The 'old days' are gone in racing; it's time for some newer approaches

This photo is from the 1980s, I believe at Red River Valley Speedway, of LM driver Steve Thorsen. Corey Litton provided me with it a few years ago.

I find myself doing this. Longing for the old days of racing sometimes.

You know, when stands were packed weekly, when there were much more heated rivalries, when in a lot of communities racing was THE weekly entertainment.  Tracks ran three or four classes, would get 15-20 cars per class, and the shows would get done in 3-3 1/2 hours.

But here is a reality.

The old days are gone.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t aspects that can be applied today  (for example, I don’t think there is as much personal communication, whether it’s in-person or on the phone, between promoters and drivers), but you can’t promote and run a track totally like you did in the 1980s or even the 1990s.

For example: newspaper and radio advertising used to be big parts of racing promoting in those days.  Now, neither are very effective methods of reaching fans or drivers, at least in my opinion (and this is coming from a guy who worked in newspapers for more than 10 years). Even local TV advertising I am not sure is a good way to reach people.

The reality is attendance and car counts at most weekly shows, with a few exceptions, have decreased, or at the best plateaued. I think the sport has lost a lot of the true race fans like myself – someone who goes there to watch the race but doesn’t necessarily follow a specific driver or class. That group used to fill the stands 30 or 40 years ago but it has dwindled.

You still have moms and dads, siblings, aunts and uncles, friends and grandparents come to the track weekly to watch a specific individual. But if you walked up an down the stands, you would have fewer and fewer fans there just simply to watch the races every week.

I hear some folks say racing isn’t as good as years ago. I would say it’s different. At a lot of tracks I grew up going to, they were soaked in water beforehand; cars, particularly the lower-paying divisions, were asked to pack the track. It was muddy as hell a lot of times, or in some cases a bit greasy. The cars are very different now, too. I often go to a track, it’s packed in and hard as a rock, often left on the dry side, a lot of times dusty for the heats, or even slimy for the heats.

Another reality is people aren’t into cars like they were years ago.  When I was growing up, the Sportsman class had Camaros, Mustangs, Monte Carlos in them. Cool cars. The street stock class had Malibus, Cutlass Supremes, Chevelles and Novas.  If you were a car buff and came to the track, you got to side a decent variety of cars.

Most people I talk to now aren’t into the design of mechanics of cars. I am certainly not, even though I did like the different bodies designs growing up.

Again, the old days are gone.

There is much, much more competition for our time and entertainment dollar now. Youth sports have exploded and if you have kids competing in hockey, basketball, volleyball, baseball/softball or soccer in the summer – chances are they are playing at a tournament somewhere. People like to go camping or go to the lake. There are reunions and weddings. Vacations to Duluth or the Black Hills. Or, sometimes, you just don’t feel like going out and sitting in the stands on a 100-degree day where it feels like a sauna. All have contributed to the attendance woes.

If there is down time at a track because of a wreck, or track work, what are 90 percent of the people doing during that time? They are on their phones. Attention spans now are like those of gnats. That is a major consideration when it comes to fan engagement at a race.

From a driving standpoint, it takes many nights a week to prep a race car. And the costs? Ridiculously high, and they seem to keep climbing while purses are stagnant.  At the same time the cost to run a track has dramatically increased. Food prices get higher and higher. Gas prices have a major impact as you need fuel for track prep equipment. Workers need to be paid. Then there’s insurance, wreckers, sanctioning fees…it adds up fast.

That begs the question how this trend gets fixed, and there is no simple or easy answer.  I know some tracks are trying very hard to reverse the attendance trend – Mississippi Thunder Speedway is one example, trying some different pricing options for pit entry. Some tracks are letting individuals under the age of 17 free into the grandstand with a paid adult. I do think tracks have to at least TRY some new approaches in a rapidly changing world. Tracks like Viking and Fiesta City (and I am sure there are others) let their drivers into the pits for free -- a great gesture to at least save a little bit of money.

I know several tracks are trying; there are also those living on what they used to be 30-40 years ago, and that approach does not work. The sport and times are much different.

I do think cutting classes and the length of the average weekly show would help a lot. Very few folks sit in the stands for 4-5 hour weekly racing programs without getting sick of it.

One thing I like to do with the blog is feature stories – telling the stories of drivers of different classes. This year I’ve done stories on drivers from 10 different classes. Many have good stories to tell. And maybe if 1 or 2 people on facebook who have never been to a race see the article on the driver, and check out a race at their local track to watch that person.

I think with social media, the chance for tracks to promote their drivers is out there – and why not do it more?  Even if it is a short interview or Q and A, just a bit of information out there might grab someone’s attention.

Having good social media advertising is vital now. It’s one thing to just put scheduled standard ads on your Facebook and Instagram pages, it’s  another to post content that grabs attention, or generates some real excitement and anticipation going into it. For now, Facebook is free and an opportunity to do that.

All of us in racing want to see the sport grow again, and there is no one magic pill to do so. But we can’t “go back to the old days” anymore and expect the same results as years ago.