HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- With a nod toward the likely historic achievement that will be Jimmie Johnson's fourth consecutive Cup championship barring unforeseen developments, Brian France faced the media Friday at Homestead-Miami Speedway and answered a wide spectrum of questions regarding the state of NASCAR.

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Clearly the sponsorship market is tougher than it's ever been in my memory. I don't anticipate that getting remarkably better -- although I will tell you we are starting to see the inquiries through our New York group and the teams who do the selling of our sport. I'm starting to feel the ice thaw on that.

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-- BRIAN FRANCE

France, chairman and CEO of NASCAR, applauded the historic accomplishment that will be Johnson's if he can finish 25th or better in Sunday's Ford 400. France downplayed criticism by those who seem upset or bored by the fact that Johnson has beaten down the competition in such dominant fashion the past four seasons.

"I'm sure every sport has had that dilemma of watching a dominant performance occur at the expense of smaller teams or others," France said. "Those are always questions that you would ask -- as to how do you get to the perfect world? All I can say is what is here upon us -- and it's historic. It's an incredible achievement that Jimmie is putting forward in NASCAR. That's what is before us."

Despite the fact that attendance figures at events are down at least 10 percent overall, television ratings have generally been down and corporate sponsorship involvement has sagged, France insisted that NASCAR is strong, its future bright.

The struggling economy has been blamed by France and other NASCAR officials for the overall drop in attendance at races.

As for the drop in TV ratings, France said: "There are literally a dozen different things that factor into that. I won't get into all of them. Needless to say, if you're a sport that has rising rates or slightly declining rates, you want to be mindful of all of those things and do the best you can to help drive interest in your sport. We're going to do all those things that we possibly can and more.

"You measure it over a very long time, and you work on the things that, as I said, can create more interest and create more viewers and, frankly, create more people going to events, more people buying merchandise, more people interested in NASCAR in general. That's a core, fundamental issue that we take very seriously. We're going to spend a lot of time in the offseason seeing how we can improve. I think any sport league does that. I think that's a cornerstone of the popularity of a league over time."

With as many as five teams that have run a full schedule this season either going away altogether or planning to scale back significantly, France admitted that he would like to see more corporate dollars flowing into the sport. But he also admitted that isn't likely to occur anytime soon.

"We had these same conversations about this at the same time last year when the economy was worse, and there are always teams at this time of year that are under-funded, looking for sponsorship. That's not anything new," France said.

"Clearly the sponsorship market is tougher than it's ever been in my memory. I don't anticipate that getting remarkably better -- although I will tell you we are starting to see the inquiries through our New York group and the teams who do the selling of our sport. I'm starting to feel the ice thaw on that. There are companies who are very close to joining us on one level or another. It doesn't mean it will be all perfect from the sponsorship standpoint and everyone will have everything they want."

Champion's Week

• Schedule released
• NASCAR Foundation auction
• Tweet2Vegas contest
• Fans can get tickets

France also commented on two hotly-debated, controversial subjects that were at the forefront in the 2009 -- NASCAR's drug-testing policy that came under fire when it was challenged by suspended driver Jeremy Mayfield; and intense driver criticism on the dangers presented by races at Talladega Superspeedway.

"On the drug policy, we believe we made the right decisions to make an already tough policy even more tough," France said. "We think we have to do that due to the circumstances that go on in the country today, and in sports in general. We have a 200 mile an hour race car. We felt it was very imperative that we improve our policy, which we did. We will stand behind that very clearly."

As for Talladega, France said races there always face scrutiny and that the governing body attempts to learn from and improve on each event that is held at the facility. But he also made it clear that NASCAR will be reluctant to make too many changes to races that have proven popular with the fans.

"Those are our signature races, no question about it -- starting with the Daytona 500, going to the Pepsi 400 (at Daytona International Speedway in July) and going to Talladega twice," France said. "Those are the highest-rated television races, and we've got to make certain the racing is safe for sure. And then we need to make sure it's a typical Daytona-Talladega kind of race, and that's what we work on."

France also conceded that while there are no immediate plans to shorten NASCAR's lengthy schedule -- which runs 38 weeks long when two non-points events are included -- he did not rule out possibly looking into shortening the length of some individual races.

"We've done that in the past at Dover, some other places. We have done that when that makes sense," France said. "We wouldn't just cut the laps back or the distance back unless we thought it would make a big difference [to the fans]."