I Don’t Like Nascar, But I Still Miss The Action

Don't ever base your racing opinions by what you see on the TV - motorsport is all about experiencing it in person
I Don’t Like Nascar, But I Still Miss The Action

I’m about to talk about Nascar. I know some of you will think awesome, while others are just here to see how badly I bash this classic American racing institution. But there’s a broader message in this article that applies not just to Nascar, but all types of motorsports. I’m going with Nascar because I have some interesting behind-the-scenes experience that I suspect will help shed light to the moral of this story.

Wait a tic - there’s a Nascar article on Car Throttle that claims to have a moral to the story? That’s the idea, but first, let’s get the requisite Nascar bashing out of the way.

I Don’t Like Nascar, But I Still Miss The Action

I’m not fond of Nascar. With constant format changes, rules up the wazoo, and cookie cutter cars designed to run side-by-side until half the field crashes, Nascar is a mere corporate shadow of the gritty, honest, shade-tree, win-on-Sunday-sell-on-Monday fun it used to be. And since 2016 television ratings are tanking like the latest Top Gear series, I suspect my opinions are shared by many.

Also, it’s positively boring to watch. I could flush a ping pong ball down the toilet, or tie a bunch of Hot Wheels cars to the ceiling fan in my kitchen and have a better experience. Don’t actually try that, by the way. You’d be surprised how much damage a tiny toy car can do with a bit of momentum behind it.

But when you get right down to it, isn’t racing in general pretty darn boring to watch on TV? Sorry if I ruffle some feathers here, but Formula 1 puts me to sleep. Drag racing is even worse, especially Top Fuel where races are over in four seconds. And then you have endurance racing, where the challenge isn’t necessarily to go fast, but to just keep going. The real excitement happens in the pits with mechanics pulling off miracle repair jobs, but you never see such things on TV.

The only racing I can watch on the TV with some measure of enjoyment is touring car racing, but such events are hard to find in the States. And I’m bonkers enough for rally that I can enjoy watching a few stages if the camera angles are good. Even with these though, I’m bored enough after 20 minutes to change the channel.

So why do I miss Nascar? Because Nascar, like pretty much every other form of motorsports action, isn’t meant to be seen on the TV. It’s not a two-dimensional medium to be absorbed on a 50-inch screen. The best surround-sound stereo is still a laughable interpretation to what you actually hear at a race. Chicken wings, Cheetos and beer, while thoroughly enjoyable, are not the smells of racing. And I’ve had the opportunity in my career to experience Nascar in a way that only major manufacturer involvement and team sponsorships can provide.

I Don’t Like Nascar, But I Still Miss The Action

Through those opportunities I didn’t just go to races, I sat with fans in exclusive pit road suites listening to drivers talk about everything from racing to cooking dinner. I toured race shops. I hung out with drivers in their RVs pre-race and post-race, talking about what happened. I attended driver meetings. I sat next to crew chiefs on pit road during races, 10 feet away from crews changing four tires and dumping 24 gallons of race fuel into cars in eight seconds.

I learned that Nascar isn’t some low-tech, simpleton series where drivers only turn left. Aside from the few road courses on the Nascar circuit, understand that these cars are quite heavy with prolific horsepower and not that much downforce. They’re racing on oval circuits wide enough for jumbo jets to land on. Ever been driving on a windy day and been hit by a gust of wind? Ever been overtaken by a lorry going a fair chunk faster than you? Imagine that force quadrupled. At 200mph. Surrounded by cars. The track may turn left, but these drivers are constantly sawing the wheel left and right to keep control.

None of this is conveyed properly through television. None of it.

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It’s been a couple years since I was elbow-deep in Nascar. I still have no interest in watching it on television, but yeah, I miss the live action. And not just the access-all-areas, hot passes action. I’ve been in the stands with the crowd and it’s a completely immersive experience. Hearing the engines. Smelling the fuel and rubber. Getting down by the fence and actually feeling the cars go past. I can say the same thing for attending stage rally events. And NHRA drag racing events. And should the opportunity arise for me, I’m sure Formula 1 and endurance races would be just the same.

I don’t like watching Nascar, but I love the Nascar experience. And that’s the moral of the story. Don’t judge a racing series by what you see on the TV, because racing isn’t meant to be watched. It’s meant to be experienced.

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Comments

Anonymous

Hey man, great article! Yeah, i agree that certain things have to be experienced rather than seen

07/23/2016 - 06:32 |
2 | 1
Abbas Algudaihi

I hate people who say NASCAR is just turning left and anyone can do it.

07/23/2016 - 09:13 |
11 | 2

Show them how close they get and that they are going 200mph. Going straight would be terrifying enough adding turns is just horrific to go around. That’s why only racecar drivers are racing.

07/23/2016 - 12:12 |
6 | 0

I used to be one of those people.

Then I rode shotgun in one of those “experience” cars.

