Brian France | |
---|---|
CEO and chairman of NASCAR | |
In office September 2003 –August 5, 2018 | |
Preceded by | Bill France Jr. |
Succeeded by | Jim France |
Personal details | |
Born | Brian Zachary France August 2,1962 (age 62) Daytona Beach,Florida,U.S. |
Spouse | Amy France |
Children | 4 |
Parent | Bill France Jr. (father) |
Relatives | Bill France Sr. (grandfather) Jim France (uncle) Lesa Kennedy (sister) |
Alma mater | University of Central Florida |
Brian Zachary France (born August 2,1962) is an American businessman and the former CEO and chairman of NASCAR. He served in the post from 2003 to 2018,following his grandfather (and NASCAR co-founder) Bill France Sr. and father Bill Jr.,in the executive position. [1] In 2019,France founded Silver Falcon Capital,Inc. and became CEO of the private investing firm. [2]
France was exposed to the business of stock car racing from a young age. [3] His first job in racing was as a janitor at the Talladega Superspeedway. [4] France studied at the University of Central Florida but joined NASCAR before earning a degree. [5]
France managed several short tracks,including Tucson Raceway Park in Arizona in the earlier years of his career. [6] In the 1990s,he ran NASCAR's Los Angeles office and helped create associations between NASCAR and the entertainment industry. [7] As a result,films began advertising at NASCAR events,and NASCAR drivers began to feature in various forms of media. [8] In 1995,Brian France helped to create the Craftsman Truck Series. [9] [7] In 2000,he became NASCAR's executive vice president. [10]
France became NASCAR's CEO and chairman of the board in 2003,after his father retired from the position. One of France's first actions as CEO was to create a new safety rule that barred drivers from racing back to the start/finish line when under caution. [11] After assuming control of NASCAR,France negotiated a title sponsorship from Sprint Nextel [9] and introduced the Chase for the Sprint Cup over the transition period, [3] receiving a $4.5 billion television contract for the initial ten race seasons, [7] in addition to a later multibillion-dollar deal with NBC. [12] France also made an effort to expand the audience base of NASCAR to minorities,and allowed Toyota vehicles to begin competing on the NASCAR circuit. [13] During France's tenure as CEO,NASCAR's TV ratings peaked in the mid-2000s,but by 2014,they had dropped,accompanied by a 15% decrease in track attendance. [14] Sporting News named France one of the five most powerful sports executives in 2005, [9] and,in 2006, Time magazine named him one of the "100 Most Influential of the Century." [15]
During the 2016 presidential campaign,NASCAR pulled its Xfinity Series and Camping World Truck Series award ceremonies from a Trump resort near Miami. Later,on February 29,2016,France and several NASCAR drivers appeared at a rally to endorse Donald Trump's candidacy. [16]
In August 2018,France took an "indefinite leave of absence" from his role as CEO and chairman of NASCAR. [17] On August 5,France was pulled over in Sag Harbor,New York,for driving through a stop sign and subsequently arrested for DUI and possession of oxycodone. [18] France later pleaded guilty to one count misdemeanor DUI on June 7,2019. [19] His leave of absence officially ended in February 2019 when interim head of NASCAR,Jim France,permanently took over as CEO and chairman. [20]
In 2019,France founded and became CEO of Silver Falcon Capital,Inc.,a private investment firm based in Charlotte,North Carolina. [21]
France founded Brand Sense Partners,a Los Angeles-based licensing company. [22] He and his wife are the founders of the Amy and Brian France Foundation, [23] and the Luke and Meadow Foundation,a philanthropic cause that focuses on children. [4]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(February 2022) |
Brian France implemented a wide variety of policies and mandates that tended to focus heavily on driver safety (largely in response to the death of Dale Earnhardt) and equal opportunity for virtually all drivers to contend. Some of the rules implemented included mandation of the HANS device for all drivers, installation of SAFER barriers around the outside walls of each track (eventually, the inside walls of each track as well), as well as the 'yellow line rule' at superspeedways (which states that no driver may advance their position if they noticeably place at least their left side tires below the inside yellow line surrounding the track), and the 'overtime line' rule, which was a designated area of the track where if a caution were to be thrown at any time within the closing two laps and the leader had passed through the area, but had not yet crossed the official start/finish line, the race would end and a winner would be declared (this was removed after the 2017 NASCAR season). Many fans, especially those of a somewhat older age who had gotten used to Bill France Jr.'s style of management, were not in favor of these rule changes; this caused NASCAR's ratings to drop significantly throughout the early to mid-2010s.
