Smaller NASCAR teams begin layoffs

Posted: November 18, 2008
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- Hall of Fame Racing, the NASCAR team owned by Arizona Diamondbacks executives, will cut its staff even if it secures sponsorship to run a full 2009 season.
Other teams aren't waiting.
Petty Enterprises, The Wood Brothers, Bill Davis Racing and Ernie Elliott's engine shop all reduced their staffs in the two days since Sunday's season finale.
Exact numbers are difficult to pin down, but Petty and the Wood Brothers are believed to have let go more than 20 employees each. The two teams are among the most storied programs in NASCAR.
BDR, which has no sponsorship lined up for its Sprint Cup program, has cut its staff to all but a handful of employees. Elliott, who built engines for Chip Ganassi Racing, did the same since it's unlikely Ganassi will use his motors once he completes a merger with Dale Earnhardt Inc.
The layoffs come as team owners adjust to the economic crisis, which slowly trickled into NASCAR but is now wreaking havoc on the industry. Just last week, 100-plus employee were released from DEI so the team can move forward with its merger with Ganassi.
Ganassi let go of 71 people in July, starting a wave that has hit all teams regardless of their level of funding.
Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing and Roush Fenway Racing all had small staff reductions over the past month, and Roush let additional employees go this week as the organization adjusts to running fewer entries in the Truck Series next season.
But it's the smallest teams -- like Hall of Fame -- that are being squeezed the hardest. Sponsorship is extremely difficult to find and operating costs in NASCAR are at an all-time high. Without outside funding or a merger with another team, many small organizations are in danger of shutting.
HoF general manager Tyler Epp said Tuesday employees were told no one will be laid off before the end of November, as team officials search for more funding. But with 44 employees for a single car operation, Epp said the team is overstaffed.
"The reality is we ran 39th in points this year and personnel changes are going to be made," Epp said. "And we simply have too many people for a one-car team. We're going to have a reduction no matter what happens."
Epp said the team is close on several possibilities, but a merger with another small NASCAR team is not likely at this time. The team has partial sponsorship from DLP HDTV for next season.
Hall of Fame originally was formed by former Dallas Cowboys quarterbacks Troy Aikman and Roger Staubach, but they sold their interest in the team last year to Diamondbacks executives Jeff Moorad and Tom Garfinkel. Moorad is the Diamondbacks' chief executive officer, and Garfinkel is the chief operating officer.
The team had a technical alliance with Joe Gibbs Racing, but Epp said the agreement most likely will not carry into 2009 as the team searches for a new partner. Depending on whom they lease their motors from -- and JGR is still a possibility, Epp said -- the team could also have a manufacturer switch.
HoF started in Chevrolets, then moved to Toyotas with Gibbs. J.J. Yeley began the season driving the No. 96, but was replaced late in the year by Ken Schrader. JGR phenom Joey Logano also ran two races in the car.
Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

New SpringWidget

Get this widget!

Happy 100th

Happy 100th birthday to my Grandmother Mrs. Elva Belcher!

Check your tub before getting in

Forget on a plane, try snakes near the drain

By MICHAEL LaFORGIA
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 15, 2008

OCEAN RIDGE — Cue scary music.
Elena Trowell, a 22-year-old brunette from Georgia, slips into a warm bath in her duplex on Sunday morning, reclining as water tumbles over her feet.
See more photos

