NASCAR banquet drops NY City for Vegas

A second annual NASCAR Sprint Cup race isn't in Las Vegas' foreseeable future, but one of the sport's big events apparently is coming to town.

NASCAR and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority have reached an agreement in principle to bring the Sprint Cup banquet, awards ceremony and postseason celebration to Las Vegas in the first week of December.

LVCVA president Rossi Ralenkotter confirmed the tentative agreement to move the annual event from downtown New York, where it has been held for the past 27 years, and make it a citywide event centered on the Strip.

"Some deal points still need to be finalized," Ralenkotter said Thursday.

The sides have yet to settle the length of the contract; Ralenkotter wants a deal of three to five years. Also to be determined is the degree to which Las Vegas will be included in advertising and media references to the event.

The LVCVA would pay NASCAR between $500,000 and $1 million for each year of the contract, Ralenkotter said. NASCAR has the option of selecting the venue for the banquet, likely to be Dec. 4.

A spokesman for NASCAR, Ramsey Poston, said "nothing's been finalized" about this year's banquet plans.

The event honors the top 10 drivers from the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

Speedway Motorsports Inc., owner of Las Vegas Motor Speedway, has lobbied in recent years for the postseason event to be moved here.

"Every key person in our industry — top executives from NASCAR, sponsors and our superstar drivers and crew chiefs — attends the banquet," speedway president Chris Powell said. Las Vegas Review Journal