I am no longer one of those people. Jesus Christ that was terrifying. The driver I was riding with was literally drifting the car around the corners at Talladega (granted, a very shallow drift, only a couple of degrees, but still), and we were only going 160mph. I can only imagine now much skill it takes to hold one of those cars steady at 200mph when you’re less than a foot away from other cars on all sides…

07/24/2016 - 00:29 |
5 | 0
Anonymous

Not the same with Formula 1. It’s more expensive, and it’s really boring to watch. I would totally go to a NASCAR race.

Frankly, the best racing to go watch is anything grass roots. One I love is dirt oval racing, didn’t have much interest until my wife dragged me to one and it was loud, up close you can see the whole race from anywhere in the stands and the racing is tight most of the time. Back in the day I used to go with my dad to watch rallycross in the UK and that was fantastic, same with proper banger racing.

07/23/2016 - 09:15 |
16 | 0
Kilgore Trout

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

I agree completely. At my old job, I used to get free tickets to the big-dollar races at Kentucky Speedway and also to the grassroots Lawrenceburg Speedway, which is a small dirt oval in Indiana. I always thought watching the sprints, midgets, hornets, and pure stocks in Lawrenceburg was a lot more fun than NASCAR over in Sparta.

07/24/2016 - 02:32 |
0 | 0
Gus (SQUAD SQUAD)

I find formula 1 OK, but all the recent restrictions have made it boring. The cars need to be more experimental again, there’s no more innovation because of the rules, and it also prevents more competitive driving and twists and turns. Bring back old f1.

07/23/2016 - 09:45 |
2 | 0

That’s what NASCAR needs too honestly. Plymouth Superbirds next to Mustang Mach 1s, and things like that

07/24/2016 - 20:50 |
0 | 0
maurotehsilva

I feel the same way, I mostly watch NASCAR on tv but like he other day in New Hampshire Motor Speedway I enjoyed the pre-race experience and the race itself that day. Granted it was a fairly clean race until the last 28 laps of the New Hampshire 301.But it felt great to watch a major motorsport live for the first time since my sophomore (second) year of high school back in 2009 at the Daytona 500, when Matt Kenseth won thanks to a rainout, the ‘500 before I also went to, where Ryan Newman won the race in its entirety. NHMS is the closest venue to my home, which is ironically located just south of the New Hampshire line though, so it’s just an hour an a half drive depending on the traffic on the Everett Turnpike.

07/23/2016 - 10:49 |
3 | 0

I’ve never been to speedway, i never found racing that interesting tough, id rather be driving than watching. Idk if i could even do that though, as i have one of the shortest attention spans on the planet.

07/23/2016 - 17:13 |
0 | 0
Raregliscor1

BTCC is the best racing series in the world imo. The rest don’t come near.

07/23/2016 - 11:35 |
1 | 1

Well it was

07/23/2016 - 13:06 |
1 | 0

I like the v8 supercars as well.

07/24/2016 - 20:50 |
0 | 0
Dat Incredible Chadkake

In conclusion, turn off the TV and go to an actual race gosh dang it

07/23/2016 - 14:35 |
2 | 0
.... 3

In my opinion, NASCAR is the best motorsport to watch, but you really have to be a racecar driver in real life, or on iRacing or such to really get into it. I’ll explain it here, and probably in a future article. But, it’s really fun to watch once you understand everything that is going on. For me, I am in the process of getting into INEX Racing (A Lower series that feeds into NASCAR), and run too much iRacing on Ovals. So I can understand it more than most. For me, it’s really interesting to watch as the track rubbers in and heats up, causing the drivers to go to a different line around the track, and bringing in different groves to drive the race track. Opposite of F1 for instance, there could be 5 different racing lines by the end of the race. The strategy aspect is amazing as well. For instance, at a track where tires wear to the point where at the end of a fuel stint, tires may be 3-4 seconds slower than at the beginning of a stint. I’ll use this year’s Atlanta race for instance. Jimmie Johnson pitted for tires as soon as he knew he could make it to the end on fuel, this let him be 3 seconds faster on his new tires. When his fellow drivers pitted, he had an 11 second lead. However, he was losing over a second a lap to 2nd place Kevin Harvick. Harvick caught up to Jimmie Johnson around the end of the race, but Johnson had saved his tires, and stayed ahead of Dale Earnhardt Jr by less than a second to win the race. There is so much more that I will explain at a future date, but that, in a nutshell, is just some of the stuff that many don’t try to figure out about NASCAR. Once you can figure out some of these things, it becomes much more fun to watch. Also, if you want to watch some NASCAR, it is on NBC Sports Network tomorrow (7/24) at 2:30 for the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis.

07/23/2016 - 15:14 |
4 | 1
Hevar
07/23/2016 - 16:15 |
7 | 0
The Prius Tumor

In reply to by Hevar

Nobody likes memes that dont make sense for the situation. Get out of your basement and do something meaningful with your life.

07/23/2016 - 16:58 |
0 | 16