Is racing all pay-to-play now?

Over the past months, it has dawned that I had the financial proposition all wrong and that in most series, even pro drivers pay for their seats, not just the gentlemen drivers.

In the USCC I would have thought that about half the drivers were bringing sponsor dollars, a quarter weren't getting paid but weren't paying either, and a quarter were getting paid.

This article made me reconsider.

I assumed that NASCAR and F1 drivers were still in the "getting paid" ranks, but then I read this.

So, is racing pretty much a "find sponsors if you want to drive" situation for everyone now? How does a driver's sponsorship fit into the team's sponsorship picture - are drivers' sponsors unnamed angels, or do teams work the driver's sponsor into the equation at all (A Guy's team, sponsored by ABC Company, brought to you by some of those smaller stickers on the car)?

I read GRM's article about how to go pro a few years ago and apparently didn't get a clue at the time. Looking forward to another visit to the topic in the next issue, I think.

It helps to be born into money, or exceptionally talented at quickly acquiring wealth.

I remember reading about Ramana Lagemann using up part of his family fortune chasing and ultimately winning a seat as a pro rally driver with Subaru. As a true shoe string... well aglet budget racer (I couldn't even afford shoe strings) I harrumphed and fumed with envious anger.

I've been under the impression the last 5-10 years that only factory drivers were actually making money in road racing (Grand-Am, ALMS, TUSCC, etc.) Didn't realize it was in other types of racing as well.

When I first heard of this it broke my heart like finding out Santa wasn't real, that the WWF was fake, and that becoming an astronaut is probably one of the hardest things in the world to do. Why? It killed any kind of childhood dream about making a living out of racing. I'm already to old to make that happen anyways.

I just started getting into auto racing, and it seems like the costs of running a team are too high, or climbing too fast compared to revenue; pro drivers are supposed to be paid to race, not the other way around. Pro football and pro basketball players (etc.) aren't paying the teams to get a roster spot. It's also a big problem when good pro drivers aren't what teams are looking for. I think some of it is that North American racing doesn't have large TV viewership, at least in the U.S., with an exception of NASCAR.

conesare2seconds wrote: I read GRM's article about how to go pro a few years ago and apparently didn't get a clue at the time. Looking forward to another visit to the topic in the next issue, I think.

Karl Thomson wrote that article. He has at least one driver on his team that makes his living driving race cars. He also implied that very few people would have what it takes to follow the path he laid out. Which, if you add up, would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to follow though.

There's an old joke

Q: How do you make a million in racing? A: Start with two million.

Stupid, but true. The few "pro" drivers I know (as in, people with seats in works cars) have all been tremendously wealthy to start with.

The only way for 99.99% of the people to make money racing is either be an engineer/mechanic for the cars or build parts for them. Unfortunately it's just the facts.

I learned that at 17 talking to the guys at Robert Yates Racing.

It's a shame that racing has gotten so expensive and that it's not a real way to make a living. The good part is though, you can make some money as a test driver.

Randy Pobst does a pretty good job telling his tale and showing the behind the scenes information of the racing world.

Also, most "pro" drivers do get paid to race - for example, they bring $2 Million per year to a team, they get to keep ~$100k as salary+possible performance bonuses.

During the last downturn the teams realized that it's much easier to let the drivers do all the legwork finding sponsors and then bring them to them rather than having to go out and find sponsors and then hire drivers.

A good friend of mine is currently dealing with this very situation.

The way his deal will most likely work will be that his sponor will give a boat-load of cash to a team, and my friend will be paid enough by the sponsor to be able to quit his "day-job". His travel expenses for races would be covered, as well.

Or, the sponsor may buy the car and everything needed to run it, and have my friend run it out of his own shop.

THIS, is nothing new at all. There is an old book titled something like "rich guys fast guys and absolute idiots" and it catalogues the situation, it was written around 1980 give or take. If you read about any era of motor racing you find this; read the backgrounds of Lange versus his aristocratic team mates. Back around 1988 when I was still racing bikes I remember Rich Oliver having a paid 250 GP ride till the team found out that he was 27, suddenly they wanted him to bring cash. Now there is up side to having to bring your own sponsor; as a driver the team may be much more reluctant to dump you with short notice or arbitrarily and if they do you have much better chance of landing another gig. Yes this sucks that unlike guys who are good at stick and ball sports talented drivers have scrape and claw for funding but are they in any different position than world class runners?

   Tom

DirtyBird222 wrote: ...When I first heard of this it broke my heart like finding out Santa wasn't real, that the WWF was fake, and that becoming an astronaut is probably one of the hardest things in the world to do. Why? It killed any kind of childhood dream about making a living out of racing. I'm already to old to make that happen anyways.

