NASCAR, a ready made TV sport

By By Stan Torgerson / sports columnist
Feb. 18, 2003
There isn't any sport that owes more to television than stock car racing and NASCAR. Not that there weren't followers and believers prior to TV. A driver named Barney Oldfield was a legend in his own right in the early 1900's when drivers always had a mechanic riding by their side in case of mechanical problems.
But the millions of dollars that are now being won, the sponsorships that help pay the bills, and the virtual movie star worship extended to the top drivers are almost all as a result of putting the drivers and their cars on television and glamorizing them both.
When I was a kid, and yes smart guys, there were automobiles even back in those days, my dad would take me to the races each fall at the Minnesota State Fair. The track was dirt and the cars were open-wheeled race cars, not as big as today's stock cars, of course, but larger than the midgets some tracks favor.
The drivers sat in an open cockpit and all wore goggles to keep the flying dirt out of their eyes. When they reached a corner on the typical one mile or less track, they would skid the rear end around into the turn, throwing up large clouds of dust through which their trailing opponents would have to navigate.
The races were 10 or 20 laps, never more than 25 miles as I remember. The motors were loud and in the grandstand my dad and I and the other spectators would never take our eyes off every moment of every race. It was very exciting, particularly to a teenager.
During my adult years announcing sports in Memphis a long track called Lehi was built for major stock car races. There was a short track in West Memphis that ran every weekend.
The Lehi track was supposed to be for the big league racers with only two or three events each year. I was hired as the assistant to Chris Economaki, probably the greatest racing announcer of all time, who was to do the public address system and keep the fans on the edge of their seats.
Unfortunately the Lehi track ran into seemingly constant weather problems. It was dirt, of course, and rain put it out of business. In three years it probably had no more than two, maybe three races that went from start to finish or even started at all.
One year I was invited to the Indianapolis 500, then the biggest of the big because the stocks had not yet taken over the sport.. The entire family was included and off we went. We learned two things.
One, what real traffic can be. We left for the track early and discovered that 100,000 people all seemed to be attending one to a car. Funny, I can't remember who won the race but I have never forgotten that traffic.
But more importantly, we discovered that, except for the first and last lap or two, a race at a 21/2 mile track is like sitting on a street curb watching traffic drive by.
All you can see is the brief portion of the race immediately in front of you. What happens on the backstretch or the far turns is completely out of your range of vision. It was one of the most boring afternoons I have ever spent at a major event. That's why I don't go to Talladega or Darlington or any of the other classic big stockcar tracks.
If I want a cold beer I can drink it at home. I don't have to drive through Indianapolis type traffic to enjoy it in Alabama.
But a race on television is a different story. They always tell you who is leading, by how much, and how fast he's driving. There's no need to wonder what's going on in the pits. They show you. And when there's a crash such as the major rollover that occurred early Sunday at Daytona, the replay camera shows it to you again and again, fast, slow, far away or up close. No one says "what happened" if they leave the room for a minute. Be patient and you'll see it again.
Television has made the drivers swashbuckling heroes. They walk out on the track in their gaudy suits, waving to the crowd, conferring with their vassals whose job it is to pour their gas, change their tires, tinker with the car and act like teenagers at an Ole Miss Mississippi State football game if their man wins.
You're never sitting on the curb observing the traffic. Instead you're actually part of the excitment, a member of the pit crew, riding in the back of the car looking over the driver's shoulder thanks to the interior camera, telling yourself to look out when another car races wheel to wheel with yours.
When there is a crash you're a brother, a father, a wife or mother, filled with fear about the safety of your driver and relieved when he walks away from a wreck that looks as if survival would be impossible.
Most of us have played football, basketball, baseball, golf or tennis at sometime in our lives. Been there. Done that.
But very few of us have ever spent three or four hours making left turns at 185 miles per hour knowing our life could be at risk any moment. That's why stock car racing and television were made for each other. In its own way, television allows us to do something we have never done and never will do. And always wanted to.