It Must Be Tougher Than It Looks

Fan Commentary by Grandstand Bob

Like many race fans, I sit comfortably and pontificate about how NASCAR should run its business. Many times, I’m openly critical of their decisions, and I get downright angry frequently, but I don’t think that I could run the business any better than it’s currently being run. That’s tough for someone like me to say, but it’s true.

Many months ago, I welcomed the news that a new series was forming to challenge NASCAR. TRAC (Team Racing Auto Circuit) promised a new concept – team ownership by local celebrities and true stock car racing. In a column I wrote at the time, I speculated about the things that TRAC must do to compete with NASCAR. I knew that there were some steep challenges in front of TRAC, but I didn’t believe that they were insurmountable.

Turns out that I was wrong. TRAC recently announced that it was dissolving itself and searching for ways to pay back creditors. I guess that I underestimated the difficulty in starting and managing a racing circuit.

I suggested that TRAC could go a long way toward success if they would start by correcting some of the things that I thought NASCAR was doing incorrectly. Among other things, I suggested lower ticket prices, racing on tracks conducive to racing and tapping a pool of under funded drivers. I still believe that those tactics could work, but they can’t work without the one thing that TRAC was lacking – serious money.

And why did they lack serious money? Because NASCAR is huge and getting bigger. And why is NASCAR so big and growing so quickly? Because they are doing most everything right in running their business. Maybe some of their decisions regarding fans and racing on the track are off base, but they are laughing all the way to the bank when people complain.

Granted, NASCAR didn’t do all of this themselves. They owe a lot of their success to the sport's pioneers. In the beginning, they managed a rowdy bunch of competitors that gave the sport flavor and appeal. Names like Junior Johnson, Tim Flock and Tim Richmond come to mind. In those days, before intense media coverage and big-money sponsors, NASCAR was more like the all-knowing football coach managing a den of rowdy players, making sure that they were ready to compete and trying like hell to keep them out of trouble away from the track.

Following closely behind them were charismatic drivers, such as Cale Yarborough, Dale Earnhardt and Darrell Waltrip, who created intense fan loyalty, and perhaps more importantly, a package that NASCAR could sell to television.

Television coverage is really the fuel behind all that NASCAR does, and with the possible exception of the NFL, nobody does television better than NASCAR. Because of their success with television, fans are flocking to the sport in large numbers, and here is the real key – the number of new fans is far outpacing the number of fans who are giving up on the sport.

I believe that this fact was the overriding factor in the decision to take Darlington’s Labor Day date from them. NASCAR wants badly to increase its presence in the West, and there are fewer better ways to do it than by putting a high-profile race out there. Sure, they’ll lose some fans in the Southeast, but they’ll gain many more than that in California.

Another factor in NASCAR’s success is its tight control on everything from the competitors to the guy selling hotdogs under the grandstand. Not everyone associated with the sport respects NASCAR, but they all fear it enough to keep in line. Whether good or not, this allows the sanctioning body to act as an autocracy, meaning that it is pretty free to do whatever the hell it pleases. And, if you don’t like living by their rules, they’ll find someone else who will.

NASCAR’s route to success has me thinking about my junior high football coach, Mr. Goodrich. He did some stupid things and pretty much stomped anyone who got in his way, but he was good at building winning football teams, and winning football games was more important than winning friends. Just as Mr. Goodrich was given a “free pass” as long as he was winning games, NASCAR will continue to succeed if it continues its current path.

Grandstand Bob Profile and Past Columns

note: This opinions expressed in this column are those of writer and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of ARS Racing Outlet or its parent company, Beydler and Bell, LLC.