That said no speedway wants to see one of its races go elsewhere. (Speculation is that the Atlanta s

A long-running rumor became sobering reality Thursday: Atlanta Motor Speedway has lost one of its Sprint Cup events for 2011. The track that has played atlanta rental cars host to two NASCAR events for half a century NASCAR itself is only 63 years old has seen its allotment halved. This is not good news.
To his credit, AMS president Ed Clark didn t try to pretend it was. It s got a little sting to it, he said. The tough part was telling the staff. They deserved atlanta rental cars to be the first to know. But every one of them said they have a commitment to building the Labor Day weekend race into the biggest event in the state.
atlanta rental cars And there is. The Labor Day weekend Sunday night race came into being last year and will be known as the Emory Healthcare 500 this September. atlanta rental cars AMS was so hot to have the night race that it ceded its place in the season-ending Chase for the Sprint Cup, and the first go-round left Clark and his folks hugely encouraged.
Even when the track was playing host to two events, it was clear AMS saw Labor Day as the greater of the two. No doubt about it, Clark said. It s a holiday weekend at a more favorable time of the year It s tough to do an outdoor event here in March. Even if it s 60 degrees for the race, it s cold for the [overnight] campers.
That said no speedway wants to see one of its races go elsewhere. (Speculation is that the Atlanta spring race will fall to the Kentucky Speedway, which is a corporate brother of AMS. Small world.) There s a stigma to losing anything, and AMS has long seen itself as one of the pillars of NASCAR.
Atlanta wasn t quite Daytona atlanta rental cars or Talladega or Charlotte on the circuit, but it was a big Southern city with two annual races, and the fall event was the prestigious season-ender. But then NASCAR sought to get bigger and wider, and tracks outside the deep South were handed Cup events and AMS was dislodged by Homestead, Fla., as the site of the season s final race, and soon Atlanta was fighting to keep up.
The loss of the spring race marks another annual sporting event gone from the local calendar, taking its place on the dusty shelf of golf tournaments and tennis events though the Atlanta atlanta rental cars Tennis Championships made a reappearance last month and the Tour de Georgia. It s a reflection of a crowded marketplace and shrinking pocketbooks and sponsorships, sure, but the absence of any event marks another rip in the fabric of civic life.
This doesn t, however, mean that Atlanta has become a NASCAR ghost town. The Labor Day race has real potential, and it falls at a sweet spot in the sporting schedule: On a holiday atlanta rental cars weekend, flush with the beginning atlanta rental cars of college football, atlanta rental cars a week before the NFL commences.
We re going to maximize the opportunity, said Clark, who s a salesman of the first rank. We ve expanded our [Labor Day] schedule from two days to four. There ll be a Drivin N Cryin concert on Friday night, and the morning after the race the speedway will serve free breakfast to its campers.
NASCAR lost it s appeal to me when it added the Chase, obviously to help someone, anyone keep Jeff Gordon from breaking the all time record of championships. He would already atlanta rental cars be one away from that under the old format.
giving up the chase race for Labor Day was AMS idea? I d been to almost atlanta rental cars every AMS race since fall 03 (my 1st live one) but Labor Day killed the fall one for me. sorry, but I did well to get home by midnight w/the old start time w/a night race I d be a True Blood character trying to beat the sunrise BTW I agree about Pocono but more from a safety (or lack there of) standpoint that place is going to get a driver killed even w/SAFER, COT, etc
The reality is they could take away a race from every track except Daytona, Talladega and Bristol and then they might be able to fill up the seats at the tracks. Look at how many empty seats The Brickyard had and tell me Nascar doesnt have more of a problem than two races at Atlanta.
One is the cost of the good seats. Over $120 dollars for a front stretch just at Darlington. atlanta rental cars Go take a family atlanta rental cars of four with 8-10 year old kids and have front stretch seats and by the end of the day its a $600- $700 trip. Not to many takers on that front. Nascar needs to reduce costs accross the board. It begins with tickets and then it continues into how Owners operate. atlanta rental cars Cant fins a sponser? Well stop asking primary atlanta rental cars ones for $20 million dollars to operate, atlanta rental cars and you may see Nascar have a rebirth.
Maybe if folks had actually come to both races they wouldn t be taking one away. Just sayin . AMS hasn t been the same since they made it a clone tri-oval to fit more seats in. It was the 3rd fastest track on the circuit and suddenly it was just like a dozen other tracks. NASCAR has become a spec series anyway; you can only tell the cars apart by the stickers and I have trouble telling the pretty boy corporate shill drivers apart too.
