Where have all the rivalries gone?
Posted 4 months, 1 week ago.
Posted by: Stephanie
All right. Let’s dive into an offshoot topic from yesterday’s post.
The overall question: why aren’t we more invested in the drivers these days?
A lack of meaningful rivalries was one of the first things that came to mind.
If there was one thing that defined the final four years of Champ Car, it was the Tracy/Bourdais rivalry. I defy anyone to find a Champ Car fan who didn’t/doesn’t hold fiercely strong views on the matter. In fact, many people who didn’t follow the series all that closely still knew this story well enough to have an opinion. There were t-shirts and everything.
And people are still influenced by it. Planet-IRL.com’s own editor-in-chief, Kohl, flatly refused to assist with the recent online push to convince Monster to sponsor Paul Tracy full-time because his feelings against PT are so strong. (You can witness some of that vitriol first-hand in Planet-IRL’s most recent podcast with special guest Crash Gladys.)
Of course, this isn’t the only rivalry that’s existed over the years. Once upon a time, we had Foyt and Andretti, Unser and Andretti, Unser Jr. and Andretti, Mansell and Andretti.
(Wow. That Andretti name comes up a lot in this subject, doesn’t it?)
And the list goes on. But no such interactions exist in today’s field. There have been flashes in the pan — when Milka threw the towel at Danica in Mid-Ohio in 2008, it made national news. But that one was never really destined to stick. (A rivalry sort of demands that the parties involved be at more or less the same level of competitiveness.)
For the most part, what we’re getting is watered-down, sanitized versions of the drivers’ personalities. Many of them are hesitant to speak their minds for fear of offending the sponsors to which they cling so tenuously.
For example, Danica’s apparently been sent to charm school — the fiery temper we’re used to seeing from her was significantly cooled this season.
And although Dario is rarely caught calling anyone out on anything, he did write a blog entry after Motegi where he ripped pretty soundly into Rafa Matos. (You can find it here.) Apparently, drivers have been lining up in droves to give Rafa a hard time about his antics on the racetrack. Not sure about the rest of you, but this blog entry is the first I’d heard about it. And I suspect that Dario may have felt pretty safe about putting his comments where he did because not very many people seem to know about the Speed IndyCar blogs at all.
There was a glimmer of potential at Indy. When Marco Andretti and Mario Moraes tangled on the first lap, Marco climbed out of his car and called Mario clueless, declaring with exasperation, “that kid doesn’t get it and he never will.” The potential for an interesting story here is high: an American versus a Brazilian, both around the same age, one from one of racing’s greatest families and the other a relative unknown. But after these initial comments, nothing ever came of this. Whether they just never had words for each other again, I can’t say. But I can’t help but suspect that what actually happened is that Marco was given a talking-to and told to keep his mouth shut.
Unfortunately, by pushing this culture on the drivers, the people responsible are having the exact opposite effect of what they intend — they’re actually doing the sponsors a major disservice. Nothing gets TV time like a good throwdown, on or off the racetrack. If the sport hopes to get any attention outside of the group of fans that already follow it, it needs to allow these stories to develop to give people something to talk about around the water cooler on Monday morning.
There’s a fine line to be walked with this, though. I’ll openly admit that I don’t watch NASCAR very closely — I find most aspects of it to be artificially contrived to generate ratings, and it’s quite off-putting. But the sense I get from those who do follow it is that people are getting very tired of the over-marketing that’s happening over there these days. I’m told that little tiffs between drivers are milked for well beyond what they’re worth and that fans are becoming wise to it. (I don’t have any examples to draw from to back this point up. If anyone does, please leave a comment.)
After the IndyCar championship was decided in Homestead, I posited that one of the things we can hang our hat on at the moment is that we’re allowing our racing to unfold naturally and with integrity. This must continue to be the case. We can’t force an artificial rivalry on guys like, say, Dixon and Briscoe — who people generally perceive to be professional and understated — and expect it to work.
But if we can stop muzzling the drivers who are more fiery and opinionated, and if we can bring in some household names to stir the pot up a little, these things should develop honestly on their own.
The important thing is to generate this thought process: “well, driver X who I love didn’t win, but at least he/she finished ahead of driver Y who I hate.” If casual fans think this way, it means they care, and they might even tune in again to see what happens in the next race. And few things would be more effective at spurring the advancement of the sport than a growing fan base that cares.
