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wabi.hu Wabi Zahnklinik in Sopron | From: fogaszat Views: 2279 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() 1 ratings | |
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wabi.hu Wabi is a hungarian Beauty Centre with dental clinic and plastic surgery. http | From: fogaszat Views: 1593 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() 2 ratings | |
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wabi.hu Wabi Zahnklinik in Sopron | From: fogaszat Views: 2279 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() 1 ratings | |
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A popular dental treatment besides dentures and bridges used to replace missing teeth are dental implants. You can find many surgeons that provide denta...
Source: www.goarticles.com
Why see a Dentist in Budapest
Dentistry in Budapest, Hungary has taken on a major role in the economy. Tourists come from all over Europe to visit Budapest and see a dentist. The reasons are varied, but include cost, sightseeing, skilled doctors, and the level of care available. Th...
Source: www.articlealley.com
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wabi.hu Wabi is a hungarian Beauty Centre with dental clinic and plastic surgery. http | From: fogaszat Views: 1593 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() 2 ratings | |
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Imagine this dream scenario: for the first time ever, you're sitting right behind home plate at a major league baseball game. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and you've paid top dollar in this tough economy to see your favorite ballplayers up close. But as teams change sides in the bottom of the first, you notice a problem. As the visiting team scratches its heads, you peer into the opposing dugout as no one comes out to bat...because they're all packing up and heading for the locker room.
Five minutes later, the game is called, and the home team is on its way home, counting your hard-earned money.
It sounds impossible, but this is a very real, very scary phenomenon sweeping NASCAR's top three series: the "start and park." While the series' biggest owners have continued to get richer, their smaller counterparts have had trouble dislodging them from the top. So they came up with a new, more profitable way to survive: pack it in early.
These teams are easy to find each Sunday, as a quick look down the final running order shows them pulling into the garage within the first 50 or 60 laps. At the Cup Series race at Pocono, there were five, all of which retired by Lap 56 due to "vibration, " "fuel pump" or "ignition" issues -- problems that were really just words on paper per NASCAR policy to list a reason a car fails to finish. The Truck Series division was even worse, with a short field at Texas in which nine of the 33 cars packed it in before the conclusion of Lap 26. The stats sheet looks like a nightmare's worth of mechanical failures; but in reality, those teams had equipment they're deliberately choosing to pack up in pristine condition -- "parking" it to earn some purse money.
And when it comes to starting and parking, there's plenty of cash on the line. Those five cars -- a cool 12% of the starting field at Pocono -- picked up nearly $325, 000 combined. Prism Motorsports, which owns the No. 66 car driven by Dave Blaney, has earned over $1.1 million this season despite finishing just two of 12 races. Completing just 866 of 3, 975 laps (21%), they consistently pull in at or around the first pit stop, occasionally changing tires once to simply give the impression they're "trying" in front of NASCAR officials.
But starting and parking isn't a full-fledged effort at competing; it's an opportunity to pocket some serious cash to not just survive, but also profit. According to a source requesting anonymity, one of the lower-tier teams currently asks for about $100, 000 from a financial backer as the bare minimum the team would need to complete a full race competitively. However, some of that cost -- about 30 to 40 percent -- comes from leasing an engine from a multi-car program like Hendrick Motorsports or Roush Fenway Racing in order to post speeds competitive enough to make the field.
If teams want to start and park, it can take the engine cost out of the equation by making the race and only running just a few laps, reducing wear and tear and preserving the engine they have over the course of five, 10, even 15 races. In the meantime, the team buys just a handful of tires for the weekend, saving thousands of dollars from Goodyear, and employs just regular crewmen instead of those professionally trained for the 16-second pit stops you see each weekend.
When you cut corners like that, the $100, 000 becomes maybe half that amount, allowing teams like Prism to run a few laps and make a tidy profit with their $64, 875 won at Pocono. It's turning racing into a business, allowing them to keep castaway crewmen, drivers and others employed while teams like Hendrick continue to hold all the money and the cards. Case in point: Phoenix Racing won a miracle race at Talladega borrowing a Hendrick driver (Brad Keselowski) and using a former Hendrick chassis. Two weeks later, Phoenix's beat-up old Dodge Charger -- without Hendrick support -- was pulling it in early at Darlington to bank some cash.
