Does NASCAR need global talent

From Shane van Gisbergen burst onto the scene with his improbable victory at the Chicago street circuit in his first-ever NASCAR Cup Series start, it was the talk of the series; and for good reason. A few weeks later, on the road course at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the starting lineup began to look more like a United Nations meeting than a stock car race.

As many as seven countries were represented at the Brickyard upside-down race, and drivers from other international series expressed interest in trying their hand at one of the three touring series.

Given the competitiveness of top-level racing in the United States and abroad, this has sparked an interesting discussion: Does NASCAR need a new international contingent of drivers, or given the breadth of seats, do they need NASCAR?

This week, Trenton Worsham and Chase Folsom explore the topic in 2-Headed Monster.

NASCAR needs new blood

International competitors are not new to the sport of NASCAR. Drivers such as Mario Andretti And Earl Ross were both winners at the highest level of stock car racing, while decades later drivers like Juan Pablo Montoya And Marcos Ambroise both earned victories in the series.

Currently, the only Cup Series driver not of American origin is Daniel Suarez – who is also a Cup Series winner and Xfinity Series champion. But it was just recently that a New Zealand driver raced in Australia and dominated the peloton in his own match at Van Gisbergen that got people talking.

Given the popularity of the win and the fact that van Gisbergen is inundated with potential offers, it begs the question: do they NEED to race here or does NASCAR NEED them?

Lately, most of these drivers come to try something new and see if they can do it. Some of these drivers, like van Gisbergen, are champions in their respective fields. Others who raced were two Formula 1 drivers in Jensen button And Kimi Raikkonen who have won championships in their sport. So why does NASCAR need these drivers?

We can start by looking at Suarez, who is not only a Cup winner, but a former Xfinity Series champion. He alone has an international fan base known as “Daniel’s Amigos” who come in droves to many of the races in California as well as Texas, waving flags and making lots of noise. His team, Trackhouse Racing, is co-owned by musician Pitbull, also known as ‘Mr. Mondial’. He grew up in Florida with Cuban immigrant parents, his father organizing a massive lift to help hundreds escape Castro’s Cuba. Although he is American by birth, his heritage and culture are far from it.

After van Gisbergen became the first driver in more than 60 years to score his first Cup victory at Chicago, some members of the reactionary YouTube community, in which some don’t watch much NASCAR, say they have watched running and reacted to it.

Formula 1 fans watched Raikkonen and Button, and by the end of the final race in Indianapolis, seven countries were represented. The sport is starting to be viewed seriously and learned about in a positive way thanks to the arrival of these drivers, as opposed to just a slapstick sport reflected in comedies or videos of big wrecks online.

NASCAR competes in expansion series in Europe, Mexico and Canada, although still divisions of NASCAR, some with various differences. EuroNASCAR focuses primarily on road courses and street courses, while the Pinty’s Series in Canada has more ovals.

Watching some of the content from these divisions shows that it is more of a festival environment with fans seeing the cars and drivers in person or at events leading up to the weekend. If these fans follow their local heroes so closely, imagine the attention from top drivers in these parts of the world.

Although not a driver, Garage 56, who competed in this year’s NASCAR exhibition at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, has also made an impact on a global scale. NASCAR drivers competing in endurance events is nothing new, but they’ve never raced anything close to what they’re used to. The effort attracted positive light from the media and generated interest from fans, particularly when it came to pit stops against the rest of the field. It was something that NASCAR needed to bring a more global look to the sport, primarily from a technical standpoint.

Diversity is something that NASCAR has pushed and strived for over the past few years and adding more representation from around the world would achieve that. These drivers don’t need a Daytona 500 or a championship to validate their careers. They are already considered among the best in the world, champions in their disciplines, in some cases already enjoying worldwide popularity.

Ask yourself what would be most interesting to fans around the world: if Max Verstappen Or Lewis Hamilton came to NASCAR, or Chase Elliott And Kyle Larson try Formula 1? –Trenton Worsham

NASCAR has more to offer drivers, regardless of nationality

For decades, the question of where NASCAR fits into the world of motorsports has floated. Some say that NASCAR drivers are the best in the world, while others, mainly those who look a certain Drive to survive series, view NASCAR as an inferior form of motorsport that “only turns left.” But how much does NASCAR actually need drivers from other forms of motorsports, and how much do they need NASCAR? In my opinion, neither party needs the other, they just enjoy the company.

Seriously, the fans love to see the open wheel, the road course specialists come and race with the cup guys. This adds publicity and adds a global aspect to the series, as well as international appeal. Personally, I grew up in the era of Ron Fellows, Alex Tagliani, Jacques Villeneuve, Boris said, and many others, competing in every road race possible and often battling for victory, and it was always fun to watch. But at the same time, it was never necessary to retain the NASCAR fan base. If anything, it only gave hardcore NASCAR fans someone to root against, as they wanted to see their own personal favorites that they watch race every week, bring them to the “ringers.”

In the last couple of years alone, we’ve seen many notable road racing specialists come and try out for NASCAR, as the new car has brought an intriguing new element to the sport. Former Formula 1 driver Raikkonen, Daniel KvyatButton and Kamui Kobayashi came to run, along with other notables such as Brodie Kostecki, Mike Rockenfellervan Gisbergen, and Jordan Taylor. While it’s great to see these drivers come and give NASCAR a chance, one could argue that they don’t exactly make the NASCAR field more competitive for this specific race, despite their records in other sports.

Take van Gisbergen out of the conversation and the drivers listed above finish an average of 29th in 14 starts over the past two seasons, with a best finish of 18th by Button at the Circuit of the Americas last March.

As we know, van Gisbergen somewhat set the world on fire in his two starts behind the wheel of the Trackhouse Racing Project91 car, with his stunning victory on the Chicago street course and a very respectable top 10 finish at Indianapolis likely propelling him to a sort of seat at the Track Pavilion. However, as with everyone else, they may have had a decent showing depending on a number of circumstances due to crashes or crashes from regulars – but it’s far from a threat for victory or a match in the top 15.

There is an argument to be made that adding these rings on road does not increase the value of the product on track and therefore NASCAR does not need them.

Another example that proves that NASCAR doesn’t need bells is television ratings. Looking at the ratings, there is no clear increase in viewership related to when these drivers compete, showing that the fan base will still watch or not watch, whether they are on the field .

The race at Watkins Glen International last year – which had a rain delay – hosted several international drivers and ranked in the bottom half of the season’s audience, with just over 2, 5 million viewers, it was ranked 19th of the 36 Cup Series races. calendar.

This season’s race at COTA showed much of the same, with just over 3.1 million viewers it ranks just 11th out of 24 races contested so far this season, while the race at Indianapolis on weekend -last year ranks 13th with 2.8 million viewers. To add to that, the COTA race and Indy race were down in viewership from a season ago despite the addition of the road course ringers. Today’s Chicago Street Race attracted 4.8 million viewers in the US, but despite van Gisbergen’s epic performance on the streets of the windy city, that was likely because it was of the first street race in NASCAR history, not the addition of him and Button to the field.

On the other hand, it doesn’t discredit what these drivers have done in other forms of motorsport. These are all world-class drivers who simply specialize in their specific form of motorsport, and not many people can pull an SVG, or a Kyle Larson for us NASCAR fans, and just hop into any new car and be competitive. That also doesn’t mean we don’t want them to come and give American stock car racing a chance, of course, the more the merrier. This is simply to say that NASCAR doesn’t need them to be successful. –Chase Folsom