Running 2023 Motorsports thread

Good. It was a gimmick.

 

Good. And I'm guessing the Brickyard eventually goes back to the oval soon because even an almost empty IMS is better than what the road course has been drawing.

NASCAR's weird attempts at staving off massive losses of their core fan base have all backfired. Now jettison the stage racing and the Chase and maybe I'll care again.

 

I think even CART began to realize you couldn't beat the beast that is football. Saturdays are owned by college football and the NFL dominates Sunday viewing.

There just aren't enough decent outlets available with an audience share worth the return for open-wheel racing after Labor Day. NASCAR is barely able to keep its numbers from eroding even with the Chase.

A little history on IndyCar's schedule. Back when AAA/USAC was still running the Championship Trail with dirt cars, the schedule was mainly dependent on horse tracks at state fairs and a few purpose-built facilities. So the races at places like Terre Haute, Milwaukee, DuQuoin, Detroit, Sacramento and others were run in conjunction with the fair crowd. So until the series went full pavement, open wheel racing was a spring-summer sport with the 500 serving as the unofficial beginning of the season.

And even in the 1970s "golden era", the IndyCar schedule was rarely more than 12-14 races a season. Unlike NASCAR's spring-fall schedule, the open wheels only came to town once a year.

 

Ditch the big track and take the whole show to IRP. Make it 500 laps on Saturday night.

 

What are the best 2-3 true dirt races to attend? Eldora? Talladega short? Others?

 

The Knoxville Nationals in Iowa would be on my short bucket list. My favorite three northern California tracks that may or may not still exist: Petaluma, Calistoga, Chico.

My all-time favorite dirt track was West Capital Raceway in West Sacramento. Man, I loved watching the super modifieds there, throwing up huge chunks of clay coming out of Turn 4. Pretty much all the big shoes from San Jose north would show up on Saturday nights.

Howard Kaeding. Big John Viel. Mike Andreotti. Wayne Sue. Johnny Anderson. In its heyday, they'd have up to 60 cars on a typical race night.

Closed in 1980. It's a truck stop now.

 

Junior almost won tonight, but then something in his car caught fire with less than 50 to go. I really want to see the guy win one more race.

 

Good. The last thing one of the better tracks on that circuit needed was an idiotic gimmick to take something away from what makes the track interesting in the first place.

Talk with Smoke to use Eldora. Go to IRP. But keep dirt out of Bristol, eh? Thanks.

 

When things were going great, the France family could fart out $100 bills. But the whole "we're going to see double-digit growth forever" delusion has come back to bite them in the ass.

Big Bill France's famous line was "never mess with the show, and everything is the show." Too bad the current group running NASCAR didn't pay attention.

Honestly, if it wasn't for huge TV money saving their bacon for the past 15 years -- mainly because their anemic numbers compared to pre-2000 are better than anything else in the spring -- they'd already be in deep doo-doo. Attendance is nowhere near what it was during the "NASCAR Dad" phenomenon. And the big corporate sponsorship has dried up significantly.

But letting marketing steer the ship has to be NASCAR's biggest mistake. Brian Z.'s Madison Avenue buddies were allowed to decide the sport was too big for Darlington while trying to build tracks in Seattle and Denver and Staten Island was a license to burn cash. Brian Z. was/is an idiot grandchild who should have been booted for much smarter Lesa before Little Bill kicked the bucket.

I interviewed Brian three times and never once did I get the feeling he actually understood anything about running a racing series. (For all I know, he had been snorting in the bathroom.) On the other hand, Lesa was laser-focused on the future, even after her husband was killed. And it's possible her son Ben will steer NASCAR back onto the rails.

There's about four million core NASCAR fans out there but they're getting older every year, and this constant tinkering with the rules/tracks/races can't be generating enough new eyeballs to make up for the ones giving up on the sport. The lack of young fans is really noticable when we show up for Speedweek now. Whatever network/streaming service willing to pony up for the next contract better come in with eyes wide open.

 

NASCAR has a massive uphill battle. I know older people who used to be NASCAR fans who have no use for the Chase, stages and so many of the other things implemented during Brian France's run (FWIW, I agree with the former fans). Worse, we keep hearing that younger generations are more into video games, social media and anything but vehicles and what makes them go faster and work more efficiently. The combination of drawbacks could be too much to overcome, but there's no doubt that NASCAR is doing itself no favors with its slew of missteps.

 

I attended races and watched occasionally when our kids were growing up. My father raced short track before and shortly after I was born in the mid-60s, so he had a mild interest. Took me to my first race.

Our son is 26. He has zero interest in any racing events and never has wanted to go, and none of his friends have any interest, either, to my knowledge. Microcosm, I guess, of the generational decline.

 

Reports are that Spire just bought another Cup Series charter.

For $40 million.

https://racer.com/2023/09/16/spire-acquires-live-fast-charter-in-new-partnership-with-trackhouse/

Which sounds bananas to me.

Good for B.J. McLeod and others cashing in. I guess charters aren't going away anytime soon, unless Daytona wants to spend a LOT of money.

Spire and Trackhouse, which just throws money around, are partnering up as a result of this deal. I'm guessing a lot of that $40 million is Justin Marks' money. If you believe the rumors, perhaps some is coming from Michael Andretti. Why he wants in on NASCAR right now is mystifying.

Charters are killing the sport's blue-collar roots. What team owners are going to drop $40 million to jump into a series? Other than rich guys. Guys like Childress and Hendrick started teams when they didn't have a ton. You'll obv never see that again.