Thoughts on USAR ProCup new Engine Leasing

[flraceguy]

Well I know there isn't all the information out on the new program yet, but what is everybody's thoughts on the Engine Leasing Program and the fact that they are allowing the K & N cars into the Series for this year...

Have a great day all..

[TINYTIMDSS]

it is putting the small teams out of a good series. 30k for a motor if you brake it you pay to fix and if you don't have 30k you can finace for 45k so there willl be a alot of cars be sold

[Don Nerone]

When we started it the rule was 362 all steel no tuch 350cfm holly.
$3500 wound build a cheep one.
The cars were NASCAR sportsman or 5 year old cup or bush cars.
$7500 would geet u a fair car.
Then they fixed it.....
(sure that was my falt to)
Don 62

[ABYSS64]

And they had to ask why at SOBO they only had 15 cars?? They've killed it for good this time I'm afraid.

[Jimmy McKinley]

(Sigh...) Another great short-track only series down the drain. Why does NA$CRAP have to stick their nose in *everything* "stock-car"...??

If they're allowing K&N Series cars, those are/were the old NA$CAR North Series.

I bet no one, or *very few*, can tell who the 2010 NASCAR Weekly Track National Champion was (or whatever they're calling it nowadays) without looking it up.

[TINYTIMDSS]

one it is not nascar killing the series it is the high dollar teams that are killing it. two if you pay attetion to the northen states the weekly serie is called the whelen weekly racing series

[TINYTIMDSS]

oh they also cut the pay last year, but kept the entry the same and the raised the price on tires

[Don Nerone]

when we started PRO CUP hooters would fund whatever it took to go foward. TV big purse.Made the deal so good the tracks could not say no.
Without funding its not going to happen. Ware is the money going to come from? Its not going to come from ticket sales thats for sure. Even before the slow down it was happing. An evemt with tv purse and the track would be $160,000. if you sold out every seat at USA for $20.00 you still didnt make it.
NASCAR the old ASA and ALL PRO_ALLAMERICAN and many more did well buy selling corp sponsors not ticket sales. Most of that money was for tv rights and with NASCAR eating the funding and races on sat night primetime short tracks are suffering.
When short track fans and racers become a grop tha corp america wants it will return.
Right now we look like a bunch of buzzards trying to eat 1 rabbit.

Don62

[flraceguy]

Don a couple of good points there.. Regrettably in these days and times Funding is a big deal... and ticket sales for the event in those types of series seems to be cream on top.... I go to them because I luv short track style racing, so I may be one of odd ducks in this...

have a great day all

[ABYSS64]

Speaking of Nascrap sticking there nose where it isn't wanted. Remember full fields of late models when Hooters Super Cup existed , pulling All Pro, ASA, Sunoco Super Series teams away from there regular series to come run with Hooters. Then some dumb ass decides to bring what looked like a Busch car into the scene, they start a series with these Pro Cup, along comes Nascar, Hooters damn near killed All Pro, so Nascar decides to lay it down for Hooters and company, quote " if you guys want to continue to run the Pro Cup series on Nascar sanctioned tracks you'll have to do away with the Super Cup late models" . So next thing you know, were all sitting with a bunch of Super Cup stuff and nobody gives a damn. Another great series killed due to politics and powers that be not having the balls to stand up to nascrap again.

Nascrap think they know what is best for the sport of stock car racing, REALLY? REALLY? I see all those empty seats, teams scrambling to find sponsors.
Yet almost every short track race I attended last year was damn near sold out. Most of the people I hang out with have Woo, Lucas or PASS series drivers t-shirts on, not to many Nascrap team shirts. The tickets I hold in my hand at this very moment, PASS series race at Wilkesboro, dirt late models at Eastbay and Woo at Volusia, not one single nascrap ticket and other than the truck race I could care less about Daytona speedweeks.

Where I work there are 7 people not counting myself that are coming to Florida for speedweeks, not a single one of them plan to go to anything at Daytona, all plan to go to Eastbay,Volusia,Ocala and New Symrna. 4 of them have never been to any of those but are fed up with following nascrap, so it is our job to make sure they have a blast and hopefully bring a few more fans to short track racing. So lets count them up, there are 7 plus 4 bringing the wife or gf, 2 teens, I'll have 4 of my daughters, my gf, 2 friends outside work, so that's 20 people in 2 motorhomes that don't give a damn about nascrap and are headed to Florida to spend who knows how much at the short tracks for several weeks, Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm, and to think it's been said my kind are bad for the sport and I don't show any support for short track racing, imagine that.

[Benny The Mule]

I live in NC and there are Procup cars for sale everywhere around me. That might tell a tale itself, i too am coming to speedweek in my beloved home state........without a Nascar event visit. I have to deal with the Whelen series up her all summer unless i go to the dirt tracks.

[Frasson118]

You know who I feel bad for in this... New Smyrna Speedway. This is the 2nd year in a row, that they scheduled a series that offered a decent show, but off-season rule changes KILLED them. Remember the ASA series race last year? ASA went with the new Pony-car body rules, and only about 9 cars showed up.

