On a warm but breezy morning in Florida, Bill Lester is surrounded by a flurry of activity. Although it’s the middle of winter, the 80-degree weather promises for a good day at the track. Standing amid an array of tires, tools, and oil canisters, Lester is the calm in the middle of a storm. Technicians and mechanics dressed in multicolored uniforms rush to prepare their 650-horsepower beasts to race the 3.2-mile oval at Daytona International Speedway.
The garages that house these mighty race vehicles are more reminiscent of the antiseptic rooms of NASA than the oily, grimy confines of traditional garages. Breaking the silence is the occasional deafening howl of a combustion engine as a vehicle streaks past. The growl eventually fades into the distance, yet the choreographed gust of activity continues for what is known as SpeedWeek.
Lester, the handsome, polished, amiable driver of Bill Davis Racing’s No. 22 Toyota Tundra, remains so calm that it seems quite impossible that he will soon be turning laps at 190 mph in the qualifying session of the Craftsman Truck Series. But after 11 years in the cutthroat business of fighting for corporate sponsorship dollars, an afternoon drive brings its own kind of peace.
Lester is among some of the new faces of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, the sanctioning body of a sporting division once associated with Confederate flag waving. NASCAR is now looking to build upon its growing African American fan base by showcasing its black drivers and owners. George Pyne, NASCAR’s chief operating officer, hopes the organization finds its Tiger Woods or Williams sisters to generate excitement and take the sport to the next level, but some remain critical of its diversity efforts.
Many doubt that NASCAR is willing to upset the status quo of its traditional fan base. This begs several questions: If there were a Tiger Woods of motor sports in the pipeline, would NASCAR be ready for him? Would he step into an environment that would cultivate and encourage success? Would African American spectators feel welcome in an organization where the flying of Confederate flags was once commonplace?
This is something NASCAR must address soon. According to an ESPN sports poll conducted in 2002, more than 6.6 million NASCAR fans are African American, representing 8.9% of the sport’s entire fan base, and an increase of 29% since 1999. The poll also indicates that African American fans are slightly more affluent than African Americans who are not fans. In light of this, diversity efforts are fiscally crucial for NASCAR’s continued growth.
From an African American perspective, NASCAR’s past is checkered at best. Images of good ol’ boys aside, there is the story of Wendell Scott, the first African American driver/owner who raced from 1961 to 1972 in the Grand National Division, the precursor to the Winston Cup Series. Scott won his only race in Jacksonville in 1964, but he wasn’t declared a winner or allowed to come into the winner’s circle to collect his award until hours after the race, when fans had gone home. Scott died in 1990 and has yet to be awarded a proper trophy, according to his daughter Sybil Scott.
It’s also no secret that drivers and owners have had a hard time existing longer than a season or two. Stock car racing is one of the last major American professional sports where blacks have struggled to gain presence. No African American drivers compete in NASCAR’s two top levels — the Nextel Cup and Busch Series. Lester, 43, is the only black driver competing in NASCAR’s third tier, the Craftsman Truck Series.
Ownership has also been challenged. Currently, there is only one African American team owner in all of NASCAR — 63-year-old Sam Belnavis. He has a minority stake in Rousch Racing.
NASCAR began its inroads into the minority market by opening tracks in urban centers such as Dallas, Los Angeles, and Chicago and establishing a diversity council in 2000. The council consists of 44 members who are drivers, owners, sponsors, and others connected to motor sports. The goal of the council, headed by Brian France, the organization’s new CEO and grandson of NASCAR founder Bill France Sr., is to address professional development as well as build a minority fan base.
Michael Warmack claims that NASCAR’s efforts are mostly window dressing. As director of business development for Grupo Mundo Inc., a Florida-based marketing and management company, Warmack is working to bring diversity to the motor sports industry. In 2003, Grupo Mundo structured a merchandising and marketing deal for rapper Nelly to sponsor a truck in the Craftsman Series. Warmack insists that NASCAR’s big push for diversity offers little substance and is only intended for the organization’s financial gain. “NASCAR has reached its apex,” he explains. “Their only option for growth is to look at other markets.” He believes that NASCAR has been more interested in featuring faces than actually developing drivers.
