foreverfree
I don't think much will help their ratings unless A.J. and Johnny Rutherford dust off their driver's suits.
SS. Thus helping the supreme commander Tony George complete the clean sweep with "foreign drivers' in every car!
BTW They don't want "smoke" coming back and kickin their foreign candy butts.
Has there ever been a case where a once huge event has been reduced to irrelevancy as quickly as has the Indy 500?
Can anyone name a driver in the current Indy 500 besides Robbie Gordon? Without star power Indy is like a local short track race. Someone will win but few will care beyond the people who attended.
So much for ratings. Indy type cars are going the way of the Edsel. Nascar kicks butt!
Is this the Indy500 thread? Pretty week....I bet the World600...I mean Coke600 thread will get 1000 posts this evening. I had a pretty good idea the race would be delayed. They would get a bigger audience if it started later on the West Coast. But, what the heck, it is a race for the people of the midwest. If they want to get up and enter the track at 5am, let them. Remember, they make their money on the 250,000 tickets sold, not the TV audience.
I have never heard of someone switching drivers mid race....that is crazy
foreverfree
The Indianapolis 500 defeated the Coca-Cola 600 in preliminary overnight Nielsen ratings, despite enduring lengthy rain delays Sunday. ABC's 4.7 rating for the Indy 500 fell from a 5.1 last year, but it edged out the 4.5 for Fox's Coca-Cola 600, which declined 8 percent from 2003.
Usually, the Indy 500 is over by the time the Coca-Cola 600 begins, but rain delays caused them to compete for two hours. In each half-hour segment from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. Eastern, the Indy 500 won, ending with a 4.8 rating from 7 to 7:30, compared with a 4.0 for the Coca-Cola 600. Each overnight ratings point equals 754,274 television households.
Viewership did not plummet during the Indy 500's rain delays, which actually pushed it into a later time period with more viewership. The two rain-delay segments, the first from noon to 2 p.m. and the second from 2:45 to 4:30, rated a 3.6 and a 3.7.
meanwhile
LOW RATINGS
Games 3 and 4 of the Stanley Cup final on ABC drew two of the lowest overnight ratings since broadcast networks began carrying the NHL final in 1998. Saturday's Game 3, won by Calgary 3-0, got a 2.2 rating, the lowest since 1998. Tampa Bay's 1-0 victory Monday night had a 2.8, which tied last year's Game 3 between New Jersey and Anaheim for the second-lowest since 1998.
As long as local, grass roots racing exists, that's where I'll be - AT THE TRACK.
Rather than pay... is it HUNDREDS of dollars for a good seat, hotel, meals, etc., etc.?... I'll plunk down no more than $15.00 for a regular Saturday night race, and no more than $35.00 for a World of Outlaws show. The people in the stands are my friends. We see each other every Saturday, and we're all like a big family.
After the race, all I have to do is walk across the track into the pits to congratulate the winners - people I know - and hang out with the rest of the drivers, owners, and crews. I don't need a pile of credentials to prove I belong there.
Exciting? Yeah. Three wide in the turns, sliding sideways, closer to each other than the cars in the parking lot. And that's just an 8-lap heat race.
I've been to few NASCAR races. At Pocono, I was privileged to be able to see ten feet of a 2-1/2- mile track. The end of the front stretch, I swear, was in the next county. I wound up watching the race on the Diamondvision. Later, I realized that I spent $120.00 for a bus ride, an uncomfortable seat, etc. so I could watch the race on TELEVISON.
Dover is a much better venue, and I actually enjoyed that one.
This Saturday night, turn off the TV, step away from the keyboard, grab the wife and kids and visit your local speedway. You will have the time of your life, and won't have to mortgage the house.
SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL SPEEDWAY!!!
http://www.angelfire.com/ct3/victoryspeedway