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They need a sponsor...

By Randy Hoeft

@YumaSunSports

Turn out the lights, the party’s over.

The global racing community will no longer be focusing its attention on this corner of the world in January with the cancellation of the Winter Heat Sprint Car Showdown.

The announcement was made Thursday by Tom Dalen, the new director of operations at Cocopah Speedway, home of the Winter Heat in 2015 and 2016, which attracted some of the world’s best open-wheel racers, including NASCAR Sprint Cup stars Kasey Kahne and Kyle Larson.

The two-weekend, five-race winter season event originated as the brainchild of three-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion Tony Stewart.

Dalen sited the cost of the event and a delay in announcing the 2017 event as reasons for dropping it from the schedule.

“We are not doing Winter Heat,” said Dalen. “Without a major sponsor, it’s an expensive program, it’s a lot of money, it’s just a ton of money and I don’t feel comfortable at this point.

“It took Mr. Burgess (former Cocopah Speedway director of operations Greg Burgess) a year and half to plan his first one. What makes me think I can get it done in six months? It’s a lot of work and a lot of things to do.

“Not only that, but being that it’s got to be this late in the year, a lot of those marquee drivers that we depend on to bring in the fans, they’ve made other plans. They are full-time drivers, this is their job, they race cars and when we didn’t announce right away in February and March, they made other plans

“So those marquee drivers, they’re going to New Zealand, Australia. Not that we couldn’t put on a good show with our local guys and the California guys, I’m not saying that. But still, if we want to draw that extra to get us over the hump, those are the people we need, we need the Kasey Kahnes, the Kyle Larsons, they bring people into the stands, those are the people we need, you know.”

The Winter Heat was proposed by Stewart when Stewart raced for the first time at Cocopah Speedway in 2013 with the Lucas Oil American Sprint Car Series. He told Burgess he was impressed with the track and asked about starting a winter racing series for sprint cars to give teams an alternative to making the trip to Australia and New Zealand in the off season.

And the Winter Heat was a hit, attracting teams from as far away as the east coast, along with drivers like Kahne and Larson, as well as up-and-coming NASCAR star Christopher Bell, World of Outlaws legend Steve Kinser, two-time USAC National Sprint Car Champion Bryan Clauson, who also qualified for the 2016 Indy 500, and a who’s who of other top open-wheel talent. The event also attracted pay-per-view television coverage, and put the Yuma area on the global map.

Dalen said he hopes the event will return in the future, but it will require a major sponsor to come on board.

“We need somebody to help us put the show on; that’s what we need,” said Dalen.

“It’s a pretty good size payout, when you’re paying $12,000 to win, that’s a lot of money. By the time it’s all said and done, you’re talking about two weekends of racing and about $250,000.

“There is no way you can do it without sponsorship and that’s something I need to work on, and that’s what I plan on working on, getting some sponsorship.

“I would love to have it come back, and if we can do that, I’m all for doing it, I love sprint car racing, and we’re not going away from sprint car racing.”

While announcing the end of the Winter Heat, Dalen pointed out that the Lucas Oil American Sprint Car Series National Tour will return to Cocopah Speedway in November, and he said he’s talked to the USAC Southwest Sprint Car Series about racing at Cocopah Speedway multiple times in 2017, as well as the World of Outlaws Craftsman Sprint Car Series.

“I’ve talked to the World of Outlaws, I’m trying to put a show together for them,” said Dalen. “So we’re not giving up on sprint car racing, it’s just we’re changing a little bit and retooling and regearing and that’s where we are right now.

“This (Cocopah Speedway) is an enterprise just like anything else, and nobody goes into business to lose money,” continued Dalen. “It’s got to support itself. So that’s my goal, to make it support itself.”

Bummer. It was a good thing to do midwinter & easy flight from Colorado...

This never could quite generate enough front gate to make it worthwhile. 

This is good news for us in New Zealand.

With top drivers racing both Midgets and Sprintcars this meeting was quickly becoming a problem for us. We run our marquee Midget series over the Christmas/New Year break and with the US Midget ranks a bit thin at the moment we need all the top drivers available to come down under and put on a show.

Not so much an issue for our friends in Australia as the US winged Sprintcar ranks have such depth that you can take out 25 drivers and still easily find 5-10 quality drivers.

It was ran for only two years and the car and fan count went up the second year. Just like any specialty race, it takes a year or two before it fills out. I could see this race getting as large as any big sprint car race.

I hope it comes back, it was some very good racing. Hell, Yuma should kick in some money, all those rooms rented and butts in the restaurants. RV parks, hotels, all the food and drink, they will miss this race. I don't think any restaurant we went to knew about the race, they just knew they had more customers than the week before. I know because my wife and I asked almost every waiter/waitress we had.

ROD

Your are completely correct! The Indian Casino is the major benefactor here, as people eat, sleep and gamble right accross the street from the race track. Casinos pay to have talent acts, or music performances all the time at places like tahoe, reno, vegas, they pay those performers to fill the casino's, and those people by booze, food and accomidations. Thats who needs to step up here. Keep in mind that the off days the fans and such are spending money over at the casino, so as Rod states, this event was on a fairly steep curve up in car count and fans, this hiates can only hurt things!

I thought the tribe sponsored it... or do they own the track?

I went both times (2nd weekends,  missed Larson!) thought the crowd was good, lots of snowbirds from all over

Who knows, wish they'd bring it back....

Bump.

I think it would make more sense to be a 3 day show like thurs-fri-sat.  Some people in sprint car racing do have jobs.  Your fans also would not have to hang around for a week.  The casino would still do well.

I attended, both years and in my opinion the 5 race over 9 days format is the best option.  Most of the people that I met in the stands were locals or transplanted locals from up North and Snowbirds.  Many planned their winter vacations around the race dates. My other observations are;

     Soon after the first year of events, the local paper published an article stating that the event brought an economic gain of $2.4 Million dollars to local businesses.  Wouldn't it benefit those businesses that received this windfall, to become sponsors of the event?

     This, most likely will piss some people off, however I have been to 3 other 2 day races at Cocopah, featuring the ASCS 360 sprints and they put on a much better show, with more passing and closer racing than the 410's.  The first year for the 410's was better than the second, probably because the larger car count the second year added more events and laps on a track that has a short period of prime racing time.  In addition the 410's are locked down more than the 360's, resulting in additional track wear.  The 2nd year crowd didn't look to be any better than the first year, perhaps the result of mostly follow the leader racing.  The crowds both years were good but not great.

     Regardless of what the future plans are concerning 410 racing at Cocopah, perhaps a smaller and harder tire rule for both rears should be considered due to the unique track material composition.  Or other means to un-hook the cars to allow for better races.  Another option is to bring back the event using ASCS 360 rules.

     Whatever is decided, even if they make no changes and bring back the 410's,  I'll be there.  It's a great way to spend a winter vacation for a couple weeks when temps in Oklahoma are freezing.