NASCAR released its new policies on betting Monday, putting into place a new policy that will prohibit those closely associated with the sport from wagering on it.
Under the new rules, drivers, team members and NASCAR officials are all banned from gambling on series events, with penalties that the be as severe as a $200,000 fine or termination from the company.
NASCAR Updates Rules Following PASPA Repeal
The rules, which were drafted with the help of Sportradar Integrity Servies, also prohibit NASCAR drivers and employees from sharing any confidential information to help others make bets on races.
“NASCAR Members shall not engage, nor attempt to engage, in any legal or illegal gambling activity relating to any [NASCAR event],†the new rules read. “The Rule applies to all gambling activities, including without limitation, those available in any gaming facility, casino, lottery gaming facility, race track gaming facility, on the internet or electronically, or in all other establishments and locations.â€
The sweeping new rules are a reaction to the May 2018 decision by the Supreme Court which struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA), the federal law that had prevented states from passing new sports betting regulations. Since then, several states have joined Nevada in offering legalized sports betting, with several more considering doing so in 2019.
New Rules Remove Ambiguity
It wasn’t as though NASCAR had no policy in place before now. However, the old rules were vague, only explicitly outlawing betting by company employees, and not mentioning drivers or team members. While officials were confident that any attempt to influence a race would be covered by rules that prevented “actions detrimental to racing,†they felt the expansion of sports betting merited more precise language in their rule book.
The subject of how such a policy would work came up when the NASCAR Cup Series came to Delaware, the first state that began offering full sports betting in 2018. That meant that fans and gamblers were able to place their bets right at Dover International Speedway, where an on-site betting kiosk offered a range of wagers on an October playoff race held there.
“For ’19 we’ll have some rules that we’ll put in place,†NASCAR president Steve Phelps said last October before the race at Dover. “For right now, there’ll be betting here. We’ll study and see how that goes, but I think we’ll have some rules in place for sponsorship, for what betting looks like and continue to see what happens in the landscape overall.â€
NASCAR Sees Benefits, Dangers from Betting
Like many other sports, NASCAR would like to protect the integrity of its events while also capitalizing on the opportunities presented by legalized betting. The hope is that betting will improve fan engagement, which in turn could help improve sagging attendance and television ratings figures. However, NASCAR represents only a very small fraction of the overall sports betting market, with a report by the News Journal last year saying that the racing series generated less than 0.2 percent of the total handle at sportsbooks in Delaware.