Nascar Silicon Motor Speedway
[ Home ] [ Up ] [ Design & Construction ] [ Downtown Waterfront ] [ Festival Bay ] [ Flying the Friendly Skies of Airport Retail ] [ Iafec Corner ] [ Jekyll & Hide Club ] [ Letters, E-mail, Fax ] [ Mall Makeover ] [ Nascar Silicon Motor Speedway ] [ Networking in Box ] [ Observations & Conversations ] [ Ocean Walk Village ] [ October 1999 ] [ Opportunities ] [ Porto Cima ] [ Prominent Players ] [ Scottsdale Waterfront ] [ Simply  Books Sets The Trend ] [ Sponsorships ] [ Transactions ] [ Two Cents Worth ]

Up

Sounds like a scene from a Winston Cup race, right? But this scenario is being played out at a NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway™, a division of Campbell, California-based Silicon Entertainment and one of the hottest new entertainment venues in the United States. Just as its simulated racecars roar to life, Silicon Entertainment thundered onto the entertainment scene just over two years ago and has been running victory laps ever since.

The first of the interactive indoor race driving centers opened at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota in September 1997. In less than two years, the concept clocked more than one million races, and four more Speedways opened at Woodfield shopping center in Schaumburg, IL; the Galleria in Dallas, Texas; Irvine Spectrum Center, Irvine, California; and Palisades Center, West Nyack, New York. Existing Speedways are so popular that reservations are recommended to avoid the up-to-six-hour waits to drive. The simulated racing experience offered by Silicon seems so real and has so captured the imagination of the American public that competive leagues and teams have been formed across the country.

In a nutshell, NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedways have marked a new era in high-tech entertainment at malls and shopping centers. Part of the reason is that they are much more than a mere arcade, offering thrills, chills and spills in the excitement of seemingly real racing with cutting-edge computer technology. As the San Jose Mercury News reported, “Just like a good amusement park ride, it can get you screaming and leave you soaked with sweat. Just like a good video game, it’s an easy concept for the beginner but rewards serious players with increasing sophistication and almost endless variations. And just like a NASCAR race, it’s noisy, full of bright colors and just might end with a crash....” Road and Track Magazine says the concept is “the ultimate attraction for the stock-car racer lurking in all of us.”

NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway maintains an exclusive licensing agreement with NASCAR (National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing), which provides what is widely held to be the fastest growing spectator sport in the country. Silicon Speedways feature state-of-the-art stock car simulators that offer all the excitement of authentic NASCAR racing. The race cars seat both a driver and an in-car crew member, or spotter, providing older teens, adults and family groups the opportunity to experience the thrills of racing head-to-head, wheel-to-wheel at nearly 200 miles per hour. Each simulator resembles an authentic stock car. The race car is mounted on a responsive platform, has racing seats, seat belts, five 3-D display systems, and realistic working controls with a four-speed shift, clutch, brake, accelerator and feedback steering. Each car also has a multi-channel audio system with 3-D sound and simulated radio communications links.

“New technology allows us to replicate, in high fidelity, the complex and thrilling experience of actually driving 195 miles per hour in real stock car race conditions,” explains Rick Moncrief, chief technical officer of Silicon Entertainment. To create this authenticity, Silicon Entertainment turned to some of the biggest names in racing for technical advice. “We’ve worked with NASCAR Winston Cup drivers to create an experience that is close to what they experience every weekend,” explains David Morse, chairman and CEO of the company.

Lifelike racecars seat a driver and an
in-car crew member. High-speed racing action is projected in real time onto five screens
surrounding each car.

NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway’s official drivers include champion NASCAR Winston Cup drivers Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Dale Jarrett, Rusty Wallace, Bobby Labonte, Michael Waltrip, Kenny Irwin and Jeremy Mayfield. These team drivers, along with two-time Indianapolis 500 champion Arie Luyendyk, are involved with the Speedway as stockholders and technical advisors, offering feedback and advice on how to accurately duplicate the feel of driving a NASCAR Winston Cup race car. They also make regular personal appearances at Speedway locations and get behind a wheel while they are there. Prior to a celeb appearance, special competitions are held for local players.

The winners of those competitions then get to race, in a startlingly lifelike competition, against a real NASCAR champ.

