Motorsports FanHouse

2010 Ticket Prices Drop at Darlington

Geoffrey Miller — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:50:00 EST

Filed under: Darlington Raceway, Sprint Cup

Darlington Raceway is trying out the method that most fans think will lead to an increase in ticket sales -- and you can bet that many other NASCAR Sprint Cup tracks will be taking a good hard look at its results.

The 1.366-mile South Carolina track will roll back its ticket prices up to $31 per seat for next May's Southern 500 at the track built in 1950, according to the Associated Press, in an effort to bring fill its grandstands.

Last season, track president Chris Browning said "The Lady in Black" came within 3,000 seats of recording another sellout of its Saturday night race, despite a local area swamped with unemployment.

From the AP:

Darlington president Chris Browning told The Associated Press on Thursday that the track "Too Tough To Tame" would offer reduced prices on about 35,000 seats for next year's Southern 500. Add that to the 9,000 or so seats reduced by $10 for last May's event, and 44,000 of the track's 62,000 would cost less than they did in 2008.

Darlington came within 3,000 tickets of a fifth straight sellout this spring, a strong showing in a region afflicted with 12 percent unemployment. But Browning said officials didn't want to just hold the line and pray more prosperous times were ahead by May.

"We kicked around a whole lot of different scenarios," he said by phone, "and at the end of the day, we felt like this was the right thing to do."

Browning said renewal forms will go out to all ticket buyers next week. Should they respond by the deadline of Sept. 18, purchasers could receive an additional $5 discount.

Certainly Darlington is making a smart move by dropping the price on nearly 71 percent of its total grandstand capacity, but to also be the first track announcing the move should help ticket sales. The race has been held on the eve of Mother's Day in the past few seasons, though NASCAR has yet to release the 2010 Sprint Cup schedule.

The story, however, said the track has already received its sanctioning agreement for next season from NASCAR. Both International Speedway Corporation (who owns Darlington) and NASCAR are run by the France Family.

Ticket prices rose exponentially during NASCAR's explosion in the 1990s and early 2000s, though most seats are certainly within the range of most NFL games. A sizable difference, though, is that most tracks hold a much larger capacity than most other professional sport stadiums, creating the need for tracks to find ways to fill seats.

The 2009 season saw a several tracks sell tickets in certain sections at a discount of their previously set price. Darlington, however, is the first track to announce that its dropping ticket prices before any fans have had a chance to even get their passes for next May's race.

2010 Ticket Prices Drop at Darlington originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:50:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Numbers: Mark Martin Stays Up Late

Geoffrey Miller — Wed, 13 May 2009 09:38:00 EST

Filed under: Mark Martin, Darlington Raceway, Sprint Cup Numbers

Enjoy a look back at Mark Martin's Southern 500 Darlington win from Saturday night from the angle of Sprint Cup Numbers:

1.531 - Martin's margin of victory, in seconds, over teammate Jimmie Johnson

2 - Wins for Martin at Darlington in 43 career starts

3 - Career 'Did Not Finish' results for Martin at Darlington, each of which was for engine problems

5 - Age of Martin's crew chief Alan Gustafson when Martin had his first Sprint Cup start in 1981

6 - Career victories for Gustafson as a Sprint Cup crew chief

7.523 - Martin's average running position, 5th-best in the field

9 - Number of races Martin has finished on the lead lap at Darlington in the past 10 he's raced

11 - Martin's new ranking in the Sprint Cup driver standings, up four spots from before the race and up from 34th after crashing at Atlanta in March

37 - Martin's new career win total

46 - Number of laps Martin led Saturday night

50 - Martin's age, and possibly the new '20' in Sprint Cup racing

96.6 - Percentage of laps Martin has completed at Darlington of 14,620 attempted

285 - Points Martin is behind Sprint Cup point leader Jeff Gordon

360 - Laps of 367 Martin completed inside the Top-15, second only to Ryan Newman's 367

Numbers: Mark Martin Stays Up Late originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Wed, 13 May 2009 09:38:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sprint Cup Notes & Quotes: Darlington

Geoffrey Miller — Sun, 10 May 2009 12:21:00 EST

Filed under: Darlington Raceway, Sprint Cup

Here's a quick-hitting rewind on all of the happenings from Saturday night's Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway.

Yellow Fever - Despite 60 years of racing and 106 Sprint Cup Series events at Darlington Raceway, never had the field combined to create as many caution flags as it did Saturday night. The yellow waved 17 times for 73 laps, upping the previous record from 15 cautions.

The number of caution flags wasn't a record though as a race in 1995 had 12 cautions for 94 laps, a race in 1977 had 6 cautions for 93 laps, and one in 1974 with 11 cautions for 101 laps.

Teammate Trouble - Carl Edwards wasn't exactly happy with his teammate Greg Biffle after an incident on lap 284.

