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Driven to Succeed
Aikman, Staubach determined not to end up like their QB brethren - NASCAR also-rans
BY NATE RYAN
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Nov 8, 2005
JUSTIN, Texas Aside from household names that command immense respect and financial clout in any sport, what do Dan Marino, Brett Favre and Terry Bradshaw have in common?
Enormously successful careers as NFL quarterbacks would be one answer.
Mediocre business ventures in NASCAR would be another.
With five Super Bowl rings between them, Roger Staubach and Troy Aikman have the former in common with their prolific passing colleagues. They don't intend on sharing the latter now that the co-owners of Hall of Fame Racing are poised to take their first snap in the Nextel Cup Series with the 2006 Daytona 500.
"We've gone about it a lot differently than other teams have," Aikman said. "We've been very diligent and very careful about how we've put this team together. There's been some other people that said, 'Hey, we want to get involved in NASCAR.' We've learned from some of their mistakes."
Foregoing the flash-in-the-pan approach that has burned many professional athletes dabbling in stock-car ownership, the Dallas Cowboys legends settled on a deliberate method of building their race team. They waited 18 months to secure the funding, drivers and support crew.
Aikman said there were other sponsorship opportunities for earlier entry, but having studied NASCAR's harsh economic realities as intently as he once read defenses, the Fox analyst and Staubach decided they weren't interested in moving quickly.
"There are people who come out and say, 'here's our driver,' and then have made some hires that made it very difficult," Aikman said. "We were in position to do that. But we said if we're going to get involved in this thing, let's do everything we can to give ourselves the best opportunity to have success.
"Now that doesn't guarantee anything. There are generations of families in NASCAR that are struggling. But we've done everything that we feel we can do."
The team has a high-end sponsor in Texas Instruments' DLP brand. The 36-race schedule will be split between veterans Tony Raines and Terry Labonte, who should guarantee the car qualifying spots for the first five races as a former champion. The crew chief is Philippe Lopez, a veteran of many major Cup teams.
Trans-Am veteran Bill Saunders was hired as general manager and moved to Charlotte, N.C., to supervise a 40-man staff that will be housed in a building formerly belonging to Joe Gibbs Racing, the linchpin to Aikman and Staubach's deal.
In a Cowboys-Redskins alliance, Gibbs will supply cars, engines and technological wisdom to a single-car startup entering an arena where multicar teams dominate. Robby Gordon Motorsports was the only new single-car operation this season, and Gordon has failed to qualify for seven races and failed to finish 13 others.
The Gibbs affiliation will provide a safety net, but Hall of Fame Racing expects to face the same struggles as their gridiron predecessors did.
Marino's foray into Cup with Bill Elliott lasted less than a season. Favre teamed with Dale Jarrett in a Busch car that never won. Bradshaw has been a high-profile partner for three years in Fitz-Bradshaw Racing, which lacks top-10 credentials in Busch.
There currently are no single-car teams in the top 20.
"Success in this sport is different from what I'm accustomed," Aikman said. "When someone says you finished in the top 20, you've been successful. I've never heard of such a thing. I'm used to you finished second, you weren't very good."
Aikman and Staubach don't pretend to be lifelong NASCAR fans, and they haven't shied from their Texas ties and football backgrounds. The news conference to introduce Raines and Labonte was held at Texas Motor Speedway, and Staubach was interviewed via satellite from the Naval Academy, where the 1963 Heisman Trophy winner was attending a reunion.
Their Chevrolet is No. 96 - the multiple of their uniform numbers 8 and 12.
Staubach said he was "a little scared but excited" about NASCAR and was counting on his business experience to guide him. The 63-year-old is the CEO of The Staubach Company, a global real estate advisory firm with 1,300 employees.
"We've also learned as we've built a wonderful real estate firm that you get the right people in the right places, miracles happen," he said. "We have to be successful. We are going to be competitive."
But caution remains a keyword. Staubach joked about if this was the "Aikman-Staubach" or "Staubach-Aikman" team. Aikman doesn't want it to be either.
"If this thing doesn't work, that's how it's going to be remembered, and Roger and I realize that," he said. "We're extremely motivated. We're going to be as involved as we have to be to make sure it doesn't fail."