Part of the problem here surrounds NASCAR's widening money gap. These teams are so far behind the curve of the bigger programs, the only way they can challenge is to gain the millions in sponsorship and engineering advances those teams have accrued yet refuse to share with others. That leaves a bid for the Chase all but impossible, meaning the best these teams can race for is a chance to qualify for a locked in starting spot with NASCAR's Top-35 rule.
But the monetary incentive to run 25th or even 30th just isn't there. Just check out the purse money from Sunday's race: Joe Nemechek, who parked his car and finished 41st, earned $64, 725 from the track. Fellow underdog driver Dexter Bean, who ran the whole distance, came home 36th and won $65, 450. That's just a $725 difference -- not enough for even half a tire bill to run the full weekend. The competitor in you wants them to run all day; but if you're not going to make extra money for going the extra mile, the financial bottom line tells owners, "What's the point?"
And as a struggling economy only causes the numbers of start and parkers to increase, there are consequences. These programs designed to run only a few laps are knocking out full-time drivers who had every intention of competing, robbing the fans of an extra competitor on race day when the "start and park" team pulls it in after just a few minutes of competition. Of course, the goal of these programs is to one day pull in sponsorship themselves, but that's difficult -- if not impossible -- to do without some significant on-track exposure. So, many of these teams find themselves in a Catch-22, doing just enough to stay above water while falling short of the results they need to attract companies interested in backing them.
Fixing the problem would seem to be twofold: increasing incentive for owners to run the full distance while curbing the costs needed to compete. But doing that is far easier said than done, with multi-car teams feasting upon the money from clients to rent engines in these tough economic times. And with the Chase as NASCAR's postseason marketing tool, the top 12 contenders make the rest of the 43-car field all but meaningless come September.
At the moment, one thing's for certain: the sport's not doing anything to stop this problem. They're in a bit of a bind themselves, with clamping down on start-and-park programs giving them less than a 43-car field each week -- raising the specter of negativity from casual observers in the face of declining ratings and fan attendance. So, for now everyone's playing that dangerous game of turning their heads and pretending the problem just isn't a problem.
"NASCAR doesn't perceive this to be an issue, " the organization said back in April. "It doesn't impact the quality of competition whatsoever. NASCAR has always been about teams having the opportunity to participate in our sport; some teams might not have the full complement of resources to compete at the same level as others, but it's all about having an opportunity."
The issue is, to keep that opportunity fans need to come and watch the races. And if half the starting field pulls out after just a few laps of competition ... would you still watch?
Let's hope we never have to find out; but as the money dries up for NASCAR's middle class, no changes mean this practice is only going to increase. source>>>
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NASCAR says it would be open to other foreign manufacturers joining Toyota in stock car racing.
Chief executive Brian France adds that nothing is imminent but talks with several companies have been ongoing for a long time.
France spoke at Michigan International Speedway for Sunday's Sprint Cup race. He was asked about the likelihood of companies like Japanese manufacturer Honda and some German automakers eventually competing in NASCAR.
He says foreign companies are interested in developing the North American market and that NASCAR is the "pre-eminent place to consider" if a company wants to do that. source>>>
Peruse the entries for Sunday's LifeLock 400 at Michigan International Speedway and you'll find a welcomed listing: Bill Elliott, in the No. 21 Ford, fielded by Wood Brothers Racing. That one line has it all: Legendary driver, legendary team - and a legendary number.
The number has visited Victory Lane 90 times in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series competition, a total shared among 17 drivers. No other car number has had so many different winners.
Arguably, no other car number has had so many great drivers behind the wheel. David Pearson, Cale Yarborough, Buddy Baker, A.J. Foyt, Tim Flock, Marvin Panch and Curtis Turner all drove the 21. Pearson had the most victories in the ride, 43, that total coming in 157 starts, another high for the 21.
