[LSC9901]

This is part of a story by David Poole in the Charlotte Observer. What's your opinion ??



Myth No. 5

5. NASCAR’s new fans are killing the sport for its longtime fans.

Let me just say it simply right off the bat. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been a NASCAR fan for five minutes or 50 years, you have the same right to like or dislike a driver or a track or a TV announcer or who sings the national anthem or anything like that.

You can pull for open-wheel drivers or against them. You can pull for Toyota because it’s bringing new blood to NASCAR or pull against Toyota because you read about Pearl Harbor in a history book. It’s your prerogative.

That’s the joy of being a fan. If you like Elliott Sadler because of the way he talks, or think Jamie McMurray is a metrosexual dreamboat, or Carl Edwards because he has six-pack abs or Tony Stewart because he doesn’t take any grief off anybody, good for you.

Just don’t let anybody tell you that he has more of a right to be a fan than you do because he’s been around longer.

Look, at some point in every fan’s life he or she went to a track or watched a race on television for the first time. Passion for the sport may have been born when a son went with his dad for the first time, or when a group of single girls decided to go have a party in the infield one weekend.

You may have hated racing until you met and fell in love with someone who didn’t. You may know cars from top to bottom, every bolt and every rivet, or you may not even be able to put gasoline in.

It does not matter. If you want to be a fan, be a fan. But if you decide to be a fan, watch out for anybody who starts a sentence with “I’ve been going to races for...” That’s almost always followed by a lecture on why that person is more entitled to pull for a driver or love going to the track more than you.

Until somebody has a meeting and decides what the cutoff date is, I am going to consider every fan to be equal. Unless somebody tells me that all fans have to carry an ID card affirming that they became a fan before the invitation to love racing got revoked because the lot was full, I am going to consider it everybody’s right to come and go as they please.

As for the question of whether NASCAR is “catering” too much to new fans at the expense of people who’ve been around a while, I will simply ask you to consider how you’d handle it in your business.

Let’s say you sell insurance. Or you run a restaurant. Or you cut hair. Whatever. If you’re trying to get new customers to buy a life insurance policy or patronize your place of business, how do you treat them the first time you meet? Aren’t you extra nice, trying to make them feel welcome? Don’t you take a little extra time, helping them understand their options or the products you have to offer? Might you give them a free desk calendar, suggest your best dessert or offer them a discounted rate on a shampoo, hoping your kindness will be viewed as an invitation to do business again?

Or, would you treat new customers with skepticism and disdain? Let ‘em come back six or seven times to see if they’re really willing to commit to having me worry about making them feel like valued customers.

What have they done for me so far? I’ve got a good business right now, I don’t need more people coming in here and taking my attention and focus away from the people who’ve always come in here. Let them invest a little bit of their money and themselves into doing business with me, and then maybe I will care about them.

Which approach do you think would work better?

[Quality88]

I disagree totally..... your not a fan cause you grab onto the coat tails of a fad. There are people out there that claim to be fans, but only watch cause its a popular sport. They are more interested in wrecks than racin. That's not bein a fan, IMO

Root for a driver all you want. You can just root for racin in general.

[Bob Tanner]

I disagree.

I won't repeat my post to Phil in another thread but it's germane.

One thing which gives me a bit of heartburn, IRT this general topic, is the feeling the longtime fans gets when it becomes so evident that NA__AR is targeting the new fan demographic and is catering (or pandering, if that word better describes what you sense) to this new fan. Speaking only for myself, I get the feeling that both NA__AR and the new fans will be glad when we are all gone because there will be less descension between the two types of fans and less complaining over the direction NA__AR seems to be taking.

The new fans aren't causing the riff Poole alludes to, NA__AR is. It doesnt necessarily cause me to loose interest, it just pisses me off.

[Quality88]

Originally Posted by Bob Tanner

I disagree.

I won't repeat my post to Phil in another thread but it's germane.

One thing which gives me a bit of heartburn, IRT this general topic, is the feeling the longtime fans gets when it becomes so evident that NA__AR is targeting the new fan demographic and is catering (or pandering, if that word better describes what you sense) to this new fan. Speaking only for myself, I get the feeling that both NA__AR and the new fans will be glad when we are all gone because there will be less descension between the two types of fans and less complaining over the direction NA__AR seems to be taking.

The new fans aren't causing the riff Poole alludes to, NA__AR is. It doesnt necessarily cause me to loose interest, it just pisses me off.

Yes the new fans will be glad the old fans are gone, but then again when the old fans are gone, the new fans will be the old fans bein agitated by the new fans. Does that make sense?

[LSC9901]

Originally Posted by Quality88

Yes the new fans will be glad the old fans are gone, but then again when the old fans are gone, the new fans will be the old fans bein agitated by the new fans. Does that make sense?

Perfect sense. At that point they'll be saying "WOW ... Dustin was right !!!"

