DIVERSITY Ex-NFL player pushing for blacks

Joe Gibbs Racing is a big private player in NASCAR's move to include minorities.
By MIKE HARRIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
After several failed attempts, NASCAR is trying again to bring more ethnic diversity to auto racing. This time, former NFL All-Pro Reggie White is lending a hand.
Two new programs will use the stock car sanctioning body's weekly late-model series to help minority drivers and crewmen find a place in the sport.
Access Marketing and Communications, in a partnership with NASCAR, will begin a training program in 2004 called "Drive for Diversity" to find rides for four drivers and up to 12 crewmen in the NASCAR Dodge Weekly Series.
Weekend program
In the other program, White, with help from Joe Gibbs Racing, has formed a team that will race one minority driver in a Friday night series and another in a Saturday night series at tracks in North and South Carolina.
"We're out selling this the same as if we were a competitive team," said Daryl Stewart, general manager of Access, a public relations company. "NASCAR doesn't write the checks. All this is going to be sponsored with corporate money."
The newly formed Reggie White Motorsports with Joe Gibbs Racing has primary sponsors signed for both of its cars for 2004, although the team is still looking for associate sponsors.
Steve de Souza, vice president for Busch operations at Joe Gibbs Racing, is overseeing the new program. He said White, and Joe Gibbs and his son, J.D., are committed to making the program work and will make up any shortfall in the budget for next season.
And they will be working with Access on the project.
"That is the group that's going to be promoting and utilizing this as a template," de Souza said.
NASCAR has grown in popularity over the past 10 years. It has a $2.6 billion TV contract that has helped the stock car sport reach millions more people and will become even more mainstream next season when Nextel replaces Winston as the sponsor of its top series.
Time is right
"Diversity has become a very visible and important issue in our sport," NASCAR spokesman Terrence Burns said. "The time is right for a very serious program that will be part of the foundation of the sport in the future."
In its search for new markets, the Southern-born sport wants to shed the last vestiges of its Good Ol' Boy image and reach out to blacks, Hispanics and other minorities who can buy tickets, watch races on TV or use its sponsors' products.
The key to attracting such new markets may well be finding a successful competitor that appeals to them, like Tiger Woods in golf.
There is only one black team owner, Sam Belnavis, and only a handful of minority crewman in NASCAR's top series.
The new programs come at a time another one is ending in a sport that has had trouble finding funding for such initiatives.
Dodge announced that its diversity program will not return next year, meaning that Dodge driver Bill Lester, who is black, has no sponsor for his truck team. The Dodge program was responsible for placing Lester and several black crew members.
Wendell Scott is the only black driver to win at NASCAR's highest level, in 1963, but his career did not pave the way for other minorities.
Stewart said Access will get resumes from drivers in the next week or two, pick the top candidates and test them on tracks before making final selections.
Some crew members will be recruited from traditionally black schools, like North Carolina A & amp;T, which already has a training program. Stewart said Access is also asking established NASCAR teams to provide mentors to coach and advise the selected drivers and the crewmen.