NASCAR Chairman Brian France says he thinks the racing is good and getting better as teams adjust to the new, that the series is looking to adjust its drug testing policy and that franchising, in the long run, doesn't help the series. France spoke to the media Friday at Daytona. Here's some of what he said:

 

 

          “”we started out right here in Daytona in February with a pretty dramatic Daytona 500 for sure. It got us off with a lot of momentum. We carried that momentum and have had various things go well and some things that we obviously we would always like to improve on. Some of the high points, of course, being the new car and getting it online at all the different facilities and tracks that we race on. I know that there has been a lot of debate we should do this or we should do that to make the car more raceable and various drivers have voiced their concerns over the many weeks and events.

 

 

            “”The decision that we made, which was not to move the goal posts around and move the rules around and let them catch up to the car is really paying off because every week more and more teams get comfortable, are running up front that were struggling earlier and they’ll still be a few that haven’t quite figured it out, but we’re very confident that strategy and the teams are going to figure this car out and the racing action, which is the most important thing that we do is going to continue to be terrific and it’s going to continue to be safe and, of course, competitive.

 

 

            “”So, we have had a number of high points throughout the year. It’s also nice to see some of the drivers who haven’t run up front make a run, and it’s nice to see Kyle Busch and some others … also nice to see some young drivers we have coming up through the ranks, Joey Logano, Brad Keselowski, being two that come to mind that they are showing pretty obvious big time talent. Last thing I would point out … is the economy. Of course as I’ve said to many of you in the past, we’re not immune to a difficult economy. We’re certainly not immune to high energy costs and that’s why the tracks and ourselves are working very hard to make sure our fans get as much value as they can that come to our events because we know the hardships. We know how much it costs to fill the tank up, stay in the hotel rooms and all the things that go on in getting to a NASCAR race.

 

 

            Q: WHAT’S THE LATEST ON DRUG TESTING

 

 

FRANCE: We’re about completed with our look at our policy and we’ve said before that we have a longstanding policy that we think works well. We’ve also acknowledged that there’s different circumstances and different things that are going on today that might not have gone on when we originated the policy and if there are ways to improve it and there probably will be, we will. We’ll have those answers pretty shortly. I would think within a month to six weeks we should be ready to … and I wouldn’t look for some dramatic change in our policy because the basis of our policy, No. 1 we can test any time that we want for cause. The other key ingredient, and I’ve told a lot of people this, you can have any policy you want but if the punishments aren’t tough, that’s the ultimate deterrent and if you look at lifetime suspsensions, which we have several out there today, you look at what happens on a first infraction. In our sport, its’ very severe and it probably means that your career could be over, probably will be over. Certainly in a second infraction, probably will end a career. A third will get you a lifetime suspension and so while our policy ought to be looked at and reviewed, it’s important to point out we’ve got some very strong parts in our policy that we want to make sure that we preserve.’’

 

 

Q: Nine months ago GM stock was trading at $43 a share and now it’s trading at $10. Ford’s stock price has dropped 50 percent in three months, analysts predicts that Chrysler is going to file bankruptcy sooner than later. How does this impact NASCAR and what contingency plans to attract other foreign manufacturers.

 

 

FRANCE: They’re going through a very difficult time. I’m not going to read into all their issues because they would be better to speak to those. They have repeatedly told us that they’re long-standing positions in NASCAR work well and they’ve got to market their products whatever their products are going to be. This is a place where they come where they actually get to be a part of the sport in a way that is so unique and so different from any sport. Obviously, with their challenges come their reviews and everything else. We’ll have to see how that goes. We’ll just have to see. Those are the kinds of decisions they’ll have to make. Wish they were more healthy, think they will be at some point. In my own view the reality of high-energy prices and the kind of vehicles … that the long-product cycles that they have takes a little time for them to get back on their feet, but I’m hopeful they will.

 

 

Q: The allegations in the lawsuit, whether they have merit or not, how difficult is it to see your sport placed in that life.

 

 

FRANCE: Naturally we would like to not have to be dealing with it. There’s a lot of other things we need to deal with, but we will. It’s a lawsuit and lawsuits take on a life of their own. It’s going through the court system as we speak. My own experience with lawsuits over many years is by the time the facts ultimately catch up to the actual lawsuit, they’re usually a whole lot different than the claims that are made on the front end when you’re after a lot of money. We’ll have to see what happens. We will be defending ourselves very vigorously. We’ll just have to see.

 

 

 

Q: Do you see the future being 11 Cup owners with four teams or will you encourage others to come into the sport if only for a partial schedule?

 

 

FRANCE: Let me say that we’re going to be very aggressive at trying to recruit and attract new owners. I don’t subscribe to this idea that you’ll have to have four teams. That’s where we were going a few years ago. We’re going to be looking at anything that we can do from a policy standpoint, from a rules standpoint. Part of the new car concept, we’ll see if we achieve this, is to bring the barrier of entry down, meaning the cars are cheaper to operate, to own, they’re less things you can do to it, so there’s less expertise that you need to buy or have to field a competitive team. I know the jury is still out on that but that’s our goal. If there are any other things and there will be, that’s something Steve O’Donnell and his team are studying what can we do to attract new owners who will field competitive teams in the future. That’s what makes us work, the more competition, better competition, the better we’re going to be. It starts with me and it starts with our organization, knowing that’s important and making sure we do everything we can.’’

