NASCAR team owner says sport should enact a spending cap

“Kind of punish the ones that don’t care about spending and that extra money goes into a pool that would help the other owners, and hopefully they would use their money to make their cars more competitive, too,’’
 
Snowman, please leave political figures off this open forum.
It can lead to rather unsavory comments.

We do have a place for politics. If you would like access, just let me know.
 
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TexasRaceLady said:
Snowman, please leave political figures off this open forum.
It can lead to rather unsavory comments.

We do have a place for politics. If you would like access, just let me know.
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My apologies, it was just a joke nothing more.
In all seriousness, I could get behind a salary cap but not a spending cap. Take Hendrick shelling out some serious coin for Dale Jr, JJ, and Gordon at the same time. JGR with Edwards, Hamlin, Ky Busch and Kenseth. However, with the youth movement in full swing I don't see it as a necessity anymore.
 
I think it's a good idea. Also agree it shouldn't pertain to driver salaries. The luxury tax idea is also good. All around a good I idea pretty much.
 
Gene Haas commented last year that the cost of fielding a championship-caliber Cup team is, "about $15 million per car, excluding the driver." That is the number that should be worked on collectively, by Nascar and the RTA. Cost of the driver will best be regulated by the free market IMO. I think Nascar is a very long way from having a drivers union and collective bargaining. I don't see that happening.

Brett Griffin, spotter for Clint Bowyer, recently commented that SHR personnel travelling to each race is... (gulp)... 180 people. Gads, that is shocking.
 
IMO salary cap would be another way Nascar makes a small box even smaller. There are already to many rules, the cars are so close in horse power passing is extremely hard, everyone fits the same template and therefore run very close in speeds. I hear a lot of people say going faster isn't conducive to better racing, but people like to see big horsepower and fast speeds. To save money Nascar did away with qualifying engines, gear rules and limiting sets of tires. Nascar is not better now than it used to be, the excitement is not the same. Sorry for the rant.
 
Stop!
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There are too many rules already.
 
I feel your pain @Pat but if it keeps NASCAR running....

Then again...a smaller NASCAR might be interesting to watch.
 
Maybe limit them to one or two car teams and don't have employees for one team work for another like the Gibbs deal with Truex's crewmen. That would be a lot easier than trying to monitor how much they spend.
 
Spending cap could be put in place by using the corporate tax filing. All account receivables and payable are on the return, it may require NASCAR to have and independent auditor to enforce the cap.
 
A spending cap will be real easy to police :rolleyes:
I suggest making cup cars claimers ......... any car can be bought for 10 grand ............... but that won't work either :idunno:
Showroom stock cars provided by a dealer drawn from a hat might do it though !!! but those pesky air bags will muck up the show
 
Just an incentive for creative accounting and under the table partnerships.
 
They could put a salary cap in place, but with so many moving parts involved there would be a million ways around it. Especially when GM, Ford, and Toyota, get involved. I really don't see NASCAR lording over them with how they spend their money. And a lot of the cost could easily be transferred from
teams to manufacturer. The old adage of "money buys speed" has never changed. And won't.
 
I am in the camp of many who say that a some sort of spending cap is unworkable. When you have teams bending the rules attempting to gain an advantage week in and week out you know the same thing would happen when it came to expenditures.

A salary cap works in stick and ball as it only applies to the players salaries as the teams can pay the coaches, trainers, scouts and anyone else as much as they want. If they wanted to pick up each player by helicopter to bring them to the practice facility or stadium they are free to do so.
 
No budget cap, but even the Formula Juan is thinking about introducing standard parts now. Could see more of those in NASCAR soon.
 
kyle18fan said:
A spending cap will be real easy to police :rolleyes:
I suggest making cup cars claimers ......... any car can be bought for 10 grand ............... but that won't work either :idunno:
Showroom stock cars provided by a dealer drawn from a hat might do it though !!! but those pesky air bags will muck up the show
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yup real stock cars
crew cheif rides in passenger seat is also the spotter.
driver and cc get out and service the car during pitstops.
 
Must be that time again... have heard complaints that "racin' is too expensive" since I was a young'in - and that was back when Big Bill France was still in charge...

You can't regulate how much racers spend. They will spend more money than they can really afford to find an edge, and if you limit how much they can spend in one place then they'll spend that money someplace else. Eventually some realize that it's not how much you spend but how you spend it, but it can cost a lot before you come to that conclusion...

You can create rules that make some spending useless. Such as narrow hard tires that cannot handle too much horsepower, or boxy aerodynamics that create a lower stall speed. But rules don't really save racers money because racers see rules as challenges and will spend to try to defeat them.

You can't limit spending by limiting race purses. There will be racers who will spend crazy amounts of money just to win - it's more of an ego thing than business plan.

I don't envy leaders of sanctioning bodies. They have to try to reign in crazy-spending racers in order to avoid losing their series because teams implode. But it's a battle that you can't really win. About all they can do is make their series exciting enough that racers keep coming back to it.
 
You might be able to police how much an engine shop like Yates or Hendrick spend but you would never be able to put a price tag on an engine supplier like TRD.
 
Ol Smokie said:
You might be able to police how much an engine shop like Yates or Hendrick spend but you would never be able to put a price tag on an engine supplier like TRD.
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make them use stock engine parts, like they used to.
 
LewTheShoe said:
Gene Haas commented last year that the cost of fielding a championship-caliber Cup team is, "about $15 million per car, excluding the driver." That is the number that should be worked on collectively, by Nascar and the RTA. Cost of the driver will best be regulated by the free market IMO. I think Nascar is a very long way from having a drivers union and collective bargaining. I don't see that happening.

Brett Griffin, spotter for Clint Bowyer, recently commented that SHR personnel travelling to each race is... (gulp)... 180 people. Gads, that is shocking.
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4 drivers. 4-8 hauler drivers. 4-6 pr people. Approx 20 crew members by car. You're looking at a minimum of approximately 136 people for a four car team. Now factor in hotel costs, food and beverage costs, rental cars, and jet fuels costs (since most of the top teams fly private). That's at minimum $20k per race. That's $680k MINIMUM (leaving out the Charlotte races) per year for four car teams. Probably more since many teams stay on the west coast for the entire three week swing.

And that's just in travel costs.
 
Even if a spending cap was feasible Nascar should wait until things play out before embarking on more changes. The market needs to determine what primary sponsorships are worth and it is possible that both Nascar and the tracks will need to give back some TV money to the teams on a year by year basis in order to ensure their survival.
 
The only way to drive down cost is in the regulation of the equipment and the allowable testing. Driver salaries are starting to take care of themselves and headed down. Sponsor money shrinking, and TV money will be next. But, they will still be racing!
 
Hotrod said:
Sounds like crates may be the answer then.
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Well... crates are already having their problems at the short tracks. You can buy counterfeit seals online, and people are getting busted for hidden illegal modifications. Front-running teams who don't cheat are replacing or paying legal shops to rebuild their crate engines every few races - those costs add up a lot.
 
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