NASCAR women

[Faithless]

If there's one sport where you think women would have no problem being equals with men, it would be auto racing. Yet, there are probably more women involved with other aspects of the field, then as racers.

WOMEN STEERING WAY INTO NASCAR: Females gain presence in business, track sides of sport

Posted on Sun, Mar. 06, 2005 * By Mike Drummond * Knight Ridder

Pat Hill reached into a stock car after it had sprinted four practice laps and seared her finger on the floorboard.

With the pain that day 15 years ago came an epiphany.

Few were making effective floor insulation for race cars at the time, Hill says. "That's when the light went on."

Armed with a high school education, money saved from a previous job selling exhaust insulation in Ohio, and an informed hunch, she invented KoolMat, a fiberglass-and-silicone material that is gaining traction among NASCAR teams.

The 57-year-old entrepreneur represents an emerging female force in NASCAR - a sport that's shifting away from its white-men legacy since launching a diversity initiative in 2000.

Of 57 Nextel Cup teams, seven women are listed as owning or co-owning nine of them, a high-water mark reached when the season kicked off this month, according to NASCAR.

Georgetta Roush, listed as an owner of Roush Racing, and Teresa Earnhardt, hands-on owner of Dale Earnhardt Inc., are among women fielding cars in today's Nextel Cup race at California Speedway outside Los Angeles.

Female representation has manifested itself in a growing fan base and female-oriented marketing campaigns. As the sport's fan base grew to 75 million from 63 million in the past four years, women continued to represent 40 percent of the NASCAR faithful.

This year, hair-product maker Garnier Fructis joined the likes of Lowe's, Jack Daniel's and Viagra as NASCAR sponsors.

Although the sport has no firm census numbers, longtime observers say women are filling more nuts-and-bolts roles beyond the traditional event-planning and public-relations tasks.

Lisa Smokstad of Hendrick Motorsports is among a growing number of grease monkeys in NASCAR garages and related businesses. Smokstad is the tire specialist for driver Brian Vickers, who captured the Busch Series title in 2003.

She has a psychology degree and jokes that it comes in handy working around men. When she started in motorsports in 1992, she noticed few, if any, women in the crews. She thinks nothing of seeing them in crews or in driver seats now.

Her only encounters with chauvinism have come from fans, things like "that's so cute; she's trying to lift that tire," she says.

Women on the crew, behind the wheel or in the executive suite has pitted purists vs. progressives.

"Women do not belong in NASCAR, as drivers or even crew members," longtime fan Monica Debi said in an e-mail. "We do not need to dilute the requirements of this sport in the way we have diluted so many other things in our society, so that those originally not qualified would be allowed to participate."

Debi likely is in the minority.

"It don't hurt to have women around," says Hans Debot, owner of deBotech Inc., a Mooresville, N.C., maker of carbon fiber insulation for race cars. He has two women working in his shop. "I don't have a problem with women in anything. It's better than having to look at dudes all day."

Female stock car drivers have emerged from time to time. Annie France, wife of NASCAR founder Bill France, drove in an all-woman race in Daytona in 1940.

Janet Guthrie generally is regarded as a female pioneer in motorsports. In 1976, she became the first woman to compete in a NASCAR Winston Cup event. She took 15th place in Charlotte's World 600.

NASCAR driver Shawna Robinson is running in the Busch Series this year. Up-and-comers include Indy phenom Sarah Fisher.

At least three women will be driving in the Busch Series and the Craftsman Truck races at California Speedway, including Kelly Sutton. Sutton has been using KoolMat - the insulation material Pat Hill developed - in her truck for about four years.

"The cooler you are, the fresher you are and the more likely you're going to make better decisions" on the track, says Sutton, who recently relocated from Maryland to Huntersville.

Sutton says her father decided to buy the material after encountering Hill at a trade show.

Back at her office, a converted garage in Mooresville, aka Race City USA, Hill prepares another insulation kit. Using a cutting knife, she slices stenciled patterns of KoolMat for Jaguar, Dodge Viper and other car enthusiasts, another large part of her business.

Hill developed KoolMat more than a decade ago. But it wasn't until she moved to Mooresville in 2003 that her business accelerated. She says she has expanded her network in the motorsports and car enthusiast worlds, and revenues have increased 25 percent each of the past two years.

