schedule for 2007 floating around with a Kentucky date on it, and if it means Pocono or New Hampshire loses a date, I’m all for it. There are 4 tracks I can think of off the top of my head that don’t deserve 2 dates: Pocono, New Hampshire, California and Phoenix, and I wouldn’t weep if Dover coughed up a date.
My revised schedule would replace one of the Pocono races with a trip to Mexico City, New Hampshire would yield a date to Montreal, Darlington would trade its May date for the Southern 500 (bye-bye Cali on Labor Day,) Rockingham would take Darlington’s May date (so it’s less rainy) and the remaining date would be an open date between Richmond and the start of the Chase.
Oh, and another thing: there’s no way Talladega or Richmond come off the schedule. ISC owns Talladega and has an interest in Richmond (although the Fair Board technically owns the track) and they’d find a way to keep them on the schedule no matter what.
And technically it’s not Cintas that is suing NASCAR (and ISC,) it’s the Kentucky Speedway. Cintas’s chairman is part of the investment group that owns Kentucky Speedway, but the company has no interest in the Speedway other than a sponsorship deal.
And a little secret about UNITE HERE: they’re a labor union with an axe to grind with Cintas. They’re just trying to turn NASCAR fans against Cintas as part of their fight with them over unionizing Cintas’s employees.