Three major NASCAR publications go belly up

Things are not good in NASCAR. In fact one might conclude things are getting dire. Grandstands are half empty at many races and TV ratings are down. Now comes another telltale sign. Three major NASCAR Publications, that tried to ride the coattails of dead NASCAR hero Dale Earnhardt, and wrote stories everyday about Dale Earnhardt Jr. even though he never wins, have gone belly up. First it was the demise of the NASCAR Scene publication. Once the dominant publication in the sport, last owner American City Business Journals (ACNJ) never "got it" during the digital transition and in the end Scene was closed and staff members terminated.

Two of the remaining NASCAR-themed business interests of ACBJ were SceneDaily and Rowdy.com, both online projects. Rowdy was a small and independent effort led by a group from Charlottesville, VA. ACBJ liked their efforts so much they bought the entire thing and moved the Rowdy staff to Charlotte, NC.

Only weeks ago Rowdy.com co-founder Tom van der Voort wrote about changes to that business. After several years of floundering without direction or support, Rowdy.com was closed. Any remaining NASCAR content will appear on the TSN website.

Tuesday, word began to creep out that this time it was SceneDaily about to be affected. Reporter Bob Pockrass then confirmed that later this week visitors to SceneDaily.com will be redirected to the TSN NASCAR page. Just like that, another stand-alone NASCAR website is gone.