With the postponement of Springfield's annual Turkey Bowl to the weekend after Thanksgiving my 2022 racing season has come to a disappointing end as I also lost the chance to see the Turkey Dash at the CJ Raceway two weeks ago. After being very cooperative for most of the back half of the racing season, Mother Nature decided to usher in winter just a little earlier this year and that is always the risk, or reward of scheduling races late on the calendar.
With the end of East Bay Raceway south of Tampa, Florida, now scheduled for just a couple of years from now, I had to get back to one of my all-time favorite tracks one more time and that is why my 2022 season started off with a Speed Weeks trip where we were able to catch seven straight nights of action. The first four of those were enjoyed at "The Clay by the Bay" and we then moved on to one night at the New Smyrna Speedway (my only pavement race of 2022) and then two nights at Volusia where we were treated to the debut of the Xtreme Outlaw Sprint Car series. This prompted me to recall some of the other "firsts" that I have been a part of over the years and I have to say that I didn't really hear that much more about this new non-wing Sprint Car series after that.
So with that seven race "head start" on my season I would have thought that I would have easily been back in the mid-60's for a race count by the end of the year. That was not to be though as another cold and wet Spring limited me to just one race in March and three in April. Then, in June my wife and I went on a spectacular eight day European vacation cruising the Danube and when I returned I found myself with more of a discerning attitude in regard to whether or not I was going to go to a race. In the past, if there was a race scheduled within a couple of hours of home on a night that I was available, I was always going to go hoping to see a great show. Let's just say that I have been disappointed a few too many times over the years, in particular items that you can find in several of my past entries here on the Back Stretch (I am going to make you look through the archives here during the offseason to find the specifics), so I will admit that I stayed home more often this season assuming that I would see a show that started late, had too long of an intermission, had poor track prep, would be too dusty, would get over with too late, etc.
Frankly I have changed from a glass half full (optimist) to a glass half empty (pessimist) when it comes to racing and I am hoping that a long offseason will change my attitude. So even with the seven race head start my total ends up being 57 nights of racing at 24 different tracks in five states Florida, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa and Illinois. Yes, that is still a lot of races, as my wife reminds me, but take away those seven in Florida and it is just five more than my lowest total since I snared my driver's license in 1979 and that 45 came in a year when I had three kids playing Spring, Summer and Fall sports.
As usual I spent the most nights this season at the Knoxville Raceway with nine. Eight of them came in a ten day span with the 360 Nationals and the 410 Nationals while the ninth visit was for the opener of the Late Model Nationals, one of the only two nights of racing that I saw completed in the month of September.
The closest track to my Mt. Pleasant home, 34 Raceway west of Burlington found me there for five nights of racing this year although one of them ended up being rained out just before the heat races were completed. When I announce for the Sprint Invaders I leave the Notebook in the car so this linked story comes from my colleague Bill Wright telling the story of Chase Randall's amazing debut with the series. His first of six Sprint Invaders victories on the season.
Along with East Bay, I made the much shorter trip south to the Lee County Speedway in Donnellson four times this season and while both the first appearance here by the SLMR and my personal favorite event Shiverfest were entertaining, I would have to go with their July 1st event as my pick of the four.
I also spent four nights at the Davenport Speedway, a track that I have to admit has become one of my favorites over the past couple of years. In 2021 Dirt On Dirt named the MARS race from here as the Race of the Year and Ricky Kay and his crew have a legitimate shot of getting that honor two years in a row with this gem. What has Davenport climbing up the list of my favorite tracks? They start on time, track prep is good and, if needed, only takes a short amount of farming before feature time and they have a curfew so I know that they are always going to present a show in a timely manner (all tracks should act as if they have a curfew). Yes, they have a lot of big shows on the schedule at Davenport, but they have earned the right and have attracted the following to do so. It does not take a "big show" for me to want to go to Davenport as their weekly events boast some of the highest car counts this side of Boone.
I spent three nights each at Oskaloosa, Vinton and at the Lucas Oil Speedway where the three nights were on a Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in October for the USRA Nationals. Joining Volusia with two nights each are Stuart, Quincy, Columbus Junction, East Moline and Memphis, Missouri. One trip each was made to New Smyrna, I-35 Winston, West Liberty, Spoon River, Eldon, Tipton, Bloomfield, and Dubuque.
Each year I try to get to one "new to me" track and in 2021 that was the Clay County County Fair Speedway in Spencer. How good was that trip? Good enough to make the five plus hour drive to northwest Iowa again this past September while my new track in 2022 was the 81 Speedway in Park City, Kansas.
As I put this season to bed there have been some interesting rumors floating around that I am interested to see if they come to be. If they do, I believe that it will be a positive step forward for three or more tracks. Sort of like a good domino effect. Also, with our new format, I have already started to plug in dates on the Positively Racing Special Events calendar so make sure that you bookmark that to see where you can find specials in Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska, Minnesota, Wisconsin, eastern Kansas and southeastern South Dakota.
