NASCAR CAMPING WORLD TRUCK SERIES TEAMS FORSAKE PROFIT FOR SHEER PASSION OF RACING
MANY TEAMS RUNNING ON PARTIAL OR NO SPONSORSHIP HEADING INTO MARTINSVILLE
Despite heralded pre-season predictions of doom and gloom, the sky has yet to fall on the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series. In fact, many owners have moved heaven and earth to stay afloat, running their operations out of their own pockets, motivated by nothing other than sheer passion for the sport.
And the opportunity for potential sponsors is ripe, as ratings for the Truck Series on SPEED™ continue to soar. The Truck Series broadcast from Atlanta scored a Nielsen Household Rating of 1.29 (943,000 households), peaking at 1.63 (1,197,000 households), a 23-percent increase over 2008. After 19 of 22 NCWTS races on SPEED saw Nielsen Ratings growth in 2008, 15 in double digits, numbers continue to climb in 2009 as Daytona enjoyed a 21-percent increase to open this season.
However, sponsorship in the Truck Series is the exception rather than the rule, with many teams running Saturday's race at Martinsville Speedway (2 p.m. ET on FOX) on only partial or zero sponsorship. Daytona winner and 2006 champion Todd Bodine's No. 30 Germain Racing Toyota entry, currently second in points, was in question this weekend until a deal came together recently with Whelen Engineering, and reigning series champion and driver of the No. 1 Red Horse Racing Toyota, Johnny Benson, is without a sponsor.
With the average budget for a top Truck team estimated at $2.5-$3 million per year, something is keeping these guys in the game despite empty coffers - fervor for the Truck Series.
"It truly is passion versus profit," said Tom DeLoach, owner of Red Horse Racing. "If you were in this trying to make money, you'd be better off stopping at the very beginning and you'd wind up with more profit. Your most profitable moment is just before you start."
"When you are spending money like that out of your own pocket, there is nothing that shows greater commitment to the sport," Benson said.
Bank or bust, most of these teams keep hauling to the track in hopes that one more strong performance will net them a name on their hood.
"It's that optimism that right around the corner, it's going to happen," DeLoach said. "You always believe the next play is the one that is going to make everything happen. The next time you step up to the plate, you'll hit a homerun. The next time you throw a pass, it's going to be a touchdown. The next time you shoot a basket, it's going to be three points and seal the game. Racing is no different than that. The next race you're going to win the race and someone is going to step up and say, 'I want to sponsor you for the rest of the season.'"
While these owners' commitment to their teams is beyond admirable, equally impressive are the entry lists. Anemic fields were expected before the season commenced but have been full thus far. The preliminary entry list for Saturday's Kroger 250 contains a full field of 36 trucks.
"I'm very impressed by the turnout we've had in the Truck Series this year," said Bob Germain, owner of Germain Racing. "I thought at California that the field would be in the 20s (truck count). The series is very healthy and everyone is committed to it."
"We had a full field even at California, the most challenging race for everyone to get out to," said SPEED reporter Adam Alexander. "You don't trek all the way across the country unless you want to be there and there are a lot of people who want to be here."
While owners are pounding the pavement to drum up support for their teams, they're not the only ones feeling the pressure of running the season without backing.
"It definitely affects us (drivers)," Benson said. "Not having sponsorship doesn't affect our level of competition because we are still going to do our best each weekend but seeing other teams close their doors because of a lack of sponsorship makes everyone in the garage concerned. It makes you think it could happen to your team just as easily."
No matter how you cut it, running out of one's pocket is not only stressful but does not make good business sense either.
"I'm effectively into my third year without sponsorship," DeLoach said. "How long can you go before you say this doesn't make a whole lot of sense? I spent 30 years working for a corporation in various jobs and at no time would I have ever made these kinds of decisions in the business world. If you apply cold, hard business to it, this wouldn't work."
And Germain Racing, notified unexpectedly late last December that Lumber Liquidators was not returning as sponsor for the No. 30 truck, has made the difficult decision to cease operation this season if they are unable to land a sponsor.
"Because of business climate in our (auto dealership) business, we had a meeting last fall," Germain said. "The Gemains have invested an awful lot in this race team because we love the sport and we're very competitive people. Our business is off in the realm of 50-percent. The automobile business is struggling right now in general and we said we can't, in the foreseeable future, continue to invest our money into the race team. Whatever we have as sponsored programs is what we'll run.
"As unbelievable as it is to say, if we don't find a sponsor for Todd, we probably won't run the truck, which is a shame because that 30 truck is the foundation of this whole team," he continued. "It's very emotional to think about not running."
However, the Germains have a strong track record of running the team on their own nickel, as they were owner/sponsors for part of the 2004 season and the entire 2005 schedule. DeLoach is in his third year of running Red Horse Racing without sponsorship and they're just the tip of the iceberg in a racing community that can't bear to hang it up.
"The Truck Series certainly is all about the love of racing and being with a family," Alexander said. "For the Truck teams, this is where they race, where their family is and where they plan to stay. They don't want to see that die and have worked really hard to keep it going. It's going to take a lot more than a challenging economy and lack of sponsorship to keep them away."
"The Truck Series teams do this because they don't know anything different," said Krista Voda, host of NCWTS Setup. "They've done this their entire lives, love to race and have never really competed for the money. They're fighting to stay alive just to keep showing up each weekend."
So, what does the future hold for these top-notch teams seeking sponsorship?
"We're beating on doors," DeLoach said. "We seem to get very close but in today's environment, we don't get a 'no.' But until you get a 'yes,' it is a 'no.' There is no money in the bank. We keep trying to hang on long enough that we see some sort of turn and a company says 'yes, we want to play.'"
"I've made it my goal to get funding for the No. 30 team and I've been busy talking to people and I'm confident we're going to put something together," Germain said. "Doing it one race at a time isn't a lot of fun. We've had a lot of people say, 'We want to help Todd and you guys. What can we do?' I'm pretty optimistic that we're going to be okay. Under normal circumstances, when the car business is good, let's keep plugging away but it's a struggle out there."
It's a struggle many Truck Series teams are willing to soldier through despite poor economic conditions.
"The struggles in the Truck Series are a great representation of what's going on in the country right now but what jump out at me are passion and hope," Voda said. "We went into the season wondering if we'd have tiny fields and that hasn't happened so far, despite limited funds. That dedication and passion for Truck racing gives hope and shows the series still works. There still is a reason to keep fighting and trucking along despite the economy."
SPEED, now in more than 78 million homes in North America, is the exclusive home of the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race, Gatorade Duel at Daytona, NASCAR Sprint Pit Crew Challenge and the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series. The only network delivering live, at-track programming all season long, SPEED offers the definitive pre- and post-race NASCAR Sprint Cup Series programs - NASCAR RaceDay and NASCAR Victory Lane, as well as other popular NASCAR programs including Trackside Live, NASCAR Performance, NASCAR Live!, This Week in NASCAR, NCWTS Setup, NASCAR Smarts and NASCAR in a Hurry.