Biffle appeared to have touched the rear of Edwards' No. 99 while battling for position in turn 2, spinning the No. 99 into the outside wall. Edwards finished 32nd.

"We've been fighting real hard all night with our car and making progress, and Greg just got into my left rear and put me in the fence there," Edwards said. "It's too bad that happened. That's a really good car. I've been trying to give all night and race cautiously, and we just got tangled up with him there."

When asked after the race, Biffle didn't think he made contact with Edwards.

Lovin' the Walls - While many of Sprint Cup's finest loved making contact with outside walls at Darlington Raceway Saturday night, the biggest and best part of those walls was the paint job put on them by the track.

Sections of red and white alternated in a fashion reminiscient of days gone by at the historic track, and the look was fantastic. Here's to hoping Darlington sticks with the look.

Crowd Reaction - Speaking of days gone by, did you catch the crowd reaction to Kyle Busch's flat tire and ensuing wall contact?

After Busch brought the No. 18 to pit road and later made the hard left turn for repairs in the garage area, the Darlington crowd erupted in a fashion similar to the treatment Jeff Gordon used to recieve when he had such luck.

Give Logano Credit - I made a note on the semi-live Twitter updates [check us out at twitter.com/FanHouseRacing today!] that I could have counted on one hand the number of people at Daytona who would have said Joey Logano would lead late in the going at Darlington.

But the kid did it, and wound up with a 9th-place finish to show for it.

"This place will kill you -- trust me. You're running right up by the fence and all day you are about in the fence," said Logano. "It's close, but it's fun, its grueling and I'm glad its over."

You and Kyle Busch both.

Sprint Cup Notes & Quotes: Darlington originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Sun, 10 May 2009 12:21:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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FanHouse Warmup: Southern 500

Geoffrey Miller — Sat, 09 May 2009 01:37:00 EST

Filed under: Darlington Raceway, Sprint Cup

The Essentials

Race: Southern 500

Where: Darlington Raceway
Time: Saturday 7:20 p.m./EDT
TV/Radio: FOX Sports, MRN Radio
Twitter: In-race updates at FanHouseRacing
Forecast: 64 degrees, 20% chance of storms
Distance: 367 laps (500.1 miles)
Pole Winner: Matt Kenseth
2008 Winner: Kyle Busch

The Storylines

NASCAR's gettin' used to this two day show format, it would seem. Both this weekend's action at Darlington Raceway and last weekend's run at Richmond have been run in a quick and simple two day pattern.

The Sprint Cup teams have practiced on Friday morning and afteroon before taking part in qualifying. From then on, there's no more practice, though NASCAR hasn't impounded cars and allows teams to work on them for Saturday's race,

You just know that the teams and crew members have been loving both the format and the stretch of races. Minus any testing, from the Talladega event on April 26 to the Coca-Cola 600 at Lowe's Motor Speedway on May 24 the farthest a team will have had to travel was six hours. Two of those five races are in the teams' backyard, while three are Saturday night races -- meaning their home on Sunday.

That's not a bad schedule for teams to regroup somewhat at home, but they'll have to get it done because the schedule after Charlotte doesn't stay that easy.

Matt Kenseth must have had some pent-up energy after failing to run at the competitive nature that he'd like to see for many of the past few race weekends.

The 2009 Daytona 500 champ took advantage of Kyle Busch's flat tire malfortune late in Friday night's Nationwide Series race at Darlington Raceway to win and earlier in the day, the No. 17 scored its first pole since 2005 over Jeff Gordon.

A weekend can't start off much better than that -- except if Kenseth had won the pole for the Nationwide event. Unfortunately, wet weather on Friday prevented that from happening.

Jimmie Johnson has endured a rough patch that we're not used to seeing from the No. 48 team.

Last weekend at Richmond, brake issues caused a solo spin before the team tried to fix the problem. Then, Johnson got caught up in a wreck that was completely not of his own doing and tore up the race car, leading to an ugly 36th-place finish.

Friday afternoon, Johnson wrecked during the first lap of his qualifying run, meaning he'll start 42nd in the field for Saturday night's Southern 500 with a backup car that will have seen the same amount of practice as wins this year for Dale Earnhardt Jr.

One can imagine he'll be hoping for a solid run, and hoping that he could have saved it like this all over again.

The Predictions

Geoffrey Miller: Denny Hamlin
Holly Cain: Greg Biffle

Enjoy the race.

FanHouse Warmup: Southern 500 originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Sat, 09 May 2009 01:37:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Kyle Busch Is 'Rowdy' Real Thing

Holly Cain — Wed, 06 May 2009 22:15:00 EST

Filed under: Kyle Busch, Darlington Raceway, Chase for the Sprint Cup, Joe Gibbs Racing

As with Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Busch is one of the season's most polarizing drivers in NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series.

