The Grand American Road Racing Association has never been far removed from NASCAR. Founded by Jim and Bill France Jr. 1999 and bought out wholly by NASCAR in 2004, Grand Am has always been the stock-car racing series’ road-racing arm.
Now according to the Grand Am website, the two series will operate more closely, to leverage Grand Am’s slim popularity using NASCAR’s huge resources.
Picking through the corporate-speak, (“strategic leadership alignment … to maximize objectives and opportunities, increase synergy,”) it seems that two changes will be made: Grand Am will get full use of NASCAR’s Research and Development Center in Concord, N.C., and two Grand Am officials have been promoted.
“This is yet another indication of NASCAR’s strong support of Grand Am’s efforts across the board,” NASCAR President Mike Helton said on the site. “Grand Am should experience increased benefit from NASCAR’s variety of resources, including within the competition arena.”
Grand-Am CEO Ed Bennett added, “The importance of GRAND-AM tapping into the expertise and capability of the R&D Center cannot be over-emphasized. Combine all of that expertise with what GRAND-AM already has in-house with our current momentum, and the future is bright, especially in terms of efforts toward increased manufacturer participation and development.”
One of the big changes in Grand Am for 2012 was the introduction of the Corvette Daytona Prototype bodywork, jointly developed with Chevrolet, Grand Am, and Grand Am chassis manufacturers. Grand Am hopes to continue this trend: by offering auto manufacturers the chance to design bodywork for racing cars using styling cues from road cars, the series hopes to increase manufacturer interest, and thus manufacturer investment in promotion.
The other changes were in personnel: Dave Spitzer, Vice President of Competition, has been promoted to Managing Director of Manufacturer and Series Development, and Race Director Mark Raffauf will become Managing Director of Competition.
Spitzer was the point man on the introduction of the Corvette DP bodywork, and also has led Grand Am’s international competition development, bringing Ferrari and Audi on board with series-specific models—a huge gain for the series’ legitimacy.
Spitzer is also working on getting Germany’s ultra-popular DTM series to open a U.S. arm under NASCAR supervision, a move somewhat optimistically scheduled for 2013. He will continue to work with European manufacturers to try to entice them to become more involved with Grand Am.
Raffauf will apparently take over some of Spitzer’s old duties while still serving as Grand Am’s chief official at events.