We still have the states of Missouri, Arkansas and Texas to wrap up in regard to our state points standings and once the race at the Dome is completed we will soon follow the final Missouri Points with our Best of the Midwest rundown for 2022. Then be sure to check in during the Holidays as we will update the Cumulative All Iowa Points in all nine divisions.
Finally, a couple of weeks ago I saw several of my announcer friends on Facebook share a post promoting a Short Track Announcers Summit that will take place on January 7th with the tag line "A good announcer can save a mediocre race program. A bad announcer can kill a great one." The host is Dave Moody who is widely known for his work on MRN and SiriusXm Radio and I can't help but wonder if the newest challenge to being a "good announcer" will be addressed. I wrote the following as part of my February 1st, 2001, Back Stretch and I can tell you from experience that I hear more and more fans who have purchased a ticket to sit in the stands say that they are irritated by how the announcer only seems to be talking to the Pay-Per-View crowd. Perhaps Mr. Moody will have some words of wisdom on that subject at this Summit?
That brings me to the wide variety of announcing styles that I have experienced over the past several months and as someone who has announced at least one night of dirt track racing in each of the past forty years, it shouldn't surprise you to hear me say that the announcer will either make or break your PPV. Yes, even a good announcer or announcers can overcome an overzealous director while a not so good announcer can drive you to the point where you just hit the mute button, one big advantage that PPV has over actually being there!
Again we are talking about a preference of styles here and there is a wide range of preferences among race fans from young to old. I know that my style is not a good fit for PPV and it wouldn't surprise me if I have been muted a few times myself, so my comments here should not be taken as me preaching about how to do it, they are only my opinions and are not meant to be considered right or wrong. No announcer is perfect, some of the best in the business still have little quirks that most people enjoy and others do not and that is not limited to race track announcers The biggest names in the industry such as Jim Nantz, Joe Buck, Kevin Harlan, etc. still have people who piss and moan about them on social media, but you wouldn't want them to change because they achieved their success by being who they are and the same thing goes for the cream of the crop on the microphones at dirt tracks. The difference is that all of them honed their skills on announcing to the fans in the stands and they are still adjusting to what is still a relative new medium in PPV.
I feel like I was at my best as an announcer in the 1980's. There were no VIP booths with speakers inside and a good sound system back then would be considered trash now. I started my night during wheel packing (for you younger fans that was when the race cars would come out and pack the race track for about twenty to thirty minutes prior to hot laps with mud clods flying in the air and giving you a nice tacky surface to start the show on) reading off the sponsors of the drivers who were participating and letting the fans know who some of the newcomers were and their accomplishments at other tracks. This would continue during hot laps, but my microphone would turn off once the green flag flew. Immediately following the National Anthem I would give the starting line up of the first heat race, car number, name and hometown, not always in that same order, for each driver from front to back. There was no time to rattle off a list of sponsors for each, otherwise the green flag would fly and I would be drowned out by the roar of the engines. In fact I was even careful to pause in giving the lineup as the cars passed in front of the grandstand on the pace lap in order to make sure that every driver's name could be heard.
Once the green flag waved I would make a comment or two when the entire field was racing down the back stretch, but once they were spread out enough that I knew that the fans in the stands could no longer hear me I would turn the microphone off and watch for interesting items to point out should the caution wave. Once the checkers flew I would recognize the drivers who transferred, or finished in the top four for instance and then read off the sponsors of the winner before asking the crowd to give him or her a big round of applause. That all went quick though because I had to get out the full lineup of the next race before the green flag waved and that was up to me to get that done as the flagman's job (Doyle Bennett, Bill Newman, Donnie Williams to name a few) was to run off a smooth and efficient program. They weren't going to wait on me!
All of these years later that is still my style because right or wrong, if the microphone that I am using is going out on the public address system at the track, those fans in the stands are my priority no matter how many people are plugged into me as well through the PPV. Sorry, but these people that I can see are the ones who spent the money and made their way to the track that night, they are the ones that are buying the concessions and hopefully reading the billboards of the sponsors in the area that are the lifeblood of the facility and that is why they come first to me.
Frankly I feel that race tracks are putting their announcers in a tough position if the same voice is being used for both the fans in attendance and those who are dialed in on the PPV as there is no way to do a good job for both audiences. Let me use two of my own experiences from this past year to illustrate.
With Covid keeping the fans out of the stands during the month of May I was given the opportunity to do a DoneRightTV broadcast of a night of action at 34 Raceway where my self and Rob Hinckley were seated at a table, headsets on and a monitor in front of us so that we could see what the camera was on. We weren't being heard over the PA system, we were just working with the PPV crowd and it had to be the fastest four hours that I have ever experienced at a race track. Rob and I got into a nice flow where not only were were getting all of the essentials out there such as lineups and finishes, but we were also calling the races in a more conversational tone throwing in some facts and trivia about some of the drivers along the way. When you watch Jim Nantz do a college basketball game he doesn't describe every dribble or every pass as you the viewer can see that on your screen. Instead he and his color analyst add to the experience rather than sounding like some rabid auctioneer trying to paint a picture that is already painted.
