After seeing the public reaction to the NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond Raceway last weekend, it finally confirmed something to me that I had theorized for years.
Half of NASCAR’s fans want lots of wrecks in a race, not good racing.
The Cup race at Richmond featured only one caution for incident: when Noah Gragson spun Daniel Suarez. On the flip side, it contained tons of passing, tire strategy, comers and goers.
It was a race that played out naturally, with no overtime gimmicks or restart divebombs deciding the winner. Chris Buescher had fast pace and no mistakes, and that earned him a hard-fought win.
But that race earned only a 53.9% approval rating on The Athletic‘s Jeff Gluck’s Good Race Poll. So nearly half the fans who watched Richmond did not like it.
One week earlier, the High Point 400 at Pocono Raceway featured tons of wrecks — to the point of being just shy of a wreck-fest. What did that race not have? Passing.
Once the field settled on a restart, there was limited passing. Martin Truex Jr. said it was “just impossible to pass the leader.”
“Our car was so fast, but the guy would get out in clean air and be gone,” Truex said.
Because of that, Denny Hamlin had to rough up Kyle Larson on a restart in order to get the win, and it was a great finish as a result. But the race did not have great racing.
But what did this race get on Gluck’s poll? An 81.1% approval rating. Some were even calling it the best Pocono race ever.
So roughly 28% of NASCAR fans (on X, at least) preferred the race with lots of wrecks to the race with lots of racing. I’m no scientific researcher, but I believe that proves that there is a large chunk of fans who like wrecks more than they like good racing.
And it makes complete sense! People enjoy violence in their entertainment. There’s a reason Oppenheimer and Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One are two of the most beloved movies of this year. There is a reason that shooter video games rake in millions and millions of dollars.
There is a reason NASCAR’s broadcast partners continue using footage of Ryan Newman‘s and Bobby Allison‘s awful superspeedway wrecks even though people were injured.
People can’t look away from violence and are even drawn to it in entertainment. It’s just another weird part of the human condition.
But NASCAR viewers need to keep that attraction to violence somewhat in check when watching races. Because this isn’t a movie. These are drivers are real people, and every time they wreck, there is a chance something actually bad could happen besides just setting the car owner back a lot of money.
Seeing the big wrecks is certainly part of what makes NASCAR awesome as well as the unpredictability that comes with it. Not to mention every caution means a crazy restart is about to follow.
But the drivers’ talent and racing IQ comes through more in a race like Richmond, and I wish more fans would appreciate that aspect as well.
Brad Keselowski certainly agrees with me. Watch his impassioned speech about the racing at Richmond.
Maybe you disagree with me and were bored to death by Richmond. That’s completely OK. People like different things. Tons of people thought Napoleon Dynamite was one of the funniest movies ever while I was bored to death by it.
That Richmond race wasn’t by any means the greatest race I ever saw. But it was a good race, and NASCAR certainly needs races like that on its schedule.
Because if every week was just a ton of wrecks and crazy restarts, then eventually we would get desensitized to that and it would become boring or too ridiculous. And you’d wind up with a whole bunch of Mickey Mouse race winners and champions.
Michael Massie joined Frontstretch in 2017 and has served as the Content Director since 2020.
Massie, a Richmond, Va., native, has covered NASCAR, IndyCar, SRX and the CARS Tour. Outside of motorsports, the Virginia Tech grad and Green Bay Packers minority owner can be seen cheering on his beloved Hokies and Packers.