After Winston’s departure as title sponsor of NASCAR’s top series this year, could tobacco join distilled liquor products and pornography on a list of sponsors excluded from the sport? “That’s an issue that’s on our radar for next year,” NASCAR president Mike Helton said Friday at Pocono Raceway. The series will be known as the Nextel Cup beginning in 2004 when that firm replaces R.J. Reynolds Tobacco. NASCAR’s deal with RJR kept other cigarette companies out of the sport for the 33 years of their relationship. But once RJR leaves, Helton said, the sport must decide if it will allow any other tobacco company’s products into the sport. “We’ve kept hard liquor and pornography, hard core and soft core, out of the sport on the morality issue,” Helton said. “The question we’re going to have to look at is whether we need to do that with tobacco.” Helton’s comments came during a conversation about his trip to Washington, D.C., on Thursday to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee about NASCAR’s position on ephedra-based diet supplements. Earlier this year, NASCAR added ephedra to a list of drugs it looks for under a substance abuse policy that allows for testing if there is “reasonable suspicion” a driver or crew member is using banned substances. NASCAR also could have sponsorship issues to work out if the federal government moves to restrict ephedra-based products. Stacker 2 sponsors the #23 team owned by Bill Davis Racing and TrimSpa sponsors a Busch Series team and is the title sponsor of the Busch race being held this weekend at Pikes Peak.( ThatsRacin.com )(7-26-2003)
