Speedway Motorsports Inc. Chairman and CEO Bruton Smith said Friday he hopes to add a second race date at SMI’s Las Vegas Motor Speedway next year, as well as persuade NASCAR to relocate its annual Sprint Cup awards banquet here [Las Vegas]. Last year, Smith floated the idea of moving the banquet from New York City, its home since 1981. He renewed calls to move the event again during his Friday press conference, citing high hotel prices and the ability to include fans in the event if it were held in Las Vegas. “I don’t know how y’all feel, but if you go there (New York) and you look at your hotel bill when you go up there, I looked at mine and it looked like my phone number,” said Smith. “¦ “The time has come when we ought to do something different and the different thing would be to have it right here,” said Smith. But NASCAR is unlikely to award a new race date or move the banquet in the near future, said Ramsey Poston, managing director of corporate communications for NASCAR. “The schedule is full now,” said Poston. And as for the banquet, “We feel like it works well now in New York,” Poston said.(SPEEDtv.com)(3-1-2008)
