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Drifting and So Cal not the right fit for NASCAR
By admin | August 30, 2008
By Richard Allen
Drifting and NASCAR both involve cars and skilled drivers. Both attract fans with sensations of sights, sounds and smells that cannot be matched. However, although they may sound like they do, the two have nothing in common with each other.
In drifting, drivers attempt to slide cars around turns with the object being to keep the car going sideways as much as possible. It is about style as much as anything.
Although it can be seen just about everywhere and may have originated somewhere else, drifting is a Southern California thing. It is what I often refer to as an “X Games Sport”. I do not know if it actually is an event in the X Games because I have not watched enough of the ESPN made for television extreme sports competition to know, and I never will.
I am not writing this article to condemn drifting or the fans of drifting. I do not know enough about it to do that. The purpose of this article is to point out that Southern California is a place that goes for non traditional activities. It is not place where NASCAR ought to thrive…and it does not. The masses of empty seats which will be evident on Sunday at the Auto Club Speedway will prove that.
Drifting appeals to a younger, hipper crowd, a crowd that likes to do rather than watch. As a high school teacher I can attest to the fact that many of today’s kids, whether from California or not, are of this same type mindset. Because of this era of video games and instant gratification they have very short attention spans. They see no point in watching cars go around an oval track for three hours.
NASCAR appeals to a more traditional crowd, a crowd that likes to sit back and take in their favorite sport with a cold beverage. This crowd is a different generation all together. They enjoy the fact that it takes a while to determine the winner of a NASCAR race because endurance is something this crowd appreciates.
The two audiences will never mix, never in a meaningful way that is. By trying to reach out to this region of the country for the purpose of building a new spectator base NASCAR has reached in the wrong direction. Any fans that might be gained by going to the Los Angeles area twice a year will never be anything more than casual fans at best. And what’s worse, NASCAR has alienated its core fan base to reach out to this new audience.
A.J. Allmendinger, as part of a promotion, tried his hand at drifting this week. I did not watch it and have no intention of watching it, just like the crowd who would enjoy such a thing has no intention of watching the Pepsi 500 on Sunday night.
Drifting is an appropriate term for many Southern California sports fans. They try something for a short time then they drift away to the next big thing. That would, in part at least, explain why such a big city has no NFL team.
Unfortunately, by racing in Los Angeles this Labor Day weekend NASCAR has decided to cast its lot with an audience that will never embrace them while leaving an audience that would have gone to Darlington, or at least watched on television, feeling abandoned.
It could be that if NASCAR ever decides to come back home it will find that its most durable fans are “drifting” to the lake, the beach or the dirt track.
Richard Allen is a member of the National Motorsports Press Association. His weekly column appears in The Mountain Press every Wednesday.
Topics: Articles |
August 31st, 2008 at 6:19 am
Good morning Sir:
My hearty congratulations for being one of the very few within the media that do not subscribe to the perpetual “press release train” of the infamous Gillian Zucker — manager in residence in the Ivory Towers of the California / Fontana / Auito Club Speedway / name du jour speedway.
The sheer audacity of rewarding this facility with not one but TWO cup dates and now a CHASE date is nothing sjhort of ludicrous.
Again, my hearty congratulations for great reporting.
The local grocers distribution of free tickets will not help fill the seats and the added Cup date at KC will play a major impact on Gillians “favored status” track.
Regards,
August 31st, 2008 at 8:29 am
As a native So Californian, lifelong NASCAR and auto racing fan, and a car culture maven who has been living in the deep south for 10 years, I’m a little confused as to the focus on the column. Is it So Cal car culture? Generation Y? NASCAR? Auto Club Speedway and its mgmt?
I disagree that NASCAR has no business being in So Cal. No place on earth is the culture of the automobile more powerful than So Cal. Autosports like drag racing and off road racing were born there. Stock car racing has been around So Cal since the car was invented. Today, there are as many NASCAR drivers from California and the west coast as there are from the south. Folks in So Cal love their cars in a way southerners will never understand or appreciate.
I don’t understand the connection between drifting and NASCAR. Drifting did not originate in So Cal. It came from Japan, where car enthusiasts would modify their Toyotas and Nissans then take them to the narrow mountain roads and powerslide them thru the tight turns. Videos of this activity were sold and it caught on. The first legit drifting competition in the US was in the late 90’s, and drifting is not sanctioned by the FIA.
Drifting is popular in So Cal for a couple reasons. First, it holds great appeal to Asians and pacific islanders who identify with the cars and the attitude much more than they identify with American V8 engines and oval track racing. In Japan, China, Korea and the Philippines, there aren’t many Chevys and Fords screaming around 1/2 mile ovals, but there are plenty of Toyotas driving on twisty roads. Second, So Cal is filled with Japanese cars and similar roads so the link to drifting’s past is easy to make. So Cal’s Asian population is massive and their young people simply have no interest in NASCAR but they worship JDM car culture. NASCAR will never reach these people but they connect instantly to drifting.
The problem with NASCAR and Auto Club spdwy is the overwhelming desire of these people to connect NASCAR racing with the Hollywood elite. The track may be 60 miles east of LA, but it might as well be on another planet. Life in places like Ontario, Riverside and San Bernardino is much more like life in Georgia and North Carolina than it is Beverly Hills and West LA. Folks in this area listen to country music, drive 4WD trucks and love the outdoors just like southerners do. Sure, they may not drink as much sweet tea, and prefer mexican food to pork barbecue, but there are more similarities than you may realize. The age and income demographic is definitely there in So Cal, always has been.