Her product now competes with and complements a variety of insulating products, including floorboards from deBotech and Kevlar from DuPont.

As she plows profits back into the business, she talks about expanding. Maybe developing vacuum-formed KoolMats - single sheets that fit into cars, instead of the puzzlelike kits she cuts now.

"If I get my vacuum form done," she says, "I will have made my mark."

Drive for diversity

NASCAR launched a diversity campaign in 2000 to attract minorities and women to the sport and has since seen the number of nontraditional fans grow.

But the initiative gained ground inside the sport last year, when Charlotte, N.C.-based Access Marketing and Communications started Drive for Diversity.

The company holds tryouts for qualified minority and female drivers and crew members. Team owners and crew members make selections based on performance.

Drive for Diversity placed eight drivers and 12 crew members in various NASCAR teams this year.
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NASCAR is driving for diversity -- AUTO RACING:The search for the Tiger Woods of racing puts focus on young racers.

Posted on Sun, Feb. 20, 2005 * BY TERRY BLOUNT * DALLAS MORNING NEWS

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - The 43-person field for today's Daytona 500 will not have a female driver. It also won't have a black driver or a Hispanic driver.

NASCAR desperately wants that to change. Many of the top teams in Nextel Cup are starting from the ground up, sometimes with kids too young for driver's licenses.

NASCAR officials hope talented young racers will gradually advance, the same way most of today's top stars perfected their skills.

Ramsey Poston, NASCAR director of communications, said the goal is clear: "We want to make NASCAR look more like America."

NASCAR chairman Brian France said the effort will take time.

"You have to judge it over the next five to 10 years," he said.

NASCAR has had a few black drivers, starting with Wendell Scott in the 1960s. A few women have competed in the Cup series. Shawna Robinson was the last, in 2001.

Mexico's Michel Jourdain Jr. is driving in the Busch series this season, and Mexican open-wheel star Adrian Fer- nandez will race in the inaugural Mexico City Busch event next month.

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series has two women, one black and one Japanese driver this season.

But none of those drivers has become a serious contender. Most didn't receive an opportunity with a good team. Some didn't get a chance until late in their careers, and others didn't have the background to achieve success.

Poston said that's what NASCAR wants to provide now.

"We don't want to just put someone in a Cup car for the sake of doing it," he said. "It wouldn't be fair to them and it wouldn't be fair to the other competitors. What we are trying to do through our diversity program is build future stars."

Many of the top Cup organizations are racing each other to become the first team to do it.

"There's going to be a huge groundswell if we can find a Tiger Woods to drive a racecar," said team owner Joe Gibbs. "I think there will be a real attraction to it, a real excitement."

Many people in NASCAR believe that potential Tiger Woods is a ninth-grader from Eudora, Kan., named Chase Austin. At age 15, he already has signed a contract with Hendrick Motorsports.

Why sign someone not old enough to have a driver's license?

"Because he's a great race-car driver," Rick Hendrick said. "The fact that he's black was just a bonus."

Lowe's Motor Speedway president Humpy Wheeler called Austin, "The best African-American driver in the country. This kid is going to be a great one."

NASCAR doesn't allow drivers to compete in any of its series until they are 18, so Austin will have a three-year training program at lower levels. But he has high expectations.

"I want to be in the Cup series when I'm 18," Austin said. "But I didn't know the steps I would have to take to do that. I didn't know there were teams involved. I just thought a driver got a car and he drove it."

Cup teams are stockpiling young drivers from different backgrounds, hoping to find the next Jeff Gordon or Kurt Busch.

Along with Austin, Hendrick has three other drivers 22 or younger he's grooming. And 19-year-old Kyle Busch, Kurt's brother, is racing in Cup this season for Hendrick.

Chip Ganassi has an 18-year-old driver under contract in Reed Sorenson, but Ganassi laughs off the rumors that he is trying to sign younger teenagers to start racing for his organization.

"Yeah, we're going to start a program in kindergarten now," Ganassi said. "We'll use slot cars to see who does that really well and get them under contract."

All joking aside, Ganassi understands the importance of signing drivers at younger ages.

"Everybody wants to put his finger on the next star," he said. "I'm sure Rick Hendrick sees things in his young drivers that make them better than mine. Everybody thinks they know the secret formula as to what makes a great driver.

