The local Clear Chuckle folks wanted so desperately to take our affiliations of MRN Radio and the Performance Racing Network away from us at Rock 104 last winter.
They succeeded. But, only one problem for them.
Just when I thought CC had all the bases covered — um, I guess they forgot one thing. The Brickyard 400’s neither on MRN or PRN! It’s on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s radio network.
I just checked all their stations — and they’re carrying regular programming. A check of the Brickyard400.com website confirmed any and all suspicion — no radio station in this area’s linked up with the IMS network.
Thankfully, the Brickyard 400’s on WDAM-TV — the other place I work. 🙂
And you guys didn’t jump to pick it up?
Wouldn’t have been worth it.
As I alluded to, this was one of those situations where the race was on free TV. As I note at DougMorris.net/nascar, we were losing the numbers game — sales and ratings — when Fox and NBC started carrying Winston Cup racing in 2001.
The other factor that hurt us — as much as I hate to bring this up, but it’s true — the death of Dale Earnhardt at the ’01 Daytona 500. In the weeks and months that followed, I literally heard from several listeners claim they lost interest in NASCAR since his death.
Fair weather fans? Judge for yourself.
On the one hand, it would’ve been nice to do what would’ve been dubbed The RockTrax and RaceTrax Brickyard 400 Reunion Special. While some listeners hated to hear about our loss of NASCAR, others are glad to have "the old RockTrax" back.
I only had about 2 callers ask, "What (radio) station’s carryin’ the race (Brickyard 400)?" If I had several, then I’d probably make a case to the Blakeneys we ought to consider allying with IMS Radio.