Here is a rundown of what got me thinking...
Kyle Kirkwood kept Álex Palou from opening the IndyCar season with three consecutive victories. A different McLaren driver has our attention. Another McLaren driver won. A part-time McLaren driver won. Tires did not wear nearly as quickly as anticipated in Bristol. We did not have a stunner in MotoGP, though we almost did, and then illegal tire pressures made that point moot. A trio of drivers did pick up their third consecutive victories. Formula E went unnoticed in Miami. If two Road to Indy Series compete at NOLA Motorsports Park without IndyCar, do they make a sound? There were a lot of races this weekend. Some started later than I wished.
I Hate Late Start Times
I am tired of 3:30 p.m. start times or 4:00 p.m. start times or as we saw with this weekend’s Grand Prix of Long Beach, a 4:55 p.m. start time. All times Eastern, of course.
It feels like a night lost when a race ends between 6:30 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.
There is not much you can do after. You likely do not want to do anything. It is after 7:00 p.m. Work is tomorrow. There might be a few chores to finish. You may still need to eat dinner. By 9:00 p.m., you want to be one foot in bed and hoping you will not be up much later. The time at the end of the day is very valuable.
Which means it sucks when a race is still going on and taking up your time.
There are going to be instances when this is unavoidable, like Long Beach where a race cannot start much earlier than 3:00 p.m. to begin with. There are also times when it is nice to have a later race and you do not mind that leading into the rest of the night. It is tiresome when it is a weekly occurrence.
For IndyCar, it is one thing. IndyCar doesn’t race enough for any routine to become a bother. It is NASCAR where it drives you nuts. Why is Darlington in April ending at nearly 7:00 p.m.? If Bristol didn’t have one of its four fastest races yesterday, that race would have pushed a 7:00 p.m. finish, but even with near record speeds, that race was still going to 6:00 p.m. And for whose benefit?
We live in a time of hyper-maximization, especially when it comes to television viewership. No series, nor race track even, is making a bulk of its revenue from the gate. It is coming from television. NASCAR makes so much money from television it gives money to the tracks. The tracks still need to sell tickets and concessions, but it is starting from a much better place than where it was not that long ago. The track doesn’t care too much if attendance is down 12% because the race is ending 30 minutes to sunset and the nearest bit of civilization is 90 minutes away in any direction. It will take the hit. Television says when the race goes green.
However, it is nice when a race is over at 4:30 p.m. and you have the rest of your afternoon for yourself. It is nice when dinner can be at dinner time. You may even decide to enjoy a meal out. Any race ending later than 5:15 p.m. scuttles those plans.
Apparently it matters, otherwise NASCAR and its partners wouldn’t have basically every race regardless of coast starting at 3:00 p.m. Eastern. Think about all the night races that have been lost. Why race on Saturday when viewership will be significantly lower than on a Sunday afternoon? NASCAR raced in the baking heat of a July Sunday in Atlanta!
If it didn’t matter, things may be different. An argument could be made for avoiding events. With how this weekend’s Bristol event went, it could have ended long before The Masters hit the back-nine in the final round had the race started at 1:00 p.m. instead of not just after 3:00 p.m. However, even when against the very end of the most famous golf tournament in the world, it is still better viewership than missing the climatic part altogether. Just when you think you have it figured out, you are still wrong.
This isn’t even about NASCAR and IndyCar avoiding conflicting start times. Even if NASCAR started earlier, this year’s Long Beach race started over an hour later than the previous four editions. It is a West Coast race, it is going to be a later race no matter what. I don’t know if it had to be that late though. Perhaps there is middle ground. How about a 4:10 p.m. start next year?
Maybe I am just getting old. Time is limited more now than ever. Every day feels like it is over just after it begins. Most days I see 5:00 p.m. roll around and think about how little time there is to complete all the necessary tasks for that day. It wasn’t that long ago my day was just beginning at 5:00 p.m.
The world is not going to change for my happiness. It isn’t going to change for yours either. This is the stage where you must evolve or otherwise should die.
Again, not all later starts are bad. They are great on holiday weekends. There are times when you can get everything done in the morning and early afternoon. Then it is nice to end with a race. A 5:00 p.m. Saturday start for IMSA? I don’t mind that. Maybe these starts will feel better when the sun will be out until nearly 9:00 p.m. and the temperatures are above 70° F and it isn’t the fourth consecutive day of grey skies. It would be nice to have the occasional Sunday where all the racing is done well before dinner time and the final part of the day is free for whatever you wish.
These later starts are not going anywhere. We live at a time where the audience is all too aware of what each start time means. An early start is not viewed as a good thing. It is taking less valuable real estate. It only becomes more valuable when viewership follows. No successful has a scheduled 1:00 p.m. start. That is a sign of trouble. If the numbers are not the highest at that hour, the race will take place at a more prolific hour. Even with all the data and research, it hardly seems to make a difference. Is a 3:00 p.m. start really that much better than a 1:00 p.m. start? A couple hundred thousand seems inconsequential. We live in a world where more is more. All that matters is more.
The upcoming holiday could be a greater blessing than first thought.
Winners From the Weekend
You know about Kyle Kirkwood, but did you know...
Oscar Piastri won the Bahrain Grand Prix, his second victory of the season.
Pepe Martí (sprint) and Alex Dunne (feature) split the Formula Two races from Bahrain. Nikola Tsolov (sprint) and Rafael Câmara (feature) split the Formula Three races.
Marc Márquez won MotoGP's Qatar Grand Prix, his third victory of the season, and Márquez also won the sprint race. Arón Canet won the Moto2 race. Ángel Piqueras won the Moto3 race, his second victory of the season.
The #7 Porsche of Felipe Nasr and Nick Tandy won the IMSA race from Long Beach, its third consecutive victory to open the season. The #177 AO Racing Porsche of Laurens Vanthoor and Jonny Edgar won in GTD. Vanthoor has won three consecutive races after winning the opening two races overall with the #7 Porsche.
Justin Rothberg swept the GT America races from Long Beach.
The #32 Team WRT BMW of Ugo Wilde, Kelvin van der Linde and Charles Weerts won the 6 Hours of Paul Ricard.
Nicolò Bulega (race one), Toprak Razgatlioglu (SuperPole race) and Andrea Locatelli (race two) split the World Superbike races from Assen. Bo Bendsneyder and Can Öncü split the World Supersport races.
Matthew Payne (race one and three) and Chaz Mostert (race two) split the Supercars races from Taupō.
Kyle Larson won the NASCAR Cup race from Bristol, his second victory of the season. Kyle Larson also won the Grand National Series race, his second victory in that series. Chandler Smith won the Truck race.
The #1 TGR Team au TOM’S Toyota of Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita won the Super GT race from Okayama. The #65 K2 R&D LEON Racing Mercedes-AMG of Nagoya Gamou and Togo Suganami won in GT300.
Pascal Wehrlein won the Miami ePrix after Norman Nato was assessed a time penalty.
Chase Sexton won the Supercross race from Philadelphia, his fourth victory of the season. Cole Davies won the 250cc race, his second victory.
Alessandro de Tullio (race one and two) and Max Garcia split the USF Pro 2000 races from NOLA Motorsports Park. Liam McNeilly swept the U.S. F2000 races, and McNeilly has won five consecutive races to open the season.
Coming Up this Weekend
Formula One wraps up three consecutive weekends of racing with the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
Motegi hosts round two for the Super Formula season.
The FIA World Endurance Championship will race at Imola.
Supercross will be in New Jersey.
Rockingham hosts a NASCAR national series for the first time in 13 years. Trucks race Friday with the Grand National Series on Saturday.
