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race attendance

Last month's sell-out crowd at Iowa Speedway for the indy car race had more people in the stands than last night's Chicagoland NASCAR event--and the entire state of Iowa barely hits the 3,000,000 mark while the entire Chicagoland area numbers in the multiple millions. On TV, there were a lot of empty seats; and the total seating capacity at the Joliet venue is 75,000. That fact just really pleases me alot and the credit goes to Stan Clement, CEO of Iowa Speedway and his staff--they are constantly hyping their facility--and with just cause. If you haven't been to an Iowa event--it is worth your time and money. The last week in July is a Nationwide event and Labor Day weekend is the Truck Series event.

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Permalink Reply by Wilsonfan on July 12, 2009 at 11:42am

Last night's NASCAR race was so boring I fell asleep and had to read the sports page to see who won the event--and that track is only 2 and l/2 hours from my home--and in this house, I am the antique. Hope the Indy race is more exciting today! I'm sure razor blades have been keep away from Wheldon, Patrick, Viso, Kanan, Marco, PT, etc. sad state of affairs for that group--but Will Power, Justin Wilson sure look good.

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Permalink Reply by Kayla on July 12, 2009 at 1:09pm

Look, I love Indy Car! Greap people, great fun to watch but, let's get NASCAR a little credit. At least they can bump draft and PASS -- something Indy Car is struggling with right now.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Eugene Johnson on July 13, 2009 at 7:43am

Isn't it great that, not so ago, when people were were talking about which side they were on, they were talking Indycar/Champ car. Now which side are you on, refers to Indycar/NASCAR. I think this is a very positive development!!!

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Permalink Reply by Robbie Solesbee on July 13, 2009 at 5:42pm

All the more reason to bring the series to either Rockingham or Darlington.I do media relations for a small dirt track here in SC. The Saturday night NASCAR shows don't seem to be cutting into our business and we draw decent crowds without a Suoer Late Model Class. We do close the weekend of Darlington because it's less than an hour away and a good many people go to that race. Our RacersReunion.com website along with Love Chevrolet put on a show at the Old Columbia Speedway in April. We drew 30,000 people to a race track that has not been run on in 35 years. Ned Jarrett and Buddy Baker were our main drawing cards, but the majority was there to see the old cars. Also I saw very few NASCAR oriented t-shirts in the crowd. NASCAR is dying out in the South and IndyCar is missing a golden opportunity as Rockingham needs races and Darlington is down to one event.

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Permalink Reply by Wilsonfan on July 13, 2009 at 6:48pm

I have heard that the Rockingham facilitiy was looked at closely; but the track needs to be repaved in order to be suitable for the low indy cars--too rough currently--I've been to Darlington for a NASCAR race--don't know if the indy staff has even considered Darlington--I continue to repeat--the media would love to make an over-night success of some sport--and wouldn't we love that--a very long, over-night success story. But I'll take it!

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Permalink Reply by B-Dawg on July 16, 2009 at 11:54pm

AMEN!!! I was pushing for Rockingham and Darlington two years ago. My thought about Darlington -- which hosted a NASCAR-sanctioned Indy-style car race in 1952 (the Speedway division that just ran that single season) -- why don't they run an IRL race there on Labor Day weekend? I mean, they ran the Southern 500 for 54 years before ditching it for the bigger bucks of L.A...
If you go back to the beginning, the guy who built Darlington, Harold Brasington, was a big Indy car fan, and when he built his track, he wanted an Indy car race. When he couldn't get it, he got NASCAR to run the first 500-mile stock car race at his track in 1950. The rest is history.

As far as NASCAR dying out in the South... the longtime fans know when they've been sold out. Ask anybody in Wilkes County, NC... When they stopped racing at North Wilkesboro, they left the local fans -- some who had been with the sport from the beginning -- with nothing. The track has sat idle for almost 13 years, and the county has suffered economically ever since.