[Quality88]

Originally Posted by LSC9901

Perfect sense. At that point they'll be saying "WOW ... Dustin was right !!!"

one of my greatest accolades

[Racer Duck]

New fan, old fan .. what difference does it make? When did this become a fan against fan competition? I thought this was about racin'? We aren't talking about which beer belly can get around track first, or who's slickest with the TV remote. You like the red car, I like the white one, so what! You think my driver sux, and I think worse about yours, so what! What's important here is the racing. Without racing, we don't have any reason to be here.

Now, if you'd rather be spending your time at the beer barn, or rummaging thru a thousand T-shirts to find just the right one, you ain't a fan.

We fans should be upset when we see NASCAR catering on one group. As Q said, someday it'll be your turn to be on the outside lookin in. Be mad at who's causing the problem, not the guy in the seat next to you. Remember, you're both there for the same reason: to see the race.

[SteelPhoenyx]

Originally Posted by Racer Duck

New fan, old fan .. what difference does it make?

Best statement of this entire thread...right here!

It hasn't happened to me yet, but I'd hate to have my validity as a fan put into question just because I haven't been watching it since I was 2. Anybody doing that would probably get met with a cheerful grin and a 1-fingered salute.

I can see longtime fans' frustration with 'bandwagon fans'... but give the rest of us 'newbies' a break! Just because I only recently lost the yellow stripes on my bumper does not mean I have any less of a right to cheer wildly and passionately for my favorite drivers as a 'preME'. Or think that Pocono is the most boring track on the face of the earth, and why do they have 2 races there?

Watching NASCAR racing (and I watch all the televised races I can) has led me to exploring other racing too. I'm planning on hitting as many of the local tracks as I can this season. I've developed a liking for dirt track racing and there's a track not far from where I live. Hell, there's at least 3 I can think of within an hour or so. Used to date a guy that did the modified midget racing in Stockton many years ago, I forgot how much fun it was to go to those races until recently.

The irony is, even though my 2 favorite drivers are in the Cup, I'm gradually becoming more of a Truck series fan. Probably because of the lack of 'dog & pony show' attached to it.

I just want the racing to start back up...

[Quality88]

In my tirade I may have been unclear, and singled out a few by without clarification..... I have no problem with people just comin into the sport and are loyal followin fans. What I don't care for are those that just jump in cause it's the current "fad" of choice and have the nerve to down the long time foloowin fans. Like they actually know the sport. I hope this clears a few things up.

[The Dude]

Originally Posted by Quality88

In my tirade I may have been unclear, and singled out a few by without clarification..... I have no problem with people just comin into the sport and are loyal followin fans. What I don't care for are those that just jump in cause it's the current "fad" of choice and have the nerve to down the long time foloowin fans. Like they actually know the sport. I hope this clears a few things up.

Every sport is gonna have people like that, but don't worry, they won't be around long.

[PenelopePitStop]

Man! You guys are hard to keep up with! Of the 6 NASCAR Myths, this is the only one I picked to respond to without spending the next week and a half online.

First ... I think this guy did much of his research on the comments at GTG! I'm not kidding!

I don't think that new fans are killing the sport. I agree with Bob. "The new fans aren't causing the riff Poole alludes to, NA__AR is. It doesn't necessarily cause me to loose interest, it just pisses me off." New fans don't have the power to ruin the sport. NASCAR is doing that very well ... perhaps with a bit of help from the media.

Now, I don't have an issue with new fans. Come on board! AND LEARN! Learn from people "who start a sentence with 'I’ve been going to races for...'”. Poole is way out of line with "That’s almost always followed by a lecture on why that person is more entitled to pull for a driver or love going to the track more than you." I've been on GTG for a year now, and I admire many, many members who have been going to or following racing much longer than I have, and I have never, not once, come even close to feeling that those members felt they were any more entitled than I am.

New fans are great! IGNORANT fans are not! New AND ignorant fans are the worst! Especially when one of their posts sneak on to GTG! The first race I watched, my first question was, "Why don't they have any break lights?" (I know I'll get razzed for that one!) I was trying to understand the sport beyond just following a driver. Frankly, I couldn't keep track of any one driver very well back then. New fans who strive to be NASCAR-knowledgeable are endearing to me.

Poole's "new business" analogy has one major flaw: He's catering to the new business and forgetting the existing business. Precisely what NASCAR is doing. For me, I wouldn't treat the new customers any different from the existing customers. Perks for everyone!

"Let me just say it simply right off the bat. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been a NASCAR fan for five minutes or 50 years, you have the same right to like or dislike a driver or a track or a TV announcer or who sings the national anthem or anything like that." No sh*t! What the hell does the "right" have to do with it? What does he think? All us "older" NASCAR fans gather around newbies and stone them?

This guy really gets on my last nerve!

[SteelPhoenyx]

The thing is, David Poole is a regular contributor on the Rowdy.com podcast. Usually he has some very good, very insightful things to say. That's what I find kinda surprising about this whole article. I like Pooley... he amuses me.