Kentucky Speedway Chronicles: Edition XXXVI
NASCAR was back in court Thursday asking a federal judge to toss out Kentucky Speedway’s $400 million antitrust lawsuit against the sanctioning body and ISC it’s parent company.
Judge William Bertelsman said he would act soon on NASCAR’s motion to dismiss the case. He pointed out that another antitrust case he dismissed two weeks ago was a “simpler situation than this.”
Well OK, whatever that means your Honor.
What makes this legal round noteworthy (NASCAR lost the first asking for a venue change to Fla.) is a couple of the arguments being offered.
On this side sitting behind a long Mahogany table are lawyers for Kentucky Speedway pleading their case:
Lawyers for Kentucky Speedway, a track not even six years old, argue in the suit that if it were allowed to compete, it would have been one of the tracks to have a Nextel Cup race. They cite safety features, state-of-the-art amenities and a colossal fan base allowing for larger purses to winning drivers.
On the other side camped behind a long ebony table (more expensive wood doncha know?) are the lawyers for NASCAR:
But NASCAR’s attorney said the speedway had no standing to sue because its goal was not to assure competition - as antitrust law guarantees - but to essentially become part of the monopoly the track says it wants to bring down.“These are people who are trying to get the benefits of the very antitrust , anticompetitive conduct they’re attacking,” said NASCAR attorney Stuart Singer.”
Excuse me while I choke back this belly laugh…
Ahem… That’s two funny at half the price, and here is the reason why. It wasn’t so long ago Kentucky Shyster, err… lawyer Stan Chesley had this to say:
Stock car racing is the most popular spectator sport in the United States, and we intend to do our best to see that fair play and fair racing is re-established,
ok now stay with me here.. NASCAR owns ethier all or part of 11 race tracks.. with those they give themselfs 19 races… out of 36.. They had said that if NYC and Seattle would build them a racetrack (with tax payers money) they would gurantee them a date.. because they would be owned by ISC..
Then you have SMI which owns 6 tracks for which they get 10 races… So with the two companys they own 29 of the 36 races…
HOW is this not an anti trust issue when you have race tracks like KMS and Nashville that have state of the art tracks and are denied dates.. because the whole reason for this is because Nascar and keep thier dates with thier tracks.. and SMI can keep thiers…
they do have a case like it or not.. and i hope they win..
First of all (and to use your words) “stay with me here.”
What Kentucky’s lawyers are asking is to form the very same alleged cabal they say ISC/NASCAR runs. They claim if they win they will form their own group to bid on race events and possibly thru strength of numbers outbid others for events.
A disingenuous arguement at best.
Secondly you may recall NASCAR settled out of court a similar lawsuit filed by Francis Ferko and Texas Motor Speedway. That settlement was pushed by NASCAR