McNulty: Shortened Daytona 500 more NASCAR greed

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Driving home in my Ford F-150 pickup after Sunday's rain-shortened Daytona 500 -- the climax of DirectTV SpeedWeeks at Daytona International Speedway -- I was listening to SIRIUS NASCAR Radio's post-race, call-in show.
(That sentence was brought to you by Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers, which sent me to the "World Center of Racing" to cover the "Great American Race.") Anyway, with Pepsi in hand and my tank filled with Hess gas ...
OK, you get the idea.
Too bad NASCAR doesn't.
Too bad NASCAR doesn't realize that its reckless need for greed has driven the sport into a wall.
Do you think it's mere coincidence that NASCAR's once-soaring popularity -- from the late 1990s to the mid-2000s, stock car racing was America's fastest-growing sport -- is now in an alarming descent? It's not. And our troubled economy is only partly to blame. NASCAR's noticeable drop in TV ratings and ticket sales has been mostly self-inflicted.
First, NASCAR raced away from its Southeastern, blue-collar roots to chase the big-money marketing of Madison Avenue, which lured a flock of new fans to the track but left many longtime fans feeling abandoned by the sport they grew up with. Then there were all those changes to the schedule, to the championship format, to the cars.
And every change brought more money to NASCAR's coffers.
Everyone involved got richer.
Everyone, that is, except the hardcore fans, those hardworking folks whose pride, passion and paychecks put NASCAR on the sports map in the 1970s and '80s.
They've been taken for granted.
It happened again Sunday.
For only the fourth time in 51 years -- but the second time since 2003 -- the Daytona 500 was cut short because of rain.
Six years ago, Michael Waltrip won when the race was stopped after 109 of the scheduled 200 laps. On Sunday, Matt Kenseth won when the red-flagged race was deemed over and official after 152 laps, 120 miles shy of 500.
So much for all that feel-good talk about NASCAR showing a renewed appreciation for its fans during tough economic times.
Do you know how long NASCAR waited before calling the race? Fifteen minutes.
It didn't matter that the rain lasted only an hour and the race could've resumed not long after 10 p.m. Or that 200,000 fans spent plenty to get to Daytona. Or that the season-opening 500 is supposed to be NASCAR's Super Bowl.
Can you imagine the Super Bowl being called at the start of the fourth quarter because of lightning? Even in baseball's World Series, rain-interrupted games are now played to completion.
But not NASCAR races.
As long as a race gets past its halfway point -- even this race -- it's official. And that's wrong.
It's also unnecessary, though the remedy probably would cost NASCAR some TV dollars.
This race should've started at least two hours earlier, as it did before NASCAR sold its soul to TV.
From 1979-2000, the 500 started at 12:15 p.m (Eastern), then moved to 2:30 p.m. to accommodate West Coast viewers. The start was moved to 2:55 p.m. in 2004, and to 3:45 p.m. in 2007, assuring a spectacular, under-the-lights finish.
Unless, of course, it rains.
As it did Sunday.
Then, fans everywhere get cheated, get less racing, get an anticlimactic ending decided by something other than cars, drivers and their pit crews.
Could Kenseth have held on? Were those three Richard Petty Motorsports cars for real? Might Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon have found their way to the front? Those radio-show callers wanted to know. They wanted the Daytona 500, not a Daytona 380 with no hard driving to the checkered flag.
But, hey, NASCAR got paid.
That's all that matters.

(Ray McNulty is sports columnist for Scripps Treasure Coast (Fla.) Newspapers, The Stuart News, Fort Pierce Tribune and Vero Beach Press Journal. Contact him at ray.mcnulty@scripps.com or on the Web at www.tcpalm.com.)

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