A few years back I wrote a tongue in cheek piece comparing the Daytona 500 to the Indy 500. Even now, I would take an all-expense trip to the Daytona 500 over a similar trip to the Indy. I’m just not an Indy car fan. However, two races that took place over the last two months showcased just how far NASCAR has fallen.
Back in May, on Memorial Day weekend, the 100th running of the Indy 500 took place to a capacity crowd and then some. The event was an exercise in pomp and circumstance. On Sunday, just two months later, NASCAR ran the Brickyard 400 on the same track. NASCAR considers the Brickyard to be one of its premier races every year. On Sunday Kyle Busch won that race. The stands looked to be two thirds empty. More people showed up at that race track to watch the Indy qualifying than came to watch the actual NASCAR race Sunday. I saw bigger crowds at the ARCA races at Daytona back in the 70s.
NASCAR is dying. There is just no denying it. It is a clear cut case of suicide. You see twenty years ago, NASCAR was the fastest growing spectator sport in America. Crowds were camping out for days before each race. Ten years ago you couldn’t get a ticket to the Bristol races. This year’s Bristol race was run before a half-empty grandstand. What happened?
Here is what I think transpired. NASCAR was a mostly regional sport. It grew up out of the moonshine runners who had once built fast cars to outrun the law. When prohibition came to an end and the demand for moonshine dropped off these adrenalin junkies needed something else to do with their knowledge of fast cars and NASCAR was born. The entity continued to grow in popularity year by year thriving at first on the mostly redneck southern fans. And, don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking rednecks. Hell, I is one.
But NASCAR soon found out that rednecks were not limited to the south. There were hundreds of thousands of potential race fans throughout the Midwest and up the east coast. Slowly but surely the popularity spread across the country and the crowds grew enormous. The money and sponsors came pouring in to the sport. The sky was the limit it seemed.
And then NASCAR made a fatal mistake. The powers that be asked themselves, “why limit ourselves to the rednecks?” And the move toward political correctness began. Sponsors like Winston were sent packing because there was a negative connotation with the product. Of course, NASCAR still embraced beer. Wild-eyed southern boy drivers were being replaced with scrawny pretty boys from California.
NASCAR felt the cars were getting too fast. The sport was becoming too dangerous, so they put restrictor plates to slow the cars down on the super-speedways like Daytona and Talladega. But, it did not end there. Each year, the sport tweaked its rules until the cars became basically identical. Racing teams became powerless to build a better car and develop an edge. The lines between the car manufacturers faded nearly away making it harder to hate this guy for driving a Ford or that guy for driving a Chevy.
NASCAR severely discouraged fighting between drivers or retaliation on the track. These drivers were now millionaires and must be protected from themselves. There are no more Dale Earnhardts, Allisons or Cale Yarborough. There are no Buddy Bakers, CooCoo Marlins or Rusty Wallace. Gone are Richard Petty and David Pearson. NASCAR lacks the characters that once made it so entertaining. There just aren’t drivers worth hating. Sure people hate Jimmy Johnson because he wins and sensible people dislike Kyle Busch. But you don’t dislike Busch because he’s such a character, it is just because he so smarmy. That is not the same as rooting against Dale SR because he was the Intimidator. NASCAR is paying the price for banning things like that wonderful fight between Yarborough and Allison after the Daytona 500 decades ago.
NASCAR wanted to clean up its image to appeal to the masses and in the process turned its back on its base. The fans are slowly but surely finding other things to do with their time and money. In desperation, NASCAR began tweaking the rules and the process to name the champion. What they ended up with is this disaster called The Chase. Nobody cares and few are watching. The popular thing in Hollywood these days is a thing called the “reboot”. When a movie series starts losing popularity, Hollywood does a reboot and starts back at the beginning with different actors and directors. In my opinion, NASCAR is in dire need of a reboot.