To Warmack’s point, NASCAR officials do acknowledge their financial goals. “We’re like any other sport or business,” says Pyne. “We’re trying to grow. All minorities are attractive for us. They have a significant amount of buying power. It’s good for our business. We’ll increase ticket sales; we’ll increase viewership; we’ll increase licensing.” Between 1998 and 2002, NASCAR’s fan base increased from 63 million to 75 million; total sponsorship exposure value for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series, now known as the Nextel Cup Series, increased 208% from $1.2 billion to $3.7 billion. The organization’s licensed product sales grew from $950 million to over $2 billion. Though it trails the NFL in television ratings, NASCAR is squarely in second place with almost twice the network ratings as Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association.
France says that NASCAR has a diversity budget and a plan, but will not elaborate. “We’re a private company, so we don’t release any numbers on financial matters,” he says. At the same time, he indicates that the company has no scientific measures in place to determine the effectiveness of its diversity plan as a business initiative. “One can gauge our audience in terms of our television audience and our track audience. And if we can make an impact in growing that, I think you have to [contribute] some or part to our diversity initiatives.”
The organization has done little in terms of structuring programs. It is counting on its major corporate sponsors to spend the necessary money to create programs that will increase minority participation. The sporting organization’s biggest contribution to the diversity effort seems to be giving programs started by others its blessings.
Access Marketing & Communication is one such program. A multicultural marketing firm founded late last year by The Radiate Group, a global marketing company, and Calhoun Enterprises, a food conglomerate (No. 32 on the BE INDUSTRIAL/SERVICE 100 list with $107.9 million in sales), it is designed to identify and develop top young minority drivers and give them an opportunity to compete in the Dodge Weekly Series. Calhoun Enterprises president and CEO, Greg Calhoun, is on NASCAR’s diversity council.
According to Access Marketing & Communication general manager, Daryl Stewart, they are in no contractual agreement with NASCAR, but have been “invited in” by the organization and given access to resources, including sponsors. When drivers and sponsors are on board, Access Marketing & Communication will tap into the sponsorship purse for payment. Stewart declined to say what percentage the company expects to take.
An insider claims that NASCAR “raised every single penny for Drive for Diversity” — $1.2 million so far — though the insider would not divulge from whom. The funding was earmarked for four teams to place minority drivers. Six crew members will be placed at the
truck series level. Mentoring will also be provided.
For now, Lester is clearly the most prominent minority in NASCAR. A runner-up for Rookie of the Year in 2002, who ranked 14th in points last season, Lester has had his share of challenges on and off the track. Despite early success, it took him 14 years to make the leap from the amateur ranks to professional racing. In 1999, he joined a program run by the Championship Auto Racing Team (CART). It develops African American drivers by letting them test drive cars. CART offered no sponsorship, but that year, Lester met Ed Rensi, retired president and CEO of McDonald’s Corp., who sponsored him for a single race in the Busch Grand Nationals.
A spin in avoidance of an accident resulted in Lester finishing 24th in his first professional debut in NASCAR (for much of the race he was running in the top 10). That performance eventually landed him a chance to drive in the Craftsman Truck Series — the beneficiary of a $2.5 million diversity initiative, sponsored by Dodge, which was designed to put a black driver in a NASCAR truck. Dodge, however, had been unable to attract sponsors and closed its program late last year.
“I criticize corporate America for not putting their money where their mouth is, like Dodge did,” Lester says. “It’s disappointing that these other companies that preach diversity wouldn’t come on board with them.” Of his General Mills endorsement deal, Lester says it provided exposure (he was featured on boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios) but no significant sponsorship.
Securing sponsorship is a frustrating sell, laments Lester’s wife and business partner, Cheryl. If you can first convince a company that it should consider racing, the second challenge becomes race. “Potential sponsors look at him and go, ‘Well my audience isn’t African American.’ Or they’ll say, ‘I do target African Americans, but they’re not watching racing.’ Then Bill responds that they’re not watching racing because there’s no one in the sport to identify with — the chicken and the egg problem. And most sponsors are not willing to be a pioneer. It’s quite an uphill battle.”
