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Both the online sportsbooks and Las Vegas establishments are counting on NASCAR betting, and to fuel those bets they are hopeful that Danica Patrick will at some point begin to make an impact. To date, odds have not been offered on Patrick, but that could change soon. Patrick is expected to do for NASCAR what Tiger Wood has done for golf.
Saturday's Sam's Town 300 Nationwide Series race will end the first phase of Patrick's NASCAR tutorial before she focuses on her day job as an Izod IndyCar Series driver with Andretti Autosport, with whom she spent testing Wednesday and Thursday at Barber Motorsports Park in Alabama, USA Today reports.
Meanwhile, the bookies are licking their chops.
Since the 1990's, NASCAR has moved from a regional to national sport, passing the NHL in popularity and trailing only football, basketball, and baseball when it comes to TV audience and merchandise sales, according to Ryan McGee of ESPN.com.
People who run the sportsbooks hope the sport is still in its infancy.
"It's just not a huge draw," a Vegas sports book window attendant told me last fall, asking not to be identified because "the bosses don't like us to talk too much". "We'll get a long line early the morning of our race here in Vegas, fans before they head out to the track. It's cute, everyone all dressed up in their NASCAR gear. But year round, it's nothing compared to other sports."
"We have grown every year in NASCAR wagering," Las Vegas Hilton Race and Super Sports Book Manager Sam Salmon says. "Our odds to win handle has increased an amazing amount from when we started in June of 2004. (He was at the Imperial Palace for twelve years prior.) We not only offer odds and matchups for every Cup race, we also offer group matchups, where you pick the winner among four drivers listed in a group."
Online, the over a decade old BetUS.com was offering future odds on the two main racing events for the weekend including the 300 Nationwide Series here
Dan Shapiro, Gambling911.com
