from
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davecaldwell/2019/04/08/nascars-dented-image-absorbs-yet-another-big-hit/#1df6624a4932
NASCAR's Sagging Popularity Absorbs Another Big Hit
Dave Caldwell
A general overview of the track during the running of the 59th Annual
Food City 500 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race on April 7, 2019 at
Bristol Motor Speedway. GETTY
So how is this for irony, race fans?
Darrell Waltrip, who at 72 was perceived by enough people to be over the
hill as a stock-car announcer, decided to announce his retirement last
week at Bristol Motor Speedway, where he was so successful as a driver
that an entire grandstand is named after him.
But all but a couple of the roughly 35 sections of the enormous Darrell
Waltrip Grandstand at the one end of the half-mile track were closed for
the ensuing Cup race, with no tickets available. The stands at the other
end of the track were also closed for the race.
According to estimates from journalists at the track, there were between
35,000 and 40,000 at the race, won by, guess who, Kyle Busch. Bristol
Motor Speedway, nestled in the mountains on the Tennessee-Virginia line,
has a seating capacity of 162,000.
(NASCAR does not disclose official or estimated attendances, or the
sizes of purses.)
There were 500 laps in the race, which meant that the TV cameras getting
shots for the race called by an emotional Waltrip, who will call his
last race for Fox in June, zoomed past empty stands at both ends of the
track hundreds of times. The optics were really bad.
There are empty grandstands at other NASCAR tracks. Some tracks,
including Daytona, have seen such a drop in demand for tickets that they
have removed sections of grandstands. But this was Bristol. Consider it
the Rose Bowl of racetracks, only bigger.
For years, Bristol was one of the most popular tracks in NASCAR, drawing
packed houses (and waiting lists) for its summer race under the lights.
The spring race, usually on a Sunday afternoon, was less popular, but it
drew large crowds -- 160,000 as recently as 2009. Even attendance for
the summer race dropped to 94,000 last year.
The spring race at Bristol in 2018 was hampered by poor weather. Many
stock-car fans don’t decide to buy tickets until they know that it
probably won’t rain. Rain was in the forecast last year, so there might
have been 20,000 in the seats for the start of the race, under dark skies.
The race was stopped by rain. It was completed a day later, a Monday
afternoon, with virtually no one in the stands, which is a tough break
for a sport that can’t really be run in the rain. Rain was in the area
again Sunday, but the speedway did not even offer tickets for roughly
half the seats.
You can’t blame the speedway: why staff sections with employees if
hardly anyone wants to sit there if they were open? Bristol resembled
the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for recent runnings of the Brickyard
400, with sections of grandstands closed.
Plus, the open sections at Bristol Motor Speedway appeared to be maybe
only half-filled. A week earlier for a NASCAR Cup race at Fort Worth,
Texas, it appeared as if only about one-third of the 100,000 seats at a
much bigger racetrack were occupied.
NASCAR can take some comfort in the fact that television ratings for Cup
races are about the same as last year, even a little higher. The 2018
season was a rough one on the television front for NASCAR; ratings were
down about 20% from 2017 and 25% from 2016.
Now live attendance appears to be lagging, and when it gets to the point
where enough people don’t want to go to a race at Bristol that they have
to shut half the seats, it is a sign that the decline in interest is
virtually irreversible. NASCAR is becoming a niche sport, again.
It has happened with other sports. A spring race at Bristol is on the
NASCAR Cup schedule for 2020, but it would be a huge shock if it will
return in 2021. NASCAR has a loyal group of fans, but that group is
getting older, smaller and less willing to pay for tickets.
If 35,000 fans were in a 45,000-seat stadium, that would be one thing.
But 35,000 to 40,000 fans in a 162,000-seat stadium that used to be
packed is a sad sign how much more popular this sport used to be, back
when Ol’ D.W. conquered Bristol on a regular basis. Best get used to it.
Much more on NASCAR off the track can be found here.
Dave Caldwell
Dave Caldwell
Contributor
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