Options for sponsorship are different for white drivers. “[For] many of them, their fathers and grandfathers participated in the sport,” explains Cheryl. “Even if they don’t have the family wealth, they at least know how the sport works and they can get the introductions that you might need to get a sponsor.”
Because many white drivers have grown up in the sport, they enter the amateur circuit at a young age. “There is also somewhat of a scouting system where team owners will go out and look for young talent and take a risk on a driver based on their performance in the amateur level,” Cheryl continues. “But this is a sport where you actually start out at about 5 years old.” Many African American hopefuls don’t start amateur racing until they are young adults — often after they’ve started working in order to fund their dream. Many of the diversity initiatives, including those endorsed by NASCAR, are targeted to college-age students and older.
One area where NASCAR could strongly demonstrate its commitment to not only diversity but also developing a Tiger Woods of the future, is in its support of the Philadelphia-based Urban Youth Racing School (UYRS). Founded by former sports marketer Anthony Martin in 1998, the UYRS is the only one of its kind in the United States. The program is free for students, and trains minority youth ages 8 to 18 in every aspect of motor sports and puts them in cars for what the industry calls “seat time.” It is Martin’s dream to develop similar programs throughout the country.
“I grew up in West Philadelphia and I was a racing fan, but I had no way of getting involved in racing,” he explains. “I started the racing school to introduce inner-city kids to the sport as a possible career opportunity. A lot of kids don’t know that these jobs exist. They don’t know that you can be a tire changer and make $100,000 a year. You don’t have to be the driver, you can be the engineer.”
NASCAR includes the school in its diversity brochure and holds up its patronage of the program in the face of criticism, but offers minimum financial support, says Martin. The school’s biggest financial supporters have been Rensi, who helped found the school, and a number of corporate sponsors that include General Motors, GMAC, and Sears. The school has also received tremendous support from NASCAR drivers Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Jimmy Johnson.
“The challenges [for African Americans] I have seen are access,” explains Toure Claiborne, director of partnership marketing for Sears and recent appointee to the council. Sears is also the title sponsor for the Craftsman Truck Series. “So schools like the Urban Racing School, instead of waiting for someone to bring the sport or send an invitation, [are] actually taking the sport to urban communities.” It’s in working with youth that NASCAR — or any sporting organization — will find its next champion. And for that reason, developing new driving talent will be a relatively long process.
Unlike other professional sports, getting started is significantly more expensive than buying a basketball and going to a local court or having the support of high schools and colleges. (Fielding a team in the Nextel Cup costs about $15 million a year; talented drivers can’t simply be drafted into the series.)
Recruitment within the industry also involves networking. “The racing world is no different from a lot of other businesses,” explains Martin, who has placed students from his school in racing internships and college programs to support their goals. “Having connections and relationships helps tremendously. We build bridges between the racing school and the racing team. Now we have relationships with Joe Gibbs, for example. He will look to the school for talent.”
Claiborne says that the sanctioning body is simply struggling in unfamiliar territory. “NASCAR has been slow to embrace diversity because it is a family-owned company based on tradition and the good ol’ boy network. People who aren’t familiar with urban culture or the African American culture [are] not going to jump and make any quick decisions without having some certainty of what they’re getting involved with. As much as African Americans are uncertain about the sport, NASCAR is uncertain about how to embrace diverse cultures.”