"We're no different. But luck and chance and timing is a huge part of it. You just hope you can get someone who can work with you and change when it's time to change."

Richard Childress signed Sarah Fisher, hoping she can change from a promising Indy-car driver to a serious NASCAR competitor. Fisher, 24, made her IRL debut when she was 19, an example of the IRL's goal to give young American short-track racers a chance to move up.

Fisher had some success but never got a chance in strong equipment. She has some bitter feelings about her time in the IRL.

"I gave my heart and soul to the IRL," she said. "I really believed in what they were doing, but their mission is a little confusing now. When NASCAR puts out a mission statement, they stick with it. They believe in me, and I believe in them."

NASCAR chose 18 drivers to participate in the 2005 Drive for Diversity Testing and Evaluation Combine last October in Radford, Va.

That gave Cup team owners a chance to get a close look at candidates, on and off the track. It resulted in developmental deals for the ones who stood out.

It's a foundation for what NASCAR hopes is a future of change.

"Diversity is the most important issue we need to work on in the next three to five years," France said. "This is a long-term proposition. First we have to create awareness for people who wouldn't normally look at NASCAR.

"We are pooling from all the resources we can and spending million of dollars on drivers at the short tracks, which is where it has to start."

[yoMAMA]

you know......I just don't see what's so fun about watching rednecks driving around in circles all day.

[mrazntre]

Originally Posted by yoMAMA

you know......I just don't see what's so fun about watching rednecks driving around in circles all day.

*agreed*

[VV o n g B a]

Originally Posted by yoMAMA

you know......I just don't see what's so fun about watching rednecks driving around in circles all day.

i don't find the race particularly interesting except in the last 5 laps or so. but i can understand the interest. lots of big egos, lots of personality conflicts, lots of dealmaking and backstabbing. and there aren't too many professional races where bump drafting is a viable tactic.

also can be interesting if ur an economist:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2078672/

[VV o n g B a]

Iran honors its woman car racer
Mar 15, 2005, 14:26
(Persian Journal)
Laleh Seddigh, 28, has become Iran's best female race car driver at Tehran event organized by Iran's automobile federation.

Dozens applauded and cheered as the tiny figure in a blue headscarf appeared on the stage.

Laleh Seddigh, a Ph.D. student from Tehran who is also known for her stunning looks, has been nicknamed "a little Schumacher" after the German Formula 1 champion, the BBC report said. Seddigh drives a saloon car.

Seddigh says competing with men is not easy in Iran, but she hopes her example will encourage other women to follow suit.

"Most of them, I think, are jealous, and I don't care about that," she says. "I am just going and going and hoping to be champion in the next years and I will really try to achieve that goal."
http://www.iranian.ws/iran_news/publ...cle_6041.shtml

[thaite]

Good too see woman making inroads to Nascar.

It's still not a sport, though.

[deez nuts]

less driving around in circles and more cooking in the kitchen. thanks

[mrazntre]

uhm....

I guess they've never heard of 5-point racing harnesses in Iran. Looks like a "rent-it-and-race-it" car. hEh!

are we sure she does nascar? most of the world is more into road racing and rallying

[VV o n g B a]

Originally Posted by mrazntre

uhm....

I guess they've never heard of 5-point racing harnesses in Iran. Looks like a "rent-it-and-race-it" car. hEh!

are we sure she does nascar? most of the world is more into road racing and rallying

nono, she doesn't do nascar. i posted this cuz she's a woman. she does f1 or something.

[mrazntre]

Are you sure? I know they reference Michael Schumacher from F1, but they didn't really say what type of driving she does. I might've skimmed over the article too quick though.

[kimpossible]

She's pretty.

[mrazntre]

just like bin Laden's niece.

[deez nuts]

if that iranian race car driver chick ever decided to use her skills for evil, she'll do some mad damage as a suicide car bomber.

[mr. x]

Originally Posted by Chasiubao_Boy

if that iranian race car driver chick ever decided to use her skills for evil, she'll do some mad damage as a suicide car bomber.

dont judge

that persian kitty can suicide bomb my bedroom any day

[deez nuts]

Originally Posted by mr. x

dont judge

that persian kitty can suicide bomb my bedroom any day

if that ever happens, i just hope you don't make her go to the dark side.