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CHIAPPELLI: Sprints Need Live TV
Major league sprint car racing needs the immediate and far-reaching impact of live television to grow by attracting a wider audience.
Jim Chiappelli  |  Posted March 04, 2010   Charlotte, NC
For sprint racing to grow, Chiappelli says consistent, live broadcasting is required. (WoO)
The notion by some people within the sprint car community that big-time 410 racing should not be given live or same-day coverage on national television is, among other things, short-sighted.

Some of the arguments against the increased media presence are based on fear of change and include a perceived inconvenience on fans, competitors and promoters.

I mention this in light of two recent developments.

First, I am happy to report that my employer, SPEED, has reached an agreement in principle to continue to be the TV home to the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series in 2010.

Second, and particularly troubling to me, is news that the sport’s most prestigious event, the 50th Goodyear Knoxville Nationals, will be shown on a one-week delay on SPEED in August.

I greatly admire and respect the people in Iowa who work so hard to maintain the tradition and history at Knoxville Raceway.

The decision-makers weighed the cost of producing a live event as opposed to producing a tape-delayed broadcast and believe ratings will be better for a pre-packaged show.

Given these difficult financial times, I understand their reasoning—and it’s better than no TV coverage at all--but I disagree with the call.

I have the unique perspective of being both a television insider who has attended or covered hundreds of sporting events as well as a racing fan whose family has a vested interest in the sport.

Major league sprint car racing needs the immediate and far-reaching impact of live television to grow by attracting a wider audience to provide sponsors more value for their significant investments.

This is 2010, not 1978.

Society has changed. Grass-roots racing has evolved from a pastime for weekend warriors into a full-time business and means of income for a number of the participants.

Money drives the sport. Sponsorship generates money. The best way to keep the money-providers happy is to give them maximum exposure.

Tony Stewart is among several team owners who agree.

“It’s huge,” Stewart said of the impact of live televised race coverage.

Stewart found it necessary to scale back his USAC program this season because of a lack of funding.

“It was just a little harder finding sponsorship on the USAC side versus the World of Outlaws, and obviously the TV coverage on the Outlaws side helped with that.”

“Having it live is cool,” he added.

We live in an on-demand, “I want it now” world. Tape-delayed broadcasts lose spontaneity, immediacy and emotion when results are known.

One common complaint is that television coverage ruins the live show for fans at the track because of frequent disruptions to the flow of the proceedings in order to hit scheduled commercial breaks.

Anyone who has attended football, baseball, basketball or hockey games understands that breaks in the action at a stadium, arena or ballpark are not only built into the game, they are commonplace to accommodate broadcasts.

People who attend sprint car races know to usually expect downtime between getting cars lined-up and pushed-off for time trials, qualifying heats, B-Mains and A-Features. Lengthy breaks in the action also occur because of track maintenance or cleanups after the red flag flies for a flipper.

The solution is finding the balance and working to devise contingency plans in cases of inclement weather or during shows that linger because of multiple caution periods. The goal is to make the program entertaining for those with their butts on the bleachers as well as those at home on their couches.

The hard truth is that while track owners covet thousands of ticket-buying fans, team owners and drivers need to push their products in front of hundreds of thousands of viewers.

“Live TV coverage is important no matter what sport you’re in or what you’re doing,” says sprint car legend Steve Kinser.

“It gets the knowledge out to everybody else. And these things (410 sprint cars) have gotten so expensive to race anymore, the budgets are unreal, so you’ve got to have the sponsorship, and you need to get their name out there to be able to get the sponsorship.”

Another argument against live TV is that if fans know they can watch a race on television, they will not show up in-person, thus hurting ticket sales.

Anyone who has attended a sprint car race is aware that even television cannot match the magic atmosphere at the track that both ignites and tantalizes the senses.

In fact, exposing more people to the sport will entice a greater number of them to attend a race and grow the ticket-buying fan base. In essence, a televised race is one of the best ways to advertise the sport itself.

“Sprint car racing is really exciting,” notes multiple team owner Kasey Kahne.

“If you’re at the track and you go to one (a race) you usually go back. To get it on TV and get some more people watching it and following it just helps,” added the NASCAR star.

In Knoxville’s case, the Nationals is a more than a race—it’s a happening. The four-day show produces some of the most intense and entertaining competition during the Wednesday and Thursday preliminaries. Sprint car fans should whole-heartedly support this event. However, those unable to attend for whatever reason should not be punished by the inability to watch Saturday’s A-Main live on national television.

I could not imagine having to wait a week to watch the Indianapolis 500, Daytona 500, Formula One Grand Prix of Monaco, NHRA U.S. Nationals, 24 Hours of Le Mans, Rolex 24 at Daytona or AMA Supercross opener at Anaheim.

If sprint car racing wants to stay in the national spotlight and be mentioned in the same breath with other forms of motorsport, then live television is a necessity.

The people running the World of Outlaws and most team owners and drivers understand this.

If sprint car racing expects to grow, it cannot remain stagnant.

Especially in this current economic climate, a business that resists change and fails to adapt will find it difficult to thrive as the competition for the entertainment dollar escalates.

When the sport grows, it provides opportunities for participants to grow.

“It’s not about getting a bigger piece of the pie,” says Jason Meyers, a 36-time winner with the World of Outlaws.

“It’s about taking that little piece and making it bigger through the growth of the entire pie so there is plenty to go around.”

Why isn’t there more sprint car racing being broadcast coast to coast on SPEED and other networks?

There are two main reasons—money and ratings.

I’ll save that topic for a future column.

Jim Chiappelli is SPEED’s News Director. He has worked in broadcast journalism since 1986, producing or overseeing the production of more than 6,000 newscasts and sportscasts in a career that began at network affiliates in Johnstown and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania before shifting to the NBC affiliate in Pittsburgh, where he spent 11 years, leaving as Executive Producer in 2001.

Before graduating from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Jim briefly competed in the limited late model division in Western Pennsylvania for his family, which has been involved in racing for nearly 35 years and continues to campaign a 410 sprint car team.


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The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED
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