PARTIES, CELEBS AND RACING
Part 2: Auto Racing's Presence in Greater New York

MICHAEL ANDRETTI Left alone? - Photo by: K. Ma/NYAR

May 15, 2002 -- According to Part 1 of my discussion, it seems like there is a tough road ahead for ANY racing series that wants to get a bite out of the Big Apple. Nothing is impossible, however, at least in my dictionary. What I am suggesting is, the racing community needs to really spend time and money to develop this market and let people get a sense of what auto racing is all about. Nothing comes easy, but this is the only way to do it.

To develop this tough market, total success won't be achieved the next day, the next year and maybe not even the next decade. However, when you look at Long Beach, it took Chris Pook more than ten years to develop the venue to what it is nowadays - the most prestigious road race event in America. Likewise, time is vital for building a successful event in New York City. Along with patience, it also needs some creative ideas to teach New Yorkers what racing really is through various ways in order to break into the already-crowded sports market. The fact is there are many things involved with motorsports aside from race action. We do have engineers working tirelessly behind the scene, right? If people buy expensive cars here, how come they have zero interest in racecars?

There is no question that New York is a party town. No, it's not the good old college type of party town, where you spend two bucks for a cheap beer and get really drunk from inhaling many of them. Not to be stereotyped, New Yorkers are pretentious, and the converted New Yorkers (people who moved in from other states) are even more pretentious. That's why there is dress code in many clubs in Manhattan. People like to dress up and go 'clubbing', and people social with each other by doing so. No, I am not promoting hard drinking here I don't even drink much, but the reality is people like to do partying and social with each other from that.

To give you a good example, let's just turn the clock back a year ago. After announcing the Indy 500 deal with Archipelago, Team Green threw a party at Edward Moran Bar & Grill at World Financial Center (Now temporary closed due to the 9/11 tragic event across the street). The party was absolutely jam-packed with stockbrokers and financial analysis that worked nearby at the Financial District. You've got people from Archipelago, Merrill Lynch, Goldman & Sach, AMEX etc. CNBC's "Stallion" -- NYSE Stocks Editor Bob Pisani, even showed up at the event.

But how many really came because of racing?

From what I saw, only a small percentage of people showed interests in the racing side of the party. Some people, wearing ties and suits, participated in an indoor pit-stop challenges (Barry Green and Kim Green were there to observe). Some people played the Indy 500 video game, and Michael Andretti, who sat on the side, received little attention where only some people brought memorabilia and let the winningest CART driver signed them. At one point, Andretti was so bored doing nothing. That's the scene that showed the growing 'pain' of racing in New York - you got the right people but you didn't get any attention. I remember one person came to me and asked, "Who is signing autographs there?" Check your credential buddy, it was Andretti, of course.

As I said, there are going to be some sacrifices doing these types of functions. However, this is the only way to promote motorsports, do something in person. True, 80% of people were talking about the stock market or other related subjects at the party, but the fan base can only be built on location, and time and again the reality shows that television will not make any impact in the Metropolitan area because people are so busy watching baseball games Sunday afternoon. You've got to have real team personnel, real activities and real promotional events to deliver the goods. The truth is, New Yorkers have almost no knowledge about the 'tradition' of racing, so you'll have to treat them like babies and educate them through creative events. No old stuff, so just bring on what is at the plate.

While live events certainly boost the presence of auto racing here, celebrities will bring even more attentions and deliver results. New York is not exactly Hollywood, but in most conversations there is a strong possibility that celebrities are being involved in one of them. At this point, none of the drivers has this status; no matter you are a Michael Schumacher or a Jeff Gordon. You need to have real 'New York celebrities' to hype up any racing events. Forget about Jason Priestly, please.

David Letterman supposed to be a good spokesperson locally, where he has his Late Show at Broadway for CBS, but the Indiana native is a private individual so he has been keeping low key on his involvements in racing. He did send Biff Henderson to the Detroit race last year, and he did get David Coulthard, Helio Castroneves Jeff Gordon and his former employee Kenny Brack to be on the show. However, everything was done only in national level. Jacques Villeneuve raced against a cabby around the Ed Sullivan Theatre after he won the Indy 500 in 1995, that is the exact promotional event that can bring attention to the crowd here. In 2000 before the inaugural U.S. Grand Prix, Jaguar F-1 sent Eddie Irvine (in his R1) and Johnny Herbert (in a yellow cab) and had them race at Times Square. That event DID receive attentions from local media! On the surface it didn't do much, but look deeper it was effective marketing, even though it was expensive to shut down Broadway in board daylight.

On the other hand, the IMS sent Anthony Lazzaro in a two-seater and drove around downtown Indianapolis to promote the upcoming Indy 500, but do you really need to promote the Indy 500 locally?

Maybe Pepsi can ask its poster girl Britney Spear to drive the #24 stock car at Times Square outside MTV studio?

The fact is, the scale of these events have to be large and high key, if they want to develop this market.

Let's just throw a celebrity race (call it Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race East) and have a lineup consist of J.Lo, Derek Jeter, Ricky Martin, Puff Daddy etc. I can guarantee it is going to be a good sell. This lineup won't likely to happen, but who knows.

The 9/11 events certainly hurt the chances for New York to host a race here, but the city is still bidding the biggest sports event of all - The Summer Olympics for the year 2012. Like I said, nothing is impossible.

Now we've discussed some marketing ideas, what about having an actual race here? We'll investigate this issue next.

Have your say on this issue? E-mail Kevin Ma at kma@nyautoracing.com

To be continued …

PART 1: BIG APPLE A TOUGH COOKIE