NASCAR reporter, Orlando

The same school that give Orlando Emily Badger, if I recall correctly

 

If that's the case, she should be taking prep agate...

 

I applied for this the week that it came out and got a rejection e-mail less than a week later. It sucks because I really want to get into NASCAR coverage (something I don't seem to hear too often in the biz) and I do have a little experience covering the sport (did a few Daytona races in the past). I thought I'd be a good catch, being young with decent experience but I can't seem to get away from little community papers. I think that's haunting me.

 

Pay special attention to the jobs posted in North Carolina or Virginia or really anywhere with a track nearby. Take a place like Danville, Va. It's 20 minutes from Martinsville and covers the hell out of the two Cup weekends. Then there are a handful of other semi-big races at Martinsville during the year and a Weekly Series track also in the coverage area. You could get some nice racing clips there.

I know a guy that worked at a small 6-day daily in North Carolina. He was really into racing and because he had every Sunday off and was within driving distance of Charlotte, Darlington, Martinsville, Richmond, etc. he covered a lot of Cup races on his own time.

 

I did that with the NFL one season. Covered every home game for our local team at the time, because we had a season pass and I had the day off. On my own time, but the experience was invaluable.

 

Don't overlook doing stuff at smaller tracks either. If you have a local track with Saturday night racing nearby, look at doing stuff on it. Usually, the drivers there have a lot of great stories to tell and love it when someone comes to do a story on them.

Don't limit yourself to just stock car racing either. Covering an NHRA or IHRA event is a lot of fun, drivers are fun to deal with and it can lend a different perspective toward auto racing overall.

 

Good idea, but -- and a few people on here will prolly echo this -- stay away from any job openings at the Martinsville (Va.) Bulletin ...

 

This position hasn't been filled yet. She's just filling in, along with Tim Povtak.

 

Following up on what playthrough said...
I am heading for my third straight Cup weekend at Las Vegas in two weeks (stoked, of course!), but I also do both NHRA stops when they hit Vegas (can only do the Sunday of October's weekend on my dime, but that's okay), and the Truck Series race when it hits Vegas every September.
I also did the LeMans Series race in Tooele (near Salt Lake City), but that had to stop because it conflicted with other stuff our paper was doing.
But the real kick for me is that I am flying to Infineon Raceway for the Cup weekend there in June. My first exposure to NASCAR came there in June of '02, and I did it for three years.
It's on my dime, but to me, being there is worth every penny and I can freak a few of my old colleagues out, which is cool.
I don't think I'm going to try for this job in Orlando (you think I should? I've got plenty of racing-related stuff), but I just wanted to share my portion of the story.

Thanks!

 

School has a pipeline as thick as my wood into Tribune company.

Mostly, really top-notch peeps.

The racing writing, however, has been milquetoast... at best... the past week.

 

Anyone know what Hinton is doing? Has he been seen around at Daytona?