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After 3 seasons of unique and fun racing the Superstar Racing Experience, or SRX for short, will not be returning for their fourth season in the summer of 2024. The news was surprising as the SRX had been promoting their new season for months and even had done so a few hours before closing their doors. So, today we will look into this and look at why did the SRX fail? (for now)
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35 comments
What do you think are the reasons for the SRX failing to return in 2024?
Too much Reasons.
Cuz Ray evernham bought the rights to IROC
I think it’s because of the IROC series returning
Paul Tracy
Ray
Paul Tracy is clearly at fault. He thought it was a demolition derby instead of a racing series and now the SRX is paying the price.
Another reason is because he’s a right wing maniac
Paul Tracy is really living rent free in people’s heads. He had nothing to do with SRX shutting down, more likely IROC being the case.
@@StewieGriffinFanProductionsTracy destroying cars , losing the title sponsorship, and no car manufacturer to help ….. but hey losing 2-3 cars every race till Tracy was removed than they had no more issues.
I definitely agree with you guys Paul Tracy was definitely just a complete joke being a wrecking ball on everybody.
I think that they are going to merge with IROC since Evernham just bought the rights for the branding and series. It would be more logical to put the best of the best in the International Race of Champions that has that long and iconic history.
Brandon, there’s NO reason for Ray Evernham to merge with the SRX series, Ray stopped being involved with SRX almost 2 years ago, don’t think he liked the way that series was headed! Ray is using his old original IROC race cars from his collection of race cars or building new “old type” chassis to clone the old race cars! It’s also very doubtful the new IROC series will ever run on dirt either. I hardly watched any of SRX season 3, always forgot it was on Thursday night! I never thought SRX was any good to start with, I maybe only watched 6 races out of 3 years!
@@casey6518 Casey, think of it this way. If IROC comes back, there is no point in having the SRX. It’s basically going to become the CART/Indy Split for legends and that would not be a good look. It would be better to either A. just close down and give the drivers the chance to race in IROC or B. Merge with IROC to become the main legends series
Kinda but SRX ran dirt tracks too, I don’t see the IROC series getting close to a dirt track. There was no real viewership for the network to make any $ plus I believe Camping World pulled out as a major sponsor this year! Tony’s SHR only really has 1 sponsor (14) so far for his 4 car team, Tony is bleeding $ right now!@@Brandonbrooks412
@@Brandonbrooks412And IROC likely will get current stars.
If this is the end, we’ve had a lot of memories with the series. That includes the Paul Tracy Guangdong Tigers moment at the Motor Mile Speedway
Even though I only saw 2 out of the 3 seasons SRX did, I was looking forward to Season 4. But I guess it’s time to see what IROC has for us, since it hasn’t been around since 2006
Camping World might’ve played a part in it too. They’re leaving NHRA as a title sponsor after the 2024 season
They left after last season as the title sponsor they’re still involved this year though just not title
It’s sad to see the SRX gone. It was a fun series.
Glad IROC is coming back. Didn’t know that until today, so I looked it up to confirm. Especially with Ray Evernham involved. Tbh kinda reminds me of the present-day XFL/USFL merger this year.
Something to mention is that last year the cars were extremely prone to failures. Even in the first race you had Marco Andretti saying he had brake issues. And no, it wasn’t Paul Tracy’s fault since these were single car incidents. Wonder if that played a factor.
I know someone who works for Illmor that supplies engines to the series and they supposedly never saw this coming. Illmor was already preparing engines and tech support for the coming season.
I was curious about that too…the vendors. How about Eury the chassis builder? Was it running him into the ground?
Honestly loved the series for what it was, a series meant for fun whether it be fun for driver or fun for fans. Brought fun to local short tracks bringing stars to them. It wasn’t meant to be “ my dream is to be SRX champion “, if you’re in the SRX it’s a byproduct of other achievements or drive towards that achievement. As much as this sucks I do hope it makes a return in some capacity
I’m just glad it gave us something we’d never see anywhere else, yesteryear’s Elliott vs todays Elliott. It was a lot of fun watching Bill and Chase battle.