May be they do not invested more in the drivers these days because they don’t see much of public interest and as a result – much less profits.
Nascar has become very successful on playing with the rivalries, Tony Stewart Kyle Busch, Jeff Gordon, etc. Either you love them or hate them, but yes, you want your hero to succeed and your enemy to faulter.
There seems to be none of this in IndyCar lately. We need some badasses back to create some excitement and rivalries.
Controversy does draw attention. Drama is a huge factor in a sport’s appeal. How do you strike the correct balance, though? It’s clear from assorted bloopers videos and whatnot that these drivers have personalities. Perhaps if they’re allowed to let them show more, drama might ensue?
I completely agree with you, Steph! The drivers are way too sterile right now. It was so much fun with it was Fittipaldi, Rahal, the Andretti’s, Mansell, and Tracy going at it. The personalities are there currently but unfortunately, most of the stories die within a few days. Take Texas this year for example. Marco and Danica were furious with each other after that race (well, most of the anger went only one way). It was hyped in the media for a couple days but then they came out and said they kissed and made it. It would have been a lot more interesting if they had carried that fued out a couple races. I’d say the closest thing we’ve got going now is Dan and Danica. Even that, unfortunately, only flares up about once a year. It’s just too bad that Eddie Cheever doesn’t want to drive anymore. Put Cheever, PT, and Marco in the same race and I guarantee you sparks will fly!!!!
@Slipster: The blooper videos are great, definitely, but they don’t do much to stir up stories. They don’t show us any of the passion or intensity that are part of this sport. Part of the appeal of watching a couple of drivers go at it is that it invariably gives us some insight into what they’re going through in the cars in a way that we don’t get to share otherwise. Well, that and people just like drama.
@Paul: Texas is a great example, but that was never going to be allowed to stick because of the teammate factor, sadly. You’re right, though: Cheever, PT and Marco would be EPIC! But even PT and Marco going at it for a full season could be interesting enough. Heck, PT and anybody… hmm…
I think you get rivalries in one of two ways:
Obviously The first would be run ins on the track. This year we had some pretty entertaining drama with Helio and PT at Toronto followed by some humorous T shirt antics at Edmonton. Similarly if you followed the twitter feed, TK and Helio had a spirited joust on the track at infineon and on their blackberries afterwards.
The second way is to have an overwhelmingly dominant racer step forward and cast a shadow across the land. I commented on this in my goliath post about a month ago – http://jpindycarthoughts.blogspot.com/2009/10/embracing-your-inner-goliath.html From a promotion standpoint – probably the worse thing happened in homestead, the good guy and unsung third member won.
I don’t think rivalries are dead for good – we are just in a place where half the series drivers have not been racing with the other half very long (two years to be exact). Give it some time for NHL and KV to continue to get better. Get PT in a car full time so that he can drop this good corporate citizen masquerade and within two races tops we’ll have something to talk about. Let the young group of Americans grow up – Rahal, Andretti, Hildebrand and Edwards – Caste, culture and entitlement differences will provide a tense undertone to what happens on the track.
In a sense, this newly merged entity is a young series that is growing up into what it will be one day. Time and patience…
Steph, remember Newman-Haas in ‘93 and ‘94? What made the Mario/Mansell rivalry so great was that they were teammates but they couldn’t stand each other. I don’t think there is any issue having rivals as teammates but, unfortunately, in today’s sanitized racing world, it just isn’t likely to happen. I think Graham and BobbyD was probably as close as we are going to get to an inter-team rivalry as we are going to see any time soon.
@JP: I would’ve thought the opposite would have happened — that the CC teams coming into the IRL would have generated rivalry. I’m glad it didn’t, though. I don’t want that to be the source. I don’t think the brass at the IRL would like us to think of it as a young series, but I think you’re right. A year or so to really complete the process of unification, coupled with a couple of other good moves (PT), may be the solution.
@Paul: Of course — Mario and Mansell. I named that rivalry right in the freakin’ story, too! But as we both pointed out, teammate rivalries would be especially frowned upon these days. I get that, though — dissent in the garage doesn’t help with winning races, especially not with the younger guys who still need a hand.
Hate is good!
– Robin Miller