NEWTON, NC :: Kevin Piercy is entering his fifth year as the General Manager of the historic Hickory Motor Speedway. While 2012 was a season of improvement for Hickory Motor Speedway, which consistently had some of the highest car counts in the region, Piercy feels there is still work to be done to restore the historic North Carolina track to its glory days.
“Last year was my fourth year and it’s no different than any business,” Piercy said. “It takes a couple years to figure out your direction and what you’ll accomplish with marketing and sponsorships and partnerships. It all progresses the first year or two. The third and fourth year, it came alive. From a standpoint of short track racing, there are all kinds of challenges involved. How do you get fans in the stands?
“It’s weather oriented in a lot of ways. It doesn’t have to be rain. There are so many challenges. I’m fortunate to be managing a place like Hickory. It’s a legendary facility with tradition. It stands on its own two feet. We had good car counts and a decent fan count. The balance is still challenging. We’ve still got a ways to go to be where I want to be.”
One of the highlights of the season at Hickory Motor Speedway in 2013 is the Zloop Big 10 Challenge championship series. The series is a 10 race set of races with a distict points system. Each race pays $2,000 to win and the winner of the 10 race championship series will win another $3,000.
“The Zloop Big 10 Challenge came together mid-season last year,” Piercy explained. “Bob Boston wanted to be more involved with the track. We put together this program for the Zloop Challenge. It’s a points system within the points system. It pays $3,000 to win the challenge and $2,000 to win the races. I’ve got people intending on running those ten races and it’s definitely drawing interest from competitors.”
One of the things Piercy belives attracts fans are the different types of personalities that race at Hickory.
“I think it takes all the personalities to appeal to the fans,” Piercy mentioned. “You’ve got the drivers who aren’t going to take anything off anybody. It’s like wrestling. You’ve got good guys and bad guys. It takes all the personalities. Lee Faulk and Revolution Racing brought in Pietro Fittipald last year. This year they’ll have Annabeth Barnes and another guy. They’re great folks to work with. You still have the common people racing and people who carry clout in the sport.”
Piercy also says Late Model Stock Car racing has evolved in many of the same ways NASCAR’s top divisions have evolved.
“A lot of your technology from the big three has trickled down in to short track racing,” Piercy commented. “You see that knowledge trickle down. The way it used to be in short track racing, you got your family, crew and friends together and raced. Now teams have paid crews and big haulers. The sport has evolved. It doesn’t matter at Hickory how much money you have you’ve still got to get up on the wheel.”
While Piercy is excited about the season ahead, he is also hesitant due to economic uncertainty. The sport of auto racing, as a whole, has been impacted more so than other professional sports by the volatile economy. Despite the economic uncertainty, Piercy is excited about some of the changes at the track with staff and with the tires.
“It’s hard to predict the economy but, from our standpoint, we’re excited about a lot of things,” Piercy explained. “Alan Kanupp has been in NASCAR. He’s got 20 years of experience. So we’ve brought him in as our race director. He has a vast amount of knowledge. Scott Kilby is in the technical director position now. He has such a great knowledge and how it works, it’s going to bring a lot to the table.
“Going from Goodyear to Hoosier also helps. Goodyear’s been a great company but we decided to move to Hoosier. They’re the premiere short track tire in the industry. It will allow people to travel to Hickory to race where they haven’t in the past because of tires. We signed a five year deal with Coca-Cola. We’re excited to have them on board. We don’t have to worry about negotiations. I’m excited for the year.”
Despite his excitement, Piercy is cautious about his ambitions.
“This sport is so volatile,” he said. “You’ve got to be careful how pretty a picture you paint. We’re no different from anybody else. We’ve got a ways to go to be what I consider a successful short track. You keep taking small steps and point yourself in the right direction. There are always decisions to be made. From the standpoint of success, I don’t think we’ve reached that yet. What Hickory has is location. We’re in the heart of Late Model racing. That being said, we have the tradition and the legendary people who have raced in the past and the fact this place has been running so long. There’s a constant era of people who stay in the sport year after year. It started with Ned Jarrett, then Dale and Jason. You’ve got Robert and Landon Huffman. The common denominator is that the family stays involved for generations.”
Along with the Zloop Big 10 Challenge, Hickory Motor Speedway will also host UARA-STARS races, PASS South races and the Rev-Oil Pro Cup Series.
“We have a few touring divisions coming back,” Piercy stated. “We’ve got PASS, Pro Cup, UARA and Crash-O-Rama. Crash-O-Rama was a huge success. I haven’t seen that many people since the old Nationwide Series days. People see the history here and want to come and race here.”
Piercy also said the tracks and the racing divisions should work together, perhaps hinting that Hickory may attempt to work with Southern National Motorsports Park to do a deal similar to the Dirty Dozen that Southern National and Motor Mile Speedway have worked out.
“It’s all about partnering together,” he mentioned. “We’re all in this thing together. There’s a lot of division but if we could all get on the same page, we’d be pointed in a better direction. It’s always a challenge for the sport when tracks are working against each other. Whether it is the tracks or the touring series, we all go our own separate ways. All of a sudden, this guy can’t go here and that guy can’t go there. It makes it difficult for everybody.
“It’s always good when tracks work together. We consider opportunities that come along. We take each one as an individual opportunity. You consider what’s important for the racetrack. I have to have the checks and balances to keep the place open to make it a legitimate business and be as good as we can to the fans and competitors. We have to make it a winning situation for each person. Some of the opportunities out there are not always good. We’re open to opportunities but we’ll take each one and see what’s best for everybody.”
Hickory Motor Speedway’s season kicks off on March 9th with the first NASCAR Whelen All American Series Late Model race of the season as well as the first race in the Zloop Big 10 Challenge.