As with Earnhardt, you're either with Busch or you are against him. The difference between the two drivers? Busch is out there winning races. A lot of them.

And whether it's the everybody-loves-a-winner mentality or what, a lot of "haters" are warming up to "Rowdy." As hard as it is to cheer for Busch, it's getting even harder not to.

Busch made his trademark "take that" bow to the fans Saturday at Richmond, Va. after claiming his 50th NASCAR win as a 24th birthday present. It is his Cup Series-best third victory of the season in the No. 18 M& Ms Toyota, and he is the defending winner of Southern 500, which runs on Saturday at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway -- a gritty, non-conforming track known for being "too tough to tame.''

They are characteristics Busch and Darlington share.

Busch is not a buttoned-down corporate smoothie or media darling like Jeff Gordon or Jimmie Johnson, but he's not hard-core, old school Richard Petty or Dale Earnhardt Sr. either. He's somewhere in-between the politically correct world of recent champs and the gritty, "let's just race" era of the NASCAR's previous generation.

He doesn't like speaking with reporters, but he's first in line to help out another driver's charity.

His competitors aren't likely to invite him over for dinner, but every one of them will tell you he's the guy to beat every single week.

He's intense enough to chastise his Joe Gibbs Racing pit crew on television when they make mistakes, but soft enough to admit the best part of this Mother's Day race weekend will be spending Sunday with his mom.

And as NASCAR nation found out last year at Richmond, he will use his bumper -- even at the expense of Earnhardt, the sport's most popular driver.

Latest NASCAR Images

In this Saturday, May 2, 2009, photo, Ryan Newman is greeted by members of the Virginia Army National Guard during driver introductions for the Crown Royal 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series auto race at Richmond International Raceway in Richmond, Va. Newman is 10th in points, surging after a slow start to climb 23 spots in seven weeks. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

In this photograph taken on Satuday, April 25, 2009, NASCAR truck driver Ricky Carmichael talks with a crew member after qualifying for the NASCAR Trucks series O'Reilly Auto Parts 250 auto race at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kan. Carmichael was running out of challenges on a motorcycle. Earn the nickname "Greatest of All Time" and the chances are there isn't going to be much left to accomplish. All it took was one trip to the Daytona 500 for Carmichael to figure out his next test: racing on four wheels instead of two. (AP Photo/Denny Medley)

FILE - In this April 17, 2009 file photo, driver Mark Martin sits outside his car after qualifying for a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series auto race in Avondale, Ariz. M Martin will drive a full Sprint Cup schedule for Hendrick Motorsports in 2010. The 50-year-old Martin signed a two-year contract with Hendrick last summer, but the second year originally was to be a partial schedule. It will be Martin's 22nd full season at NASCAR's top level. (AP Photo/Ken Sklute, File)

FILE - In this Feb. 13, 2009 file photo, NASCAR Trucks driver Ricky Carmichael heads to his pit dragging the back end of his truck after he was involved in a crash in the NextEra Energy Resources 250 auto race at the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Fla. Carmichael was running out of challenges on a motorcycle. All it took was one trip to the Daytona 500 for Carmichael to figure out his next test: racing on four wheels instead of two. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 3, 2007 file photoo, Ricky Carmichael of Havana, Fla., poses next to his motorcycle after practice for the Moto X racing competition at the X Games at Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif. Carmichael was running out of challenges on a motorcycle. All it took was one trip to the Daytona 500 for Carmichael to figure out his next test: racing on four wheels instead of two. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon, File)

FILE - In this April 3, 2009 file photo, driver Ryan Newman walks down pit road with teammates before qualifying for the NASCAR Samsung 500 auto race at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas. Newman joined Tony Stewart in his new racing venture last season motivated by his desire to have fun again and contend for a championship. So far, he's having that fun _ and again making noise on the track. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 10, 2008 file photo, NASCAR driver Kyle Busch drives through the esses during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Centurion Boats auto race at the Glen auto race in Watkins Glen, N.Y. Watkins Glen International is holding its own after securing a new title sponsor for the NASCAR Cup race in early August. (AP Photo/Russ Hamilton, File)

FILE - In this March 29, 2009 file photo, driver Ryan Newman signs autographs prior to the start of the Goody's 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup auto race at the Martinsville Speedway in Martinsville, Va. Newman joined Tony Stewart in his new racing venture last season motivated by his desire to have fun again and contend for a championship. So far, he's having that fun _ and again making noise on the track. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)

NEW YORK - MAY 04: NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon (R) and wife Ingrid Vandebosch attends "The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion" Costume Institute Gala at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 4, 2009 in New York City. (Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images) *** Local Caption *** Jeff Gordon;Ingrid Vandebosch

Getty Images

Former champ Darrell Waltrip, who competed against Petty, David Pearson, Earnhardt Sr. and Cale Yarborough in their primes, compared that Hall of Fame lineup with Busch, then boldly declared this week in his FOX Sports column, "I appreciate talent. ... and I have to tell you that none of them were as good as Kyle.''