I would like to think that this is somewhat how Rob and I sounded on that night and one the nicest compliments that I have ever received in my life came when I took off my headset after we went to intermission and the Producer smiled at me and said, "you've done this before." I mentioned the Chili Bowl preliminaries up above and thus far that is the best announcing that I have heard on a PPV broadcast yet. Anchored by Caleb Hart and joined by two or three "guests" at a time including drivers Kevin Swindell, Clinton Boyles and Thomas Messeraull, their call was calm, thorough and very informative. They were doing it as if they were sitting in the living room with me and I was thoroughly entertained.
Fast forward to June where I was asked to fill in on the microphone for Tony Paris at the Stuart Speedway. First of all we are blessed here in the upper Midwest to have some of the best and most unique race track announcers in the entire country so no matter who I sub in for around here, I am already at a disadvantage because I will never be able to match their style and Tony is one of those. The challenges for me on this night though would be many as you have the best Race Director in the business when it comes to presenting an efficient show, Mike VanGenderen rolling one race out right after another, plus it was live on PPV on RaceXR. With over 130 cars in the pits I'm doing my best to let the fans in the stands know the full lineup before the race goes green, in just one pace lap, and then I want to give a good play-by-play for the PPV crowd including the number of laps down and a list of positions, then as the checkers waved I would give the finish as the drivers crossed the line. Then, again in trying to keep up with my fans in the stands, I would give the finish and ask for a round of applause for the winner (the second time that the PPV fans would have to hear this) before hustling through the lineup of the next heat race that was already rolling down the back stretch and heading for green.
I hope that it all came off okay, but I have to tell you that I felt like it was the most miserable job that I have ever done on a microphone whether it was at a race track, a basketball game or doing play-by-play on the radio. I was so frustrated with my effort that I turned down an invitation to do it again a few weeks later because I did not know how I was going to be able to improve upon it. And that is why I believe that it is tough on an announcer to try to do both.
I would love to hear what Ed Reichert had to say about the announcing as he sat in the stands at East Bay this past week. That's no knock on James Essex and Bob Dillner as their primary duty was to provide commentary for the taping of a show that will be edited and broadcast at a later date on MAVtv, they didn't have the time or the motivation to announce to the grandstand like a normal PA announcer would do. When you are announcing to the people watching at home you give the qualifying times while the cars are under green, you give the lineups while the cars are on the track and moving and you give all of your news and notes while you can't be heard over the roar of the motors. Then, when it finally is quiet, you annoy the crowd in attendance even further by making them sit and listen to your "shout outs" to those people who are watching on PPV. When you separate the duties, both audiences are taken care of.
The quality of announcing that I have heard over the past five months has been a wide range although I will admit that I am somewhat of a critic. Even the best sound like auctioneers as they scurry through the list of sponsors for each driver while giving a lineup, something that makes me tune it out to a point where I don't even "hear" one of them, so just how much exposure are those sponsors really getting in that scenario?
Breathlessly telling me that Joe Blow just edged out Ed All by less than "point zero three four seconds" to lead lap fourteen really only matters to me if the caution comes out and the restart lineup is based upon how lap fourteen was scored.
Modulate your voice and realize that if you try to make everything sound amazingly exciting, when something amazing actually happens you won't have anything else to give to it. And no, I'm not kidding you, I have actually seen cars race two and three-wide before so don't act so surprised to see it yourself in a race that you are calling.
Then there are the efforts that I have considered to be challenging. I recently watched a replay of race down south from this past Fall where the announcer plugged his own Facebook page a few times and then failed to deliver one full race lineup before the green flag dropped all night long. I mean these were seven or eight car heat races where at best he got the first two rows mentioned, along with their sponsors, but once the green flag dropped the rest of the field went unidentified. Then on a couple of heats there was dead silence as you watched, a break that we were told later was caused by a fan who had come up to the booth to argue something with the officials.
Over forty years of announcing, and while I had a shirt on that matched all of the other officials, I have had several instances where somebody wanted to argue a point with me. My response would always be "I am the announcer, if I have mispronounced somebody's name please let me know, otherwise you need to go find a real official", and then I would go back to doing my job. This guy disappeared from the PPV broadcast not once, but twice although by then some of the viewers may have had it on Mute anyway and never knew what was going on.
I could go on with some other examples, but the last thing I want to do is to sound like sour grapes because it is a tougher job than most people think, but suffice it to say that your announcer will be more scrutinized than ever when your show is on PPV. I'm glad that I am semi-retired from that job!
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