NASCAR to test the European waters with secret race series?
Quote selected text Published March 3rd, 2008 in NASCAR News
NASCAR comes to Europe,” reads a headline out of the weekend’s Paris Tuning and Racing Show, an annual car show. But none of the four NASCAR manufacturers here, or any of the Cup tour teams mentioned, seem to know anything about it.
However, the Web site for a proposed 13-race series this season, at a variety of European tracks, including Brands Hatch, Rockingham and Lausitzring, opens with glossy photos of the Bill Davis-Dave Blaney Toyota, the Michael Waltrip Toyota, a Kyle Busch-Rick Hendrick 2007 Monte Carlo, and what appears to be a Rick Hendrick Impala SS.
And there are interesting souvenirs for sale — jackets and clothing from the Dale Earnhardt Jr.-Hendrick camp, from the Clint Bowyer-Richard Childress team, from the Mark Martin-DEI camp, from the Robby Gordon camp, from the Matt Kenseth-Jack Roush camp, from the Kasey Kahne-Ray Evernham camp, and items with the NASCAR rainbow quite prominent.
Where the cars for this series might come from is unclear. But a similarly mysterious NASCAR-type series is already under way in the Far East, under the logo SpeedCar, with typical NASCAR stock cars built in North Carolina, featuring some ex-Formula One drivers. That series’ next race will be later this month as part of the Malaysian Formula One weekend. Who precisely is backing that series is not clear; but Michelin, which has pulled out of F1 itself, is providing tires for that Saturday companion event. Detroit executives have insisted they know little about that tour.
There has been speculation that the Far East tour could be a low-keyed attempt by someone within this sport to gauge the potential international attraction of NASCAR-type racing, without making a high-profile marketing gamble.
A part of a rough translation of the Paris press release reads:
“A European Championship NASCAR (racing stock cars), named All-Stars V8 Cup, will come on stream in 2008 at the initiative of an English group. The professional league will have a minimum of 26 cars and has the ambition to attract a wide audience on 13 circuits, four of which are in France, in its first year of existence.
“The cars are all equipped with a Chevrolet V8 engine (350 c.i.) with Chevrolet, Dodge and Ford bodies….”
Bookmark to:
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Weird!
believe it or not it is rumored that Brian and Jim France have invested a unknown amount of money in this little venture and that technical support over their is coming from NASCAR. Now speculation is, if NASCAR continues on a downhill spiral here in the states the word around the media is the Toyota camp will start an international series and it is believed that Bill Davis ,Joe Gibbs, and Michael Waltrip Racing have known about this since the inception of the Far East Series. just recently NASCAR has told the media not to mention ticket sales or anything about dwindling crowds.we will see exactly where all this is heading soon.
Since Howie let it outta the bag…
This is exactly what I have heard. NASCAR apparently has an asian racing initiative they are working on too.
There’s another angle to this that I was writing an article on, but was ’sternly’ warned to dump it.
I’ll say this thought: Let’s just say that NASCAR was ‘less than thrilled’ of the IndyCar/Champ Car merger…
Guess its not much of a seceret then…. l0l
Didn’t they try something like this in Australia at one time?
The only way I can see this working is if NASCAR would pair with the FIA, and before last month I would say there’d be a better chance the IRL & CCWS would get back together… and well now that happened so I guess anything is possible
Personally Racing is Racing, and if it got 4 wheels I don’t care who is sanctioning it or where it takes place, or what kind of cars, or if I can pronounce the drivers names I’m gonna watch it. But the thing is Europe is already saturated with Racing beyond what they can handle so I don’t know how the fans are going to really accept this over there.
the way i see it we will have a field of international drivers in an international market, and lets face it nothing stays small forever. the good ole moonshinin southern born sport is gone and with brands like Toyota in this sport they are out to capture international fans . hell they are already the number one car seller in America and their even made here. with the defection of irl and cart drivers we will have a field of drivers that will be 1/4 foreigners to the USA drivers.that would put them (NASCAR) to position themselves perfectly into the foreign markets.
I wonder what kind of a hissy fit most of the fans here in the states will throw if they Give Rockingham the Labor day race…. Rockingham UK that is… l0l
well we all know NASCAR visited Japan for a few years, ausie land has the super car series (ambrose land), NASCAR is worried about the CCWS/IRL merger taking fans away, NASCAR rates are dropping already, and it’s very possible NASCAR could be poking their heads that way again. Although i agree it would only work if the FIA sports cars or the lemans group paired with nascar to get the events moving. They won’t be able to hold their own without some support.
the series they have now are hurtin so what are they doing getting into crap in other countrys.they should worry about what they have. no they should charge more for tickets, food ,beer and soda so they can waste they extra money over in other country. yas the nascar ways.
Here is the website for the series http://www.allstars-v8cup.com/
thanks FISHA now all i have to do is learn how to read french
Yeah it has the little English flag like most multilingual websites do, but it doesn’t turn it to English… l0l
I’m still not sure what kind of car they are going to be running because they have Late models, Spoiler cars, and COTs all on the site… l0l
If it works it works, but right now its just looking like a Cheap SCCA sanctioned series type of deal.
Plus you ask fans in Europe and America what is the first thing they think of when you say European full fenderd racing and that answer is German DTW, British Touring Car Championship, FIA Sports cars, and the European LeMans series, you just don’t think of “Stock Cars” and Europe, and I don’t think this series or the Speedcar series will change that anytime soon.
Heck they’d probably be better off racing the COT over there because at least it kinda looks like a touring/sports car with the wing and splitter on it…. l0l
Fisha695 wrote:
OMG!! ONE time you and I ACTUALLY have the same thoughts!! LOL Except for the “watching” it part. I don’t think I would get that into it, because they ARE saturated with so many types of racing there. I lived in Germany for some years. I too don’t believe that Nascar is going to have that big of a hit over there. There are just some things the Europeons won’t accept outside the box of their thinking.
And racing in general, quite frankly they see as their baby as the way its formulated there. Our style of racing just doesn’t seem like its gonna be something they’ll wrap their arms around.
BTW- This wasn’t a “secret”, I heard about this several weeks ago. Guess the cat was long out of the litter box.
We know Brian Bud Selig France didn’t come up with this idea. Sounds like that NFL Europe thing with cars to me. Is this the wave of the future?
They should run the NASCAR cars in a companion or warm-up race for the German Touring Car series. It might stur some interest that way. Then again if the NASCAR cars stink up the show too much people will be turned off by their presence.