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Oh. That.

Holy marbles! I didn't even know the Indianapolis 500 was today. Open-wheels just doesn't even have the resonance that it did even when I was a kid. I think Dale Earnhardt has a lot to do with that. NASCAR dominates the American motorsports conversation. Jeff Gordon dominated NASCAR in the mid-90s and following, but people forget that he emerged primarily as a rival to Earnhardt. You think Jeff Gordon and the rest of them are hosting Saturday Night Live without that blazed trail? Don't kid yourself. The biggest, most popular star in NASCAR is Dale Earnhardt, Jr., and he's never won a championship. THAT'S how big a shadow Earnhardt still casts over the sport. [Are you saying Junior is getting by on his daddy's name?--ed.] Look, I'm not saying he's a talentless hack. But...yes.

Meanwhile, the reason open-wheel racing (IndyCar) plays second-fiddle is because of Tony George, the former president of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and the chief instigator of the feud that split open-wheel racing into 2 rival leagues: CART and the IRL. I think it was a spasm of stupid nationalism. He didn't like the flood of foreign money (and apparently, foreigners) into the Speedway each year. But that sport's biggest stars at the time were often non-Americans. And when he insisted on natural carburation, the cars got slower, and they didn't make that cool sound. And the big stars went to CART. I still watched CART. He deserves what he gets in scorn. We had never heard of the guys in the IRL. And motorsports needs speed and stars to even think about pulling people away from the major team sports, and even golf and tennis.

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