Can the Brickyard Be Great?

The Brickyard 400 is entering its 18th year, and is at a bit of a crossroads.

The first five or 10 of these races were way cool, just for the fact that NASCAR was racing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. That was a place that had been, prior to 1994, the sole playground of open-wheel cars with big wings and speeds in the upper 230-mph range.

Side note: if you think 230 mph is a breeze, let me disabuse you of that notion. I once took a lap around IMS in a Formula Vee (VW-powered formula car), and top speed was something like 105 mph. It was frightening…Nightmare on 16th St.-frightening.

Anyway, the last eight or so races at IMS have been more like exhibitions, and Tiregate back in ’08 has severely crippled the event’s ability to compete with the Daytona 500 as a prestige race.

When you have a crowd of 140,000 at a NASCAR race, it’s usually a pretty good day. When 140,000 fans sit in a speedway with 257,000 permanent seats…it’s only half full. It’s Auto Club Speedway writ large.

Look, I get that Indy isn’t the greatest place to watch a race for folks who are used to being able to see all four corners plus pit road. It looks so much better on TV, and you don’t have to fight yellow shirts and big crowds.

In the glory days of the Indy 500, SCOOP Sr. and I would walk from inside the track to the open-air press box outside the front stretch. That involved a climb up the stairs, and standing atop the roof, you could look out on a veritable ocean of humanity.

They’d be stretched from 16th St. to 30th St., as far as the eye could see. Last year at the Brickyard, I took that walk, climbed the stairs and compared. Crowded from 16th St. to maybe 25th St., and thin in places.

The long and short of it is, race fans are wary of another tire debacle, they’re not happy with the racing and they won’t pay the ticket price for what they receive. Simply put, it’s not resonating anymore.

I think you all know that I love IMS and always will. When I shuffle off this mortal coil, I am sure that part of whatever is left will make a fly-by over the place. I do worry about the future of the race and of the sport.

Perhaps the addition of the Nationwide Series and Rolex Grand-Am Series next year will make a difference. Perhaps it won’t. We’ll have to wait and see.

We’ll figure it all out, trust me. Stay tuned to the blog on www.onmc.com, and on Facebook and Twitter!