myracingclub

Following the success of internet-based fan consortium myfootballclub look what's appeared: myracingclub.com. It's a nice and flashy looking website, but what's it all about, is it viable, or is it some sort of scam?

The concept is simple: members are invited to sign up, pay around £40 for their "stake" which is then used to fund the buyout of a team. Members don't have to pay immediately - once a certain threshold of intended members has been reached (50,000 in myfootballclub's case) members are given time to pay up the membership fee which will allow the company to have funds to purchase their intended target. If the funds or members fall short the money is, in theory, refunded. In myfootballclub's case, that team was non-league Ebbsfleet United FC, winners of this year's FA Trophy. Football purists may not have liked the idea, but it's worked - those members have a chance to vote on team selection and transfers, as well as providing some funding and security for the club.

But will such a concept transfer to the motor racing scene, as myracingclub hope? Let's have a look at the numbers first:

• myracingclub are looking for 25,000 paid up members at £40 a year. That's £1,000,000 in capital they hope to raise.
  
• myfootballclub's initial hopes were to raise £1.75m (50,000 members at £35 membership fee). In fact they paid out just £600,000 for 75% of Ebbsfleet, with 21,000 members.

So myracingclub are expecting more members paying more money for a sport that has less following than football in the UK. But forget about the financials - would it work in practice? Let's have a look at their launching press release:

From registration and launch of the racing team, members will be able to make key team decisions, including racing championships entered, car sponsorship, race day approach and more importantly decide on the team drivers.

• Deciding on team drivers is an obvious draw. There are many fans out there aggrieved that the likes on Dan Eaves and Alan Morrison aren't currently racing.
• Likewise deciding on championships entered, although I can't imagine a team starting from scratch will enter more than one category.
  
• As for race-day strategy... well how is that going to work? Will the fans be online voting on gear-ratios or damper settings just before the race, instead of actually watching racing at the circuit?
  
• The most bizarre claim is that members will be able to make key decisions on car sponsorship. It's not as if the team can suddenly turn around and say "Should we be sponsored by ASDA or Tesco this season - vote now!"

In the normal motor racing world, wannabe race drivers have to find sponsorship to enable them to apply to drive in various race championships which will cost the driver up to £80,000 per season.

Notwithstanding the fact that £80,000 would probably just get you midfield in Clios, sponsorship drives (no pun intended) the vast majority of the motorsport teams in the UK. Even if 25,000 fans stump up £40 for a stake in myracingclub, that £1,000,000 is going to be burnt through pretty quickly. Triple Eight Race Engineering, the team that runs the hugely successful VX Racing squad, made a profit of just £50k last year, and that was on a turnover of £4.1m. Unless you obtain manufacturer support your only other source of income is through sponsorship. (And no, despite what their FAQ says, you won't be getting much back from merchandising). Football clubs have the luxury of keeping gate receipts (a vital source of income) but that's not the case for motor racing teams. A new team will have to find a shedload of sponsors willing to bankroll a team with no history or past performance. And how likely is that, given that sponsors are hard enough to come by at the moment?

I'd put my £40 down on a couple of BTCC tickets instead...