Comments on: Why Do People Hate IndyCar?

By: ncrdbl1

ncrdbl1 — Mon, 28 May 2012 03:25:14 +0000

What CARTanestas cannot answer and refuse to discuss is why is it the Indy 500 went from over 17 million households in the mid 70′s to less than 9 million in the early 90s.

By: ncrdbl1

ncrdbl1 — Mon, 28 May 2012 03:16:59 +0000

CART in it’s hey day was only a clique sport. Mostly followed OUTSIDE the US. US tv numbers were lower than the Trucks get today. People want to remember it as something it never was. Outside of Indy it was a minor sport. drawing high 2s and maybe a few low 3s except for maybe LB which would on occasions reach the low 4.s. NASCAR had already over taken all of open wheel except Indy in the mid 80s. Then the Daytona 500 over took Indy in the early 90′s.

By: ncrdbl1

ncrdbl1 — Mon, 28 May 2012 03:02:44 +0000

You can see the influence of the CARTanestas in the series already. Penske is using his power to eliminate the competition. As owner of Ilmor he controls who gets the Chevy engines. He tried to stonewall agreed upon allowable changes for the Honda but Honda was too powerful. Then when Lotus turned up being too slow, politics made sure they would not get any assistance at Indy even thought it was agreed by all three engine builders that in season changes could be made to equalize competition. This will not be the last time this happens either.

By: ncrdbl1

ncrdbl1 — Mon, 28 May 2012 02:52:46 +0000

Problem is Miller is ethically challenged. Anyone who receives a salary from one series and then goes out to bash it;s competitor is ethically challenge. Doesn’t even have the guts to admit to the people he was a paid employee of CART. He is a bitter ole man who signed on to the losing side and to this day still refuses to act in a professional way when discussing the series. His comments have done more damage to open wheel racing than any split. Many do not know his association with CART and think he was objective and didn’t have an agenda. He didn’t get fired because he refused to print fluff pieces. He got fired because he used his articles as propaganda pieces. Of coourse sending pornography through the company email didn’t help. He is a person who believes he is bigger than the sport.

By: ncrdbl1

ncrdbl1 — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 07:07:22 +0000

Why do people hate open wheel racing. It is a simple answer yet no one accepts it. First off let’s clear one thing up open wheels problems began way before there was an IRL or a split. Until you are ready to accept this fact you will never be able to understand why people hate open wheel. We must go back 40 years to know the truth. For decades on Saturday night you could not attend a weekly local race without seeing shirt and hats of all the major racing stars in the US. Most were open wheel drivers. You even could see these major stars as they barnstormed across the US. People associated with the open wheel stars. This was standard practice until the 70′s. When American open wheel made a change and began moving away from the weekly racing fan toward a more European form of racing. When the roadster faded away in favor of rear engine cars. The local fans could no longer associate with what they were seeing. No longer could you see the stars of open wheel barnstorm and show up at many local events. Even events such as the Indy 500 couldn’t avoid the back lash as it’s TV ratings began to suffer. Going from a rating of 17.9 in 1976 to 9.7 less than 10 years later. There was a bump back up to 11.0 in 1986 for the first live ran not delayed by weather. But it fell back to single digits the next year and has remained in single digits ever since. American open wheel began to change the focus of their promotion. They began going after corporate American and less and less grass roots America. The local racing community became disenchanted with open wheel racing. Even open wheel organizations such as USAC began to plow the fertile ground of stock car racing. Going head to head with NASCAR for the grass roots racing fan. Events such as the formation of CART and the plane crash that killed several USAC officials weakened their position in the war with NASCAR. By the time the USAC stock car series folded in 1984 the sport of stock car racing had gained the attention of the fans which felt abandoned by open wheel racing. NASCAR had moved from a regional sport to a national sport. By the early 90s stock car racing had surpassed all of open wheel racing in the US except for the Indy 500. By the mid 90s the Daytona 500 had even surpassed the Indy 500. The issue that many think was a cause of open wheel’s problem was actually a symptom of open wheel’s problems. The split. The split in reality would have had little effect on open wheel if not for certain in the media taking sides in the battle. People like Miller did more to damage open wheel than the actual split. To those on the outside his scorched earth policy left a bitter taste in their mouth. When a person paid by one of the parties in a dispute uses his position to damage the competition it always end up hurting everyone. Miller lost all credibility due to his actions. The fact he to this day still uses his position to bash the IRL imposing his commentary in the place of actual reporting. It is no big surprise that open wheel has not started to regain it’s place in American racing. Will open wheel regain it’s position on the top of the heap? NO, that ship has sailed and will never dock again. sprint Cup racing is and for the foreseeable future will be the big dog. The best open wheel can expect is to try and regain superiority over the Nationwide Series. Reality is that in the US the France family holds all the cards. Not even the FIA would want to have a head to head dispute in the US with the France family. The three most historical racing venues in the US are Indy, Daytona and Watkins Glen. The France family owns two of the three and own the only series that race at all three venues. I do not think that even Brian France can screw things up badly enough for open wheel to reach the top of the mountain again.

