Ryan Newman’s Win Overshadowed

February 23, 2008

By Brenda Benedict

News of Ryan Newman’s win in the Daytona 500 has been spread across all types of media this week. Every news website and local news production included the news of Newman’s unexpected victory.

Ryan has made the rounds of the popular television and radio shows, including Regis and Kelly, David Letterman, The Best Damn Sports Show and ESPN. Generally, he has been congratulated and honored. But in many cases, the Tony Stewart-Kurt Busch story is overshadowing the real story of Newman’s win in the Daytona 500.

Ryan’s appearance on the David Letterman show started with a discussion of the race but the story of Stewart/Busch confrontation the week before the Daytona 500 quickly became the focus of the interview. Newman stated before the interview that “I know he’s very quick-witted (Letterman) and all of those things. I’ll try to give him a run for his money.” And he did. Ryan handled the questions with grace but it was evident that the real story that interested Letterman was what went on in the NASCAR hauler the previous weekend. When Letterman stated, “I heard punches were thrown.” Ryan responded, “I heard a punch was thrown.”

Newman graciously avoided sharing more details by putting Letterman on the spot when he told him that when Letterman mentioned the NASCAR Trailer, Letterman sounded derogatory. This helped steer the discussion away from Stewart/Busch and really seemed to rattle Letterman.

National Public Radio did a segment on the race with less than flattering comments.

Allison Stewart (no relation to Tony, I’m sure) hosted a segment to discuss the big sporting events of the past weekend. During the segment she interviewed NPR sports analyst Bill Wolfe. The two of them acknowledged that the Daytona 500 was the biggest sports story of the weekend with 200,000 people attending the race.

They labeled Ryan Newman as a nice guy but that was the extent of the discussion of the race. They joked in a condescending way about the length of the race with Wolfe commenting that he was “thirty-eight when the race started.” They then digressed into a discussion of the sport of NASCAR.

Wolfe used the story of Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch’s rivalry to illustrate the way NASCAR operates. He stated, “Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch are sworn enemies, they hate each other and have been warned to steer clear of each other. All very excellently junior high school.”

The comment by the host was then, “Isn’t it all very World Wrestling Federation?” Wolfe’s reaction was, “It always has been. It is completely World Wrestling Federation.” Wolfe then launches into a discussion of Dale Jr.’s reasons for leaving DEI in which the hosts are agreeing that in no other sport would a player change teams because he hated his step-mother. “All very soap opera like.”

The summary of the segment was by Allison Stewart, “It’s southern gothic.” National Public Radio felt no shame at such derogatory comments and even played the interview as the 'NPR Story of The Day' podcast. Their attempt to be clever and witty came across as a condescending view of the 200,000 fans that enjoyed an authentic sporting event.

While it is true that the Tony Stewart/Kurt Busch story may have impacted the outcome of the Daytona 500 because Kurt was not inclined to assist Tony Stewart, the constant replaying of the previous weekend’s events deflects attention away Ryan Newman’s accomplishment at Daytona on Sunday.

We had a race that pitted teams against teams, large automobile company against other companies and driver against driver. The race showed that the picks of the media and the fans is not necessarily going to be the winner of the race. Let’s not let the real story of the day be overshadowed.

We need to continue our focus and attention on our sport and seek to highlight those items that take skill and strategy. The Daytona 500 has enough drama for coverage in the race itself in the skill and decisions of the racers, crews and owners on race day.

The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.

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