Daily NASCAR

A classic Mike Smith Stockcartoon.

 

by NTW editor Ovalscream

Mike Smith is NASCAR fan to the bone. When heartland of the sport in the southeastern United States is in bed dreaming their sweet NASCAR dreams, the Las Vegas resident is still up watching whatever race action can be found on TV. Living out West, far from most of the races, a fan’s gotta catch the action where he can. Stock car racing is his thing, but to satisfy the itch he’s had since childhood, Mike will watch anything — even lawn mower races.

And whatever Mike doesn’t see with his eyes, his NASCAR-sotted brain fills in with a cartoon, capturing the inside story, the thought balloon that hovers over drivers, fans and the sport itself.

Mike’s Stockcartoons appear regularly in the Las Vegas Sun, where by day he serves as the newspaper’s editorial cartoonist. He has won several awards from the Nevada Press Association and placed second two years in a row for "Best Editorial Cartoons" at the National Headliner Awards. Stockcartoons are also syndicated by King Features and publish in newspapers across the country.

I caught up with Mike via telephone the other day.

How did you get into racing?

Since I was a kid I’ve been a car nut, and stock car racing has always been my favorite. But living out in Santa Clara (near San Francisco), you couldn’t catch much of it. Occasionally a race would appear on ABC’s Wide World of Sports. Bobby Allison was my favorite driver growing up. Once racing got picked up nationally by ESPN, I could catch a lot more races.

All I did as a kid was draw cars … now I draw ‘em for a living!

Tell us about your road to becoming editorial cartoonist at the Las Vegas Sun.

I went to Loyola Marymount University in LA where I studied for a degree in humanities. I started drawing political cartoons as a junior. Once I saw how much trouble I got into over them, I thought, hey, this would be a blast!

I used to hound Paul Conrad, the four-time Pulizter-winning editorial cartoonist at the LA Times. I’d drive from my dorm into Los Angeles and show him my cartoons. He’d go over them with a brutal, fine-toothed comb. "If you want a job in editorial cartooning," he’d say, "you need to learn how to draw." But I never formally studied art.

As a senior, I blindly sent packages of my work around the country. The Las Vegas Sun was one paper that started picking up some of my cartoons. But no one was interested in hiring me to be their editorial cartoonist.

After I graduated, I worked at National Car Rental at Los Angeles Airport. I’d draw cartoons in the morning and pump gas at the airport at night. I did that for a year and then Hertz offered to put me into management training at the San Francisco Airport. I called the Sun and told them about my job offer, and the editor there said, "you tell them to stick it up their ass." And that’s how I came to work at the Sun in 1983.

When did you start drawing Stockcartoons?

When LMS came to Vegas (in 1997) I thought it would be cool to do some NASCAR cartoons. The Sun started running them on Vegas.com, a sister site that does mostly travel stuff. Reaction was good so they started running them in their own pages. It wasn’t long after that Stockcartoons made its way into syndication.

There are three collections of Stockcartoons now available. The first two — "Stockcartoons" and "Stockcartoons 2" — were done about five years ago but are still available on Amazon. “Nuts for Racing” is the most recent collection. (Editor’s note: There’s a link to purchase this book from Amazon on the home page).

Where do you get your inspiration for Stockcartoons?

I approach Stockcartoons the same way I do editorial cartoons — by keeping up with the reading. I watch all the races whenever I can. Most NASCAR coverage is available online, from place like NASCAR.com and, of course, NASCAR This Week. I stop by your site every day to read Monte’s stuff. He’s incredible.

Oddly though, whenever I see Monte at the races or in the media center, he always wants to talk politics–not racing. We have a good time going at it.

Tell us about your blog.

I started the Sun’s NASCAR blog "Bloggity, Bloggity, Bloggity" as a way to draw people to my Stockcartoons. But the blog has its own fans now and is one of the more popular locations on the Sun website. Now I’m not a reporter–I’m really just a fan–but blogging is a fun way to keep in touch with other fans.

Do you like living in Las Vegas?

I like the job, so I’ll stay. I came from Southern California; life is a lot less complicated here. I love the wide-open spaces of this part of the West. Yet Vegas is close enough to California, so it isn’t difficult to get over there when you want to.

The local economy here is in as bad a shape as anywhere in the U.S. We’ve got 13 percent unemployment and a housing market that’s deeply underwater. Gaming and construction are what have fed the local economy and both are suffering. People aren’t coming to Vegas like they were a few years ago. A lot of residents here lived large during the housing boom — that’s what Vegas is all about. They used all that money they got on home equity loans to buy boats and cars and big screen TVs and now all that money is gone. Lots of people are moving away, looking for work.

Still, Vegas is still the adult playground of America-at least, that’s the image of the Strip that our Mayor (Oscar Goodman) still wants to project. He’s the guy who took such offense at President Obama’s recent remarks about people who blow their college tuition money at Vegas. Goodman is real old-school, a former criminal lawyer. A character out of Vegas’s wilder past. He’s really something.