I ve been going to AMS since I was 4 (1985). Still have every ticket stub. I fear that that I will not re-new my tickets for next years race. The sport has gotten atlanta rental cars away from its roots. Why does New Hampshire have two races. Pocono, Michigan, Fontana and several more tracks do not deserve two races. Fuel mileage races are boring. Two of the closest races in NASCAR history were in the Atlanta spring race by my favorite racers, Earnhardt and Harvick (hence the 29 in Buzz).
The problem is NASCAR grew too big to quick and they allowed all these 1.5 cookie atlanta rental cars tracks to be built. Not to mention how the sport has priced itself out the their core fan base by trying to appeal to the Hollywood types and go after TV deals. Yes, I understand TV deals pay the bills and it's good to attract atlanta rental cars new fans, but not at the expense of alienating the fans that put them in that position to begin with. Really atlanta rental cars what needs to happen is that Winston Cup needs to split into two divisions atlanta rental cars like some of the smaller touring series do. Call it Winston Cup East/West. Both divisions start the season in February at Daytona then break out into their own regional schedules coming atlanta rental cars together at certain tracks, then end the "regular" season in August. Take the top 10 drivers from each division and run 10 races from August till November at tracks across the country, ending the chase in a traditional market like Charlotte or Darlington. But I digress. I haven't watched one all the way through or attended a race in years as I already know who will win. And I'd rather spend my $100 at a tracks like Dixie, Lanier, Rome, or Senoia.
First you dropped Rockingham ..OK, couldn t sell enough tickets. The track is in the middle of nowhere, and you can t get there from anywhere. It was always a good race and an awful lot of people atlanta rental cars would still watch it on TV. I d rather watch a race at The Rock than one of those boring new cookie cutter tracks.
Next you dropped one of the races at Darlington, and moved the other race to Mother s Day weekend. Really? One of the oldest and most unique tracks on the circuit the very essence of stock car racing ..it s still a great race, but the area from which you can draw butts for the seats has been reduced due to the date.
Now, you ve dropped a race at Atlanta Motor Speedway .the fastest, most exciting track on the circuit. Not enough ticket sales? atlanta rental cars Early spring and November were not good weather dates too cold and windy in early March, and too cold and often rainy in November. OK, so you recently moved one date to September the beginning of Football Season. Who made this decision? One of your staff Northerners or Westerners? Stupid. Atlanta, Georgia happens atlanta rental cars to be smack dab in the middle of Football-is-a-Religion country. Still not selling atlanta rental cars enough tickets? How many people are watching the damn race on TV? A bunch both races!
How many butts have been in the seats in California? Unless everyone is wearing aluminum foil clothing, you could throw a hand grenade into the stands atlanta rental cars without injuring anything but the seats. How about Kansas City or Chicago? .and they all have 2 races. They haven t earned 2 races! And you re still running 2 races at that POS track in New Hampshire. Really? New Hampshire? Yeah, Yeah, I know it s for New York City .where they all think we re a bunch of beer swilling boobs in wife-beater t-shirts, chewing tobacco, and wearing over-alls. They damn sure haven t earned 2 races!
Makes me think that we have different people running things now ..not just different people, different kinds of people ..certainly no history majors. The kind of people who would dump their wife of 20 years for a pretty young girl who ll lift her skirt for you to have a free look ..only to steal your wallet when you get to the hotel room.
In the last 15 years, NASCAR has done away with Rockingham and North Wilksboro completely, cut Darlington and Atlanta in half while taking the Southern atlanta rental cars 500 away from Labor Day, all in the name of progress I suppose
As far as attendance goes, without looking at anything specific I wouldn t say that it has fallen off more than any other track over the last 2 years as the recession has just killed ticket sales pretty much everywhere. Atlanta is generally considered the fastest track and had some of the most memorable finishes ever- and that s just within the past 10 years.
Not that I care all that much about NASCAR anyway, but this is just one more reason not to waste my time with it. Just like the NBA s efforts to market it s product to the gangster atlanta rental cars rap culture is driving away many of it s old suburban fans, NASCAR s efforts to attract a new audience will erode it s traditional fan base and leave executives wondering what went wrong.
Nascar fan since 1958. The name Nascar is nolonger true. Now it is just a dollar machine for the France family and the Smith family. The name was for stock cars. Now nothing is stock about them. 3/4 size, you can t buy the car or the parts at the dealership.. Nascar has become a joke and it makes me sad to watch. Show me the love of the sport like Dale Sr, Richard, atlanta rental cars Cale, David, Bobby, Junior Johnson. The drivers of those days loved the sport, not the dollar.