“People will love the NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway,” says Rusty Wallace, 1989 NASCAR Winston Cup champion. “They’ll have a great time, it’s a great thing for the family, and it’s a lot of entertainment for everybody from age eight to 80,” he adds. “It’s awesome, incredible, the closest thing to real racing I’ve ever seen.”

The other pros are equally impressed. “It’s hard to believe I wasn’t actually on the track,” comments Jeff Gordon, current and three-time NASCAR Winston Cup champ. “This is no video game,” says seven-time Winston champ Dale Earnhardt, adding, “These simulators drive like real cars.” And two-time Daytona 500 winner Dale Jarrett says he is amazed at how competitive a simulated race can get. “I felt like I was fighting for every inch of track, not unlike any Sunday in a NASCAR Winston Cup race,” he describes.

But since these drivers have a stake in the success of the concept, perhaps it is more important to hear what customers have to say about it. Fifteen-year-old Paul Ihn, Jr. drives to the Mall of America from Hudson, Wisconsin to race at the Silcon Speedway. He was driving when the flag dropped on the millionth race for Silicon. “I’ve been racing since the Speedway opened,” he recounts. “I love it and so do my brother and my friends. My dad loves it, too. He even takes his clients there to race.” Ihn says he goes to the Speedway a couple of times a month and drives in at least two races each time. He is a member of the racing center’s Drivers Club and admits he’s become a real NASCAR fan. “Now I watch NASCAR races on TV, something I never did before,” he says.

About a year ago, Nick Dimarakis, a 31-year-old American Airlines employee, read about the new NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway opening in Woodfield Shopping Center near Chicago. Since it wasn’t far from his home in Niles, Illinois, he thought he’d check it out. After one spin on the simulated track, he says he got hooked on the intense, interactive racing competition, became a die-hard NASCAR fan, and made a whole circle of new friends. He entered the first-ever interactive race driving championship, Silicon’s 1998 3Dfx Cup, winning a free trip to Dallas to compete in the rookie division finals. This year, he took top honors overall in Silicon’s second interactive contest after posting the fastest lap time, 27.936 seconds, between May 24 and June 27, 1999, earning him a weekend trip for two to Atlanta in November. The trip includes round-trip airfare, two race tickets to the Napa 500 NASCAR Winston Cup Series race on November 21, and a two-night stay at the Ritz Carlton, Atlanta.

“Before I tried NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway, I was a drag-racing fan and my girlfriend wasn’t interested in NASCAR racing at all,” he remembers. “The new Speedway really got my attention. It was so real and so cool to race and really cool to win.

Each Speedway houses 10-12 simulators, although, depending on the location, there can be as many as 14 or as few as eight. Fans race against simulators driven by other players and eight computerized racing “drones.” All are computer-linked to each other to add to the lifelike, pulse-quickening competition, which includes the door-banging, banking and bumping that would really go along with blistering along at 200 miles per hour. As in a real race, the actions of one driver affect all other drivers. The high-speed racing action is projected in real time onto five screens that place the car and driver squarely in the middle of the track. Three big screens wrap around the car, stretching from the driver’s window across the full front to the passenger side window. Another built-in video screen serves as a rearview mirror and allows the driver to monitor the position and activity of race cars approaching from the rear. Players will soon be able to customize their cars by varying the set-up for better handling, including adjusting tire pressure, suspension settings and weight distribution.

The passenger/crew member riding with a the driver acts as a “spotter,” providing the driver with the same information that an actual spotter provides in a real race. Using a fifth built-in video monitor in the crew-side dashboard, the spotter can tell the driver to “go high” or “go low” on the track to avoid an accident and can relay other technical information to help the driver win. The crew member can also monitor the race car’s RPMs, MPH, lap speed, lap times and laps remaining, telling the driver how many seconds behind the leader they are, the driver’s current gear shift position, and the amount of engine throttle available.

Spectators also have the chance to participate in the action. Fans who prefer not to drive can view the race from trackside grandstands where they can interact with the drivers and monitor each car’s progress in a race. In short, Silicon Speedways are designed for people with more than just quarters in their jeans who are looking for another arcade game. They offer a heart-pounding experience with enough excitement and razzle-dazzle to entertain even people who don’t drive.