Rensi agrees. Since his retirement from McDonald’s Corp., he has submerged himself in his longtime hobby of motor sports. Today, he is chairman of Team Rensi, which operates at the Busch level. His major sponsors include the U.S. Marine Corps and Timberland. Rensi was also responsible for sponsoring Lester at the Busch level. “Progress
in this area always comes way too slowly — and ever so painfully,” he asserts. Rensi says NASCAR’s diversity efforts are genuine. “Is anybody satisfied? Absolutely not. Can more be done? Yes. We’re overcoming 53 years of culture in this racing industry. I don’t want to defend them. I don’t want to make excuses for them. It’s got to get fixed and changed, and I think they’re putting a good effort at it.”NASCAR has started an internship program geared toward minority college students. The organization says that it has increased openings. There were 14 in 2003 and 32 this year, but no one is able to confirm how many openings were filled. NASCAR also supports a promotional campaign to generate awareness at historically black colleges and universities. Dean Thurman Exum is director of motor sports technology at North Carolina A&T State University. He says the school has been in conversations about diversity with NASCAR for the past four years — even prior to the council, on which the university’s chancellor now sits. Based on their discussions, Exum says A&T revamped its program, which orig
inally focused on automotive technology. “Our mission [is now] to develop African American motor sports professionals,” he explains.
Approximately 10 A&T students have applied for scholarships from NASCAR during the past four years. Only one scholarship has been awarded. “When we call back to find out why, we receive no feedback.” Exum is hopeful, however. Through Access Communications & Marketing, the university has placed one student in an internship program with Richard Petty, one with Jack Roush, and one with Hamilton Motorsports. A racing enthusiast for 30 years, he huffs, “It hasn’t been a smooth situation. We’re making progress but, boy, is it slow.”
“We’re not where we need to be,” comments Dora Taylor, NASCAR’s senior manager of diversity affairs. “We’re the first to say that.”
And there is a strong chorus in agreement. Last year, conservative talk show host Bill O’Reilly reported that NASCAR paid hush money to Jesse Jackson to keep him from being critical of its lack of work toward diversity. It evoked a firestorm of emotion and criticism. Conservative supporters were upset that NASCAR would involve its organization with someone who had been so critical of the United States going to war with Iraq. Others in the black community were disappointed that Jackson could be so easily convinced to turn a blind eye to NASCAR’s discriminatory environment. Both NASCAR and Jackson deny the allegations, and neither side will say how much Jackson has received. “I take exception to that, quite frankly,” says NASCAR’s Pyne. “To the degree that Rainbow/PUSH can help make NASCAR more diverse, we will support them.” Jackson, who claims credit for securing sponsorship with Dr. Pepper for driver Morty Buckles, responds, “[Critics] make a donation seem like some kind of bribery.”
Willy T. Ribbs has been one of the harshest critics to go on record. A world-class racer, Ribbs enjoys a long list of racing accomplishments. He was the first African American to compete in the Indianapolis 500. “I have competed longer than any African American ever,” he says. Of his experiences at Indy, another racing entity, he says he has treasured experiences. But in 2001, he retired from the sport. He is so angered by his experience at NASCAR that he no longer even follows motor sports.
“A leopard doesn’t change its spots, no matter what spin they put on the new face,” he asserts of NASCAR’s proposed diversity initiatives. “It was founded in the South and its patronage is the South. Some of its most fervent supporters are the ones with the Confederate flags on their motor homes or on their trailers in the infield. Now, can you imagine Jesse Jackson turning a cheek to the NFL or the NBA, or Major League Baseball, if they had fans flying Confederate flags in the stadium? He’d be the first one down there. As I said, he’s bought and paid for. [NASCAR] silences who they want to silence.”
Interestingly enough, Ribbs’ contributions to racing are not included in NASCAR’s diversity brochure. Ribbs was the first African American to drive at the Winston Cup level in 1986 and the first African American in the diversity program sponsored by Dodge in 2000. NASCAR does, however, pay tribute to Wendell Scott.
Acquiring a team is another barrier for African Americans. Belnavis, a former director of sports marketing for Miller Brewing Co. in the ’80s, convinced the brewer to sponsor its first NASCAR driver. Last year, he became the next African American after Scott to have ownership stake in a NASCAR team to run a full season on the demanding Winston Cup. Many African Americans have tried before him, including Julius Erving and Jackie Joyner-Kersee. The difference? According to Belnavis, who spent nearly two decades around the sport, he knows it from the inside. “NASCAR has a system,” he says. “And that system consists of owners, drivers, and people who have been with the sport and have grown the sport to the level that it is.”
