Club racers rev up automakers' interest
IRVINE, Calif. -- Like any other working stiff, Jason Isley commutes to the office in his sporty coupe during the week.
But come Friday, he wrestles the baby carrier out of the back seat of the Mazda RX-8, wrenches on a set of extra-grippy tires and slaps some magnetic racing numbers on the sides. Plop on a helmet, and the transformation is complete: family man to top-performing race car driver.
Isley and his wife, Jennifer, are among the nation's thousands of amateur racers. And automakers are increasingly paying more attention to Walter Mitty types such as the Isleys.
Auto companies offer discounts, prize money, free technical advice and sometimes even cars to amateur racers, not just professionals. While club racers don't generate the headlines of the professionals, their competition creates lots of goodwill, brand loyalty, positive word of mouth and the envy of their more pedestrian workmates — all of which helps sell cars and burnish brand image.
Few automakers are as deeply involved with amateurs as Mazda.
"We're here to help people race," said Robert Davis, a senior vice president for Mazda's North America operation, at a press event here last month. "Our core values are to have as many people racing Mazdas as possible."
Mazda claims 9,000 racers and says more of its cars zoom around road-race tracks on any given weekend than any other nameplate.
"It sells cars. There's not a doubt that Mazda is the predominant car out there," says Isley, 34, who works as an editor for SportsCar magazine during the week.
Isley started racing in 1993 after he traded in his Pontiac Firebird for a Chevrolet Corvette. He eventually turned to a Sports Car Club of America series called autocross, which involves racing against the clock through a cone course rather than against other drivers.
Along the way, he met his future wife when she came to race her Mazda Miata in 1994. They and daughter Jessica, 2, live in the Ladera Ranch section of Orange County, Calif.
Autocross rewards driving finesse and the car's handling more than flat-out power. Isley says his wife has beaten him three times in events in which they have both participated.
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