Support Your Local Speedway

Every once in a while, assuming it makes sense with my schedule and my pocketbook, I'll take a Friday night and make a journey to Bloomington Speedway to take in some real, live short-trackin'. Chiefly, I do this because I really love to watch motorized vehicles go fast and because the sound of giant, stock-block V8s rumbling around a 1/4-mile oval is just fantastic.

I also like to go there because, at its heart, Bloomington Speedway is yet another locally-owned business -- just like Nick's Bar or Mother Bear's Pizza (both highly recommended if you're in Bloomington, by the way). A good way to keep the economy of a town going is to put money into the coffers of a local business, especially if that business presents a fantastic product. This holds true from the eastern tip of Maine to the islands of Hawai'i and in every country on the planet.

Since I'm a resident of Central Indiana, I also like to pour some money into the economy of Indianapolis. I go to Pacers games, Colts games, the State Fair, Shapiro's Deli, Dawson's on Main in Speedway, Union Jack Pub, shops in Broad Ripple, some places in Carmel and Westfield...so on and so forth. The one local business in Indianapolis gets more of my business than just about any place on the planet is the local speedway -- you know, that place out on 16th Street.

Sure, it's a corporation, and sure, it's run in a rather questionable way sometimes. However, the fact remains: the Indianapolis Motor Speedway started as a local, privately-owned business, and it remains as such to this day. In this slowly recovering economy, where locally-owned businesses were hit harder than just about anyone, places like the Speedway need as much support as they can get.

Many fans of auto racing in America have this us-versus-them attitude when it comes to who they pull for. There's this idea that you can support NASCAR or you can support the IRL, but you can't support both. When the Brickyard 400 rolls around, IRL fans will point to the vast swaths of bare aluminum at the Speedway and claim victory for their favorite form of motorsport. Likewise, NASCAR folks will point to empty seats at Chicagoland, Homestead or Kansas and claim a victory for themselves.

What people don't realize sometimes is this: if an IRL race at an ISC track bombs, it ultimately hurts their partner, NASCAR; if the Brickyard 400 bombs, the IRL's parent company loses out on money.

With the Speedway's "other" event starting up tomorrow, I put this simple plea out to people within and without Central Indiana: support your Speedway. If you can, go to the MotoGP race. Even if you've never seen a motorcycle race in your life and think it's probably a waste of time since it's not your favorite motorsport, quit prejudging and go to the race.

While you're at it, apply for tickets to next year's Brickyard 400 and Indianapolis 500. Maybe you don't like MotoGP, NASCAR or the IRL, but that money, whether its $20, $45 or $150, goes into keeping a locally-owned business open and bringing your preferred product to you every year.

Who knows, maybe you'll even discover that you like the other races...I certainly follow MotoGP a lot more now than I did before last year.

MotoGP preview and IRL pseudo-live blog forthcoming. See you then!