Auto racing and kids

From what I have experienced, Formula Drift has the coolest cars around. It's like playing Gran Turismo or the Fast and the Furious for real. Except that teenagers and kids in their 20s want to make their cars look and sound like Formula Drift cars. They go to the races to see what the cars look and sound like and what they can buy to make their cars look and sound like Formula Drift cars. I think that is the big difference between the people who like NASCAR and the people who like Formula Drift. The Formula Drift fans can have cars that look and sound like the ones that actually race.

 

But somehow you are edified by watching a college football game? Or the NBA? Or listening to a talking head droning on about "clutch hitting" or a "cover two"?

The stereotypes are "true" because you want them to be true.

 

Maybe that's the case but I will give myself credit, year after year, for trying to "get into" NASCAR, far beyond my requirements as an ex-sportscaster.

 

I grew up around it, but not in it. I enjoyed it some as a kid, but not in any great sense. As the years went by, however, I began to enjoy it more. I became fascinated by the challenges it presents, and knowing to some degree what is going on makes it much more engaging.

The thrill of it, however, is hard to put into words. This thrill doesn't come often, but it does come. Hemingway alluded to something like it in "The Sun Also Rises":

In bull-fighting they speak of the terrain of the bull and the terrain of the bull-fighter. As long as a bull-fighter stays in his own terrain he is comparatively safe. Each time he enters into the terrain of the bull he is in great danger. Belmonte, in his best days, worked always in the terrain of the bull. This way he gave the sensation of coming tragedy.

When you watch those guys squeeze that car in while they're going 190 and the wall is flying right at them, it grabs you. Well, at least it grabs me.

And you do get props for trying ...

 

I've tried to stay off of this thread but will join in, and I may bounce around:

The problem with NASCAR now is Brian France is trying to do away with the stereotypes, whitewash the sport and make it like stick and ball sports.

Growing up, NASCAR drivers were the end-all, be-all for me. They were guys who worked their way up, Southern guys, and to see them on the track on Sundays was magical. There was nothing Terry Bradshaw or Tony Dorsett did that even came close to Pearson, Petty, Waltrip, Yarborough, Allison. They were bigger than "rock stars" if you will. They drove the cars you could go to the dealership and buy. Their cars weren't "stock" but they were stock appearing.

You built lifetime loyalties to drivers from your home state/home town or an auto maker.

Drivers back then used to sit and sign autographs in the pits for hours after a race. Drivers used to hang out with the fans at the hotels.

All that is gone, and with it the soul of the sport.

You have to either be born into or embrace that soul of the sport to truly get it.

None of the drivers today embody the spirit of NASCAR and what it represents. Some 23-year-old from California or Nevada isn't going to win the hearts and minds of the old line race fan. They just aren't. And when Brian France has his NFL franchise and has totally wrecked what his family built, the old line race fan is still going to be going to their Saturday night short track while the Johnny Come Lately Days of Thunder race fans have moved on.