Elliott is the latest of the greatest to take over the No. 21, albeit in a limited role. Both Elliott and the Wood Brothers compete part-time these days.
Michigan is a good fit for the team's schedule, considering the car's history at the 2-mile track. In 1969, Yarborough was in the No. 21 and won the track's first NASCAR Sprint Cup event. Pearson had eight MIS wins in the 21 during the 1970s. Dale Jarrett drove the 21 in '91 at MIS, capturing his very first NASCAR Sprint Cup win. And then there's Elliott, with seven MIS wins in his storied career, although none came driving the 21.
The Wood Brothers first fielded the No. 21 in 1953, with team founder Glen Wood in the seat.
"Somehow along the way we ended up with 21, " said Glen's son Len, now a part-owner of the team. "The story goes that there was somebody from South Carolina who had 21 and it was really running fast, so we numbered our car 21 in hopes it would be fast as well.
"We always like to do well in front of Ford [people] at Michigan. When you go to Michigan you think of Detroit, and when you think of Detroit you think of the manufacturers and for us it's Ford. I won't say we try harder there, but we certainly give it as good a shot as we can."
source>>>
Danica Patrick will be in NASCAR next season.
If NASCAR executives can pull it off.
George Pyne -- the former NASCAR Chief Operating Officer, and thus one of the top officials in stock car racing, and now head of IMG sports and entertainment, the high-buck talent marketing agency - and key NASCAR executives are together working the entire Sprint Cup garage trying to put together a package for Patrick to run NASCAR next season.
Finding sponsorship is quite likely not the big issue, as hot a property as Danica Patrick is.
And Geoff Smith, who runs Roush Fenway Racing for Ford's Jack Roush, says he's pretty confident she could do the job in one of these awkward stockers...eventually.
But what would the game plan look like for her?
And how to package everything for her, that's the big stumbling block: How long a contract, two years, three years? How much money?
And then Patrick would have to prove she's serious about a NASCAR venture and willing to commit to the program...which would naturally include a heck of a lot of laps.
Would Patrick be willing to follow Juan Pablo Montoya's footsteps and run ARCA for a while? Montoya is so good a driver that he made the leap from ARCA to Cup very swiftly...but he did spend considerable time in the minors. Would Patrick accept that?
Would Patrick be willing to follow Tony Stewart's example and run a couple of years of Nationwide?
Would Patrick be willing to follow Ryan Newman's ABC game plan, a mixture of ARCA, Busch (Nationwide) and Cup?
Would Patrick be willing to endure the agony that IRL-transplant Sam Hornish Jr. has endured?
Smith and Roush have expressed an interest in signing Patrick at times the past two years.
But Smith indicates he senses that Patrick may be working this garage and these team owners perhaps a little too avariciously, and perhaps with not enough consideration for just how hard this part of the sports business really is.
"IMG is representing her and taking her around to all the teams in the NASCAR garage....in an opportunity search for her, " Smith says.
"But it's a little unclear to everybody whether this is a trial balloon, for evaluation....
"However she's a very exciting personality, because of her popularity, and a very competitive attitude, and she's very physically fit - probably more fit than half the guys in this garage and on par with the other part....
"But it's not about 'a test.'
"In our opinion she needs to be in a program that runs her a lot of laps. She has to be a full-time lap-gatherer....and then work on making the transition.
"It would be a very difficult scenario."
However this season the number of teams failing to qualify is shrinking dramatically. Only one driver here, for example, didn't make the Friday cut.
So Patrick shouldn't have any trouble qualifying for Cup races.
But Smith says there is more to the issue: "The thing that makes careers is being successful at every level you're in.
"Learning how to Cup race, by running in the back of the field and wrecking every week, is not the way to do it.
"Even the great ones here needed some grounding. Like Tony Stewart and Juan Pablo Montoya. So she would need a plan.
"And sponsors are still only going to pay to a certain level, no matter who you are.....so a team owner would have to be certain of her commitment. We don't want to get stuck being out of pocket for $5 million a year down the line.
"But Danica has a great resume, and more -- she's a great competitor, and has a great personality.
"However we don't know how it all might play out." source>>>
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