 

 

Q: Since you feel good about the competition on the track what do you say to those fans who disagree?

 

 

FRANCE: We know that some of the drivers have said that they didn’t think it was as fun or as exciting and that tends to carry on in to how our fans think. We understand that. That’s a natural thing and some of the drivers were struggling with the car and some of the same drivers who weren’t struggling a year ago. That was very anticipated. I would tell you starting with Mike Helton and our whole family is built around making sure it’s the most exciting, competitive racing in the world. All the other problems and issues and challenges and policies and all the rest of it are all part of the sport, but the reality of getting that right and how important it is and how closely we view it, we will make sure one way or the other and the races have been on balance very good. We’ll see what happens. My own view is that they’re getting better every week. As I said in my opening remarks, more teams are getting it figured out. We’ll satisfy our fans because that’s what we’ve done for 60 years.

 

 

 

Q: Have you spoken to other international automatkers if something happens to the big three automakers and what about franchising?

 

 

FRANCE: Teams have a lot of financial interest of late with private equity and other groups coming in and making investments. Rather large evaluations for them and pumping capital most recently with Richard Petty and Petty Enterprises.

 

 

Q: Have you guys kicked around models with franchising

 

 

FRANCE: Sure, sure, we do that every year. You’re talking about franchising and sorting that out. The reality is that closes off competition, that’s what it does. We have tended to look at not in a positive way. The previous question centered on getting new owners in, not closing off all potential owners. And then this idea of what value does a team owner who has paid their dues and been in NASCAR a long time really have, which was asked four or five years ago quite a bit, is kind of being answered by the investments by the various private equity firms that came in and though they had a lot of value in it and paid for that. We will always look. If we thought franchising would add more owners then subtract or made the competition better or we had to reward somebody that needed to be rewarded, we would of course look at it but it doesn’t necessarily do any of the above. It’s an easy thing to talk about and say they ought to just do it. Many portions of NASCAR are like the NBA or the NFL and there are some stark differences and there are some differences for a reason, the way we’re structured, the way it works for the race cars on the track versus teams and so on. It is something that we’ve looked at many times,. I’ve looked at it personally, I’ve looked at probably a dozen different takes on that, franchising but it’s just something that at this point that we don’t think is in our best interest.’’

 

Q: What can you tell us about your investigation into some of the allegations in the lawsuit and would you anticiapte that the two officials who have been suspended will be returned?

 

FRANCE: We're almost completed with it and you've got to remember it centers on personnel, so whether it's misconduct potentially by Miss Grant or someone else that is being investigated, we wouldn't be able to get into that anyway into the details because that violates our own policy. We've got to give privacy to the employees that work in NASCAR, but I will tell you that we've been as we have been in these kinds of circumstances and situations in the past we've been very thorough. We've talked to, I don't know, 25 or 30 people, and I mean really talked and really reviewed and really investigated, so we have a pretty good handle on what we think the claims are and some of the conduct of Miss Grant and others and that's really all we can say. Of course, it's also in a civil lawsuit that is a whole another set of challenges for us to be openly talking about things that may be litigated in front of a  jury. We'll just have to sit tight on that.

 

Q: You talked of going Back to the Basics at the start of the year. Has that been achieved?

 

FRANCE: I think so. What we meant by that is when you see guys like me and I've got to mention a lot of policy things that are of interset to the media but week in and week out we really wanted to zero in on getting Daytona off to a fast start, getting the new car intergrated as fast as we could, as safe as we could and let the storylines of the events be the headlines of what we're talking about. Last year, we had our own share of distractions with AT&T and things that our fans really don't care about, don't really care a lot about this stuff, that are not on the race tracks. I think we've done a fairly good job of trying to recognize the best drivers in the world at what they do week in and week out and hear less from the executive team in starting with myself to try to accomplish that.''

 

 

 Q: Will you bring the Rolex sports car division under NASCAR?

 

FRANCE: It is (still being discussed). It's part of the family today with the France family having control over that. It's an exciting series, quite frankly and it sure was (Thursday) night. It is something that if it makes some sense to do and NASCAR can really, we are closely aligned, that's been the case, but if we can add a lot more to it by making it officially part of the family under the NASCAR umbrella for the sport of sports car racing it's something we would like to do, but we're not there yet and it maybe a little while before we get there. But it's something we're looking at carefully.''

 

Q: In a Presidential election year, would you invite both candidates to your races?

 

FRANCE: I have. I have done that directly. We would. We would welcome both of them at various times and places. I anticipate to see both of them. NASCAR has historically been a place that polticians have come to interact and get noticed by our fans and just be part of our sports, so my anticiapation is that we'll see both of them, we'll see.