6 posts tagged “nascar”
This time of year, our NASCAR friends visit Rochester. Actually, they visit Watkins Glen, where the Sprint Cars do their road-racing thing. Lots of transmissions die out on that twisty track.
But Rochester's the nearest large-ish city to the Glen, so Kodak's show car and driver stopped by. The highlight locally was a "Kodak Night" at Frontier Field, our local AAA baseball affiliate's stadium.
Kodak and Universal Pictures did a promotional deal around the new Mummy movie with a special paint job on the Kodak Dodge. This would be impressive at your local Dairy Queen, if you could get an 800-hp car to stop in the drive-thru.
We saw the movie Thursday night. If you want to see absolutely every gimmick from the first three Indiana Jones movies rolled into a movie with Brendan Fraser, go see the Mummy III.
Back to the ballpark:
BK and CK.
Your humble author and CK. JK was not in a hammy mood last night, and I'm not about to post scowly photos.
Did I mention there was a ball game going on? Ryan Newman threw out the first pitch, signed autographs, then headed back for the Glen and his weekend of racing. Save the transmissions!
Last Sunday, I was blasting north on the interstate toward home, trying desperately not to lose the radio signal from Wayne County. Ryan Newman and Tony Stewart were battling for the lead in the last lap of the Daytona 500. Ryan's our guy; I've interviewed him for a couple of Kodak podcasts, and managed a couple of media moments for him.
Ryan, with an assist from his teammate Kurt Busch, won the race. And Ryan, true to his media training, named our company as one of his top three sponsors as soon as he got out of that race car. Job well done. Congratulations, Ryan.
(Check out the video.)
But, you'd really need to squint to find the Kodak decal on the right rear quarter-panel of his No. 12 Dodge. It's there, but otherwise, the car is painted bright blue-and-white: the colors of Alltel, his primary sponsor for all but six of this season's Sprint Cup races.
But, NASCAR lately is more about decals. This year's cars, by design, are all exactly the same shape and size. There's no difference, except where they place the decals that look like headlights, taillights, and grilles. That's the "car of tomorrow" philosophy. The only real difference is in the engine compartment.
So when someone in NASCAR Nation talks about a manufacturer's championship -- Chevy won it last year -- it won't mean a great deal. The cars are all the same. Rolling billboards that happen to have 800-horsepower V-8 engines.
Maybe this is why NASCAR's TV audience has declined a few percent each year since they inaugurated the "Chase for the Cup" format. Brand loyalty gets a little murky when your cars are all from the same cookie-cutter.
On the other hand, it could be the Chase format itself. If you know that there will be a 10-race "playoff" near the end of the season that determines the series champion, you pretty much know that the first 26 races of the season won't determine your champion. So you can afford to skip a few.
Memo to Ryan: run hard enough to make the Chase. Daytona's a great achievement. We'll all love to see you at the end of the season, too.
Here's a link to my podcast capturing the sights and sounds of a day at the races -- in this case, Watkins Glen, where the NASCAR drivers tore up the track and a few transmissions in August. The on-air racing commentators have nothing to worry about, but it beats hacking out another tired news release.
My pal Lori Page in Kodak's Atlanta office has put a great deal of effort into the Kodak Inspiration Tour, a traveling interactive digital photo experience that's traveled to state fairs, NASCAR races, and community events since earlier this summer. It'll make at least 13 stops around north America through early 2008.
I did my tour of duty at the Inspiration Tour's stop at the New York State Fair yesterday, in 90-degree Syracuse, NY. I showed unsuspecting fairgoers how to edit and print their digital pictures. And, accompanied by ace video producer Pat Maley, we shot interviews for an upcoming podcast.
I haven't visited many state fairs, but New York's has pretty much anything you'd want to see: Prize-winning livestock (especially llamas). A midway with more sawdust-filled Stewie Griffin dolls than anyone would ever want. And a surprisingly strong free concert series (yesterday's acts included Pure Prairie League, Poco, and Firefall -- a '70s MOR playlist come to life!).
Back to the Inspiration Tour. In Syracuse, you have to hunt for it. Kodak did not get a great location. Go past Chevrolet Court (the concert park area with the shiny Chevys). Head back toward the grandstand (where the pricier nighttime concert entertainment includes Brad Paisley, Carrie Underwood, and Kenny Chesney). Instead of turning right toward the grandstand, turn left. Look for the classic fire-spotter's tower like those erected all over the Adirondacks. The enormous yellow-and-white tent with all the cool Kodak digital technology is near the bottom of that tower.
Inside: it's air-conditioned. I don't know how you air-condition a tent, but it made our spot pretty popular when the temperature cracked into the 90s.
You go in and they hand you a digital memory card. Give it to one of the cheery hosts, and he or she'll take your picture in a NASCAR simulator, an Olympic medalist's stand, or a Disneyland scene. Then, there are about a dozen ways to print that photo right in the tent, and then upload it to the Kodak Gallery.
We had fun, even though we wished we'd seen a wider variety of guests come through. Maybe those Stewie Griffin kewpie dolls are a bigger deal than I thought.
Watkins Glen, NY. Aug. 12, 2007. Me, 100,000 rabid NASCAR Nation citizens, and a few Kodak moments. Perhaps I over-indulge, but this will be my only NASCAR race this season. Indulge me just this once.
Here are the highlights:
Jeff Gordon, blasting through Turn 10. Before he got the car sideways and lost to the Orange Demon, Tony Stewart. I used to despise Jeff. But he sort of grows on you. Mainly because he generally races clean. Unlike You-Know-Who in the orange car.
And yes, NASCAR is really a marketer's dream: 43 rolling billboards before a captive audience, trackside and on TV. All waiting for a wreck. Crack open your checkbooks!
My friend and colleague Jenny Cisney has a great Watkins Glen post -- with video -- on the Kodak blog. She doesn't have 5W30 motor oil in her veins, but I love her perspective. Visit it here.
Guilty pleasure: I have followed NASCAR racing since the days of Freddie Lorenzen and Richard Petty (before he became a pitchman for Goodie's Headache Powder). And every so often, I get close to the sport.
This is the best part of my job: taking the Kodak brand out to the public.
Ryan himself is actually a great guy. He came to town to meet with employees and sign autographs, and he did a few interviews with the local media. He's quite unpretentious, with a dry sense of humor. He brings a very analytical approach to competition. He and his wife are very committed to rescuing shelter animals from euthanasia through his Ryan Newman Foundation.
They don't build NASCAR cars with passenger seats, but Ryan's the guy I'd trust most if we were out on a track at 185 mph.
NASCAR has become an enormous business, and Kodak has sponsored a team for most of the last 20 years. This year, we're on Ryan Newman's Cup car for three races, and Kodak sponsors his Busch Series car in seven races.
Chances are that I will not be called upon as a relief driver.
Just posted my second "Words & Pictures" podcast at http://www.kodak.com/go/podcasts. This one features Pep Bonet, a photographer from Amsterdam who's won all kinds of awards for his gritty, unvarnished photos from Darfur, Somalia, and Sierra Leone. Interesting guy. I will ask the management about importing it to view on Vox. 'Til then, please look at the podcast here and let me know what you think. Thanks.