The challenge to NASCAR in So Cal is not appealing to the potential fan base because these people already exist. The challenge is enticing them to drive to Fontana and sit in the grandstands on a super hot and super windy day instead of doing the 1,000 other fun activities that are available to them. So Cal is not So Carolina where there is almost nothing to do so ya might as well go to the track and sit in the stands. The So Cal race needs to be held at night and not on a holiday weekend in the summer where everyone is thinking about the beach, not NASCAR. The So Cal race is much more date-sensitive than most other tracks. I live in Atlanta and they could hold the race pretty much any ol’ weekend and the fans will show up. Not so in So Cal.
Final point - Auto Club Speedway needs to refocus their marketing efforts on the real racing fan base in So Cal, and stop trying to link the track to Hollywood and the celebrity culture. The fact is that you are not going to get celebrities to drive 60 miles into the high desert unless you helicopter them in and roll out the red carpet. This pandering to the Hollywood elite sends the wrong message to the core racing fan base that they are not worthy of the same treatment and attention. If Hollywood wants to come to the track, they know where the 10 freeway is, just head east and look for the signs. In the meantime there are plenty of blue collar folks who do not drift their JDM Nissan Silvia’s thru the mountains while listening to techno music. Reach out to the NASCAR fans and everything will be fine. The drifter crowd can do their own thing.
August 31st, 2008 at 8:30 am
YIKES, what a brain dump. Sorry for the missive. I was typing and got a little carried away.
August 31st, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Uncle Bo is exactly right. Ms. Zucker and NASCAR are catering to and focusing on the wrong crowd…..
August 31st, 2008 at 12:50 pm
The reason AJ was there was because he was meeting with another Red Bull athlete. Like how Brian Vickers jumps out of planes, AJ decided to do the drifting. I believe NASCAR needs to be in So Cal, but not with two dates.
August 31st, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Uncle Bo…another well said, well spoken missive about a poorly managed track on the left coast, perpetually catering to the “folks at the OSCARs…one of the great reasons for low attendance last year…”they were all at the OSCARs.” REALLY. Which is just slightly better than the one that said…”they are all really here, they are just underneath buying souvenirs.” And we in the south last weekend have 168,000 at Bristol which seats 168,000 and next weekend will have 112,000 at Richmond, which seats 112,000 with no local grocer giving away seats or giving away a football ticket with each race ticket. I acknowledge that we live and race at OLD southern tracks located in the middle of nowhere but we seem to fill them up without benefit of the “OSCAR & Latte” crowd. And WHO, in their right mind, with minimal attenance on site, would start a Nationwide race after 10:00 PM EDT to ensure minimal tv audience on the east coast with a post midnight conclusion which is also likely to happen again on Sunday night. Some serious errors in judgement from the Ivory Towers atop the “name du jour” speedway….California / Fontana / Auto Club???
August 31st, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Thanks for the subtle digs against southern culture uncle bo. Interesting to know that you think people in South Carolina don’t appreciate cars as much as you So Cal people, and don’t have anything else to do, ever. I’ll also remind you that we have beaches on this coast too, since you suggested that the beach is why people don’t go to the Fontana track.
Fact of the matter is simply that 2-mile D-shaped track racing is not exciting and doesn’t bring about any of the excitement and thrill of watching cars battle it out in close quarters like my home NASCAR tracks here in Richmond and Martinsville. Short track racing is infinitely better than super speedway racing, and I think any track would sell more tickets, have more viewers, and satisfy NASCAR’s corporate greed if it was somehow converted into a short track.
September 1st, 2008 at 1:13 am
Quote from Uncle Bo:
“Folks in So Cal love their cars in a way southerners will never understand or appreciate”
Huh? Apparently you aren’t into car culture as much as you think. Yes, So Cal has a car culture. But so does the SoEast USA. Also, to an extent SoCal’ers wouldn’t understand. NASCAR started in the South, Uncle Bo. I’d say we appreciate our cars plenty. Also… pray tell what model Toyota people are driving around twisty roads… Camry’s? Sienna’s? Toyota hasn’t made a rear wheel drive sports car since the Supra. So to say people driving Toyotas on twisty roads inspired them to take up drifting… Certainly they weren’t inspired by any Toyota made in the last decade.
But thanks for taking a shot at us Southerners, Mr Car Culture Maven. I’ll let my buddies at the sports car club know that we can disband since we don’t understand car culture like those from Southern California.
September 1st, 2008 at 7:59 am
Dear miffed Southerners,
Please don’t take my comments so personally. I’m not attacking anyone, just pointing out how different So Cal car culture is compared to what I’ve seen in the South. I’ve lived in the South for over 10 years and have attended many car events, so I understand the differences quite well.
It was all within the context of the opinion article posted above that NASCAR, a traditionally Southern automotive activity, has no place in Southern California, which celebrates non-traditional activities. Obviously, I disagree and feel NASCAR needs to appreciate So Cal car culture a little more and find a way to connect to it instead of just saying, “these people out here don’t get us”. They do, in ways you might not appreciate.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:06 pm
I just got one thing to say. Nascar needs to get the heck out of Cal and back two Darlington and Rockingham.