A Voice For The Fans ~ High Hopes 7/22/2014 |
I bid
you welcome gentle readers, and a very warm welcome as
well to our assigned reader du jour of all things NASCAR, presumably
comfortably seated within the Fan and Media Espionage Center in beautiful
Charlotte, North Carolina. We do hope you enjoy our discourse today.
And... today's
discourse comes to you inspired by one of my gentle readers that commented on
my last column. I was reading and answering comments... something that more
journalists should do on a regular basis, as it gives both us and everyone
reading a clearer picture of what is happening within the sport and why. There
is nothing like conversation to promote and improve knowledge. We can all learn
from each other... and that includes you gentlemen from NASCAR... Brian, Mike,
Robin, Steve et al. In short... which I never am... no one knows it all.
While
engaged in that enterprise, I came across a single sentence tucked neatly
within a longer comment, and began to address it. "Part of what once made the sport great and what has been lost is
hope." Whop! Palm slaps forehead moment here! Sure, there are hundreds
or maybe thousands of things that taken altogether made auto racing fun and
intriguing for drivers, crewmen and fans, but at the top of that list had to be
hope!
The
youngster learning the ropes of Go-Karting on a backyard track already had
hopes of one day winning the Winston Cup. Dare to dream! The little guy
hammering the same pegs back and forth through the same holes over and over
again was already seeing himself atop a hauler as a crew chief, maybe for that
kid in the Go-Kart, maybe not. Either way, he had hope. It could be done. It could
happen. Either of those kids could get a job doing janitorial duties or other
lowly tasks for a race team and in time, might get the chance he's wanted since
childhood. Yes, it sounds a bit like the ant and the rubber tree plant, but thirty
or forty years ago, that's how it was done. Oops, there goes another rubber
tree plant.
Today,
that youngster had better move past Go-Karts at a very young age and into
"real" cars as soon as he can reach the pedals. It's become almost a
must that he be from a racing family, bringing back to the sport a famous name,
or that "he" must be either a "she", or not of Caucasian
origin. If you don't have a famous name, then you had better be
"diverse" as the buzz word of today describes it. If that kid on the
Go-Kart is white and named Smith, he has all the chance of the proverbial
snow-ball in Hades of getting to the elite series in NASCAR. It's more of the same for the little guy with
the hammer and a dream. There are specialized engineering schools now, aimed at
training only the best and the wealthiest to rise to the level of mechanic now
acceptable in NASCAR. Dream big little guy, but know that the dream requires a
really hefty checkbook; probably more than your Dad will make in a lifetime.
Now,
we've seen the dashed hopes of drivers and mechanics. What about the fans? Have
they also lost hope? Yes, decidedly many have lost hope... I have watched it
shrivel up and die in good friends that used to live and breathe racing, even
through the off season. Every day was race day to a race fan, yet today, those
same folks will greet you with a blank stare and query, "Oh, was there a
race today? I didn't even know that." Even worse, some brag about it with
statements such as, "I haven't watched a race since the King's last
win", yet still describe themselves as "race fans." For those,
there is no hope.
The new
century... nay, the new millennium dawned. The Crown Prince of racing was
killed at the very end of the very first race of that brand new millennium, and
it became the day the lights went out, not just in Georgia but across a country
and across a globe... and hopes were shattered.
The
sport never quite recovered from that, and a scant couple of years later,
32-year sponsor and home of marketing expertise second to none, R.J. Reynolds
announced that the Federal Government had won; they were pulling their
sponsorship from NASCAR racing, and their familiar red and white
"Winston" motif would be seen no longer... and lingering hopes
crumbled.
At the
end of that same year, the guiding hand of NASCAR, Bill France Jr., retired
from the sport due to illness, handing the reins to a son that never cared a
fig for racing and wanted only to remain on the left coast, hoping to get a
piece of the NFL pie, not this thing called NASCAR that his Granddaddy had
started... and for many, all hopes were abandoned.
2004 ...
With the new Emperor came change... as if the already staggering and reeling
sport had not undergone enough of that and desperately needed time to recover
and regain its balance. If Brian France had set out on a course to destroy
NASCAR racing, he couldn't have done a better job. Change the point system in
use since 1972 to choose a Champion; introduce something we were instructed not
to call a playoff, which, of course, it wasn't anyway. Go to work on building the
Car of Tomorrow, probably the single biggest mistake of the sport's existence,
and have it in competition everywhere by 2007. The one thing that ugly, fat
little IROC clone couldn't do was pass another car.
Over the
intervening years, the Chase, as Brian had dubbed his "Not a playoff"
thing, kept changing annually, which included scrapping the former graduated
descent of points and replacing it with what I have from the beginning called
"Counting by onesies." It works out pretty
much the same as the old way, but Brian can understand onesies.
By the start of the 2013 season, the COT was history, and NASCAR introduced the
Gen-6 cars. According to them, that means the 6th Generation, and they listed
the stages of evolution as though Darwin had written them
and they had always existed. Nice try guys, but it was the COT, not a Gen-5
that we buried last year.
Well
then, how about a little more change, shall we? The Gen-6
cars, which did seem to fill the bill as far as what was expected of them,
could pass, though still fell victim all too often to our old friend,
"aero-push." That in mind, last off-season they reworked all the
underpinnings of the cars and they did race somewhat better, but there was
still that aero-push thing. Now, with the cars only a year and a half old, as
generations go, and already reworked once, the threat is to alter not only the
bodies another time, but completely change the engine package. Why? Because
they're too fast!
