NASCAR Knows it's Good to Have a Rivalry That's ON LIKE DONKEY KONG

NASCAR is getting monster press off of their close finish at Talladega yesterday, and the growing RIVALRY between teammates Jimmy Johnson and Jeff Gordon. (Read about it here.)

Coming this weekend, a pressdog invades Kansas Speedway to elbow real journalists out of the media center buffet line and investigate the brewing (we hope) rivalry between Simona de Silvestro and Danica Patrick, as interpreted above by the raw genius of Will McCarty of isitmayyet.com. RUSH  to Will's site NOW and view the additional photoshop wonderment. 

Could Sarah Fisher be the third Han Solo in on this rivalry fight as we head to ovals? Here's hopin' we hear a lot of THIS during the race at Kansas.

Comments

[Jim Bob]

The issue is, that Jeff and Jimmie are two of the best and most accomplished drivers in the sport of NASCAR. And Jeff is a part-owner of Jimmie's car.

I love Simona and her potential, but she is still just a mid-pack driver, on a bottom feeder team. And she has never even been on a oval before, let alone raced on one.

Danica is a mid-pack driver on a high end team, who will be in NASCAR full-time soon (because Go-Daddy says so).

Hard to get much of a true "rivalry" going when these drivers are battling for 15th place on the roadies and Simona isn't experienced enough and won't be in a good enough car to challenge on the ovals.

So basically when Simona is ready to challenge at the top of the grid and be a true race contender, Danicker will likely be gone.

The Rahal/Andretti rivalry is what we really need to cultivate. Two American names, from two families that go back a few decades in the sport. Plus, neither one seem intersted in NASCAR and aren't good enough for F1. So they are going to be here for a while.

[Racemind]

Way to harsh his lightsabre battle, Jim Bob.

[The Speedgeek]

There's also nothing that says that you can't cultivate multiple rivalries, either. Danica/Simona is a natural, for obvious reasons. Rahal/Andretti is another good one, for similar ones, but unfortunately I don't think Graham's running this weekend.

The equal of JJ/Gordon? No, but it's nice to have Danica/Simona as something extra that people can have to talk about. It's not a storyline that is going to capatult IndyCar to the top of the front page of The USA Today, but it's not a "zero" on the needle-moving scale, either.

[pressdog]

I guess I did fail to stop and over think it. Here I thought it would be fun to have two people who really really want to beat each other going at it on the track. I never suspected we needed to look at the micro-economic impacts and relationship extrapolations involved.

[Andy Bernstein]

Pushing it from the outset is an idea that HVM was against, as they don't want to increase the pressure on their young and rising star.

But the imagineering sure is fun, ain't it?

[Canuck]

Why would anyone care about rivals racing for fifteenth? Throw in Sarah for a three way battle at the back, not much of a story. Indycar needs to promote the real stories not try and fabricate one.

Which girl is going to get interviewed after the race saying they had an awesome fifteenth place finish because they beat the two girls?

[pressdog]

Wow. Tough crowd.

[The Speedgeek]

Jeebus. No kidding. Heaven forbid you talk about a little something that IndyCar actually has a leg up on NASCAR and every other sanctioning body outside of karting (well, except for maybe the NHRA): men AND women running on the same track at once. Nobody's saying that the fate of the League rests on the Danica/Simona not-yet-a-feud, just that it's something interesting to talk about. Looks like you and me are in the minority here, 'Dog.

[Dylan]

The fact Danica is better on ovals and Simona is better on road courses add to the rivalry! Anyways, Simona is pretty good on the road courses and Danica's pretty good on the ovals.

[Jim Bob]

You can't have a true rivalry, when one driver is with a top team with teammates and the other is with a bottom-feeder team with no teammate.

And you can't grow a rivalry when one of the two "combattents" is already gone to NASCAR full-time in the near future.

Its a nice concept. And its something that should have already happened with Sarah and Danicker. But its never going to take off, for a bunch of reasons.

[S0CSeven]

These rivalries sound contrived.

Bring back PT & he'll give you a REAL one with somebody!

[Tom G.]

I sense a disturbance in the force P-dog. After the dust up over at George's last week people seem a little sensitive and humor challenged this week. Don't take it personally.

[pressdog]

Next thing you all will tell me is that Simona and Danica did NOT hack at each other with lightsabres after all. That the whole lightsabre thing is a LIE, because a true lightsabre battle would be too difficult to conduct while driving IndyCars.

[Chad Paff]

"Use the force, Sim"

Of course in that story, Luke and Darth are actually father and son.

So Danica would end up being Sim's mom.