NASCAR broadcaster sends warning to sport as it faces viewership crisis

NASCAR broadcasting icon Mike Joy has sent a warning to NASCAR about the future of the sport. Speaking on Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour podcast, Joy admits that the sport has failed in its attempt to attract young fans. This is an issue that threatens the very future of NASCAR, according to the experienced pundit.

After being part of NASCAR broadcasting for almost five decades, Joy has seen it all. He’s seen sport blow up as it did in the 1990s, and now is watching its popularity fall once again to a worrying degree.

Talking on the podcast, he said the following about a growing age gap between its drivers and fans. 

“We have 18 and 20-year-olds coming into the Cup Series and making a mark,” Joy said. “The fan base is getting older. We’re not attracting the younger fanbase that we need to move this sport forward into the next decade, [and] into the next couple of decades.”

In 2017, the average age of a NASCAR fan in the United States was 58 years old. This was a nine year increase from when the same analysis was done in 2006, and this trend has likely continued.

“You couldn’t go into a supermarket without knowing about NASCAR,” he admitted. “It was everywhere. When the sponsors stopped activating toward the general public and toward the race fans, the sport just took a giant dump in the relative to everyday life department.

“We lost a lot of that young fanbase that we really need to covet if we’re going to grow this sport again.”

Joy added that the movie Talladega Nights was a peak of the sport’s ebbing and flowing popularity.

Kyle Larson, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Photo by: Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images

“That was when we hit our peak for fan engagement and crowds at the racetrack. I remember going into a Food City in Bristol, Tennessee, and you couldn’t push your cart down any aisle without knocking over a cardboard cutout of some driver hawking something. You couldn’t go in a supermarket without knowing about NASCAR. It was everywhere.”

He continued:

“When NASCAR transitioned to being a sport with mostly B2B sponsors, the sponsors stopped activating toward the general public and toward the race fans, the sport just took a giant dump in the relationship relative to everyday life, and we lost a lot of that young fanbase that we need to covet if we’re going to grow the sport again.”

NASCAR has been trying to reach a new audience for many years, but the sport’s executives have offered a more optimistic view with CMO Jill Gregory saying in 2020 that 40% of the sport’s viewership were women.

“One of our points of differentiation has always been the passion and loyalty of our fans. Almost 70% of them consciously support NASCAR sponsors,” she said. “We also have an increasingly diverse set of fans, with the biggest growth coming from a younger audience.

“About 40% of our fanbase is women, and we’ve got the highest amount of female TV viewers per event of any U.S. sport other than the NFL. Our percentage of multicultural fans is growing, too, and that’s an effort we’ve been very deliberate about.”

Formula 1 has seen success in attracting younger audiences through social media campaigns – something NASCAR is currently lacking. If anything, the sport should start here. According to Joy, he believes the right sponsors will attract an audience that will let NASCAR thrive.