Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

So I understand what Kenn y is saying. Bu t it's n o t co mpletel y r igh t because co ntracts are enforceable and you can get in ju nc tions and you can stop people from racing. Bu t those are things that we try not to do. Usua lly they ar e always straigh tened ou t by negotiation and common se nse. Litiga tion is not wha t we need aro und a race tra ck. I try to keep my legal side out of it as m uc h as I can at th e ra ce tr ack, and I resiste d for years eve n rep resenting any d rivers or any riders on the legal side because whe n I come to a race track, I walk into a race track feeling like I' m a ty p ical prom ot er. We've been car ow ners and bike ow ners or sa nctioning bod y owners th rou gh all pha se s o f m ot orsports. My dad s ta rte d in 1932 so we have been in this business for 60-p lus years, and I have been doing this since I was bo rn, an d I' m 53 years old. So I remember at least 40 years ago working at motorcycle races . So I've done almost all th e job s in mot orcycl e ra cin g, but when I come to a race now, I put on a promoters hat. But th at -changes n ow, too, because now I start looking at it from the role of a 's a n c tion in g body o r as an AMA official. You have a great deal of in terest and involv emen t in several facets of IndyCa r racing. Are there any qualities of IndyCar you would like to see instilled in AMA road racing? Th at ' s a good question, but the re are a lot of p robl ems in IndyCar, too. So there is so me good and some bad . I will say this: th at CART a nd IndyCar, when yo u tal k about In dyCar, they have b e en ve ry good in marketing th ei r p roduct, th ey' ve got a lot better exposure television-wi se. But it is easy for me to switch the conversa tion over to NA5CAR be caus e if you wa n t to talk abo u t a successful series an d look a t the things th at ha ve been d on e an d th e a ttributes th at yo u wou ld like to brin g over to Pa rad ama, you would have t o lo ok a t what NA5CAR h a s done. IndyCars .. my Dad's first car was at In d ian apolis (In dy 500) in 1948, and I have been goi ng to th e Indy SOD and working as a crew member or in some capacity since 1959. Last year was my 35th yea r at Ind y . So I see a lot of things that we can u se in Paradama, bu t I th ink that just with so me co m mon sense and with so me bu s in e s s te chni qu e s fro m the board that we h ave un d erstan d in g of the bus iness side of it as opposed to just the sa nc tio ni ng b ody , th e officia ting side. I th ink that th ere is trem en d ou s potential and opport unity for Pa rada ma . Peop le will be surprised. (Ta ke) th e Crane Cams people, we walked in there, and they loved the presentation and said they wanted to be involved . And I have had meetings with TNN as wel l. With the h el p of m y board, Russ Deane and Dave Despain, of course, we think that the re are a nu mber of ot her sponsors tha t are go ing to come on. Just in the las t few months we have see n what bringin g so me bus iness sense to th is ra the r than...in the past again, I think the AMA on ly looked u pon it as a sanctioning body and only th o u gh t about it from their point of view . I'm not saying that is right or wrong, but I think they ·were right in bringing in people from the p romotional side, from the business side, to b ring some new ideas. You were in ea rly development of you r own mo torsports park in Southern California some time ago , what is the status of that project? That's another job that I forgot to mention, and as we go along I'll think of the others. We have a developmen t campa- ny that we have taken in a pa rtner, my brothers and I. In a nutshell, when Ascot originally was running out of its lease and they were not going to renew it, we started looking for a new location . Now, this is more th a n fiv e years ago. We found what we thought was a great location afte r looking at probably 20 d ifferent places in Southern California an d spending a year here or a year there wit h City Councils and a lot of expense a nd effo rt. We fin ally found wha t we thought was the best loca tion possible, the old Ka iser s teel m ill in Fo ntana, which is close to the O nta rio Airpo rt

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