August 21, 2007
By Brian Watkins

Brian Watkins

Last week brought us a new ABC program aimed at the NASCAR crowd and aptly named it “NASCAR in Primetime: an Inside Look at Life in the Fast Lane”. I was excited to hear about the program, and made sure I was tuned in. Unless you spring for the Speed Channel, there isn’t much NASCAR on TV outside of the races and I was eager to see what they had to offer. After watching the show I was more disappointed than excited to be honest, and here’s why.

The show is touted as the showing behind the scenes, uncensored access that NASCAR has never allowed before. The show's website illustrates the rise in fame and interest in NASCAR from mostly white southern men to a recent much broader spectrum of fans.

The website goes on to credit films like “Talladega Nights” with bringing NASCAR into the forefront. I’ll pause right here for a moment to say that I have not met a NASCAR fan that liked Talladega Nights. In fact I don’t think there could have been a film that added more fuel to the stereotypical redneck image of NASCAR than the fictitious driver Ricky Bobby did. But back to the ABC series.

While the production quality was great and the story lines the show covered were all well fleshed out, there really wasn’t much substance that the average NASCAR fan wouldn’t already have been exposed to.

They covered the Mark Martin “all-ways-the-brides-maid” angle, which any NASCAR fan already is well aware of. They covered the fact that Montoya is a NASCAR rookie but an open wheel champion, that he has a family and that during the races, get this, they live in a motor home right at the track!

They covered the trials and tribulations of Johnny Sauter and his start up team, illustrating the differences in abilities and resources between teams with names like Gibbs, Hendrick and Roush and the small start-ups that NASCAR fans have complained about for years.

This leads me to the conclusion that instead of creating or airing a show for NASCAR fans, it was yet another attempt to garner new fans.

While there is nothing wrong with increasing the popularity of the sport and increasing the fan base, it should be measured with some attempt at keeping the existing fan base and rewarding them for their loyalty through body style changes, rules changes, confounding qualifying procedures. Make a show that goes over the heads of the casual NASCAR observer.

But that will never happen, because keeping what you have is less profitable than adding new. The same as ensuring the big name teams and drivers are always on the track regardless of qualifying speed keeps sponsors, big money teams and merchandisers that sell only the top 3 or 4 names, happy.

In the end, the show will continue and I will watch every episode, because like many fans, I’m a sucker for anything NASCAR and while I might already be familiar with 90% of the things they air, the 10% of new insight gleaned is worth the patronizing parts.

The show did have its moments though.

One of the bright spots was interviews with fans and some celebrities sprinkled through out the show. One interviewee that was featured several times was a young boy who couldn’t have been much older than 8 or 9, that had some rather insightful comments about racing. Some of them made this kid look like he knew as much about racing (or more) than all the other fans that were interviewed, combined.

The best quote he had was his description of the experience of 43 racers flying by on the track. Others summed it up with the typical “loud as a freight train” or “ya can’t hear a dang thang”. This young man’s description? “It sounds like a thousand lions all roaring at once” I don’t think anyone has ever described it better.

The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.