The CBS Saturday night to ESPN Thursday night switch definitely didn’t help. Lack of promotion for thr SRX also didn’t help.
I think the biggest problem with the SRX is it didn’t quite live up to the Superstar billing. There were some interesting names, but aside from a few Cup regulars and retirees, it didn’t have much in the way of broad appeal. The short track shtick was great for the local short tracks I’m sure, but it limited interest from drivers outside of the stock car scene. Upping the car count and making the schedule more diverse could have gone a long way toward attracting more drivers from other series.
It would have been interesting to see these cars on a road course. I’m not a big road course guy, but it would have been interesting. I agree with most of what you said though.
@@Ka_Gg Road courses aren’t my favorite, but the occasional right turn never hurt anyone, and it would be a good way to get drivers outside of the stock car world to show up once or twice a season.
You can’t blame Tracey for all of it. He created drama which fans eat up. It was however at the cost of many wrecked cars. Appears the management may have had a few pitfalls. ESPN was definitely partly to blame. Thursday Night Thunder was a good idea but just the wrong network. ESPN simply sucks. They are on their way down the sewer. I think the cars are cool . I would like to see them run the Roval
I think it’s a combination of things and I will say this from a fan in the stands and to one watching on TV from these perspectives.
When I saw the series at first I thought “Cool, well that’s interesting how we have a lot of semi-retired and some active drivers in these cars, understandable it’s all on short tracks, but that’s okay.”
Then when I went to a race for the finale at Sharon Speedway in Hartford, OH to watch Dave and Ryan Blaney race, I didn’t have a great time.
The track announcers didn’t have a clue as to what was going on or how the formats ran, points positioning or the like, the race ended up getting shortened up by about 20 or more laps, and the amount of wrecking by guys like Michael Waltrip, Paul Tracy, and even the eventual champion Marco Andretti made it difficult to watch. By the time I walked out, I appreciated the facility, but was overall unimpressed with the live product, even if there were drivers I would have been interested in meeting.
As for the TV side, the CBS deal made it more easy to watch, but it was hard to remember when they were racing and what time it was on. Shift the racing to ESPN, and then put it on Thursday; as much as it tried to appeal to the old “THURSDAY NIGHT THUNDER” crowd of nostalgia; nobody is going to remember or potentially have time to watch a Thursday night race. Add into the fact you have Paul Tracy being an absolute clown and making it hard to watch, and that the issues got so bad to the point Ken Schrader almost walked away, didn’t really help with wanting to tune in TV wise if it is going to be a demo derby until maybe the last 10 laps.
SRX was an interesting idea, and I’m sad it’s going away, but there were a lot of issues that made it probably hard to be a breakout success that could last even 5-10 seasons potentially. I don’t know who may fill in that “Star Power” after guys like Stewart, Newman, Labonte, Biffle, etc. potentially left to do their own things, but it was worth seeing while it was here.
And to everyone saying IROC is going to take it’s place and go back to the way it was in the 2000s; at this point I expect them to just be show cars and special event stuff like the Goodwood Hill Climb. Given what we see with the SRX and it’s problems, I don’t really see how you manage to get IROC to come back as a full fledged racing series, because that schedule was hard to keep up with when it’s 4 races spread out through 9 months.
I hope SRX continues, I hope IROC comes back in some actual racing capacity, but given how hard sponsorship is coming by in auto racing even with NASCAR, it’s going to be an uphill battle for both to get off the ground or fly again.
I was always amazed that they could get those cars produced from the ground up, especially in 2020 and 2021. When they were already part shortages and just lack of availability during Covid
I really enjoyed the first season of SRX. After it was just pretty much active NASCAR drivers racing, I was over it overall. It was a fun idea, but I don’t think it was ever truly meant to be a long term thing.