She isn't looking at the faucet, at least not directly, but she registers a flicker from the waterspout, like a shadow dripping into the tub with her. A moment later she feels something slide against her toes.
She looks and, to her utter horror, discovers the stuff of urban legend: A skinny, foot-long snake had fallen from the faucet to her bath water, Trowell said, dismissing the opinions of utilities officials and animal experts who called such a thing impossible.
"I was screaming like I was being attacked," Trowell said Sunday evening. "I was so freaked out. Panicked."
Her shrieks brought her boyfriend, 26-year-old Bryan Litowich, tearing in to see what was wrong. With his help, Trowell pried open the tub's sliding glass door and danced yelping from the water.
The couple rushed to the kitchen and grabbed a Tupperware cereal container, returning to find another surprise. A second, bigger snake had fallen to the water beside the first one, Trowell said. And it was angry.
After some wrangling Litowich corralled the reptiles, which experts later said were probably corn snakes, based on photos. The couple eventually drove to a pet store, returning with a heat rock and a glass tank.
The immediate fate of the serpents decided, Trowell and Litowich were free to ponder another, more troubling question: How did snakes get into the pipes to begin with?
The answer, said utilities officials, is simple. They didn't.
"It's impossible for snakes to come out of a faucet. It's deliberately a completely enclosed system from end to end," said Michael Lowe, deputy director of utilities for the city of Boynton Beach, which pipes water to Ocean Ridge. Lowe noted the water in the pipes is pressurized at roughly 60 pounds per square inch and said he was confident Trowell was mistaken.
Yet Trowell maintained the snakes fell from the faucet.
Lowe acknowledged that Trowell called the city Sunday afternoon, and a form generated by the complaint listed Trowell's reason for calling as "snakes coming out of bathtub faucet." Trowell also reported the snakes to Ocean Ridge police, Detective Chris Yannuzzi said.
Like Lowe, animal control experts were skeptical of Trowell's story.
Joe Felegi, who owns Critter Control animal removal service in West Palm Beach, said his business handles three or four cases per month of animals crawling through plumbing into toilets and tubs.
What Trowell described is "almost impossible," Felegi said. "Usually they don't come from the water faucet, but they can come up through the drains."
"Now saying that," he added, "in my 20 years experience in dealing with wildlife conflicts, I have come to the conclusion anything is possible."

Remembering 9-11

NEW YORK (AP) — The nation paused Thursday to mark the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks with a heartfelt ceremony at the World Trade Center site, the dedication of a memorial at the Pentagon and a planned visit to ground zero by the presidential candidates.

Relatives of victims killed at the World Trade Center gathered in lower Manhattan for readings from dignitaries and a recitation of the names of the dead. Later Thursday, Barack Obama and John McCain were due at ground zero to pay silent respects.

"Today marks the seventh anniversary of the day our world was broken," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said at the start of the ceremony, calling Sept. 11, 2001, a "day that began like any other and ended as none ever has."

The ritual at ground zero included moments of silence at 8:46 a.m., 9:03 a.m. and 9:59 a.m. and 10:29 — the times when two hijacked jets slammed into the trade center buildings and the twin towers fell.

Services were also held in Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon, where a new memorial was dedicated.

Among the speakers at ground zero were three children who were very young when their father went to work at the World Trade Center seven years ago and never came home.

"I remember playing in the yard with him. I remember him pulling my wagon. He was strong. He always made me feel safe," said Alex Salamone, wearing the soccer jersey of his father, John. "I wish I could remember more, but we were so young when he died."

Edward Bracken, who lost his sister, Lucy A. Fishman, said she was "murdered by coward men using their religion to say they are right and we are wrong," then added, "Pray for the men and women who sleep on the ground every night in the Middle East to keep our world safe."

Relatives of victims began arriving at dawn at ground zero, now a huge construction site. American flags were draped over silent cranes, and some families held signs saying "We miss you," "We love you" or "You will never be forgotten."

The family of Sept. 11 victim Michael Diehl went to ground zero wearing white T-shirts bearing his photo and 9/11/01.

"It's still very hard for us to come here. It doesn't get any easier," said Diehl's sister-in-law, Norma Linguito. "I just wish they'd get the memorial up so we can have something, a marker, to remember everyone."

Family members and students representing more than 90 countries that lost victims on Sept. 11 read the names of 2,751 people killed in New York, one more than last year. The city restored Sneha Philip, a woman who mysteriously vanished on Sept. 10, 2001, to its official death toll this year after a court ruled that she was likely killed at the trade center.

McCain and Obama planned to visit the site after the ceremony concluded Thursday afternoon. The candidates agreed weeks ago to pull their campaign ads for the day and were appearing together Thursday night at a forum on volunteerism and service.

Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani spoke at the ceremony — as he has every year in New York — drawing applause from some in the crowd. As the names were being read, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine and New York Gov. David Paterson walked down a ramp to lay flowers in the pit where the towers stood.

Last year's reading by Giuliani, then a presidential candidate, drew protests from family members who said the city was ill-prepared for the terrorist attacks under his leadership and questioned whether he should be there while running for the White House.

Many families had no opposition to McCain and Obama's visit, but some questioned whether the visit was necessary. "It's probably going to be more commercial. This really should be a day for the people who lived and worked down here," said Jane Wixted, who lost her police officer son Glen Pettit on Sept. 11.

But Pettit's former colleague, Chris DeAngelo, was glad they were coming. "One of them is going to lead this nation," he said. "And for that reason, both should come here to see what happened."

At the Pentagon memorial dedication, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld mourned those who "one morning kissed their loved ones goodbye, went off to work and never came home" and the airline passengers "who in the last moments made phone calls to loved ones and prayed to the Almighty before their journey ended not far from where it began."

The Pentagon memorial is the first of three major Sept. 11 memorials to be completed. The 2-acre park, located at the spot where American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon's west wall, consists primarily of 184 cantilevered benches, each bearing a victim's name.

President Bush and first lady Laura Bush marked the anniversary during a moment of silence on the South Lawn of the White House, then went to the Pentagon where the president spoke at a service there.

In Pennsylvania, several hundred people gathered to read the names of 40 victims killed in Shanksville where Flight 93 came down after passengers reportedly stormed the cockpit to thwart terrorists' plans to use that plane as a weapon like the others.

Memorials are years away from being built in Pennsylvania and New York. As in past years, two bright blue beams of light will shine at night on the New York City skyline, in memory of the fallen towers.

———

Associated Press writers Matthew Barakat, Ramit Plushnick-Masti, Jennifer Peltz and Colleen Long contributed to this report

Dear Mr. Obama

The Eagles' Home-Opening Win

Unfortunetly I didn't get to go to the game but here is a play by play of the action, courtesy of the Georgia Southern Eagles.



Turnovers Key Eagles’ Home-Opening Win
Release: 09/06/2008


STATESBORO, Ga. – Georgia Southern’s defense forced three fumbles in the fourth quarter, keying the Eagles’ 34-20 non-conference football win over Austin Peay, Saturday night (Sept. 6) at Paulson Stadium. The win snaps Georgia Southern’s (1-1 overall) three-game losing streak -two against Football Bowl Subdivision teams - dating back to last year.

Down by seven in the fourth quarter and forced to punt, Georgia Southern’s Charlie Edwards pinned APSU inside its 10. On the first play Markeith Wylie forced a Jeff Lyle fumble and J.B. Shippy recovered on the four. It took just one play to tie the game.

Antonio Henton had a wide open lane for a touchdown. Jesse Hartley’s extra point tied the game with 13:56 remaining.

On the Governors’ next drive, Chris Rogers laid a hit on Ryan White and Wylie recovered the fumble, setting up the offense on the 38. Six plays later Henton scored from 16 yards out to put the Eagles ahead for good 27-20.

The Eagles allowed only three Austin Peay plays to turn a seven-point deficit into a touchdown lead. The Governors recorded one first down on their next drive, however, facing 4th-and-2 from the 42, Carson Hill broke up a pass attempt and the Eagles took over on downs. The Eagles covered those 42 yards on eight plays. Facing 3rd-and-goal from the two, Henton connected with Darell Norman on a touchdown pass. Hartley’s extra point helped seal the win.

Chris Covington snuffed another APSU drive later in the quarter when he drilled tight end Jack Hoeh, who fumbled the ball and Lennie Richardson recovered.

“It’s been a long time since we’ve won a game,” said head coach Chris Hatcher. “We’re still learning our team, we’re still learning what we do well, but it was good to see that many young players today respond in the fourth quarter and we’ll take 13 more wins like the one we had today.”

After the Eagles stalled on their first drive, Austin Peay marched into GS territory. Facing 4th-and-2 on the GS 35, Richardson and Larry Beard stuffed White for a 2-yard loss.

