Fantasy NASCAR wagering game kicked off in February
By Paul F. Vang
The NASCAR Sprint Cup racing season kicked off on Feb. 15, with driver Matt Kenseth winning the famous Daytona 500 event, and beginning a season that runs through November 22, making it one of the longest seasons in professional sports.
The beginning of the NASCAR season also marked the beginning of a new season for Montana Sports Action, the pari-mutuel fantasy game using real dollars, and coming on the heels of the 2008 professional football fantasy games.
As a brief refresher, pari-mutuel fantasy gaming was authorized by the 2007 Montana Legislature as a means of raising funds for the Montana Board of Horse Racing. The end goal is to create a pool of money that can be used to fatten purses at Montana horse racing events and, eventually, rebuild horse racing beyond the three surviving horse racing venues of Great Falls, Billings and Miles City.
In 2008, the Board of Horse Racing contracted with Montana Lottery to design and implement the fantasy game system. Montana Lottery, with its vendor, IntralotUSA, designed and put into place the first fantasy game in time for the 2008 professional football season.
After a brief hiatus for retooling and installing new software, Montana Sports Action started the auto racing season the week of the Daytona 500, which, on February 15, began the NASCAR racing season.
For those who aren’t auto racing fans, the Sprint Cup Series is the major leagues of stock car racing, and Daytona is the top event of the several racing circuits sanctioned by the National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing, or NASCAR.
Instructions on how to play the Montana Sports Action auto racing game are on-line at <www.montanasportsaction.com> but essentially, players fill out a play slip, selecting five race car drivers from a roster of drivers that is updated weekly.
Wagers can be made up to 10 minutes before race times. Players can wager from $5 to $100 per play. In case of ties, payouts will be awarded on the basis of numbers of $5 shares purchased.
At the end of the race, points are allocated based on their results at the end of the race, with additional points awarded for leading laps.
The results may hold surprises. At the Daytona 500, for example, Matt Kenseth came in first at the conclusion of the rain-shortened race, but he was the lap leader in just seven laps, and finished the day with 205 points. Kyle Busch finished in a distant 41st place, but was lap leader for 88 laps, and thus earned the most points with 482.
NASCAR, incidentally, offers its own fantasy game, though the scoring methods are not necessarily the same as the Montana game. Conventional "paper-and-pencil" NASCAR fantasy games are regularly conducted around Montana where racing enthusiasts have formed their own leagues.
In the first week of the Montana Sports Action game, 707 people played the game, wagering a total of $4,305.74 percent of total bets are paid to the top three players.
The first place winner, who played the game at the Chrome Bar in Absarokee, won $1,592.80, or 50 percent of the prize pool. The second place player won $955.70, and played at Nickel’s Gaming Parlour in Helena. The third place winner, who wagered at Halftime Sports Bar and Casino in Great Falls, won $637.10.
The Board of Horse Racing, which collects 61 percent of the remaining 26 percent of wagers, picked up $682 from the week’s action.
Jo Berg, Communications Director for Montana Lottery, says of the new game, “We think it went well, and with no major problems.” She added that some lottery retailers experienced some frustration in explaining to their customers how to fill out the play slips, but aside from that there were no real problems.
Currently, 163 lottery retailers offer Montana Sports Action games. A retailer must have an on-premise alcohol license to qualify for the Sports Action games. There has been some turnover, with some dealers dropping out and some new ones coming on. Berg points out, however, that the Sports Action locations are widely dispersed across Montana, and that winning entries are as well.
Though she’s not personally an auto racing fan, she noted that Matt Kenseth, the winner of the Daytona 500, was a "B List" driver on the Sports Action roster, proving that the auto racing game can be wide open.
She’s optimistic, too, that people who place a "Quick Pick" wager—letting the computer system pick the racing team—will have a better chance of winning than they did at last year's football fantasy game. She also believes that there is a better chance of ties in the game, something which happened just once in the football season in the final week.
Berg said Montana Lottery has been actively marketing the new game to let people know that the new fantasy game was ready, and she adds that, looking ahead, next fall when the 2009 professional football season begins, they’ll be offering two fantasy games at the same time which will assure another busy period for active marketing of the Montana Sports Action games.