INDIANAPOLIS — Technology is ruining automobile racing. There, I said it. That puts me in line with the 4,267 other pundits who scream that sort of thing every day.
But this is not one of those sermons lamenting the death of the carburetor and calling for the jailing of aerodynamicists. You might think that technology is spoiling race cars, but I’ve got a bigger issue: It has already spoiled too many fans. I’ll give you a few examples, in order of increasing annoyance.
Let’s open with pre-race flyovers.
Look at the grandstands during the playing of “The Star-Spangled Banner” at any big-league race. By the time you get to the bit about the rocket’s red glare, 75 percent of the crowd is gazing skyward, straining to see the first gleam of a silvery fuselage.
“Look! Here it comes! Look!”
Why have flyovers become as big a part of the race-day experience as the command to start engines? Don’t try selling me any claptrap about these folks being jacked up on patriotism. If that was true, wouldn’t they be paying more attention to the song?
No, it’s visual technology. They have seen so many flyovers on their TV screens, pocket phones and tablets that they assume the jets come with the reserved seat.
This is a fairly recent development. Richard Petty won 200 NASCAR Cup Series races, and I’ll bet less than five were preceded by flyovers.
Back then, if you thought about anything other than country and freedom while the national anthem rang out at Indy or Daytona, it was A.J. Foyt’s pit strategy or Waddell Wilson’s engine, not the Air National Guard’s F-22 Raptor.
Post-race burnouts are another case of fans turning a treat into something tediously common. In 1997, Alex Zanardi introduced CART fans to tire-smoking doughnuts. Drivers too lazy to craft their own signature moves copied Alex’s, and it hasn’t gone away. Why?
Because doughnuts and burnouts make good video. Today, they’re so expected that you hear grumbling when a winner does an old-school, dignified victory lap.
There are those, including the aforementioned Petty, who insist David Pearson was the most naturally gifted stock car racer they ever saw. The man won 105 times at the Cup Series level, yet he never did a burnout. Mr. Pearson simply drove to victory lane as if he’d been there before. Which, of course, he had.
That level of grace would get him booed today. Blame technology and spoiled fans.
What brings all this to mind is the ongoing chatter about the 2023 Indianapolis 500 and its one-lap sprint to glory. It all started on lap 194, when the third-turn wall ate Pato O’Ward’s car. Facing a lengthy cleanup, officials waved a red flag.
There was zero doubt about the real reason for the stoppage: Fans who grew up with green-white-checkered NASCAR finishes have convinced other sanctioning bodies that the audience deserves a heart-in-your-throat finish to every event.
Yes, people who learned racing etiquette from “Days of Thunder” now help craft policy. Their social-media rants made them influencers. Segments of the racing press, riding the prevailing winds as usual, went along with them.
Roger Penske, owner of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the IndyCar series and, ultimately, the winning car, said as much after the race. Pressed by the media about late restarts, Penske reminded them that in the past, “all of you said, ‘We want to see a checkered flag, not a yellow flag.’”
If you’ve witnessed the carnage that late-lap restarts can bring, you couldn’t help but be jittery when the Indianapolis 500 recommenced. Indy car wrecks at 220 mph carry infinitely more risk than NASCAR’s routine pileups.
Alas, as soon as the race resumed with the leaders starting lap 197, several cars collided long before reaching top speed.
Now came the difficult part: Once you’ve issued a red flag with six laps to go on the premise — stated or understood — that fans deserve a green-flag finish, you have boxed yourself into a rather uncomfortable position should another caution flag wave. Because if a red flag is the right thing on lap 194, you can’t say it’s the wrong thing on lap 197.
Still, it took almost two minutes of dithering before race control made the call to halt the race again. You can bet everything you own that there was consideration given to the on-site crowd, the television viewers and the restart they “deserved.”
When that inevitable restart came, it was under simultaneous green and white flags. This time, forget the jitters. You could only hope that all cars made it back around. They did, and Josef Newgarden had a victory celebration for the ages.
Newgarden’s wonderful exuberance made you temporarily overlook what you’d just seen: One more major race governed by the wishes of the masses. It’s a scary thing, allowing fans to dictate, particularly fans from this highlight-clip generation.
Give in to their demands by spicing up the finish, and they’ll only want more spice.
Look, a great race with a caution-flag ending remains a great race. At Indianapolis, see Al Unser Jr. vs. Emerson Fittipaldi, 1989; or Dario Franchitti vs. Takuma Sato, 2012. And the only Daytona 500 won by Dale Earnhardt, the 1998 edition, finished under yellow.
One of the most storied prizefights of all time, Ali-Frazier III, ended with the boxing equivalent of a caution flag when Joe Frazier did not answer the bell for the final round.
The “Thrilla in Manila” had drained both men; Muhammad Ali said, “This must be what death feels like.” Frazier’s surrender was as dramatic a moment as a sporting event can produce. Should he have been pushed back into the ring because the fans “deserved” more?
In sports, the customer is not always right, or rational. In ancient Rome, the fans usually sided with the lions.
It was more exciting.
This story appeared in the July 12, 2023, edition of the SPEED SPORT Insider.