At the risk of jacking this thread, this has always been a hot button for me, how we tell children that they can become whatever they want. Right. Good thing I'm not an elementry school teacher...

In reply to kb58:

Well, they CAN become whatever they want...

They just need to know people who have enough money to make it happen.

Well, theres always a butterfly effect in any sport. If you make it retardedly difficult for the good drivers to make a living, you'll scare away the good talent. This in turn forces great talent into lower ranks, which causes the lower ranks to become very talented in themselves. This produces some highly skilled drivers that graduate to higher levels, and if the talent doesn't migrate up then the money migrates down.

It's all about the tv ratings. People loved f1 and Indy in the early 90's of America. Now just the rednecks support nascar. And ALMS? Never had a chance.

But, look at the redbull grc, sponsors are there, kids are there, and there's the money right along by with it. Drifting did the same thing, now it's dead. "Flavor of the week", more like "favor to the weak..."

DirtyBird222 wrote: It killed any kind of childhood dream about making a living out of racing. I'm already to old to make that happen anyways.

By the time you were old enough to know what "making a living" meant, you were too old for it. :)

i'm pretty sure racing has always been like that..

If you've read The Last Open Road it depicts early sports car racing pretty accurately. It was a gentleman's sport, and the gentlemen almost always came from means. Most sports cars were expensive compared to the standard American vehicles of the day and cheap used sports cars didn't exist in the infancy of the sport.

Stock car racing was sort of the polar opposite but once factories became involved the writing was on the wall.

Indy was pretty much never about the penniless though occasionally Davids did beat the Goliaths, but that hasn't happened in decades.

It isn't just auto racing. To get into almost any sports top echelon takes money. Downhill skiing? Better be born into a six figure family, who live near a mountain and most likely don't mind devoting your childhood to a shot at a 60 second run in the Olympics.

Heck, I might be a world class luger (lugist?) but will never know because the opportunity never came up (poor and flat terrain nearby as a child). But I guarantee that there aren't any rags to riches stories about some talent scount seeing an inner city kid sledding one day and offering him an opportunity to win gold.

KyAllroad wrote: But I guarantee that there aren't any rags to riches stories about some talent scount seeing an inner city kid sledding one day and offering him an opportunity to win gold.

Isn't this kind of the story of the Jamaican Bobsled team? As for the topic at hand, one of the biggest let downs for me was the cost associated with competeing in motorsports. It'll never be more than a hobby for me.

Yup, for instance Pastor Maldanado brings something like $30 million a year in PDVSA money. How else would Captain Crash have kept his ride?

One cost of racing not spoken of much is the cost to your personal life.

To do well racing requires total immersion, when you are not racing you are training or preping for the next race or traveling to the next race. There is little family time and courting sponsors takes up any remainder.

The other end of the deal is your folks need to be well off and back you to the hilt. Very few good drivers started late, most start at 6 - 8 years old in Karts or Quarter Midgets and progress from there (if they are good and well backed).

Politics are huge, without political pull it can be difficult for even a good driver to get far. A good driver can find it very difficult to beat a track or crowd favorite.

Also keep in mind guys like Niki Lauda and Michael Schumacher paid for their first drives in F1.

Found the book mentioned:

http://www.amazon.com/Fast-Guys-Rich-Idiots-Obsession/dp/0803210965

The Stig's book talked about this. When he was younger he was offered an F1 seat, but IIRC, it had a £1M price tag that him and his family couldn't afford.

These days it's not just about being fast either. You'll need to be well-spoken, clean cut, and polished when you speak with the media. There's plenty of fast pro drivers out there that are without a ride as they have burnt bridges, or have abrasive personalities. The racing world is a very, very small one, so once news gets out that you are difficult to work with, your chances diminish----unless you have supernatural talent. (and a big bucket full-o-cash)

Omnipresent media coverage has changed the sport too. Back in the day, a driver could be an ass-kicker, rude SOB and still get away with it. A.J. Foyt would have a rough go of it today--- regardless of his talent-- which was enormous.

If you want to be a pro racer---- follow Randy Pobst's lead. He's a guy who does it right--- always friendly with fans, always good to the media, fast as Hell, always has a smile on his face. The guy is a P.R. master!

I once entered a web conference about getting sponsorship deals, just for fun. In it one of the higher-ups in Mazda's US racing program said one of the most depressing things I've ever heard which summed up much of what was discussed - to paraphrase, that drivers who can win a race are a dime a dozen, so drivers who can win a race and do good PR are the ones that are sought after.

Another point that was made along these lines is that there's only room for one Kimi Raikkonen. Because of his godlike skills, he can get away with not being a PR beauty queen, and because he's the only one, this becomes his trademark trait.