March 19, 2003

The 2003 Hokie Car

At 11 a.m. today, March 19, Virginia Governor Mark Warner will join representatives from four Commonwealth universities in Richmond to unveil Go Team VA, a joint venture between NASCAR driver Hermie Sadler, Sadler Motorsports, Inc., and some of the state's public universities.

For five Winston Cup races in Virginia this season, Sadler will donate the sponsorship of his car to a different school. Virginia Tech will receive two cars, one in this weekend's March 23 race at Bristol and the other at Martinsville on Oct. 19, while James Madison, Virginia Commonwealth and UVa will all receive one race.

While the universities will be the primary sponsors of the car, any money they raise from selling associate sponsorships will go to that school's general scholarship fund.

"I'm really looking forward to this, both as a race fan myself and as a college sports fan," Sadler said. "It's going to be an honor and a privilege and a lot of fun to ride around and Parade these colors that mean so much to so many people."

Sadler and the schools have all contributed to the Go Team VA website, http://www.goteamva.com/, where fans of the universities, NASCAR and Sadler can sign up for memberships and become a part of Go Team VA. All members receive a membership card, a Go Team VA hat and T-shirt. All members are also automatically entered into special promotional drawings. Those special giveaways include backstage passes to selected concerts, tickets to wrestling events, pit passes for races, dinners with racing personalities and a round of golf with the Sadler brothers. The cost of membership is $75 per person, and students from one of the four participating universities can join for $65.

"The goteamva.com program is going to have things available not only for our solid hard core race fans, but also lots of other things," Sadler said. "We're going to give away trips to basketball games, opportunities to stand on the sidelines during college football games, guitars from country music artists, wrestling tickets - we're going to have things that get the attention of lots of people."

Sadler and his team view the agreement as a tradeoff. He basically donates these sponsorships to the schools, and in return, he receives a great deal of exposure and support from the schools involved and their fans.

That exposure starts with the unveiling ceremony and will continue on Thursday, March 20 in Blacksburg.

Tech's team in charge of marketing the car has organized a promotion on the drillfield featuring Sadler and the show car. Sadler will be signing autographs and his team will be bringing a NASCAR simulator. Coke will be providing drinks Sycamore Deli will supply food. Various local companies have donated prizes for giveaways. Both 105.3 The Bear and 107.1 PSK will broadcast live from the event.

The event will start at 10:30 a.m. and go to 1:30. In the event of rain, Sadler and the other attractions will set up in front of the on-campus University Bookstore.

Beyond the big promotional event, die-cast models of the new Hokie car will be produced and sold at various locations around Blacksburg and at Toys R Us stores nationwide.

"We really have high expectations and I think the schools do, too," Sadler said. "I don't think it's unreasonable that if the program takes off and everyone does their part to promote it, that in time this could blossom into a 15-or 20-race deal. Maybe even a full schedule deal. So it really depends on how well we market it and promote it and how well the fans respond to it."

But as Sadler points out, the key to that is getting the memberships to Go Team VA, and he hopes that the many special promotions being offered on the page will help attract those memberships.

This is Tech's second venture into NASCAR. In 2000, Tech sponsored Hermie's brother, Elliot, in a night race at Richmond, becoming the first university to sponsor a driver in a Winston Cup event.