Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

As we are about to go into sprint cars "Month of Money", I have wondered if anyone has ever thought about creating a sprint car "Triple Crown" award and or prize money

The triple would include the Kings Royal ($50,000), Knoxville Nationals ($150,000) and the Williams Grove National Open ($50,000). Together these races are $250,000 which is a huge payday for sprint car racing. What if someone created another $50,000 fund for the winner of these three races. 

We all know that it would be very tough to win all three in the same season. Not sure if it has already been done by Kinser or Wolfgang maybe?

I know with horse racing everyone gets very excited that it could happen even though it has not happened in like 30 years. Think about the talk there would be going into the Open at Williams Grove if someone had a chance at it. 

Curious on others thoughts? I realize it will probably never happen though.

good idea but probably will never happen... who would pay the $$$ ? The Kings Royal hasn't increased it's winner amount since the first event. Roughly in todays money the event should pay $112,000. Another big difference is cost has increased way more than inflation. If you wanted the driver/team to get the same value today as back then the amount would probably need to be $250k-$350K.

I wonder if a savvy promoter could figure out a way to get it insured that it DOESN"T happen? That way the insurance company can pay it off if it ever did.

That is what I was thinking. I have heard it rumored that is what McCarl does for the Front Row Challenge. It would be very tough to win all three so the odds are not that good. But if you did an award would be cool. I think the World of Outlaws could figure something out. lol

Don martin at Lernerville don't count???

I would say no. They only pay $10,000 to win each race. You could win $20,000 in one night but not part of the triple crown. It is a big race but compared to others not as good.

Winning those 3 means plenty of money. The prestige of winning "Triple Crown" should be enough....

Yeah, its more like the month of no money now!

It would be cool, but I don't see it being something that would put more fans in the seats or more cars on the track. Typically, at least 2 out of 3 of those races are going to be won by World of Outlaws drivers although there are rare exceptions (Tim Shaffer in 2010 at Knoxville), which is the reason I don't believe it would raise the car count, because it would be very hard if not downright impossible for non-Outlaws to beat Outlaws in the 3 biggest races on the tour. And the fans will show up to those events regardless of there being bonus money to sweep all three.

IndyCar brought back the triple crown last year and this year with Indy, Pocono and California and it hasn't done them any favors. Indy doesn't bring in enough cars to have a bump day anymore, while Pocono and California only brings in the standard 21-22 season regular drivers and the stands aren't full at all (Pocono may opt out of the third year of their contract unfortunately). Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of the triple crown, but I think upping the overall purse for each event would be a better benefit to the sport than a $50,000 bonus for sweeping all three. Just my thoughts.

Ask Frank

Has anyone ever won all 3 in the same year? If not and it's so hard to do, then why not up the bonus money to say 1 Million dollars. You obviously would have to have some type of insurance company cover it like I mentioned before, but I don't think it would be totally impossible. And if an extra Million Dollar bonus isn't enough to generate a bunch of extra interested car owners, drivers and fans, then what are we all even talking about then?

Horse racing's Triple Crown is as big as it is because there is 100 years of history built into how special it is to win those three races. Even an insurance policy on a million dollar bonus would carry a big premium.

Much like the threads on here trying to spend car owner's or promoter's money, this thread seems like an easy way to spend money -- as long as it is someone else's money being spent.

In the 70's and early 80's the Knoxville Nationals, Western World at Manzanita, and Pacific Coast Open at Ascot were basically considered the Triple Crown of sprint car racing. There wasn't a prize fund, and I doubt anyone won all three in the same year. I could be wrong, but I was thinking that Ron Shuman and Sammy Swindell were the only two to win all three, and not in the same season.  Maybe Kevin Eckert or somebody can tell us for sure.