NASCAR weekend draws $198 million to area

The economic impact of this year’s annual NASCAR weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway inched closer to generating $200 million for Southern Nevada.

The March events produced $198 million, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority said. That’s an increase of nearly $1 million over 2006 and marked the sixth consecutive annual increase for Nevada’s largest sports event.

The report estimates weekend attendance to be more than 340,000, including the NASCAR races and two nights of racing at the LVMS dirt track.

• BULLRING CORRECTIONS — The speedway earlier this week revised results from Saturday’s NASCAR All-American Series event at the Bullring.

In Bandoleros, Dylan Kwasniewski won the Bandits division, and Kyle Spade was declared the winner in Young Guns after the car driven by Damon Blakeman failed a post-race technical inspection. …

Scott Gafforini inadvertently was left off the initial Super Late Models results. He finished seventh.

• DRAG RACING — Las Vegas resident Rod Fuller regained the Top Fuel points lead after advancing to the semifinal round of Sunday’s NHRA Powerade Drag Racing Series event in Madison, Ill. He has a 23-point lead over Brandon Bernstein.

In Pro Stock Motorcycle, Minden’s Karen Stoffer lost her first-place lead after Matt Smith’s near-perfect weekend. He set a national elapsed time record of 6.901 seconds (191.78 mph) on his Buell.

• BUSINESS — International Speedway Corp. will transform a 71-acre site next to its Daytona International Speedway into a $250 million entertainment complex with condominiums.

ISC also will put up for sale a 675-acre plot on New York’s Staten Island after residents’ resistance led it to scrap plans to build a NASCAR track.