Silicon Entertainment officials think the timing is right to take advantage of emerging high-tech capabilities and an entertainment market in transition. “The market for fun, interesting, retail entertainment attractions is on an upswing,” says Morse. “We’ve designed something brand-new for people who want more than just a video game for the discretionary entertainment dollar.” Pointing the the first generation of “gamers” who grew up with computer-generated forms of entertainment, Morse adds that those players have matured and are willing to spend leisure-time dollars on new high-tech entertainment designed for the whole family. “The NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway is something they can’t get anywhere else,” he feels.

Future plans include increasing use of technology. Eventually, all Silicon Speedway sites will be computer-linked and drivers in one location will be able to compete against others in other locations in the same race at the same time. Silicon Entertainment is also working on technology that will enable players at home to race with Speedway center races in real time, leading the way for Silicon to be the sanctioning body for interactive racing on the Internet.

To fuel even more widespread interest, Silicon is developing a state-of-the-art Web site, smsonline.com, to converge an enthusiastic online community of fans with its dynamic racing centers. Chris Morse, Silicon Entertainment vice president of marketing and business development, says, “We intend to enhance smsonline.com and build upon the community of our racing customers by providing online opportunities to discuss our competitions and racing exeriences. We also intend to offer customers who purchase our proprietary software and subscribe to our online services the ability, from a personal computer, to download replays of races, customize their car set-ups, view live racing at our racing centers, and race against customers at the racing centers.”

At Speedway racing centers, drivers pay $8 to race and passenger/spotters pay $2.50 to ride along. Each driving experience, from the pre-race drivers’ meeting, through the pulse-altering, eye-popping, interactive stock car race, to the Winner’s Circle for official race results, is 20 minutes of pure fantasy and fun entertainment. Friends and family members participate in the racing action as close-up spectators at no charge. Each racing center also includes a retail section offering authentic NASCAR racing merchandise and die cast collectibles from Action Performance.

NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway opened its sixth location in September at Concord Mills near Charlotte, North Carolina. New locations are under development and scheduled to open by the end of the year at Universal CityWalk in Los Angeles, California; Katy Mills near Houston, Texas; the Mall of Georgia in Atlanta, Georgia; and super regional malls in Syracuse, Buffalo, and Albany, New York. Leases are being finalized for new racing centers in Grand Rapids, Michigan; an additional site in Atlanta; and Birmingham, Alabama. Leases have been signed and locations are scheduled to open during 2000 at Opry Mills in Nashville, Tennessee and at Peabody Place in Memphis.

Russell Friend, Silicon Entertainment vice president of real estate, says, “The real estate community has embraced this concept due to the fact that the NASCAR Silicon Motor Speedway is representative of a very unique entertainment component complimenting the traditional shopping experience. This concept is adaptable to fit into a traditional retail space unlike some of the larger location-based entertainment restaurant concepts who require anywhere from three to ten times the leasable area as our concept. We’ve established great relationships with some of the country’s top shopping center developers and owners, including Simon Property Group, Mills Corporation, Pyramid Companies, General Growth, Belz Enterprises, and CBL Associates.”

Silicon Entertainment plans to open 20-30 new racing centers across the country over the next 24 months. Friend says, “We have been focused this year on nailing down sites in markets heavy in NASCAR customers,” adding that he reviews Nielsen ratings to target areas with high NASCAR event viewing scores. States where the TV-viewing population has indicated an interest in NASCAR racing include North and South Carolina, Tennessee, Northern Florida, Georgia, Virginia, upstate New York, Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Indiana, Missouri, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Colorado. Substantial tenant improvements are sought, but Friend says the he is willing to pay a higher rental rate for a good location. Silicon Entertainment uses in-house designers and construction teams, but does hire local contractors.

The company seeks spaces ranging from 4,000 sq.ft. to 8,000 sq.ft. in regional malls with attached theaters of 2,500 seats or more. Friend says he is particularly interested in locations where the theater entrance is inside the mall and there are surrounding restaurants with a bar crowd and late-night activity. These situations create heavy cross traffic between the venues; because of the popularity of the racing centers, long waits for driving times are typical for walk-in patrons, who need another activity to fill time. Conversely, the Speedways’ powerful draw creates a high traffic volume for surrounding retailers.

For more information, contact Russell Friend, vice president of real estate, Silicon Entertainment, 210 Hacienda Avenue, Campbell, CA 95008; 408-364-6710, ext. 449, Fax 408-364-6724; homepage: www.smsonline.com.