Xtremeracing

Panasonic will be one of the Major sponsors for the KW World Championship. Also for the up coming 2007 season... More detail will be on the SBI/APBA web. site shortly. Panasonic is one of the largest Corp. sponsors in the history of Offshore Racing. Look for some great things coming soon ... They will be a major player in the up coming race in Feb. for the Super Bowl.

BJM

WOW, you guys are doing big things @ SBI. One MAJOR announcement after another! Keep up the great work!

Xtremeracing

Thanks BJ, hopefully it will be good for all of Offshore racing....

AugiePensa

Man, that's great! Congrats.

Qball

Frank, first of all....congrats to SBI for hooking the sponsor. Now down to business.... what is the panasonic sponsorship going to do for the racers? Better TV? more prize money? no entry fee's? travel money? has anything been spoken about yet? With such a MAJOR sponsor it should have great affects for the racers..... once again congrats.

Xtremeracing

Thanks guys this is just the beginning of alot more to come hopefully. Like I have said in the past hopefully this will help all of Offshore and better the sport.

Qball

Steve.... I totally disagree with you. My sponsors could care less that panasonic is a MAJOR sponsor. The way you attract new sponsors is to offer them something for their money like TV, large crowds, and product recognition. If everyone works together then everyone wins. Example: panasonic comes in with $$$...some of that is passed onto the people who really put the show on (the racers) to lower the cost to race(entry fee's, tow money , etc.) and more boat will show up for a bigger show. The rest is used by the organization to promote/run the "business" with new TV, product recognition, salaries etc. That will also lead into more boats/quality boats and show. The better the quality of show the better chance of growing. It's called reinvestment into your business. It's like Nascar......started off as a small business, they put out a great product that people were interested in, reinvested money into the business & the racers, obtained huge sponsors and a gigantic following. I don't think this is a hard concept to follow.....but maybe I'm wrong. So I ask again....what is it going to do for the racers?

Qball

With my mentality.......wow....steve....I thought you were higher than throwing out insults...guess not.....why are you so mad?

I'm a little confused......maybe you can clear this up for me because someone with my mentality just does not understand......
How is a large sponsor for an organization going to help me if it is not invested back into the infrastructure (TV, media, product recognintion, etc).

Who would be asking for 20k? It's amazing how no entry fee's can grow an organization.....start off with baby steps and grow it. If you offer free entry fee's then maybe you get a consistent 10 boats more per race. Then when the next MAJOR sponsor comes along the orgaization can say here is our program.....its growing larger by the week....the new sponsor jumps on the band wagon with more $$ for the organization...it's a give and take proposition.

It's like growing a business off other peoples backs and asking them to pay to do so. Give back and make them happy and they will stay FOREVER.

AugiePensa

Guy's, I'm not gonna get into tap dancing with anyone but just a little heads up. Please leave OPA/The Jersey Boyz out of any conflict, we are doing our own thing to bring the Northeast back to it's former glory in Offshore, Racing and making it affordable for us racers with small pockets to enjoy all the thrills as everyone else. I understand both comments and agree with both sides but if you want me to run your logo on my boat it cost. Q-Ball, it would be GREAT for them to throw back a little something to the racers but then again there are so many bills to running a race. Oh, and if anyone thinks it's EASY running OPA...WRONG! If anyone thinks it's east to get a sponsor for the event...WRONG AGAIN!!! Maybe someday.

FeverMike

My.02 cents....when something good happens for the sport in general someone always seems to try and bring it down. SBI/APBA is doing it's thing and is not going away. I can just imagine with the Panasonic deal that they would use some exciting racing footage as a promo spot for there HDTV's at home theater shows and on the sales floor in stores. How's that gonna hurt your sport? I do not know what this deal between Panasonic and SBI/APBA entails any neither do you Qball so why all the negitive comments towards this? If Panasonic kicks some money to SBI/APBA and they use that money to keep there product running and putting on races and improving then how does that hurt the sport or it's racers?