Las Vegans Kurt Busch, left, and his brother, Kyle, sign autographs Friday during NASCAR Nextel Cup qualifying for Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Kurt qualified 10th Friday while his younger brother qualified 12th. Photo by Samantha Clemens. Joe Munoz, chief pilot for Maverick Helicopters, discusses ferrying race fans to Las Vegas Motor Speedway for this weekend's NASCAR race. Photo by Gary Thompson.

Craig Bullock hates to admit it, but he'll be smiling when he sees thousands of racing fans stuck in traffic Sunday outside the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

How sweet it is, Bullock says, to be able to afford to take a chopper to and from the UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 NASCAR race.

"It's fun to look down at all the traffic," said the corporate events planner for the Las Vegas office of TBA Global Events Inc. "I'm glad I don't have to fight it."

To beat the traffic, Bullock is paying $500 for an approximately 22-minute round trip that starts off at Maverick Helicopter Tours, next to McCarran International Airport.

"A little more than 10 minutes each way is a lot better than more than an hour one way," said Bullock, who is in his third year of flying rather than driving to the race, which begins at 1 p.m. and lasts about three hours.

Police have estimated that it can take more than two hours to drive the 20 miles from the raceway to the airport directly after the race.

Bryan Kroten, director of sales and marketing for Maverick, said NASCAR drivers often use choppers after the race to get to the airport. Drivers Jeff Gordon and Kyle Petty have used Maverick in the past, he said.

With more than 1,000 people already deciding they'd rather fly than crawl -- helicopter companies report that a few seats are still available -- the Federal Aviation Administration is taking a more hands-on approach with race-day helicopter traffic this year, delegating two staffers to the racetrack tower.

"It's been contracted out in the past, and we've had a presence, but we've decided to orchestrate it more closely this year," said Del Meadows, air traffic manager for the Las Vegas district of the FAA.

Meadows said he expects five local helicopter companies using nearly 50 choppers to make 450 round trips for racing fans.

"It should be the largest number of helicopters ever used for a NASCAR race," he said.

As many as seven passengers, depending on weight, can be carried on one chopper. Kroten said, however, that NASCAR enthusiasts tend to be heavier, so usually only six can be hauled in one trip.

Landing pads at the racetrack have been increased from eight to 12.

"Things should go better with our helicopter operations this year," said P.T. Tausinga, senior director of administration for the speedway.

After the race last year, many helicopter passengers found themselves waiting around 45 minutes to get in the air.

"With all the traffic we had, it just didn't go that smoothly," said Rick Eisenreich, an owner of Sundance Helicopters, which will carry about 200 passengers this year.

Meadows said that a mile of airspace is needed between the ferrying choppers and that it is possible for that distance to be cut in half depending on visibility.

Eisenreich said coordination is critical between controllers at the racetrack and those at McCarran and North Las Vegas airports and Nellis Air Force Base.

Meadows pointed out that there will always be some wait time to get in the air directly after the race because not all choppers can leave at once. He said meetings have been held to ensure better coordination this year.

Chopper pilots who will be on duty on race day have already flown the routes, so they are familiar with them, he said.

Maverick's chief pilot, Joe Munoz, said the route from McCarran is simple -- follow the east side of Las Vegas Boulevard to downtown and then fly along the east side of Interstate 15 to the track. He said the return trip follows the west side of I-15 and Las Vegas Boulevard.

Kroten said Maverick is using 13 helicopters and as many as 25 to 30 pilots to ferry more than 300 racing fans. About 25 percent of the business is corporate, and the rest "just NASCAR fans," he said. The price of the trip includes shuttles from Maverick to nearby hotels.

As of Friday, Maverick, which is flying the most passengers, still had 10 seats available for the race.

Some of Maverick's pilots will still ferry tourists to the Grand Canyon, which makes up the largest share of the company's business, Kroten said.

Two celebrities going to the race are renting two Maverick helicopters for the day at $20,000 apiece, he said.

"They just felt it would be better for them to have the helicopters' use all to themselves so they wouldn't have to wait at all," said Kroten, who said he couldn't divulge the names of the stars.

Bullock feels like a star when he's flying over the traffic jams.

"I can't imagine any other way to go to the race," he said.