In March 2020 Brian France sued John L. Steele, an internet user behind the parody Twitter account "Drunken Brian France" (@DrunkBrianF), for "infliction of emotional distress" and invasion of privacy. [24] [25] In April 2020 the lawsuit was withdrawn after Steele agreed to delete the account. [26] The lawsuit has been cited as an example of an SLAPP lawsuit. [27]
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. It is considered to be one of the top ranked motorsports organizations in the world and is one of the largest spectator sports leagues in America. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and his son, Jim France, has been the CEO since August 2018. The company is headquartered in Daytona Beach, Florida. Each year, NASCAR sanctions over 1,500 races at over 100 tracks in 48 US states, as well as in Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Europe.
AUSCAR was an auto racing sanctioning body owned by Bob Jane, which ran American-style Superspeedway racing in Australia. The initial AUSCAR venue was the 1.801 km, high-banked (24°) Calder Park Thunderdome Superspeedway in Melbourne, but over time the series expanded to include the Jane owned 1/2 mile Speedway Super Bowl at the eastern end of Adelaide International Raceway which first saw AUSCAR racing in 1990, the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit, and eventually several Australian road racing circuits including Calder Park's road course and the Oran Park Raceway in Sydney where racing was held under lights on the short version of the circuit. In the early 1990s, Jane and television station Channel 7 announced plans to turn the old Granville Showground trotting track which circled the Parramatta Speedway in Sydney into a paved, banked 1/2 mile track, but this did not happen.
Talladega Superspeedway is a 2.66-mile (4.28 km) tri-oval superspeedway in Lincoln, Alabama. The track has hosted a variety of racing events since its inaugural season of racing in 1969; primarily races sanctioned by NASCAR. The track has been owned by NASCAR since 2019 with Brian Crichton serving as the track's president. The facility has a grandstand capacity of 80,000 as of 2022. Along with the main track, the track complex also features a 4-mile (6.4 km) long roval-style road course.
Oval track racing is a form of motorsport that is contested on an oval-shaped race track. An oval track differs from a road course in that the layout resembles an oval with turns in only one direction, and the direction of traffic is almost universally counter-clockwise. Oval tracks are dedicated motorsport circuits, used predominantly in the United States. They often have banked turns and some, despite the name, are not precisely oval, and the shape of the track can vary.
International Speedway Corporation (ISC) was a corporation whose primary business was the ownership and management of motorsports race tracks. ISC was founded by NASCAR founder Bill France Sr. in 1953 for the construction of Daytona International Speedway and in 1999 it merged with Penske Motorsports to become one of the largest motorsports companies in North America. The company played an important, though controversial, role in the modernization of the sport. It worked with NASCAR to create new tracks and update older ones in an effort to improve the racing and the experience for spectators and has constructed popular new tracks in regions previously thought uninterested in NASCAR. Because both companies have several members of the France family in top positions, ISC's competitors have filed multiple lawsuits on antitrust grounds
William Henry Getty France was an American businessman and racing driver. He was also known as Bill France Sr. or Big Bill. He is best known for founding and managing NASCAR, a sanctioning body of US-based stock car racing.
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The ARCA Menards Series is an American stock car series, the premier division of the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA). It is considered a minor, semi-professional league of stock car racing, used as a feeder series into the three national touring series of NASCAR, and hosts events at a variety of track types including superspeedways, road courses, and dirt tracks. It also provides hobby drivers a chance to experience racing at large tracks used in the three national touring series in NASCAR. The series has had a longstanding relationship with NASCAR, including using former NASCAR Cup Series cars, hosting events in the same race weekend such as Daytona Speedweeks, and naming an award after NASCAR founder Bill France, Sr. However, the series was not officially affiliated with NASCAR until its buyout on April 27, 2018. 2020 was the first season that the series was sanctioned by NASCAR.
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The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) is the sanctioning body for the NASCAR Cup Series, the Xfinity Series and the Craftsman Truck Series. NASCAR also administers a number of regional racing series, including the Whelen Modified Tour, and the NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series, as well as international series in Canada, Mexico, and Europe.
The NASCAR Cup Series is the top racing series of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR), the most prestigious stock car racing series in the United States.
The 2020 Daytona 500, the 62nd running of the event, was a NASCAR Cup Series race held on February 16–17, 2020. It was contested over 209 laps—extended from 200 laps due to an overtime finish, on the 2.5-mile (4.0 km) asphalt superspeedway. It was the first race of the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season.
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