By: Brian

Brian — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 02:52:59 +0000

I had an e-mail included in Miller’s Mailbag that was positive and defended Randy Bernard and Wheldon’s presence at Vegas quite nicely after the tragedy, but most of what he picks is negative to be sure.

The main reason I can think of for the “hate” we perceive is that, generally speaking, only the people on the extreme ends of an issue tend to post online or try to shout loudly enough to be heard. Right now Indycar has more people at the negative end than at the positive. The maintstream media relies on what it reads on message boards and forums and uses that to form the basis of their coverage. This is because they are lazy and willing to view what they read online as representing the “pulse” of things. The result is that they pile on struggling entities and pump up others without having a clue as to what is actually going on. Their overly positive preception and presentation of NASCAR is a result of the same phenomenon. It’s both a self-fulfilling prophecy and a viscous circle. It’s also very unfortunate.

IndyCar needs a shot in the arm and certainly could use a run of good luck, but I don’t see it as all gloom and doom and I have good freinds and relatives who work in the series and feel the same way.

By: E.M.H.

E.M.H. — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 15:32:11 +0000

Dammit, Dog! Quit finding ways to say what I said, but shorter with more elegance!!

By: Gary

Gary — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 13:15:30 +0000

You are spot on.

I am a hater of the Indy Car series. For all the reasons you state. I’ve loved OW racing since the dirt track days growing up in central NY. Loved going to F1 at The Glen, moved to Ohio and going to Indy. Followed CART until they were no more.

CART was challenging F1 until the grandson came along. Pushing 240 mph speeds at Indy was part of the draw. Now look at it. Now I hear excuses why 210 18 years later is OK.

I still hope that Indy Car fails so that the Hulman family will be forced to open up the rule book and allow innovation and different sounds to come from IMS.

By: pressdog

pressdog — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 14:59:10 +0000

Let’s not take the 0.0000003% of “people” who get into Miller’s mail bag or read, write or comment on blogs and extrapolate that into to the entire nation, or even all race fans. The sample is NOT indicative of the general population. I would guess fans either like IndyCar, or ignore it. Actively hate? Very rare, statistically speaking. I stopped reading the Miller Mail Bag long ago because it’s soul crushing. I am a happier person for having done so.

By: Fred

Fred — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 01:52:10 +0000

I can sum up why Americans Hate IndyCar: It hasn’t been “American” since at least the late ’60s. The ever-increasing pernicious influence of European motorsport has led to a point where no American can get a job as an OWR without racing in Europe; while the Americans who stay here and develop a fan following are treated as bastard offspring by the almighty European overlords. You want to bring OWR back from its grave? If I may be permitted a small amount of irony, two words: Auslander Raus!