What do you see as the big issues in NASCAR this year?

I think the changes in the aero package going from wing to spoiler will be big. I hear they’re talking about using an even bigger restrictor plate at Talledega, which should make the racing even more fun.

I like it that NASCAR is taking a hands-off approach with drivers this year.

The fuel of NASCAR is sponsorship, and drivers are the public face of those corporations. So there’s always going to be pressure on them to act a certain way.

I think drivers and NASCAR both get a hard rap from fans, especially bloggers. People say they want more emotion, but when driver then shows some, he gets ripped. Same thing with NASCAR-they listen to fans and do all sorts of things to respond, but then they get critiziced for making the changes.

What’s it like to be a West Coast race enthusiast?

As you can imagine, the Bay Area where I grew up is not a hub of NASCAR interest. As a teenager, me and some buddies would go to small-town tracks near San Francisco to catch races. But there wasn’t much interest. You felt like you were really isolated. Interest still isn’t as great as it is the Southeast. I usually attend races Fonatana, Phoneix, LA and Las Vegas, sometimes Sonoma. Last year, I made it to Daytona for the Coke Zero 400.

Do you have a good Vegas story to tell?

I once had lunch with an infamous, alleged hoodlum who bragged that he’d killed a few people, but they had it coming to them.

Anything about your off-job life?

I’m an avid four-wheeler. I love driving my Jeep on the Jeep trails around southern Nevada.

What’s the state of editorial cartooning these days?

I think editorial cartooning will survive. There just won’t be as many of us. Which is what’s happening with every position in print journalism.

 

A recent editorial cartoon by Mike. In addition to appearing six times a week in the Sun, USA Today picks up one of Mike’s editorial cartoons up every Thursday

What about this weekend’s race at LMS?

I think the pressure is on Kurt Busch–who like his brother Kyle grew up in Vegas, but hasn’t won a race at LMS yet–to produce. Look for Kurt to make a hard run. But look out for those Earnhardt Ganassi cars of of McMurray and Harvick, they’re really hot. Personally I’m really looking forward to watching Brad Keselowksi race; he’s colorful and cocky both on and off the track. Great material for Stockcartoons!

I’ll be doing sketchbooks on both Saturday and Sunday of the two races, so look for them on my blog.

Thanks to Mike for consenting to this interview, for providing the extra art (including the self-portrait)—and for sharing his NASCAR ‘toons with us every week.

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The frenzy surrounding Danica Patrick in the weeks since she has begun her ascent to the highest level of American motorsports has been nothing short of a spectacle. When Patrick walks down pit road (or anywhere for that matter) a crowd almost constantly surrounds her, her pit stall is four and five deep and the huddled media jostles for a sound bite from her anytime she gets out of her car.

The media darling is certainly a popular presence in the garage right now. And why not? With her comes higher ratings and more page views. People want Danica, so Danica is what they’re going to get.

So you’d think a woman who loves attention and basking in the the lights of a TV camera would be more willing to talk following a race, something that just about every other driver manages.

Not Danica though. She got out of her car and stormed to her team hauler refusing interviews from ESPN (that pesky network that pays a lot of money to be there) and all others who tried. If you were willing to wait the half-hour afterward she did give those sound bites.

This isn’t even my gripe though. This is classic Danica (the sport’s first taste of her). The way it was handled by her representatives is what gets me. I’d expect a little more organization and order out of people who should be used to dealing with this (her frazzled looking, and dare I say acting, PR representative looked like this was a first for her).

The unfortunate part of all of this is not that media people are waiting (boo-hoo right?) but that it’s making the job for those who work in the sport that much more difficult. The poor teams that are parked next to her in the garage or on pit road (not to mention her own team) have to fight past (even larger) throngs of reporters and fans to do their job. In the case of her own team they now have to wait even longer to load their hauler and leave. Already difficult tasks now take a little longer.

I would think her top-notch representation would be a little better prepared to deal with a lot of people and a temperamental driver. In the future (because her finishing badly is likely to happen with frequency as she continues to learn) instead of making her team and a lot of other people wait, why not have a post race press conference (after the winner and second and third place finisher press conference of course) in the media center? It’s a win-win for everyone. Her representation gets rid of the fan element, she gets to fume for a while, and then gets to take questions in an orderly fashion. I’m sure NASCAR and the tracks would be pleased to set it up.

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As I write this the countdown for the Daytona 500 is entering it’s final hours. While NASCAR’s biggest race has yet to begin, the week’s other events have provided an exciting lead-in. On Thursday, Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne won their respective duels to secure positions on the second row for the 500. The Truck Series and Nationwide Series took to the track on Saturday. Tony Stewart won the Nationwide race for the second straight year and Timothy Peters edged out Todd Bodine to score his second Series win. This is the NASCAR week that was February 7 to 13, 2010.

