Just stumbled across this and wow.. Where to start?!? This is going to be scatterbrained as hell because, well, so are all the issues.
A little background on myself, I'm 27 and got into watching NHRA drag racing in around 92 because my dad drag raced and he was into it. I had watched nascar occasionally but not very often and mostly for the crashes. In late 94 my sister started dating a guy that was a driver at our local short track. The first race I ever watched fully was the 1995 Daytona 500. I knew nothing really about the sport other than Earnhardt had just won his 7th title. They ran the promos and commercials during the NHRA races on TNN so I was somewhat exposed. We had a little bet going on the race. I picked Earnhardt and he picked Sterling Marlin. Wouldn't you know it they finished 1-2. I had no idea about Dale's Daytona curse or Sterling's first win the year before. From that point forward, after seeing Dale's determined drive thru the field after a late caution and a pitstop, I was a fan for life of his. I began watching NASCAR more and more, learning anything and everything I could about it. I would record every race that was on TV at the time in NHRA, and soon started with NASCAR in 1996. By 1998 I was actually recording NASCAR over NHRA races. I have most of them on tape and about 5 of the NHRA events that year. The competition and different winners and story lines were great. It kept your attention. Like others have said, you tune in, they do an interview or 2 and then it's game on. It was a good 3 - 4 hour entertainment on saturdays and sundays with the Busch Series added in. I guess now's a great time to touch on the tv times of the era.
TV - When I first started, there was no NASCAR Raceday, NASCAR Today, NASCAR Race Hub, NASCAR In a Hurry, Inside NASCAR, NASCAR NASCAR NASCAR. There was Inside Winston Cup on saturday, which was the only time you'd find out qualifying results from friday. Then they had TNN Raceday on sunday morning, and then a sunday evening ediition with race highlights. When ESPN2 came about and had nothing to show, they started in with RPM2Night. That was one of the greatest shows ever! Not only for the NASCAR world though. ESPN needed sports programming. You saw NASCAR, NASCAR Busch Series, NASCAR Goody's Dash Series races at Daytona and Bristol, and even some others thrown in on late night time slots, NASCAR Modified Tour, NASCAR Late Models, USAR, Hooters Pro Cup, the Winter Heat series from Tuscon, NASCAR Southwest Tour. THEN you also got to see IROC, CART, IRL, Indy Lights, Barber Dodge Pro Series, The whatever touring car championship that raced dodge stratuses and whatnot in the mid 90s, the other Indy Car feeder series - Formula Atlantics? TNN took care of NHRA, some NASCAR BGN and Winston Cup races, ARCA, and the ASA series. Racing was everywhere and there were a TON of series covered. What happened? The other series all went away. Now it's all NASCAR all the time. If I watch qualifying live, I don't need to see it recapped on NASCAR Today, NASCAR Race Hub, and then a 2 Hour NASCAR Raceday before the 1 Hour NASCAR Countdown before the 20 minute intro to the race. Oversaturation of the market. It's the old supply and demand theory. Give less and they want more. Give them 24 hour NASCAR access and people don't want it. (This is another reason attendance is down too - every fucking minute of the race weekend is on tv, why do I need to spend $$ to go to the track? I can't go meet my favorite driver but I can sure buy his merchandise. I can DVR every practice and qualifying session and have a weekend doing whatever then catch up on them later. Plus see them from all the tv cameras, not just the view from my seat. That is esp important since on of my main tracks is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where you can't see shit. There is no bonus or special incentive to be at the track anymore.) Take the Home Depot Raceday and use that money to put into the race broadcast and take 2 or 3 less commercial breaks during the race. TV coverage is shit because it's all one big fucking commercial. Every aspect of it. Why? The network pays NASCAR billions to show their shit product. Where does that money come from??? Advertising! That's why FOX tried to recoup their losses in 01 by not showing a cars sponsor in their graphics UNLESS that sponsor PAID FOX money to put it there. Why has it gotten worse?? LESS people are tuning in. That means the airtime the races cover need to have MORE advertising to make up for the lost viewership. You'd have to understand how the advertising process works to fully comprehend. It's like the superbowl. You know 50 million people are going to watch this game, so you charge someone a million bucks for a 30 second commercial, knowing they will reach 50 million viewers. NASCAR doesn't have 50 million viewers. Sometimes I wonder if they have 50,000 viewers. They still have to pay for the 4 hour window they are using to air the event though, so since 1 company isn't going to pony up a million bucks for 50,000 people to see their stuff, they need to find 100 sponsors to spend 100,000 on commercials, and show alot more of them! Infomercials run rampant late at night because it's dirt cheap air time. This is part of the tv issue. You can't possibly make a shit product tolerable when you are trying to cover your own ass. It also has to do with the fact that companies like ESPN that used to be all sports all the time are now into whatever pays the bills. NHRA drag racing is a prime example. They are exclusive to ESPN, and they pay millions of dollars for the priveledge. It's in their annual tax return. They pay big bucks to be on the air. Yet they STILL get pre-empted by things like a tennis match running long, little league world series, football, basketball, etc... The commercialism in tv in the USA (along with every other aspect in life) is getting worse by the year. The shows will NEVER be like they were, no matter how much we hope. Oh and the other thing killing TV, on the NASCAR end anyways, is the on-air talent thinking THEY are the show and not the race. DW I would love to watch a 3 hour show of you telling stories of your hay-day, just don't do it during the race i'm trying to watch okay? Thanks.
