Team Racing Auto Circuit (TRAC) was a proposed American stock car automobile racing organization founded by Hank Durschlag and Charles Jeter that was scheduled to begin operations in 2004. TRAC was proposed by a group called Team Sports and Entertainment Inc., whose shareholders included Cale Yarborough, a three-time winner of the NASCAR Winston Cup Series season title, television executive Robert Wussler; and former college football coach Danny Ford.
Bill Miller was named chief executive officer of Team Sports Entertainment Inc. and its subsidiary, the Charlotte-based Team Racing Auto Circuit. Miller is the chairman of Miller Industries Inc., a provider of vehicle towing and recovery equipment and services.
The concept of TRAC was to put teams of drivers in identically prepared cars that were said to be similar to the muscle cars produced by Detroit. Some of the cars that were scheduled to compete included the Chevrolet Corvette, the Dodge Viper, and the Ford Mustang. All entries were to be equipped with Riley & Scott-designed chassis and fuel-injected V8 engines supplied and sealed (to prevent tampering) by a designated vendor.
Teams, representing various race tracks throughout the country, would accumulate points in each race for each driver, presumably based on the order of finish. The plan called for regular season races, playoffs, and a championship.
TRAC had a contract from ESPN to televise the races. Raycom Media handled marketing and sold advertising, and Yarborough was the league's spokesman.
TRAC was unable to sell sponsorships for any of the proposed teams, and the league folded without conducting a single race. The end of TRAC was officially announced on August 26, 2003.
Famous quotes containing the words team, racing and/or circuit:
“I doubt if men ever made a trade of heroism. In the days of Achilles, even, they delighted in big barns, and perchance in pressed hay, and he who possessed the most valuable team was the best fellow.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Upscale people are fixated with food simply because they are now able to eat so much of it without getting fat, and the reason they don’t get fat is that they maintain a profligate level of calorie expenditure. The very same people whose evenings begin with melted goat’s cheese ... get up at dawn to run, break for a mid-morning aerobics class, and watch the evening news while racing on a stationary bicycle.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
“Within the circuit of this plodding life
There enter moments of an azure hue,
Untarnished fair as is the violet
Or anemone, when the spring strews them
By some meandering rivulet, which make
The best philosophy untrue that aims
But to console man for his grievances.
I have remembered when the winter came,”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)