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 Citing another made-in-America sports league, the National
Basketball Association, NASCAR has decided to take a bottom-up
approach in the hope of nurturing international drivers who might
one day make the leap to the United States.
"The NBA model is a great one," Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR's executive
vice-president and chief racing development officer, told Reuters.
"You have a (local league)in a particular country or region but the
ultimate goal is to play in the NBA."
Although the NBA has played games overseas, NASCAR do not intend to
export their premier Sprint Cup series, which includes the Daytona
500.
In the distant past the mostly oval track racing series had
non-points races for its stars in Australia and Japan. But those
exhibitions do not fit with current NASCAR plans.
"It was an idea before its time and we learned from that,” said
O’Donnell. "Just taking a race to another country does not help
build the sport.
"Our model for success is to grow at the grassroots level."
As part of the strategy implementation, a relatively new series,
called the Whelen Euro Series, promotes racing on a variety of
circuits in six countries, including former Formula One venues at
Brands Hatch in England and Zolder in Belgium.
As a result, fans too young to have seen the legendary battles for
the F1 world championship between Austrian Niki Lauda and Briton
James Hunt have been treated to ones between their sons, Mathias
Lauda and Freddie Hunt.
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The younger Lauda, who also races in the World Endurance
Championship, explained from Spain why he also chose a stock
car-based formula.
"NASCAR is pure racing without politics," the 35-year old Lauda told
Reuters in an interview from Spain. "Fans always look for heroes
connecting with the driver ahead of the car."
Hero-worship aside, he feels that driver-skill plays more of a part
in the outcome of a NASCAR race than Formula One.
"As a driver you can make a difference” he said. “It’s very close
racing, fun racing.”
(Editing by Andrew Both and Frank Pingue)
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