*NASCAR aims at growth, promotion of Grand-Am

By Sporting News Wire Service
September 6, 2008
06:19 PM EDT*

_type size: + -In its acquisition of the Grand-American Road Racing Association, NASCAR saw the opportunity to help a series with an exciting road-racing product gain broader mainstream exposure through the marketing and media infrastructure the stock-car racing organization already has in place.

On Thursday, NASCAR Holdings, the legal entity that includes NASCAR and other subsidiaries, agreed to acquire Grand-Am, which was formed in 1999 and operates six racing series, the best known of which are the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series and the Grand-Am KONI Challenge Series.

“It’s confusing somewhat when you’ve got a race where you’ve got three drivers [taking turns in the same car]. We’re going to work with Grand-Am to figure out how we can simplify this so everybody can understand it.” JIM HUNTER

The Rolex series kicks off its season with the Rolex 24 at Daytona, a 24-hour endurance race on the road course at Daytona International Speedway. Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart, Kyle Petty, Bobby Labonte, Juan Montoya, Kurt Busch and Jeff Gordon are among the NASCAR drivers who have participated in the Grand-Am race.

Sprint Cup owners Richard Childress and Chip Ganassi also own Grand-Am teams.

“The whole idea of the Grand-Am situation is for us to share NASCAR’s resources with Grand-Am,” said Jim Hunter, NASCAR vice president of corporate communications. "From an organizational standpoint and a resources standpoint, they’re where NASCAR was many years ago. So, from a marketing standpoint and from a communications standpoint and maybe a lot of other things, we want to share all of our resources.

“Grand-Am’s still going to be run independently. Roger Edmondson is the president, and he’s going to run the organization. But we’re going to support Grand-Am in any way we can, with our communications resources, such as the media [Web] site, for example."

Though Grand-Am has its own public site (www.grand-am.com), Hunter indicated that NASCAR would link its media site to Grand-Am content, as well as carrying Grand-Am news on the NASCAR media site.

Grand-Am, however, will not become another NASCAR series.

“The holding company for NASCAR is purchasing Grand-Am, but from an operational standpoint — I’m sure our competition department is going to work closely with their competition department — but we’re not going to run their races,” Hunter said. “They’re going to operate totally autonomously from us, but we’re going to lend them our assistance in any way we can to help build the Grand-Am series.”

Though Hunter doesn’t see a proliferation of Grand-Am companion events at speedways that host NASCAR races in the near future — beyond those that already exist, such as Daytona and Montreal — he does hope that more NASCAR drivers will cross over into Grand-Am.

“Hopefully, even more will participate, not just in the 24 Hours but in some of the other events where it gives NASCAR drivers an opportunity to participate,” Hunter said.

The important aspect of the deal, from Hunter’s perspective, is NASCAR’s ability to maximize the exposure Grand-Am receives.

“Just the access NASCAR has to the media is huge, compared to the access that Grand-Am has, or any other road-racing organization has,” Hunter said. "We’re going to do everything we can to at least put information out there that’s available on a week-in, week-out basis. There’s some really good human-interest stories in Grand-Am that we plan to use some of our people to help get those out there and take a much more proactive interest in what’s going on in Grand-Am.

“It’s confusing somewhat when you’ve got a race where you’ve got three drivers [taking turns in the same car]. We’re going to work with Grand-Am to figure out how we can simplify this so everybody can understand it.”

*Also

NASCAR Holdings reveals plan to acquire Grand-Am

Ganassi tops record Rolex 24 with third win in a row

Johnson makes solid 99 team even better at Rolex 24

Red Bull’s Allmendinger earns the pole for Rolex 24

NASCAR stars near top after Rolex 24 practice ends_*