Professional CARS Tour Media Day Signals New Era

A new era for CARS Tour unofficially began with a lot of polish on Thursday morning in Uptown Charlotte but the old guard racers and enthusiasts hope the shine only extends to Broadcast, Media and Content Day.

That’s because the appeal of the ninth-year series lies in its grit and tenacity.

So, while attendees were awed by the production bandwidth and hospitality of the downtown NASCAR Productions studio, it’s now time to get back to what made CARS Tour so special in the first place, its combination of hard driving and authentic personalities.

It’s a new era because of the much-publicized new ownership group comprised of Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kevin Harvick, Justin Marks and Jeff Burton, but largely operated business as usual by founder-president Jack McNelly and operations director Keeley Dubensky.

CARS Tour is a modern short track success story with McNelly taking the dying remnants of Hooters Pro Cup and redesigning it as a touring series for Late Model Stock Cars and Pro Late Models. The series is leading a renaissance of sorts for Late Model Stocks in the Mid-Atlantic.

It’s a thematically rich series with an incredible cast of characters, both veteran and youthful, on some of the most iconic short tracks in the Carolinas and Virginia. It’s best described as tall personalities on short tracks.

Everyone who loves short track racing inherently loves the CARS Tour, and want to see it grow, but do not want it to lose its identity in the process. Veteran Late Model racers reject the notion that they are the minor leagues for the three NASCAR national tours.

That’s the one drawback of having Content Day at NASCAR HQ.

On the other hand, the spotlight this summer provided by the new ownership group is an opportunity to show new fans what high level Late Model Stock racing is about to its most tenured participants.

“It’s grassroots but it’s our life,” said Dylon Wilson of TwoBoros Performance. “I think people have misconstrued grassroots and Late Model racing as where you get started but for a lot of us in this series, this is our Cup Series.

“We don’t want to be anywhere else. We want to race here and compete for wins. It’s not about moving up. We want to move up the all-time wins list. I have zero aspirations to be in the Truck Series and I feel like 80 percent of us are exactly where we want to be.”

But make no mistake, the brighter spotlight is a very cool thing to a racer like sixth-year veteran Brandon Pierce of Lee Pulliam Performance.

“This is the closest I’ll probably ever get to the spectacle of what you see the NASCAR guys get to do here before the start of every season,” Pierce said. “It’s really cool and I appreciate the ownership group making this happen and giving us extra tools to promote ourselves and that goes to show you the direction we’re going.”

Earnhardt, who has fielded cars in the division since Day One, says he is not out to fundamentally change the culture of his favored grassroots discipline. Between a new broadcast partnership with FloRacing and closer ties to NASCAR, he just wants to see CARS Tour get more mainstream recognition.

To that end Dubensky says the bright spotlights and cameras from Content Day don’t change their fundamental mission of producing the best show for fans on the best platform for racers.

“It’s one of those things like, how did we get here,” Dubensky said. “But we know how we got here. We buckled down. Jack and I had a very clear vision of what we wanted this series to be. We’re pulling some show levers from the old Hooters Pro Cup, but we have more resources with the new ownership group.

“But it’s very important that we keep the heart of CARS Tour the same as what got us to this point.”

For teenage development prospects, that means giving them the training ground to advance to NASCAR having learned to race the right way against veterans who can once again afford to build their brands on bullrings across the region.

That’s something dirt drivers have found better success at than their pavement counterparts in recent years, but that’s something both CARS Tour and the ASA STARS National Tour are working towards this year.

Mason Diaz, now of Chad Bryant Racing, would relish the opportunity to be a Late Model lifer.

“If I can get to the point, that my truck rolls into the track on any given weekend, and it makes people say ‘oh crap, he’s here,’ that’s where I want to be,” Diaz said. “I’m fine with that.

“There is nothing wrong with that, being the best of your series, that’s really cool. Look at Bubba Pollard, Josh Berry, Philip Morris in his day.”

Winning is fun.

“Correct,” Diaz said.

Perhaps best reflective of the big personalities’ mantra is Andrew Grady, the tattooed and mouthy driver for Mike Darne Racing, who claimed fame last summer for a scuffle in the Martinsville Late Model Stock 300 with Davey Callihan.

In what other short track racing world would he get this kind of spotlight?

“I’m a little taken back by this studio and the level everyone here went through to make sure we’re comfortable and could do something really cool,” Grady said.

Grady is a second-generation short track, the son of Late Model Stock lifer Tony Grady, who would be more than content having the career of his dad.

“Late Models are a big deal right now, and with Junior and his group coming on board, it’s about to get even bigger,” Grady said. “I would be okay with that career. I’ll be the gate keeper if you want to call it that.

“If I can do this and get into a Pro or Super Late Model every now and then too, I would be really happy with that career.”

Layne Riggs (99) passes Corey Heim (78) in the 2020 CARS Tour race at Langley Speedway. (Larry Burnett/WRT Speedwerx photo)

But admittedly, CARS Tour being in this environment to open the season and at the ground floor of NASCAR headquarters, you can’t help but wonder how big this could get over the next 10 years. Dubensky admitted that the ownership group have dreamed of a national Late Model Stock touring series … but only if it stays true to the roots of what the series has been over the past decade.

“We want to find a nice middle ground right now,” Dubensky said. “We want to make more major league short trackers like Bobby McCarty and Mike Looney, we want to make it to where a Josh Berry can get the call to go NASCAR racing, but we want to keep our costs in check too.

“We’re going to focus on what we need, more than the want. We have those conversations, and we dream big, but we’re going to try to get there by staying true to our core product and what got us here.”

Growth in the short term could mean a Touring 15 instead of a Touring 12, races in Georgia or Tennessee, but it’s all one step at a time.

“This is a regional tour,” Dubensky said “So you never want to lose sight of that. We have had the national tour conversation, but it’s way down the road, and we’re very happy being a regional touring series.”

CARS Tour opens its new era, and the 2023 season, with a Late Model Stock and Pro Late Model doubleheader at Southern National Motorsports Park on Saturday at 3 p.m. ET. For those unable to attend, the event will air live on FloRacing.

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