Busch's Richmond win -- the 15th of his five-year Cup career -- ties him with Gordon for the most wins before the age of 25. The record could belong solely to Busch by Sunday. He's still got a whole year to rewrite that one.

"At some point I'd like to be able to win 200 races over all three series,'' said Busch, who is already the youngest pole winner and the youngest race winner in Cup history. "I think that would be a good number. It's a pretty big number. ... I've got plenty of years ahead of me and we'll see if we can't give it a shot.''

Since the 2008 season, Busch has won 27 percent of the races he has entered (29 of 107 races in three series) -- or one out of every four starts.

He already has 24 Nationwide Series wins -- exactly half of Mark Martin's all-time record total. He has 11 Camping World Truck series victories -- well within reach of Ron Hornaday's record 39 wins. And Busch has never even run a full truck season.

He's among only two or three drivers that you can expect to win any week on any track. In any series.

And if he can refine his late-season playoff effort, there's no reason he isn't a favorite to win multiple championships. That is why this season is pivotal to his career. He's proven he can win races, but he hasn't won a championship since he raced Legends Cars as a teenager.

He currently leads the Nationwide championship and is ranked fifth in the Cup standings.

As he racks up trophy after trophy (he earned three last weekend at Richmond, counting a late-model charity race and Friday's Nationwide event, in addition the Cup race), he is winning over the hearts and minds of naysayers and grudge-keepers.

Busch is the latest greatest thing for this series. He's exceptionally talented, unpredictable and not afraid to ruffle the feathers of the establishment. He's what you call "good TV". He's the reality check for a sport that leans toward becoming too polished.

And right now he's the last guy a driver wants to see in the mirror behind him.

Fans can and do boo him mercilessly. But in this sport, that just means you're winning too much.

Kyle Busch Is 'Rowdy' Real Thing originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Wed, 06 May 2009 22:15:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This Is Not What the Southern 500 Deserves

Geoffrey Miller — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 17:46:00 EST

Filed under: Darlington Raceway, International Speedway Corp

One might have figured that long-time NASCAR fans would have been rejoicing this week thanks to the reincarnation of Darlington Raceway's legendary Southern 500.

The race -- a staple of NASCAR's top series for 54 years -- was traditionally held every Labor Day weekend at the gritty South Carolina track and produced some of the best-known races of NASCAR's modern-era.

It was a place where drivers made a name for themselves and was a place where legends cemented their status as such in stock car racing.

But in 2004, that all disappeared thanks to a track realignment by the higher-ups in NASCAR and International Speedway Corporation that sent the traditional weekend packing to the West Coast in what has turned into a lame, ill-timed attempt to gain fans in the Los Angeles market.

But now, with ratings dropping in 2007, attendance dropping in 2008, growth slowing, and sponsorship troubles occurring thanks to NASCAR being a tourism-based industry that has likely overpriced itself, the legendary Southern 500 at "The Lady in Black" is returning in a much different form -- with lights and in May.

Have you ever seen a more blatant exploitation of tradition?

For years, traditional NASCAR fans and those that have never been impressed by the races at the newly-named Auto Club Speedway and have clamored for the sport to reverse itself and actually make tradition and history a big part of the way it markets itself.

And what do they get? The watered-down return of what once was a great race.

I suppose I should look at this as a positive thing, but I really can't. I'm not excited. It doesn't appeal to me.

It's not really the Southern 500.

The Southern 500 isn't supposed to be in May. It's not supposed to be on a Saturday night. It's not supposed to be on Mother's Day weekend.

And it sure isn't supposed to be just another lead-in race to another NASCAR's big events -- the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte's Lowe's Motor Speedway.

Instead, the Southern 500 with all of the glory and fame it gained as a NASCAR staple for 54 years will return in all of those elements above for the second week of May in 2009 -- and it all tastes like a really bad knock off.

It's really not hard to connect the dots in this situation to see that the "Southern 500" name is coming back because Darlington Raceway is having a tough time selling naming rights to the race. For the past three years, Dodge -- on behalf of Chrysler LLC -- has been the sponsor of the event and now we all know how well that auto manufacturer is doing with the the downturn of the American economy.

In other words, it's a little too convenient and a little too cheap that the traditions and glamor of the Southern 500 are coming back in what boils down to little more than an attempt to drive hype and ticket sales, as well as mask the open wound that longtime NASCAR fans still grind on four years after racing on Labor Day moved to a region that simply doesn't care.

I've got to say, though, that things like this don't surprise me anymore with NASCAR.

This Is Not What the Southern 500 Deserves originally appeared on Motorsports FanHouse on Thu, 14 Aug 2008 17:46:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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