I don't know exactly HOW this will affect the field of cars, but it doesn't sound like it will make for an immediate improvement. Maybe later, but not right away.

[modracer22]

I might of miss it in a earlier post in this thread but why did Hooters switch from super lates to pro-cup anyways that's when I quit paying any attention to the series.

[Jimmy McKinley]

I thought that Hooter's actually had both the Super Cup (Super Late Model type cars) and the Pro Cup (BGN type cars) running during the same time frame (mid to late '90s). The Super Cup cars were on TV at the time, while the Pro Cup cars were not. And again, at the time, NA$CAR was still running their version of the All-Pro series. When the Super Cup cars came along, and on TV, and at a few NA$CAR sanctioned tracks, NA$CAR threatened to drop the All-Pro series altogether, threatened their All-Pro drivers that they better not run in the Super Cup events, etc. (at least that's what I recall of that whole situation). So the Super Cup division was dropped after two or three seasons ('99, maybe?), and they went strictly to the Pro Cup. Pro Cup then became like ARCA, except with a FULL TV package at the time. Somewhere in there, I believe, Bob Brooks, the head of Hooter's, passed away in about 2006, and the series kind of has been on a downhill slide after that. Fewer races every year, fewer cars, the TV deal kind of fell apart...and it didn't help that Lakeland - USA International Speedway, Hooter's Cup's home track, which was owned by Hooter's and Bob Brooks, fell off.

Oh - and Skip, to really answer your question, I found this:

http://www.circletrack.com/ultimater...ies/index.html

From the October, 1999 issue of Circle Track
By Glen Wilkinson

The Hooters ProCup Series as it looks today eventually evolved from the now-defunct NASCAR Sportsman series. Since its early days, the Hooters races have gone through a startling transformation in only a short period.

In 1997, the series' first "real season," there were 11 races. During the Milwaukee race in September, Brooks, who now owns USAR, the sanctioning body for the Hooters ProCup Series, decided to drop the Hooters Cup Late Model Series (the premier series at the time) and develop the Hooters ProCup Series. The decision was made because the ProCup cars were steel-bodied cars, like those running in the Winston Cup and Busch series, and thus Brooks felt they would look better on television.

"We felt there were a lot of Sportsman cars and drivers out there who didn't have a series to race in," says Gary Cornwell, USAR's media relations director. "So we developed the series from there, and we made some rule changes on what kind of body styles (the drivers) could run, because they now had to be steel bodies. At that point, we knew what we wanted, so we went about scheduling 20 races for the 1998 season. We feel that 20 races are about as much as most racers can run. A lot of drivers who came to our series came from a Late Model background, in which they raced at a particular track or in a three-track series. With this in mind, we felt the monetary concerns were conducive to 20 races."

[ABYSS64]

[QUOTE=Jimmy McKinley;62695]I thought that Hooter's actually had both the Super Cup (Super Late Model type cars) and the Pro Cup (BGN type cars) running during the same time frame (mid to late '90s). The Super Cup cars were on TV at the time, while the Pro Cup cars were not. And again, at the time, NA$CAR was still running their version of the All-Pro series. When the Super Cup cars came along, and on TV, and at a few NA$CAR sanctioned tracks, NA$CAR threatened to drop the All-Pro series altogether, threatened their All-Pro drivers that they better not run in the Super Cup events, etc. (at least that's what I recall of that whole situation). So the Super Cup division was dropped after two or three seasons ('99, maybe?), and they went strictly to the Pro Cup. Pro Cup then became like ARCA, except with a FULL TV package at the time. Somewhere in there, I believe, Bob Brooks, the head of Hooter's, passed away in about 2006, and the series kind of has been on a downhill slide after that. Fewer races every year, fewer cars, the TV deal kind of fell apart...and it didn't help that Lakeland - USA International Speedway, Hooter's Cup's home track, which was owned by Hooter's and Bob Brooks, fell off.

Jimmy you are correct, and add that to what I said, maybe I didn't explain it right. I was working for a late model team at the time and had attended several meetings about this, nascar did threaten the All Pro guys, but they also told Hooters that if they continued to run the late model tour that they would no longer be able to run either series at a track with Nascar sanction. They even went so far as to influence ARCA, trying to make them pressure their drivers not to run Hooters. If you get the chance to ever spend some time with Mike Cope ask him about the conversation Nascar had with him about running Hooters, him being a multi time All Pro Champion, they almost dis-owned Jody Ridley over running Hooters, even guys like Mike Garvey still get the cold shoulder from Nascar to this day over all that bs politicing back then.

People that have never been on the inside have no idea what goes on behind closed doors, I would say Nascar is motorsports version of the Mafia. Look at what happened with Bowman Gray when Nascar seen that they were packing the house because of the madhouse TV deal, they killed it because they weren't making any $$$$ off of it. Nascar sanctioned track, you play by our rules or we'll put you outta business!