Other series - Why did the Goody's Dash Series die? What about ASA? Where did CART go? How come IROC closed up shop? Look at the list of racing series operating in the mid 90s to early 00s and look at what's left. What the heck happened?? It got too damn expensive to compete! There are no more john doe's just picking up racing as a hobby anymore. That's why there are the same drivers in NASCAR every year. You see more leaving than you do coming in. Why? The almighty dollar and lack thereof. It's killed plenty of other racing series. On the drag racing side, IHRA is a shadow of it's former self, and the NHRA continues raising entry fees for it's backbone, the sportsman racer. You pay a 300+ dollar entry fee, plus gas, plus crew, plus hotel. Then let's don't forget safety! Your perfectly good seatbelts expire every 2 years, every year in some instances. Why are the seatbelts in my street car not replaced every few years if they are that bad? Gotta have a new SFI rating and new safety equipment. I know the same has to hold true in NASCAR and the other series. The little guy is getting driven out, so there is nobody left to replaced the big name superstar when he leaves. That's why Elliott, Labonte, Martin, etc have "retired" yet race 15+ races a year. To the guy who says I'll go watch something else... I got news for ya buddy! The water is just as muddy on this side of the fence. I've been a fan of most every racing series there is and they are ALL in decline. IRL has gotten a possible transfusion with this 2012 hype, but if it's a bust, that series is bye bye, Indy 500 or not. NHRA? Shit, since Kalitta died and they shortened the track, the racing is pointless. You think JJ winning 5 in a row here is bad.. John Force won his 15th title last year in Funny Car. Infact aside from 92 he won every year from 1990-2003. That's dominance. Larry Dixon broke Tony Schumachers streak of 6 straight Top Fuel titles in 2010. The haves and have nots are just as bad there as it is in NASCAR. Same winners every week, same champions every year, ho-hum racing. Those fans are just as upset with their series as NASCAR fans are with it.
The product - Any fan from any generation in any series always looks back at "their first time watching" as that series hay-day. Ask someone who watched in the 60s and they'll say that's when stock cars were stock cars and the 70s-10s are nothing like it. Then so on and so on.. The sad reality for those of us that are fans today is, it's always going to be stagnant or in decline. Take indycar or the indy 500. How cool must it have been to see them break 100, 150, 200, 210, 220, 230mph beariers? They came damn close to 240, then Scott Brayton was killed and IRL was going to a new slower car. The CART series did manage 240 at california, but never again. NHRA surpassed 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 310, 320, and 330 in the quarter mile, as well as the 6, 5, 4, 4.5, 4.4 second ranges. Then they (or the insurance companies) decided that's a bit much. Scott Kalitta's death sealed the deal and the 1,000 foot tracks have yielded a 325mph best. The records will forever stand at 4.42 and 337mph for a quarter mile. They've said already IF they ever go back, it will be with slower cars and smaller engines in place. NASCAR saw 200+ on the superspeedways, until Bobby Allison's trip to the catch fence. They will NEVER take off the restrictor plate. The factor of open competition is gone. The rulebook in each series is so tight there is no more gray area. THAT is what has killed the product. The NASCAR COT not only tackled the safety issue, it took care of the ingenuity factor. THIS is how you will build our car and we will put a lifesize template over it, if you are off by .006" you're out. Really? How about Daytona and Talladega.. We'll give you the shocks and springs we want you to run. No need to try to go faster, this is what you get. The rules go to the officiating of the sport too. How many times have we seen Ernie Irvan blowing his right front tire to pieces down the backstraight in the first Brickyard 400? For the debris that littered the track.. where was the caution? I watched the 1995 BGN race from talladega not too long ago. Jeff Green spun into the infield and hit the inside wall. He SPUN out of the pack and HIT THE WALL. Drove the car back with NO caution. You so much as sneeze and they throw a yellow today. In the name of safety they say. Racing back to the line for a yellow? Nah we're good. We don't think you're good enough to not kill yourselves. Although Pirate himself did blast the back of Greg Sacks car at Texas in 1997 trying to get a lap back, but that's about the only time I can think of an accident caused by it. Yellow line rule is b.s. Green white checkered I'll actually give them. Double file restarts I'll give them. It's trying to put on a better show. Let's face it, that's all it is anymore, a show.
NHRA is being questioned for its "non for profit" status by the IRS due to the board members running the place into the ground with stupid entry fees and spectator charges, while their salaries are 700k + per year. I'm sure NASCAR heads make even more than that, but they have a bigger product. Let's cross sports. How about the Chicago Cubs? They suck and will never win another world series ever. Every game is a sellout. Why? Who the hell knows. There are enough idiots passionate about them to pay the price to see them lose. They have no NEED to win a world series ever because the yearly sellouts pay all the bills and earn them the $$$. Sound familiar? We are passionate about NASCAR and racing as a whole, to spend our weekends watching, spend our $$ attending a few events, and spend $$ on a t-shirt or diecast here and there. Why? Well for me it's all I've ever known. If I stop watching now, what the hell else would I take up? Golf?
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