Despite the massive revolutions in the racing world, making major strides in the safety department, and introducing state-of-the-art driver harnesses in 2001 that Formula One would later draw inspiration from, the Stock Car Racing giant is struggling with its original and best product – the short track package. With the introduction of its new generation of race cars, the organization’s exciting short format of racing has taken a big hit with the number of audience actually dropping.

While many, including drivers, attribute this to the Next-Gen platform, the sport’s 7-time champion, Richard “The King” Petty got down straight, sharing his skepticism about the apt solution to this matter. Speaking with his long-time associate Dale Inman, the great uncovered the sour reality of NASCAR’s short-track racing.

Richard Petty reveals the bitter truth about NASCAR’s short-track racing

Roll back a couple of years and short-format racing was the bread and butter of NASCAR. Fans would travel from around the country to watch the action. From a fan’s standpoint, the races were short and exhilarating to watch, with more than enough drama while showcasing the tight and bumpy style of racing. Generally tracks like Martinsville and Bristol known for their massive crowd-pulling ability are a gold mine for the organization but in recent years, the scene has flipped on its head.

Even though the fans are still excited about being at the race track, and getting a raw feel of it all, Inman feels like more fans are content with watching the race from their couches. Petty, on the other hand, came up with a great view, eyeing things from a fan’s standpoint. He said, “The Saturday night racers and stuff, it’s hard to draw a crowd, there’s so much going on of things for the kids to do, for parents and stuff to do. A lot of short tracks are just not drawing enough people to be able to keep them open. I think they’ve got the race car and stuff but they just don’t have the fans to be able to pay the purse. So, I don’t know what they can do about it.” 

While the veteran is pretty much unsure about the solution, his former crew chief, Inman cited how a great action-packed race will get the masses coming into the track. He said, “The Xfinity crowd Saturday, they weren’t many people in the grandstand but they tore up so many cars and from what I get from the people yesterday after the race on Saturday, they sold 600 tickets an hour for the Sunday’s race and that brought the crowd and that was pretty good information.” 

WATCH THIS STORY: Throwback to 1982 when 19-year-old Michael Jordan met “The King” Richard Petty 

While the short-track racing debacle has been a point of worry for The King, his own team Legacy Motor Club has also been dealing with a huge change as it looks to transition from the Chevy side to the Toyota stable. During the course of the conversation with his former crew chief, the veteran also opened up about the challenges ahead with LMC.

“The King” details the challenges around the Chevy to Toyota transition 

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With Jimmie Johnson and Richard Petty’s Legacy Motor Club entering its third year of competition in the Cup Series, the team made massive changes, switching the base from the all-American manufacturer, Chevrolet to the Japanese powerhouse Toyota in search of success. After a miserable 2023 season, the management might have felt the need for an overhaul and Johnson and his men did just that leaving Chevy – the manufacturer that earned him multiple titles.

While some fans denounced Johnson’s sudden change of heart, deeming it a betrayal, others understood the situation. Ever since Johnson joined hands with Petty, taking over the erstwhile Petty GMS team, the team needed a befitting overhaul. Reflecting on the transition, Petty shared his thoughts. He said, “It’s a different car, different engine. We’ll have people that are experts on the Toyota coming in and some of the Chevrolet people won’t be there anymore. It’s going to be a whole new team with the majority of the players being transferred from one car to another. The big deal is getting used to working with Toyota which we’ve never done before.”

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Answering the fan query with his long-time ally, Inman, Petty then concluded his words, saying, “The big deal is the transition of everybody, just taking what we had put it over to the side and bringing everything in new.”

While the sudden change in OEM garnered quite a lot of criticism, only 2024 will tell if fans were right to worry or not!