News-Record.com

As a fan of all kinds of auto racing, I think the 12 Hours of Sebring is a significant race, but I don't blame you for excluding it from the newspaper. We live in NASCAR and college basketball country, and a medium-sized paper on a tight budget has to make choices about what events to cover and include in the paper. Heck, I'd like to see more coverage of New York sports teams, but I'm pretty sure that isn't going to happen, and that's OK. The Internet keeps me pretty informed about my interests in the world of sports.

Although I think we can both agree that William & Mary needs a little bit more front-page treatment. Waddya say?

I can see the headline now: "Tribe Doesn't Finish Last In CAA Standings (But Comes Awfully Close)"

Jason: The N&R is a newspaper, as you know, and W&M's finish in the bottom quartile of the CAA standings has long ceased to be news. It has become, like a lot of things at the College of Knowledge, capital-T tradition.

What was the Tribe's record this year, 8-20? At least the men's hoops teams won more games than the football team - that's rare.

I only knew the 12 Hours of Sebring was on because I happened to be flipping past some of the coverage on SPEED. I just don't see endurance auto racing as being of any importance in the grand scheme of sports, period. The only exception is the 24 Hours of Daytona race and that's because it brings together a lot of drivers from different styles of racing.

I can see where the guy might have a problem with the N&R not carrying coverage if, say, the N&R was the Sebring N&R. But to write and complain about it to a NC paper is insane. It would be like me writing to the Atlanta paper and complaining about the lack of coverage for the Mets.

The whole "You need to cover X" thing is one of the interesting things about working in Sports, Carrie.

We get a lot of grief for not doing more on certain college football teams (Virginia Tech, South Carolina and West Virginia, especially) and the NHL (we eliminated the roundup this year because we don't have the space, but we run AP stories on the 'Canes).

Last I checked, this wasn't Virginia (regular or West) or South Carolina, and this hasn't been a hockey town for a decade. But that doesn't stop people from asking.

Your first mistake is to use the Associated Press as an indicator of ALMS popularity. They have shown bias in many forms both in and out of the sports field.

AMLS is by far the most successfull sports car series in the US and has been gaining in both TV ratings and attendence that last few years.

How would I rate it? Second to NASCAR as a series. That may or may not be true in TV ratings or attendence when compared to IRL or Champ Car but as a series and how it is managed it is far superior.

As for this:

Carrie

"I just don't see endurance auto racing as being of any importance in the grand scheme of sports, period. The only exception is the 24 Hours of Daytona race and that's because it brings together a lot of drivers from different styles of racing."

Why would that be Carrie? Isn't it a sport just as NASCAR or the IRL? Granted it takes dedication to sit thru 12 hours but how does that make it any less of a sport?

Secondly how is AMLS different from the Daytona 24 hours? Look at the entry list, it also "brings together a lot of drivers from different styles of racing."

Why do I think not having NASCAR drivers entered may be behind your thoughts?

Or am I reading too much into it?

All I wanted was the N&R to provide equal coverage to all 3 Division I basketball teams in Guilford County. Then you started rambling on about some losing football team in the county that draws 20,000 plus fans and can't even keep its coach..........

Well, I'll ask again with a twist. Now that Carolina has lost to a Mid-Major school, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.......

I'd even settle for the lady who covers the neighborhood sporting events in the Tuesday paper.

And one more thing, since this is a racing blog, the N&R does plan a special section of the paper on the "Biggest Race in the History of Spring" now that you have had a year to prepare for it??

Marc: By what measure do you call ALMS a success? By ratings? Sponsorship? Attendance? Something else? From what little I've seen of it ALMS seems to be good, interesting racing, but it's not on my radar as either a racing editor or a racing fan.

Mark: I haven't mentioned A&T football (I assume that's what you're referring to) anywhere in this thread until now. Not sure where you're going with that knock or with the Carolina trashing.

And please don't patronize our community sports writer. Tarah Holland is doing a great job for us. She's got enough to do without assigning her to HPU basketball.

I didn't think I was patronizing your community writer, GOSH YOU PEOPLE ARE OVERLY SENSITIVE.

Just a little sensitive as a High Point resident that all Guilford County wants out of you is your tax dollars, and sometimes it makes you feel that all the N&R wants out of you is your subscription check, let me read about A&T and the Greensboro College girls tennis team and not know what's going on in HP that's fine.

As far as the Carolina bashing that's well deserved since the N&R at times is the Guilford County edition of the Daily Tar Heel.

Liked the cover of the paper on Monday. If only it had a third Carolina player with their head down it would have been an excellent "Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" kinda picture.

I'm curious, Mark: How does the Enterprise cover HPU? Does the paper send a writer and photographer to every home basketball game? Do they cover both the men and women? Does the paper travel with the team to Asheville or Rock Hill or Lynchburg?

In other words, what does the Enterprise do on the HPU front that we're not? I honestly don't know, which is why I'm askng.

Wow, amazing I came across this.

Yes, Sebring is an important race. Should it be covered in the sports pages? Probably not.

But THIS year's Sebring was a very special event that will only happen once. What happened this weekend was nothing short of what is going to be a massive shift in the AMLS and in racing in general.

Not only did the Audi Diesel car win, it DOMINATED the field. The car won the pole with ease in qualifying, the second Audi Diesel set the 2nd fastest qualifying lap on it's FIRST LAP. That is absolutely unheard of.

Next, because of a mechanical issue after qualifying, the pole car was forced to start dead last. It took the team less than half an hour to go from 35th to 1st. This isn't like Nascar where a driver can fly through the field with well-timed pit stops and cutting corner. It's absolutely amazing what the Audi team did in it's first sanctioned race with this car.

The sad thing is, when it goes to the 24hrs and probably dominates there too, the world press will pick up the story for what it is, while the AP will still ignore it in favor of whatever NASCAR event transpires that weekend.

I enjoy NASCAR for what it is. I respect the incredible amount of teamwork and engineering that goes into those cars and into winning or even finishing a race. But there are so many more interesting, challenging and innovative series out there. I hope and pray the American public will wake up to WRC and AMLS one day.