June 23, 2007
By Larry Cottrill

Larry Cottrill

Success in life is come about through planning ahead, and I’m taking this time to plan ahead for the 2007 season ending Nextel Cup Awards Banquet at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel.

Over the years, we fans have suffered through nearly unbearable 2-3 hour shows for those rare entertaining moments like seeing Tony Stewart expose the Hutchen’s Device under his tuxedo.

For every ten seconds of smiles and laughter, there has been 40 minutes of monotonous speeches and either uninspired or oddly chosen musical performances. The ultimate snoozer had to have been a few years back ( 2002? ) when the featured entertainment was an "Aerial Ballet" with spandex clad gymnasts swinging around with paper streamers on guide wires. Hand me a barf bag please!

I’ve always been one to hate hearing those who complain without offering suggestions or alternatives to a problem, so I’ve got my own suggestion for at least 5-10 minutes of entertainment that NASCAR fans would truly enjoy in this years banquet.

World's Finest Bumper Cars

A couple of hours west of New York City, off of PA’s I-80, there is a remarkable family owned amusement park nestled in the village of Elysburg called Knoebel’s. Regarded throughout the amusement industry for being among the finest traditional parks in the world, the park is noted for it’s world class roller coasters, Haunted Mansion, and more importantly it’s Scooter bumper cars.

The bumper cars at Knoebel’s have been voted "World’s Finest" by numerous publications, and with good reason. These are vintage Lusse brand Auto Scooters that are meticulously maintained. The Lusse’s look like a ‘53 Chevy Bel Air, and feel about as heavy too. They are extremely powerful and when combined with the Scooter house floor at Knoebel’s, which is well groomed with graphite, it is a bumper car lover’s dream come true. The layout of the "course" at Knoebel’s is not unlike Martinsville; a long skinny oval, though with an "island" in the middle, and fortunately with "soft walls."

I would love to see the top 12 drivers and their crew chiefs unleashed in their uniforms on the Scooters at Knoebel’s in front of the camera. Throw in Mike Helton, Brian France and Robin Pemberton for some added spice. I’m sure that the Knoebel’s staff would be happy to paint the cars up so that there would be enough red/blue/white/yellow/etc . . . needed as to match up with the colors of the cars of the Chase teams. I’d make it a 100-lap race, and rig up a lap-counting scoreboard which made it clearly visible to all participants just who was winning ( thereby painting a pretty big target on him ). This would be good old-fashioned and wholesome entertainment that everyone would enjoy, and it would be fascinating being able to see the driver’s faces and expressions throughout the event for a change.

I’d even put clips of it into preview ads of the banquet to achieve higher TV ratings.

I truly believe this would be the most memorable and best received "entertainment segment" of any banquet, past, present or future.

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.