The sport is also heavily supported by sponsors — and in
racing, sponsors want winners. In early 2002, Belnavis landed a sponsorship deal with the National Guard but lacked a car, a driver, and a crew. Help from industry insiders led to a partnership with veteran team owner Travis Carter, who had the car and crew but no sponsor. It cost BelCar between $10 million and $12 million to race last season. After the team finished a disappointing 31st (and earned only $2.5 million), the National Guard took its advertising dollars to a car owned by Jack Roush, who owns many successful teams in the sport, including the car driven by last year’s Winston Cup champion, Matt Kenseth. BelCar Racing folded in November.It’s not uncommon for teams to fold in NASCAR, and when they do, owners begin looking for new partners or new sponsors and crews, and drivers start looking for another job.
Belnavis helps oversee two Roush trucks and one Nextel Cup car. He is also the chief diversity officer for Roush Racing. (The partnership consists of Jack Roush, his son, his daughter, and Belnavis. Belnavis wouldn’t disclose what percentage of ownership he has in the Roush vehicles.) His partnership includes Roush managing and Alex Haley Racing, which was created by the Alex Haley estate. As of this writing, they have yet to find a sponsor. Talks are under way with several potential sponsors. If a sponsor is found, Roush will provide garage space, a crew, and other resources, but he will not have an ownership stake in Haley.
This season, Lester is driving a truck for Toyota. (This is the first time a foreign automaker has fielded a racing vehicle in one of NASCAR’s professional leagues, which has drawn criticism from the fans. Traditionally, only American-made cars could race NASCAR.)
But not everyone is impressed. “Bill Lester did not perform well,” says Cherise Belnavis-Johnson, vice president of Belnavis Associates, the company that holds the minority stake in Rousch Racing. “Granted, yes, he’s black, but if you’re not performing well on the track, you’re hurting more than you’re helping. There is no question in my mind that we are being watched to see if we belong, and that is usually determined by on-track performance.”
Lester is under pressure to perform, particularly with so many wanting him to do well. As a result, he has received intense scrutiny. Martin, Rensi, Warmack, and Claiborne have all said that Lester has been unduly ridiculed, with criticism ranging from his driving performance to how he represents his sponsors. But drivers can’t win by themselves. They need quality cars and crews. Heavily financed teams can afford to hire the best engineers and the best pit crews.
Martin says that Lester’s performance record is more an indication of funding than skill. “Bill’s racing team for last year was underfunded,” he states. Although Dodge did award Lester $2.5 million, most estimates for fielding a truck in the series range between $3 and $5 million. Warmack takes it step further. “Minority drivers, when they have been linked with a team in NASCAR, have clearly not had the same equipment as their bosses,” he offers. “And, yes, the argument can be made that all vehicles are subject to a particular standard, but it’s also true that some owners spend more on some drivers than they spend on others.”
Bill was not handpicked out of a crowd as some may think, says Claiborne. “Bill competed to get where he is. Some people would argue that Bill isn’t black enough. I think people have seen Bill represent himself clean and without controversy, and for that reason, he may not represent a kid in West Philly, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t represent African Americans in motor sports. I think he does a terrific job of doing that.”
As for NASCAR, unconfirmed reports at this writing indicate that the organization is negotiating with Earvin "
;Magic” Johnson — an African American business giant who has influence on corporations, but no experience in motor sports or diversity — to head its diversity program. NASCAR may believe that if you get a big enough black name to back your efforts, everyone will believe your intentions. They may have miscalculated on Jackson.
The truth is, NASCAR doesn’t need an African American front man—it needs a business plan and a strategy for diversity, which includes controls and metrics for goals and successes. Diversity is not altruistic; today it is a legitimate business practice that all corporations serious about expansion and adding to their bottom line have embraced. NASCAR’s bottom line will be the true indicator of how the organization moves the needle on diversity. And in that case, change is inevitable. Is a Tiger Woods or Serena Williams of racing on the horizon? History would suggest most definitely. And when he or she arrives, the sport will never be the same.