Those folks over at the new NASCAR Social Media Spy site must have it all balled up. NASCAR has finally reached the point that most of its employees know absolutely nothing about racing - or, evidently, running a web site.
Now we can say it right to your face... "WE TOLD YOU SO. THE NEW NASCAR.COM SUCKS."
Tried to look up "Winner's Circle Plan" at the "New" NASCAR.com - Got the message below:
You are trying access a restricted area of the site. Please validate your actions. If you think that this is a site error, please reach us on support center at support.nascar.com
In looking through Google News Archives yesterday to read a story about Mark Martin earning the Richmond Pole as a Rookie in 1981 and not being able to start his car at race time because of a rag left between the carburetor and air cleaner, I stumbled across another 1981 story that reminded me of something I had completely forgotten.
That story concerned efforts by sponsor, Wrangler to get money to Richard Childress and Dale Earnhardt after they teamed for the final 11 races of 1981 following Earnhardt's and Wrangler's departure from the Jim Stacy team after the August 1981 Talladega race. Earnhardt was originally being sponsored by Wrangler in the #2 Rod Osterlund Pontiac for 1981 and without warning the team was sold to Stacy in July.
Wrangler had already done several fairly unusual things for Dale. In January 1981 I sat down with him at Daryl's Restaurant on Church Street in Greensboro, NC and signed a $100,000 Personal Services Contract. That meant Dale would earn $100,000 from Wrangler regardless of what he did in the car on the track. That was big money for 1981 and not many NASCAR drivers could boast such a deal.
Wrangler also put its in-house accounting department in charge of auditing the sale of Dale Earnhardt souvenirs. That meant that all money dealings between Dale and Little Bud Moore regarding the sale of Dale Earnhardt items had the money flow through the Blue Bell, Inc. accounting department for a complete audit and reconciliation to assure Dale received what he was entitled to receive from the sale of his souvenirs.
When Wrangler and Dale joined Richard Childress for the final 11 races of 1981, Wrangler incurred tremendous unanticipated expenses. First, we had to scrap all postcards, print materials, press kits, posters and advertising materials with the #2 car on them and reshoot materials with a #3 Childress car.
Childress tow vehicles & race cars had to be painted, as well as other peripheral gear.
In order to get Childress' race shop up to speed, Wrangler bought a great amount of equipment so that the Richard Childress operation would be on the same footing as other major NASCAR teams in terms of shop equipment.
Wrangler also paid the salary of Dale's former crew chief at Osterlund, Doug Richert when he joined Childress. We also paid the salary of PR rep, Joe Whitlock and secretary, Judy Tucker who had been let go by Stacy, as well as buying office equipment for them.
We paid for fabricator, Robert Gee to hang superspeedway bodies on the Childress cars.
We also did what I had forgotten - we negotiated with 11 racetrack promoters to pay to Childress and Earnhardt the same Winner's Circle money the Osterland/Stacy team received.
I believe that amounted to something like $6,000 a race, but don't hold me to that figure. However, it was money Richard Childress had never seen before.
We went to Darwin Doll at Michigan, Gary Baker at Bristol, Red Tyler at Darlington, Paul Sawyer at Richmond, Denis McGlynn at Dover, Clay Earles at Martinsville, Enoch Staley at North Wilkesboro, Humpy Wheeler at Charlotte, Frank Wilson at Rockingham, Walter Nix at Atlanta and Les Richter at Riverside. All eleven agreed to pay Childress the money to compete.
When Wrangler left Childress for Bud Moore after 1981, we also helped get Piedmont Airlines to sponsor Childress with Ricky Rudd and we left behind all the shop equipment we bought for Richard. To this day, Richard Childress owes a bundle to Wrangler for his success.
Here is the article I mentioned below. Forgive my lack of talent in printing from Google News Archives. I have attempted to hand write what didn't transfer very well and that doesn't look too good. I hope you can figure it out and enjoy reading the piece. We pulled out all stops at Wrangler for both Richard Childress and Dale Earnhardt.
Sorry to hear that the Gaston Gazette has eliminated the position. Monte has long been one of the best and most astute motorsports writers.
The press ox seating areas for deadline print media must be looking pretty darned empty these days. I remember when I didn't have enough seats for deadline print media seeking seats.
From a report at Racintoday.com by Deb Williams:
Its evident race fans are happy about NASCARs return to dirt track racing.
Tony Stewart said Monday that more than 16,000 reserved seats have been sold for the July 24 NASCAR Camping World Series truck race at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio. Stewart said less than 1,000 reserved seats remain available.
Deb Williams can be reached at dwilliams@racintoday.com
You'll hear Mark talk about doing the set-up himself on his 1981 Rookie Pole car at Richmond in this interview. He was using his Late Model ASA crew.
If you'll click this link and go toward the end of the story, you'll see the writer describe Mark's crew chief, Bobby Jones' animated conversation with the crewman who left the rag, as well as the writer's observation that Mark should have gotten the Goodys Headache Award that day.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1298&dat=19810916&id=...
Dale Earnhardt was particularly fond of Mark's mom - and, I don't know who the someone was..
