Just Breathing

10/7/05

ecause I'm a motorsports fanatic, one of my favorite shows on television is Dave Despain's Wind Tunnel on Sunday nights. The show is terrific, with great guest hosts, writers, owners, drivers and racing celebs. One recent co-host was Ed Hinton who writes for Sports Illustrated and the Orlando Sentinel newspaper.

I remember reading Hinton's writing in some online format, but his recent Wind Tunnel appearance made one of those "light bulbs" go off over my head. Hinton referred to the strength and vitality of NASCAR and referred to all of the other motor racing series as "just breathing." Just breathing is an absolutely perfect way to describe everything else but the 800-pound gorilla, NASCAR.

I must ask, is drag racing dying or just on life support? With the consistent empty grandstands we all see, large overflow drag racing crowds seem to be a thing of the past except for a few strong venues.

Damn, I wish I could have made it to the last NHRA Fall event at Chicago, what a beautiful stadium and quality drag racing surface - that should make every drag racing fan salivate. I watched the ESPN TV show from Joliet depicting the tremendous points battle in nitro funny car and I would have loved seeing the tight competition in person at an event so close to Chicago—a city I love.

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But it's my contention that the current NHRA management has completely lost touch with the fan and has no idea how to get him or her back or bring in new fans. I saw the shots from the Ameriquest Airship over the recent NHRA Joliet event - and it hurt.

As I mentioned in last month's column we may only have about 1.5 million TV households who will take the time to watch an NHRA ESPN telecast on a given weekend. That 1.5 mil is certainly a committed bunch of viewers, but that number is in line with the fan base of IRL or Champ Car.

Intuitively when I see the empty grandstands of Joliet I want to jump in and help with solutions, not castigate NHRA for still not getting the job done, again.

I've noticed the subtle, incremental changes over the past five years as the current management distances itself from the customer. If you attend the Big Show with any regularity you'll notice that grey is the dominant hair color, luckily I've just got grey temples. Here are 10 common sense ideas that can be applied for the 2006 drag racing season to bring in some new blood. It's a one year effort to build back and fortify our fan base.

1. Cut all general admission ticket prices by 50 percent.

2. Each paying adult may bring in one person under the age of 16 for free to any qualifying day. Sunday eliminations tickets are 50 percent off for persons under the age of 16. Make NHRA POWERade Drag Racing the most family friendly, affordable destination in entertainment.

3. Support this country's youth groups, future NHRA spectators. Give away Friday or Saturday qualifying tickets to local Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Future Farmers of America, Big Brothers and Big Sisters of America, Boys and Girls Clubs of America, YMCA, Campfire Boys and Girls, Junior Achievement and Make-a-Wish Foundation chapters in every city we visit.