Welcome to NASCAR, Danica – now kick butt

Wrecked cars will cost Dale Jr’s teams around $200,000

Back home, JPM’s move struggling for acceptance

ESPN Changes Reap Big Rewards

Strolling through NASCAR’s storied Daytona Beach history

Vintage Insiders

I Gotta Question About Firesuits

Start And Park Teams Aren’t Ruining NASCAR

**Remember if you have a NASCAR blog or website and would like a recent article you wrote featured in this section email me and you could be part of next week’s NASCAR Week That Was. Please only send stuff you have written.**

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Life under the NASCAR big top, er, media chalet. Can you spot Monte? (Hint: Look toward the print media drone pit and then wayyyyyy to the right). (Photo: John Clark/NASCAR This Week)

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - The raised stage to my right is the property of ESPN. On the same side of the room, over my right shoulder, is the SpeedTV interview space. To my left is Sirius XM, and I’m sure that are others - nascar.com? Motor Racing Network? Performance Racing Network? Northern Alabama Rural Electricity Cooperative Racing Network? - tucked away in the various nooks and crannies of this sprawling … tent.

Later on, captains of industry and various and sundry others with lots of money to burn - in other words, no one related to me - will be wined and dined in this tent, from this point on to be deemed a "hospitality chalet." At a certain level of income, tents cease to exist. Within this tent, all the problems of the economy will magically disappear and, like the New Orleans Saints, those with the proper credentials will let the good times roll.

This being Super Bowl week, I’m sure you’d love to read this French phrase just one more time:

Laissez les bon temps roulez!

For now, though, the bon temps aren’t roulezing yet. NASCAR, while in the process of delivering its stars to the various broadcast partners, charitably allows everyone else to (a.) sit at tables in lines typing, thus providing valuable file footage and backdrops for TV shows, not to mention serving as poster boys and girls for the technological revolution (look, kids, some of them are undoubtedly tweeting at this very moment!), (b.) pick up the scraps when theses stars complete their radio/TV gigs by crowding in close and firing unruly questions their way, and (c.) enjoy a nutritious lunch with more than enough coffee and Diet Coke to fuel hours of sitting and typing. Or, quite possibly, launch a space shuttle. Oops. That was the Five Hour Energy Drink.

 

The expected feeding frenzy formed around Danica Patrick during the Sprint Media Tour Schmoozing Race at Daytona yesterday,. (Photo: John Clark/NASCAR This Week)

 

Fortunately, this isn’t really a nose-to-the-grindstone day. All the preseason articles are already written. Much of the heavy lifting occurred during the offseason Sprint Media Tour Series. This is a Schmoozing Race, sort of the journalistic equivalent of the Budweiser Shootout.

It’s great fun.

Jimmie Johnson and I chat about whether or not driving hot race cars makes the children of drivers more likely to be daughters than sons. When I note that many present-day race drivers have "Jr." at the ends of their names, Johnson admits this point poses serious questions about the hypothesis, which was never particularly scientific in nature. Oh, well, just something to think about.

Tony Stewart, noticing that I am listening to music as I write, tells me he tried that in a race car once … and it had no effect because he was concentrating too much on the racing even to notice the music blaring into his ears.

On the way to the bathroom, even I get rerouted to the Sirius XM table, where I am very animated during the interview with Rick Benjamin and "Chocolate" Myers. This is partly due to the fact that I still have to use the bathroom.

 

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So you think I go crazy in the offseason when there’s no NASCAR to cover, huh?

C’mon. Don’t be ridiculous. I’m a cynical sportswriter.

It’s just a coincidence that I’ve now watched Stroker Ace, that 1983 classic that starred such Shakespeareans as Burt Reynolds, Jim Nabors, Loni Anderson and Bubba Smith, not once but twice in the last week.

Or that I watched Le Mans, the Steve McQueen flick from 1971.

Or that I watched a flag-to-flag replay of a 1983 race at Rockingham, won by Richard Petty, on ESPN Classic.

Or that I recently entertained notions of building my first model car in about 15 years.

Or that I watched HBO’s Jimmie Johnson 24/7 before 6 a.m. this morning.

Or that I wrote NASCAR officials an email asking what would happen if it rained on Feb. 6 (the Super Bowl is Feb 7).

Or that The History Channel’s Madhouse has me looking at a possible weekend to go watch Modifieds run Bowman Gray Stadium.

Or that I recently daydreamed about a year in which I actually got along with NASCAR. (I probably shouldn’t have mentioned that. My friends may have me committed.)

Or that someone asked me recently to pick the winner of the Daytona 500, and I didn’t say the first name that popped into my head. I told her I’d have to get down there and come up with a hunch on-site.

No, don’t be ridiculous. I’m not yearning for the beginning of another season.

It’s all just coincidence. Or a subconscious trick I’m playing on myself.

Pretty soon I’ll be taking up all my time at home paying bills, washing clothes and packing for the next road trip.

It’s almost time to become a gypsy again and run away with the circus. I’ve been doing it so long I may not be fit for anything else.

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