The NASCAR Hall Of Fame Rules And Regs
Written by Patterson Belser, Friday January 23 2009
I come from the state of Alabama, as some of you may know. Alabama has quite the history behind it, and some of that history is a big piece of the reason why I left it behind. Luckily, as a wise man once said, “Obama president now,” so hopefully we can all begin to move beyond some of this history. Regardless, my home state has quite the collection of colorful characters, a fairly unbelievable history and as odd as this happens to be, a large collection of random Halls of Fame. Now, these are nowhere near the popular hotspot Halls of Fame that reside in Cooperstown, Canton or Cleveland. But, that is not to say that the home state does not contain some random Halls.
Here are a few examples of what I have come to know as statewide Halls of Fame. First, there’s the aptly named Alabama Hall of Fame that features famous residents of the state such as B.B. Comer, former resident of my grandmother’s hometown and former governor, Daniel Pratt, founder of Prattville and J. Marion Sims, father of modern gynecology. Then, there is the Mobile Sports Hall of Fame that features, in pure Mobile “We are the center of the world, though no one outside of Mobile could give a damn” fashion, only characters from the greater Mobile area that are famous. I sell Mobile Hall of Fame a bit short here though, as Hank Aaron, Willie McCovey, Satchel Paige, Ozzie Smith and Craftsman Truck Series driver Rick Crawford all hail from the area. As you can see, it puts the Alabama Hall of Fame to shame (rhymes!). My state also has the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame, the Alabama Music Hall of Fame and the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame.
Meanwhile, the state does offer a Hall of Fame that is not worthy of me poking some fun towards it, and that is the International Motorsports Hall of Fame seated right beside the superspeedway in Talladega. The IMHoF was founded back in the early 1980’s by the great Bill France, Sr. and includes the greatest collection of drivers from the world over, all located in one place. In order to be inducted into the IMHoF by the 150 member panel, one needs to be retired for five years. Well, unless they are old enough for the panel to agree that the person may not be around five years after they retire to see themselves inducted. Oh, and also if the panel feels that the person is worthy of early induction. Yeah, bending the rules for special circumstances is a long-standing tradition of the great state of Alabama. I say that from my high horse, while I sit in my home in what is currently the most corrupt city, in the most corrupt state in the United States, sweet home Chicago. It appears my hypocrisy knows no bounds.
Alright, enough meandering and enough fourth grade level Alabama History class for those of you that have been willing to stick around this long, but I am just saying that I know a thing or two about Halls of Fame. While Alabama currently holds the closest thing to a NASCAR Hall of Fame, though completely unaffiliated with NASCAR, there is to be seen in the world, NASCAR has decided to officially open their own sanctioned Hall of Fame in Charlotte, which only makes sense. The Hall of Fame will add new members each year, starting with the opening year. It will also have a special area featuring the founders of NASCAR, though these people will not necessarily be inducted members into the NASCAR Hall of Fame. This will be a permanent installment into the Hall and all future inductees will be added to this original group, though members of the original group will still be eligible to be inducted into the Hall of Fame in the future.
With that in mind, here comes the latest news regarding the NASCAR Hall of Fame, which is slated to open in 2010 and the first class inducted into the Hall will be announced during the All-Star Race week of the same year.
NASCAR announced yesterday the criteria involved in choosing each five person class to be inducted into the Hall of Fame each year and it is quite the list of qualifiers. To be allowed to be seen fit to be inducted, one must have ten years of experience as a driver or a non-driver and have been retired for a minimum of three years, unless special circumstances circumvent this first rule. Then, those that qualify under these standards via a twenty member nominating committee, will move onto a voting committee that consists of the original nominating committee, former drivers, owners and crew chiefs, members of manufacturers and representatives of the media. There will also be a ballot that takes in all of the votes from all of the fans which will be totaled up and added in as one ballot vote.
Once nominations are solidified from all participating parties, then a list will be culled and made public by June of 2009. All voting will be completed by mid-September of 2009 and the results will be announced in October.
According to the article that I read (and copied and pasted directly from nascar dot com), the inducting team will involve the following:
Nominating Committee (20 members)
• Seven NASCAR representatives
• NASCAR Hall of Fame Executive Director
• NASCAR Hall of Fame Historian
• Two track owners from International Speedway Corporation
• Two track owners from Speedway Motorsports Incorporated
• Track owner from Indianapolis Motor Speedway
• Track owner from Dover International Speedway
• Track owner from Pocono Raceway
• Four track owners from historic short tracks: Bowman-Gray Speedway in Winston-Salem, NC; Greenville-Pickens Speedway in Greenville, SC; Riverhead Raceway in Riverhead, NY and Toyota Speedway at Irwindale in Irwindale, CA
Voting Committee (47 members plus one fan vote)
• 20 members of the nominating committee
• 14 media representatives: Three each from the National Motorsports Press Association, the Associated Press Sports Editors and the Eastern Motorsports Press Association; one each from FOX, Turner Sports, ESPN, MRN and PRN
• One representative each from Chevrolet, Dodge, Ford and Toyota
• Three retired drivers
• Three retired owners
• Three retired crew chiefs
• Fan vote
And that is that for now. Happy Friday, everyone, and here's to a promising weekend!
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2 comments
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Ba-Zing!
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I'd like to see the building plans. Are they going to set it up inside so you have to constantly turn left to see all the exhibits?