Your local media outlets?

[Teej]

I was wondering if anyone outside of the Indianapolis-area has noticed historical or factual mistakes on a regular basis by your local media in regards to IndyCars or the 500?

Last week, our local ABC afiliate, WPTA-21, was interviewing Graham Rahal and it listed him with Rahal-Letterman Racing

This morning, a local writer for the Journal Gazette did a column on Graham Rahal and said his father failed to make the race the year after he won it

I sent a polite email explaining not ony did Rahal qualify for the race in 1987, but he was in the middle of the front row. Rahal failed to make the race in 1993 as the defending CART champion. Al Unser Jr was the last defending winner not to make the race in 1995.

I guess any publicity is good publicity, but if these guys are wrong about sports that I feel I know quite a bit about, how much do they know about other sports that I don't care for as much?

[SpeedwayRyan]

I guess any publicity is good publicity, but if these guys are wrong about sports that I feel I know quite a bit about, how much do they know about other sports that I don't care for as much?

Oh yeah, the guys and gals who have to QUICKLY put stories together for live news broadcasts and tough newspaper deadlines make all kinds of mistakes -- you only notice them if you really know the sport, so most of us notice the racing mistakes more than anything. Then again, a quick glance at the Media Guide that they most certainly have sitting on their desk would ensure that they were correct.

One of the Indy stations had RHR's name on the screen as "Ryan Hunter-Ray" the other day...people just assume things (like that, or the fact that Graham runs for his dad's team) and fail to check them.

[NoviVespa]

I was a printer at The Chicago Tribune. I had to work Saturday nights. That would be when they put out the Sunday edition. By the time I would get to work, some editions of the Sunday paper were already printed. So, sitting in the lunch room, I would look at the sports section of the paper. Now, they did this two years straight. They had a full page of the starting field, with pictures and stats about the drivers. Starting from the Pole Position going back to the last car starting, they had them numbered 1, 2, 3....down to 33 for the last starter. It must have been the Kentucky Derby influence dictating their decision.

I talked to my boss about this error, and they then corrected it. This was back in the early 80s.

[TooMuchStagger]

I was wondering if anyone outside of the Indianapolis-area has noticed historical or factual mistakes on a regular basis by your local media in regards to IndyCars or the 500?

You mean like the guy on a KC radio station that said the Indy 500 was rained out this weekend?

[MichaelP]

I was a printer at The Chicago Tribune. I had to work Saturday nights. That would be when they put out the Sunday edition. By the time I would get to work, some editions of the Sunday paper were already printed. So, sitting in the lunch room, I would look at the sports section of the paper. Now, they did this two years straight. They had a full page of the starting field, with pictures and stats about the drivers. Starting from the Pole Position going back to the last car starting, they had them numbered 1, 2, 3....down to 33 for the last starter. It must have been the Kentucky Derby influence dictating their decision.

I talked to my boss about this error, and they then corrected it. This was back in the early 80s.

My favorite error was in the Detroit news, probably in the late 80s. In the F1 starting lineup they had a car who was sponsored by West tobacco and powered by a Zakspeed engine and listed the driver as being from the country of "West Zakspeed".

Journalists these days are so sloppy it's pathetic. The amount of mistakes I do catch leads me to believe that the mistakes made are significant, as I seriously doubt I catch even 1 percent of the mistakes in any given newspaper on any given day.

[Buckett]

the country of "West Zakspeed".

I hear it's lovely there this time of year. Just steer clear of East Zakspeed. Buncha freakin' hooligans there.

[cheeseczar]

Our local radio station has their "NASCAR Minute" on Fridays and Mondays.

They use Indy Car sounds as the lead in and when the segment is over.

I wrote them an email and asked if the NASCAR sounds sounded too slow and if that's why the use Indy Car sounds.

No reply.

[badart]

The Chicago Tribune yesterday had a list of all the Pole Winners, their speed and what they finished in the Race. Did you know that Tom Sneva's 4-lap average was 298mph??? Ray Harroun went over 200 as well. They totally butchered the list.

[Coyote]

Our local radio station has their "NASCAR Minute" on Fridays and Mondays.

They use Indy Car sounds as the lead in and when the segment is over.

I wrote them an email and asked if the NASCAR sounds sounded too slow and if that's why the use Indy Car sounds.

No reply.

[Doyouloveit?]

FWIW, Playboy has a little write up about Indy and qualifying. It pretty much highlighted the pole speeds throughout the years.

[PHJIndy]

It happens here in Indy. The Indy Star listed Graham as Bobby's grandson!

[Ren Butler]

My favorite error was in the Detroit news, probably in the late 80s. In the F1 starting lineup they had a car who was sponsored by West tobacco and powered by a Zakspeed engine and listed the driver as being from the country of "West Zakspeed".

This is one of my all-time favorites, and I actually played a role in it.

I was working as an intern for the Indy Star web site in 1998, and CNN/SI paid the Star to use its driver bios (all of which I wrote).

Well, that was back when Kenny Brack used the umlaut over the "a" in his last name. The coding we used for an a-umlaut was ";auml".

Well, some idiot at CNN/SI interpreted the coded name "Kenny Br;aumlck" as "Kenny Braumlick."

True story.

[MarkDonohueFan]

My buddy is an editor at the San Francisco Chronicle. He is an old school writer who HATES the over-exposure of NASCAR. We spent some time together at Spring Training in AZ. He said the sports page was going toward more Indy coverage and less stock car coverage if he could help it.

He gave Miami-Homestead opener, Long Beach, and Kansas front page under the flap and Motegi was a banner headline. He has run a story in summary off of the AP wires every day since the track opened last week.

I think Infineon will appreciate the free media, but the Bay Area enjoys open wheel racing. They do have an old area in Golden Gate Park called the Speedway grounds (an old oval was there) and of course they have Laguna Seca and Infineon in the area.

California cannot be discounted for their open wheel history.

[Coyote]

This is one of my all-time favorites, and I actually played a role in it.

I was working as an intern for the Indy Star web site in 1998, and CNN/SI paid the Star to use its driver bios (all of which I wrote).

Well, that was back when Kenny Brack used the umlaut over the "a" in his last name. The coding we used for an a-umlaut was ";auml".

Well, some idiot at CNN/SI interpreted the coded name "Kenny Br;aumlck" as "Kenny Braumlick."

True story.

Awesome that's there's still a link to it! Priceless. With this and the Dave Despain and Chris Berman rants you guys have me in stitches today. I love this place...

[Buckett]

Kenny Braumlick

THE Kenny Braumlick??? He's from West Zakspeed, no?