Pro Sportsman Association hires Todd Veney

Pro Sportsman Association hires Todd Veney

The newly formed Pro Sportsman Association announced today the hiring of veteran racer/journalist Todd Veney to handle media and marketing duties for the 2012 season. Veney and the PSA will work to increase media exposure and fan awareness of the Top Alcohol Dragster and Funny Car categories.

Veney, son of drag racing legend Ken Veney, has an extensive résumé as not only a journalist but as an alcohol driver. He worked as an associate editor at NHRA’s National DRAGSTER from 1988 to 1999 and has free-lanced for the past 12 years. On the track, after several stints with his own car, he now drives Jay Blake’s Permatex/Follow A Dream Top Alcohol Funny Car and finished seventh in the national standings the past two years.

With the start of the racing season right around the corner, Veney is excited about starting his new job with the PSA. "This is right up my alley and something I'm really looking forward to," he said. "I've loved alcohol cars above all others since dragsters and Funny Cars still ran against each other in the 1970s in Pro Comp. I think we can really make something of this, and I look forward to working with the PSA board and with racers, tracks, and the media to give our kind of racing the coverage it deserves."

PSA President Will Hanna feels the new association has the right man for the job.

“As the board started putting this association together, naturally one of the first questions was, ‘Who do we hire?' ” stated Hanna. “Todd was everybody's first choice. He not only has the journalistic experience that we're looking for, but there probably are only a handful of people in the world who care about the Top Alcohol classes more than he does. In any kind of business, when you get someone who is not only qualified but passionate about their work, it’s hard to go wrong.

“Todd is going to get down in the trenches to get the alcohol classes media exposure on not only a national level, but on a local level in regional event markets,” Hanna continued. “There are so many racers in the alcohol classes who have a story, not to mention all the behind-the-scenes angles on the competition side. I’m not only excited as the President of the PSA, but as a life-long fan of the alcohol classes about what is in store this year.”

The Pro Sportsman Association is a non-profit organization formed to build the value and the brand of Top Alcohol racing. The PSA is primarily funded by the membership dues of racers, racing businesses and fans who have a vested interest in seeing Top Alcohol racing reach the proverbial ‘next level.’ By building the Top Alcohol classes’ value to both the tracks and to NHRA, we hope to not only maintain but increase the number of events that feature our classes as front-gate draws. By raising awareness through media and other promotions, the PSA hopes to build the Top Alcohol classes’ fan following in the long term and to help bring new teams to Top Alcohol racing.

The PSA is offering an introductory discount of $100 off ($595 per year) their yearly dues for racers and businesses that join before March 1st. After March 1st, dues will be $695 per year.

For more information on how to become involved, email Will Hanna at will.hanna@insidetopalcohol.com. The PSA hopes to have their website, www.prosportsmanassociation.com up and running within the next few weeks.

Contact: Todd Veney/Pro Sportsman Association
tv@toddveney.com

 

What is Todd Veney doing for the PSA?

We have had a few questions on what exactly Todd Veney is going to do for the organization. Why did we hire him, why are members being asked to pay such high dues.

Todd Veney has been hired as an independent contractor to work for the PSA. He is not an employee.

Todd will be literally blitzing the media with material for every regional and national event that the alcohol cars are running at.

He also will be writing at least one feature per month in addition to the press releases for events.

He will at a minimum, send a TAD and TAFC preview out before each regional and national race. He will also send out a wrap-up release after each regional.

He will also correspond and directly work with the local media of the regional events we compete at. This will require a lot of leg work of contacting editors and reporters of those different outlets. This will be done weeks in advance of the event, so that the contact is made, and the know we are coming to town, and hopefully we can get some slots in those publications.

Todd will also work directly with the track operators, NHRA and Lucas to maximize results at our regional events.

Having Todd's name on board has already opened several doors for us on the media front. As we establish contacts with these editors, build some rapport with them, they will see the quality of his work, and it hopefully should lead to more publications in the future.

As I have stated in some other posts, we are trying to build our fan base up. We are trying to get more fans to our races.

There is no way of definitively knowing how successful this will be. If we sit back and wait for NHRA to do this, or just hope the tracks do it, then we'll be on a fast track to a 10-12 race national circuit. All the while we can talk about who shoulda did what.

Yes I know it's a chunk of money to ask from most of you. What the PSA is trying to do is be proactive, put our best foot forward. We have got to build our fan base back up, we have got to show tracks we are a professional group that wants to see the tracks be successful. We work for the tracks so the tracks can work for the fans. We don't have races without tracks. We need to work to make sure tracks are 'happy customers' because there are other options for the tracks to bring in fans.

We need everyone to get on board. The more operating budget we have, the more we can do.

We are a non profit corporation, so there will be transparency in all of our financial dealings. Members will be able to get financial statements on request.

Hope this clears up some questions that are out there. Please keep them coming. We want everyone to know exactly what and how we plan to accomplish our goals.