Aikman, Staubach determined not to end up like their QB brethren - NASCAR also-rans
BY NATE RYAN
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Nov 8, 2005
JUSTIN, Texas Aside from household names that command immense respect and financial clout in any sport, what do Dan Marino, Brett Favre and Terry Bradshaw have in common?
Enormously successful careers as NFL quarterbacks would be one answer.
Mediocre business ventures in NASCAR would be another.
With five Super Bowl rings between them, Roger Staubach and Troy Aikman have the former in common with their prolific passing colleagues. They don't intend on sharing the latter now that the co-owners of Hall of Fame Racing are poised to take their first snap in the Nextel Cup Series with the 2006 Daytona 500.
"We've gone about it a lot differently than other teams have," Aikman said. "We've been very diligent and very careful about how we've put this team together. There's been some other people that said, 'Hey, we want to get involved in NASCAR.' We've learned from some of their mistakes."
Foregoing the flash-in-the-pan approach that has burned many professional athletes dabbling in stock-car ownership, the Dallas Cowboys legends settled on a deliberate method of building their race team. They waited 18 months to secure the funding, drivers and support crew.
Aikman said there were other sponsorship opportunities for earlier entry, but having studied NASCAR's harsh economic realities as intently as he once read defenses, the Fox analyst and Staubach decided they weren't interested in moving quickly.
"There are people who come out and say, 'here's our driver,' and then have made some hires that made it very difficult," Aikman said. "We were in position to do that. But we said if we're going to get involved in this thing, let's do everything we can to give ourselves the best opportunity to have success.
"Now that doesn't guarantee anything. There are generations of families in NASCAR that are struggling. But we've done everything that we feel we can do."
The team has a high-end sponsor in Texas Instruments' DLP brand. The 36-race schedule will be split between veterans Tony Raines and Terry Labonte, who should guarantee the car qualifying spots for the first five races as a former champion. The crew chief is Philippe Lopez, a veteran of many major Cup teams.
Trans-Am veteran Bill Saunders was hired as general manager and moved to Charlotte, N.C., to supervise a 40-man staff that will be housed in a building formerly belonging to Joe Gibbs Racing, the linchpin to Aikman and Staubach's deal.
In a Cowboys-Redskins alliance, Gibbs will supply cars, engines and technological wisdom to a single-car startup entering an arena where multicar teams dominate. Robby Gordon Motorsports was the only new single-car operation this season, and Gordon has failed to qualify for seven races and failed to finish 13 others.
The Gibbs affiliation will provide a safety net, but Hall of Fame Racing expects to face the same struggles as their gridiron predecessors did.
Marino's foray into Cup with Bill Elliott lasted less than a season. Favre teamed with Dale Jarrett in a Busch car that never won. Bradshaw has been a high-profile partner for three years in Fitz-Bradshaw Racing, which lacks top-10 credentials in Busch.
There currently are no single-car teams in the top 20.
"Success in this sport is different from what I'm accustomed," Aikman said. "When someone says you finished in the top 20, you've been successful. I've never heard of such a thing. I'm used to you finished second, you weren't very good."
Aikman and Staubach don't pretend to be lifelong NASCAR fans, and they haven't shied from their Texas ties and football backgrounds. The news conference to introduce Raines and Labonte was held at Texas Motor Speedway, and Staubach was interviewed via satellite from the Naval Academy, where the 1963 Heisman Trophy winner was attending a reunion.
Their Chevrolet is No. 96 - the multiple of their uniform numbers 8 and 12.
Staubach said he was "a little scared but excited" about NASCAR and was counting on his business experience to guide him. The 63-year-old is the CEO of The Staubach Company, a global real estate advisory firm with 1,300 employees.
"We've also learned as we've built a wonderful real estate firm that you get the right people in the right places, miracles happen," he said. "We have to be successful. We are going to be competitive."
But caution remains a keyword. Staubach joked about if this was the "Aikman-Staubach" or "Staubach-Aikman" team. Aikman doesn't want it to be either.
"If this thing doesn't work, that's how it's going to be remembered, and Roger and I realize that," he said. "We're extremely motivated. We're going to be as involved as we have to be to make sure it doesn't fail."