WOW! Who was the first genius to notice this, when
they've been setting "New Track Records" at nearly every track since
they came to exist? Of course, while all that was going on, about half the
tracks on the circuit were repaved, which did nothing to
alleviate the problem of going too fast. Oh yes, and with all that
change, Brian put his thumb back into the Chase pie and this time came up with
a system I won't even bother to explain... and yes, it's that ridiculous. As
far as this lady is concerned, as long as that "thing" stays in
place, NASCAR will have no Champion. Homestead will, but not NASCAR.
So,
having removed almost all hope from aspiring drivers or mechanics, NASCAR used
change as the weapon of choice to beat down the fans and remove their hope as
well. It's always been NASCAR's game... their sandbox, as the saying goes... so
they get to make the rules. It seems, though, the fans have found a loophole in
those rules and played it as a trump card. You see, there is no way the
fans can be mandated to attend or even watch races... and so they stopped doing
so... in numbers too big to ignore, as the old Helen Reddy song goes.
As we
sit here today, NASCAR has taken control of everything it possibly can, and
what it doesn't totally control, it's working on.... things such as souvenir
stands and the like. We have NASCAR approved drivers, NASCAR approved
mechanics, NASCAR approved cars, NASCAR approved tracks... but where are the
fans? We are the only thing not NASCAR approved, and the majority of us are
just gone. Did anyone watch the fiasco in Chicago on Saturday night? It was a
pretty good race as cookie-cutters go, and some of the drivers brought their
kinfolk to watch it. Still, I could have fit the spectators in my living room
and they'd have all had seats.
NASCAR
acts as though it doesn't miss us or even know we're gone. They ignore the
empty seats and smile over the new lucrative TV contracts, even as they
struggle to replace a Series Sponsor for our second tier series, which loses
Nationwide at the conclusion of this season. Someone misses us though, and it's
someone that counts. NASCAR has kicked the fans to the curb for so long, we
began to think we'd done something to deserve it, but we didn't. When we
finally woke up and realized that, we left, but when we did so, it
inadvertently hurt someone else... the guys that pay all the bills for this
travelling circus show... the team owners.
Last
week, they announced that the top 9 teams had formed the RTA or Race Teams
Alliance, for the purpose of lowering costs. In a column hastily put forth on
this subject last week,
I told you there would be more to come, and that statement stands. The more
folks talk... or don't... the more I'm sure there will be much more to come. The
RTA originally said they merely wanted to talk with NASCAR to discuss the
escalating cost of racing incurred by team owners, and NASCAR's first response,
issued by Brett Jewkes, seemed amicable to that
arrangement. NASCAR President, Mike Helton first said that NASCAR held no
animosity toward the RTA, and head of the new RTA, Rob Kauffman of Michael
Waltrip Racing agreed that his organization felt no animosity toward NASCAR.
However,
within a couple of days, that tune changed when Helton flatly stated that any
further communications between the two would be handled through NASCAR's
lawyers, and without missing a beat, Kauffman announced the name and contact
information for the elite law firm already in place to represent the RTA. Gentle
readers, I'm not sure, but I'm thinking that in a good dictionary, that
dialogue could be found right next to the word, "animosity."
This is
another of those many times when I wish I could be the fly on the wall and know
what goes on behind the now closed doors on both sides of this one, but I'd
probably only get swatted for my effort, so I'll remain content to sit it out
with all of you as a spectator, but do you know what? For the first time in my
memory, someone has challenged NASCAR and the sanctioning body actually
flinched. Yes, they've now drawn a line in the sand and are firmly entrenched
behind a wall of legalese thick enough to repel a nuclear assault, but they're
worried, not confident.
This new
entity is not the drivers' union of 1969; it's a far cry from it and a stairway
to heaven above it. This is a coalition of almost all the money that makes
NASCAR run. These are the men that spend the fortunes that make the France
family rich, and they hold in their hands the power to bring it down. No, they
don't want to do that; it would be a perfect example of biting off one's nose
to spite his face, but the fact remains that they could... and NASCAR knows
this.
That's
enough of this for today, but you know we'll be talking about this one again
and again. For now, they are all hiding behind lawyers, but sooner or later,
someone has to give in and the talks have to take place. This scribe is looking
forward to that time when the lawyers are dispensed with and the two sides sit
down like the grown men some of them pretend to be and exchange reasonable
dialogue about vast fortunes that can be made or lost in a heartbeat, depending
on how those talks progress. I told you it was going to be a very interesting
time.
Now it's
time for our Classic Country Closeout, and don't think for a moment that we're
gonna hear Frank Sinatra singing about ants and plants. I have better fare in
mind for your Country appetite today. This is another one of those NASCAR
releases that I spent weeks chasing around the country and can now be found
both on Amazon.com and YouTube. Progress, they call it, but I'm still glad I
have it. The first song was originally done by and produced a smash hit for
Dave Dudley. It's a song called "Six
Days on the Road" and is heard here, not by Dave, but by NASCAR's own
Cale Yarborough, and yes gentle readers, Cale could sing, unlike some others,
who only thought they could. Please enjoy:
The next
one I've chosen for your listening pleasure is another from that same album, originally
cut in 1975, "NASCAR Goes Country",
and as such, this isn't Roger Miller singing his great song, "King of the Road" but who
else? "King" Richard Petty!
Oh, what
the heck! It's my column and I'm still typing... because I can. This bonus is
offered simply because I miss this man's voice on my TV, not because he's the
best singer of the bunch. What say you friends? Do you like ol' Buddy Baker
singing about "Butter Beans?"
Be well
gentle readers, and remember to keep smiling. It looks so good on you!
~ PattyKay