A few sketches and thoughts regarding recent NASCAR headlines

By Mike Smith (contact)

Sunday, July 20, 2008 | 8:34 p.m.

Thank you, Tony Stewart. Thank you for a headline that wasn’t about Kyle Busch.

I can only draw so many cartoons about Kyle. Fortunately, Tony’s plan to change teams provided me with fresh material to lampoon. The hard part was deciding which idea would become the final drawing.

Above are two sketches that didn’t make the cut mainly because each contains elements that I have used before in other cartoons. It’s common to have an idea that may be similar to past cartoons, but it often requires sketching out the idea before I realize that it is something I have used earlier. You can see the final cartoon here.

Another headline that recently caught my attention addressed declining race attendance. Atlanta Motor Speedway, which is owned by Speedway Motorsports Inc., has hired an advertising firm to launch a campaign to increase brand awareness as a way to boost race attendance. But it doesn’t take a high-priced ad agency to see what the path is to filling seats at the Atlanta track during a recession. Just take a free cue from the Las Vegas casinos that have lowered room rates, and reduce the price of race tickets.

Back to Tony Stewart. Tony traditionally performs his best in the second half of the NASCAR season, but I’m not expecting his usual surge this year. Will Joe Gibbs Racing want to do everything it can to help a driver perform his best if he’s moving to a competing team? And it’s not as if he’s moving to another Toyota team. He’s moving to a Chevy team. The people at JGR won’t want any advantages discovered in the second half of this season or any secrets for the 2009 season migrating to Chevrolet with Tony. I wonder if we’ll see Tony locked out of team meetings the same way Kyle Busch was at Hendrick Motorsports before his departure.

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