My first contact with Team “Bring It” Racing came in the form of this e-mail, which came in on December 12 with a subject line of “Plight Of The Privateer” and read, as follows, in its entirety: To the editor of Road Racing (sic) World, Our name is DeesMotorsports, Inc. We are a road racing team based out of Columbia, SC. The reason we are writing this letter is to ask if you would be willing to do a story on the plight of privateer teams and riders in aquiring sponsorships. We will be starting our first season in Feb. 2008 and have been seeking sponsorships since the beginning of 2007. But we have had very little luck. It’s as if the companies and businesses have forgotten that there are more teams out there besides the mega factory teams. That these teams need their support too. We have constantly and consistently been denied sponsorship, no matter how large or successful the company we contact. These privateer teams are the heart and soul of the road racing world and need just as much support and respect as the more established teams out there. They work day and night to try and achieve their goals. With the proper support, these teams could give fans a great show every weekend by a more competitive race and podium appearances. Please consider writing this story. If you would like to speak with us, our owners’ name is Darrien Brown. He is an ex-pro road racer. His phone number is 803-467-0687. Or if you like, email him at [email protected]. Thank You for your time and consideration in this matter. Sincerely, Valencia Coleman DeesMotorsports/Team ‘Bring It’ Racing I had never heard of DeesMotorsports/Team “Bring It” Racing or Darrien Brown, but, curious, I called the number listed in the e-mail for team owner Brown, and got a message machine. Ms. Coleman called me back on December 13, explaining that Brown was too busy preparing the team’s bikes to talk to me. Ms. Coleman was unable to tell me the names of the team’s riders, and could not tell me if any of them had ever won any races of any type. I told her that a race team needs race results before it can expect to get any sponsors, and suggested that she order photocopies of the now-out-of-print Roadracing World series, How To Get And Keep Sponsors. The next time I heard of Team “Bring It” Racing was when I got a phone call from Jon Row, who runs the Motorcycle Press Department at American Honda and who is a straight shooter I have known for decades. Row was inquiring about a story that Roadracing World was doing about the team and a Honda dealership with which they had some sort of ongoing disagreement, Carolina Honda. This was news to me; I knew nothing about any disagreement or story. I asked Row to send me anything he had on the case, and he forwarded me an e-mail dated December 14 and sent to Carolina Honda by Ms. Coleman, which follows: From: [email protected] Sent: Friday, December 14, 2007 5:27 PM To: [email protected] Subject: From DeesMotorsports, Inc. Mr. Wertman, I’m sure that your event had a large turnout, after all it is HRC. But that has very little to do with our current situation. We are not customers that you promised a discount to and then reneged, we are a brand new race team, the only one in our community, that Carolina Honda promised a generous support package to. You keep saying that we failed to keep our word by showing up late to your event. Please remember the number of times we tried to meet with you prior to the event. The number of times you failed to keep even one of several appointments to meet with us. And yes, after our first meeting we did promise to make appearances at your events, but let’s not play with words. When you failed to meet with us to even discuss terms, we were no longer obligated or obliged. As you are aware, we contacted Road Racing World magazine and they are very interested in knowing how things turn out between Carolina Honda and Team “Bring It” Racing. We have provided them with paperwork and the names of several sources to contact about Carolina Honda and the way you do business. Your owner needs to meet with us very soon or we will have no choice but to go through with this article without his input. We need to know an exact date that he can meet with us so we can attempt to resolve the issues that have caused this discord between us. This is a time-sensitive issue. Sincerely, DeesMotorsports/Team “Bring It” Racing After seeing the above e-mail, I sent Ms. Coleman the following e-mail on the morning of December 19: I have received the e-mail (you sent to Carolina Honda) and note that it states “As you are aware, we contacted Road Racing World magazine and they are very interested in knowing how things turn out between Carolina Honda and Team ‘Bring It’ Racing. We have provided them with paperwork and the names of several sources to contact about Carolina Honda and the way you do business. Your owner needs to meet with us very soon or we will have no choice but to go through with this article without his input.” Who did your team contact from Roadracing World, and who from Roadracing World told you “they are very interested in knowing how things turn out between Carolina Honda and ‘Team Bring’ It Racing”? Please advise. John Ulrich Roadracing World Publishing, Inc. As this is written I haven’t received any answer from Ms. Coleman, but I have confirmed that no Roadracing World employee has spoken to Ms. Coleman nor expressed any interest in any type of coverage of Team “Bring It” Racing. Which means that Ms. Coleman just made it up, in an attempt to pressure Carolina Honda for who knows what. Based on this web page for the new team, ~http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:k8oxrP0GsMkJ:www.deesmotorsports.com/sponsornew.php+http://www.deesmotorsports.com/sponsornew.php&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us&client=safari~, I would guess that she wanted money, and lots of it. I guess it all leads to a few more handy lessons to include when we update the How To Get And Keep Sponsors series: –You have to have results before you can get sponsorship. –It would probably be useful to have results before deciding on the name Team “Bring It” Racing, unless you intend to bring bullsh-t. –Bringing bullsh-t earns nothing but contempt. –Falsely claiming that Roadracing World is doing a story on your team, for any purpose, and especially in the course of an extortion attempt, will only end badly when we find out about it, and we always find out about it one way or another. I wish Ms. Coleman, Team “Bring It” Racing, and anybody associated with it, all the best–as long as they stop making false claims and stop trying to use the name of Roadracing World to extort money from potential “sponsors.”