As manufacturers teeter, race teams watch, wait

As April Fool's pranks go, it cut a little too close to the bone. A fake story posted last Wednesday by Car and Driver magazine, which claimed that President Barack Obama had ordered financially strapped carmakers General Motors and Chrysler to drop their support of NASCAR, wasn't exactly received in a spirit of good humor. In a garage area where sponsors are in short supply, several teams have suspended operations, layoffs have been rampant and even sanctioned testing has been banned to save cash, it was seen as tasteless piling on.

Auto industry blues

CNN's Michael Jones and NASCAR.COM's Mark Aumann discuss how the automakers' troubles may impact NASCAR.

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• The impact of the testing ban
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But the prank only underscored real concerns over the uncertainty faced by auto manufacturers in NASCAR. Chrysler, whose Dodge nameplate backs eight cars in the Sprint Cup Series, was classified as a nonviable standalone company by a White House task force and given 30 days to work out an agreement with Italian automaker Fiat. The stakes are even bigger at GM, whose Chevrolet brand name is carried by 17 cars on NASCAR's top level. GM's chairman was recently removed at the behest of the president, and the company was given 60 days to put forth an acceptable restructuring plan. For both manufacturers, bankruptcy is a very real possibility.

Manufacturers play a very public role in today's NASCAR, supplying varying degrees of equipment, technical support, and cash to their affiliated race teams. They're also closely tied with race tracks, many of which have sponsorship deals with manufacturers that involve money and vehicles changing hands in return for exclusive promotional rights. They advertise on event telecasts, sponsor races, sign on as official NASCAR sponsors, and in a few rare cases -- such as with the Wood Brothers' Motorcraft-backed car or the former Dodge-backed vehicle at Gillett Evernham Motorsports -- sponsor race cars themselves.

It's a symbiotic relationship, with the manufacturers supplying teams with some of the parts, money and technology that it takes to win on NASCAR's national circuits. But what happens if one or more of those carmakers falls into bankruptcy? What happens if the president really does order them out of NASCAR? What happens if one disappears altogether? In such an unprecedented environment, no one is really sure. But that doesn't mean teams aren't bracing for the worst.

"I think the climate that we're in today, it would be poor business to not look at the worst-case scenarios," said Jeff Burton, who drives a Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing. "That's not to say that we believe a worst-case scenario is coming, but if you turn the news on, you can't help but notice that it needs to have attention paid to it. Not only from that standpoint, but from the entire company standpoint with all of its sponsors and all of its partners. Our sport is driven by sponsors and fans being able to participate, and when the economy gets bad, it gets harder for those two groups to participate. I think that throughout the company, we have to be looking at worst-case scenarios. I don't think we have an option."

Complicating the situation is the fact that the amount of manufacturer money received by teams is one of those closely guarded state secrets, like how much drivers are paid. The amounts can vary greatly from one organization to the next, with more successful or higher-profile organizations receiving the lion's share, and small teams getting little to none. All teams want cash, but some may have to make due with a little time in a wind tunnel or on a manufacturer's seven-post rig. (Continued)