The Eagles, led by Henton, drove into the Governors territory. The sophomore quarterback found Raja Andrews down the right sidelines for 36 yards, setting up the Eagles 1st-and-goal from the four. Two rushes by Adam Urbano resulted in the true-freshman’s first touchdown. However the team was flagged offsides and moved back five yards on the extra point attempt. Hartley missed his first-ever extra point attempt as an Eagle, snapping his streak of 50 consecutive extra points made.

Andrews went back to field another punt by Ryan Key at the start of the second quarter. He caught it on his own 22, eluded several tacklers and scored a touchdown. However, the punt rush team was flagged for offsides, wiping out what would have been the second punt return for a touchdown in his career.

Lee Chapple hit Michael McIntosh on 3rd-and-long to set up a short fourth down inside APSU territory then Urbano converted on fourth down. Samair Baker rushed twice, Jarrell Crawford rushed it down to the one then Leander Barney punched it in for a 13-0 lead with 5:33 left in the first half.

Theo Townsend capped an 8-play, 87-yard drive that covered 3:16 when he scored from one yard out. The extra point cut Georgia Southern’s lead to 13-7 with 2:17 before halftime.

On 4th-and-1 the Eagles tied a fake punt but Covington fumbled the ball out-of-bounds and the Governors took over inside GS territory.

With 24 seconds left in the half Gary Orr connected with Lanis Frederick on a 20-yard touchdown. Beard charged through the line to block the extra point attempt, making it 13-all heading into the locker room.

The Governors squibbed the ensuing kickoff. Terence Hall returned the kick to the Eagles’ 40. Henton took off on an 18-yard run, down to the APSU 42. However, his pass was intercepted in the endzone to end the half.

Orr and the Governors drove down the field to start the second half, covering 67 yards on eight plays. His touchdown pass to Jontamion Forrest for eight yards and the extra point put APSU ahead 20-13.

Urbano broke through the right side but was hit and fumbled as the Governors took over on the GS side. The Eagles defense held APSU to a 3-and-out, however, on the first play of the next drive, Henton fumbled and Austin Peay took over on the GS 48 late in the third quarter. But on 4th-and-1 the defense stepped up again as Quentin Taylor and Beard stuffed Townsend for a loss.

“At halftime we were just ‘out there’. We had no emotion, we were a flat group and they just stuck it to us. We tried reverses, we tried to fake a punt and fumbled when we would have gotten a first down. We just couldn’t do anything right,” admitted Hatcher. “And then I challenged them at halftime to come out and play better and then all of the sudden they had a great drive. We didn’t do much, but in the fourth quarter our defense really stood up and forced some big turnovers. We then got behind that big offensive line and Henton and those running backs did a great job of running the football and we came out of here with a big win.”

Henton finished with 103 yards on the ground on nine attempts and scored two touchdowns. He also completed 10-of-16 passes for 68 yards and another score.

Defensively, Covington matched his career-high of 11 tackles. The senior also shared on a sack and forced a fumble. Taylor, Hill and Brandon Echols had seven tackles apiece.

Urbano rushed for 41 yards and a touchdown. Norman caught three passes and Andrews hauled in two for 42 yards. Overall, the Eagles out-gained Austin Peay 224-123 on the ground and 313-292 in total offense.

Lyle rushed for 86 yards on 17 carries for the Governors. Orr completed 17-of-29 passes for 169 yards and two touchdowns but was sacked four times. Frederick caught a game-high six passes for 71 yards and a score.

The Eagles continue their four-game homestand next Saturday (Sept. 13), playing host to Northeastern. Kickoff is scheduled for 6 p.m. at Paulson Stadium.

GAME NOTES: Beard’s blocked kick was the first by an Eagle since Tim Camp blocked a West Georgia punt in the 2007 season-opener... The announced attendance was 18,225... Austin Peay held the ball 33:49 to 26:11 for the Eagles... Covington’s other career-high tackle total was last year against South Dakota State... Shippy finished with five tackles. In addition, he, Beard and Wylie had 1.5 tackles for a loss.