MAY 21, 2002

NASCAR shows the way

NASCAR is to help fund a school which will train professional automotive service technicians.

NASCAR is to help fund a school which will train professional automotive service technicians. The NASCAR Technical Institute is a joint venture between NASCAR and the Universal Technical Institute and intends to prepare around 1900 students each year for work in the automotive sector. The school, which will employ around 150 people, is costing $12m to establish but it is certain to produce some of the hundreds of engineers and mechanics who will be needed in the sport in the future.

At the moment there are only a handful of motor racing-related courses in Britain and one of the biggest problems the industry is suffering is lack of good, experienced people. This has led the big teams coming in and poaching the best people which is turn has forced up staff costs, which are one of the major factors in running any racing team. A bigger and better supply of trained technicians has got to be good for the sport in general.