As I write this on the evening of May 8th, I can honestly say that one of the worst pieces of writing I will read this year just came out this morning.
The piece is from RACER, and it’s by Derek Daly. Daly was a veteran of single seaters in his driving career, with points in Formula 1 and plenty of major starts in Champ Car back in the day.
Framed as an open letter to Roger Penske, it’s a bizarre bit of writing where Daly contends that a big negative for IndyCar is how many different paint schemes (liveries if you are European and wrong) each driver goes through in a season.
I’m not going to bully Daly too much as again, he is a former racing car driver and I am a failed racing car writer.
But a writer I still am, and I have an internal set of rules when I decide to get off my lazy ass and write something about contemporary racing. Daly failed to follow most of them, and thus his column is a great example of how not to write one.
Again, these are my rules, and websites you young writers work for may have different ones they tell you to do. It’s also important, beyond this, to ensure that you are following your organization’s style guide; I use the AP style guide just because it’s as universal as we can get.
What we’re looking at is how a column works. Columns, to me, are ideas. Style guides are how to translate them.
With the additional caveat that a lot of these rules do not apply for set long-form or historical pieces, let’s get started.
Column too long
Daly’s column weighs in at 2,339 words. This is a lot, especially in the world we live in now, where people get bored easier.
I usually aim for 800 to 1,500 words. Now, obviously, if everything else is clicking and the writing is going on well, I might ignore this rule and keep going. But as we’ll see, this particular column doesn’t click or work.
Column make no argument / weak argument
A column is an idea, and ultimately it should be an argument. What are you trying to say about a subject?
Some columns I see sometimes turn into “this happened, this happened, that happened,” or they just present something tired or unoriginal.
“Homestead becoming the NASCAR championship race is great.” What are you bringing to the table that’s different from guys like Bob Pockrass or Dustin Long who have already written much better columns with this exact premise than you will ever write?
“Homestead becoming the NASCAR championship race again is a step back” is an interesting angle. It’s one a lot of people would disagree with, but it could be a great piece if you make good points and write it well.
Daly’s column, again, is about how IndyCar teams use too many different paint schemes and that it is confusing young fans. This is a weak argument because it is such an incredibly irrelevant gripe with the series.
Yes, sometimes older fans in some Facebook comments sections grumble about all the new paint schemes every week. But, uh, the whole having-a-race-at-Thermal-Club thing seems like a much more relevant topic?
But okay, super obscure topic. Daly might just save the day if he can make some solid points.
Argument reasoning is non-existent/obviously flawed
Oh boy, Daly absolutely failed to do so.
Framing the column as a letter to Roger Penske, Daley spent quite a bit of ink on what the 14-year-old Roger would think. The results are, oh boy.
“Imagine a current-day 14-year-old Little Roger attending his first Indy 500 with his dad and cheering on Simon Pagenaud winning for Team Penske in the bright yellow Menards-backed car. Imagine Little Roger running to the gift shop to buy his new favorite model of the winning car and a t-shirt. Then think about him pestering Dad to take him to Detroit the following weekend to cheer on his new favorite driver. (Does this sound familiar?).
“When he gets to Detroit, there is no yellow Menards car and Dad is trying to explain that although he thinks that Pagenaud might be there, he’s not in the Menards car anymore and tells his son to look for a totally different color – and Dad has no idea what the color is. I’m pretty sure Little Roger is more than a little frustrated and disappointed.”
This is a really sad two paragraphs right here, in which a 72-year-old man is attempting to explain to an 88-year-old man what a modern 14-year-old thinks.
So first and foremost, does Daly not remember what it was like to be 14 years old? I do, because that was only… over half of my life away now (wow, I am getting old), but I’m still far closer to that age than this guy is.
14-year-old Finley was a know-it-all who tried to act far, far too cool for what he actually was. Maybe 10-year-old Finley would act like this, but not the me that was only a year from getting my learner’s permit to drive and starting to look at girls a different way.
Do neither little Roger nor his dad have smartphones? Do they not know how to go onto the internet? Derek, do you have a smartphone and know what the internet is?
Really sad by the way that neither of these eggheads got that Simon guy’s CAR NUMBER down. Shame, because that part of the car DOES NOT CHANGE in-season, at least in general.
My favorite part of this column is when Daly goes on a tantrum about how Will Power and Josef Newgarden showed up to Toronto two years ago with the same color of car, right below a caption of the Target-era Chip Ganassi Racing cars that completely goes against Daly’s entire point.
Daly also claims that McLaughlin showing up in a blue car in this race, after having been in a red car and a yellow car in the weeks prior, is a reason why McLaughlin has not built a brand yet in America. What?
“These examples might seem trivial, Roger, because we’ve grown so accustomed to the confusion, but I think it’s a roadblock to youthifying the fan base. And it gets worse.
“After Marcus Ericsson won the Indy 500 in a red Huski Chocolate car, he turned up at Mid-Ohio in a green Ridgeline car. I’m sure Little Roger was looking at Dad and scratching his head.
“Worst of all, it might have been Portland, where Ericsson turned up in Scott Dixon’s colors. At the same race, IndyCar champion Alex Palou went from his familiar blue NTT car to a green Ridgeline one. Newgarden had been racing PPG blue but turned up in a black and white Hitachi car. Rahal, who has no familiar branding whatsoever, expected people to know which of the two Quartz Oil-liveried team cars was driven by himself or Jack Harvey. At this stage, I can imagine Little Roger in an infield asking Dad to take him to a baseball game.”
Okay, first of all, no tweenager is going to ask his dad to go to a baseball game. Maybe in like the 1950’s, but not in [current year]. That is a sport that Dad will buy tickets to on his own accord because he remembers when his dad surprised him with tickets when he was a kid.
I have some bad breaking news to report, folks. The Mercedes F1 team has lost all of their branding after confusing all of their fans by showing up to Miami this past weekend in a special pink-accented car.
In fact, a bunch of F1 teams ran special paint schemes this past weekend. Hopefully Liberty Media enjoyed that 2.1 million viewer count (over double that of IndyCar opposite), because they will clearly never ever get back to that level.
I mean, holy shit, NASCAR is constantly drawing about three times the viewership IndyCar does in spite of IndyCar not being on cable. NASCAR teams change paint schemes more than they change underwear and have done so for many years now. How have they not completely imploded yet?
You might cast this letter off your desk, Roger, but I think there is a problem that needs to be addressed. Bernie Ecclestone absolutely understood familiar color branding for teams and drivers in Formula 1.
Yeah, then Bernie left F1 and their domestic American business absolutely exploded in spite of teams running a lot of different paint schemes throughout the season.
Opening/closing bad
These are the two most important parts of any bit of writing. You need something to hook the audience and something to unhook the audience that makes them satisfied that they didn’t just waste 5-15 minutes.
The opening to this piece is fine, but the ending is some of the most obvious ass-kissing I have ever seen. The NASCAR on Sirius on-air crew would look at it and go, “Derek, buddy, we think it’s a bit much.”
“Thanks, Roger. By the way – I still have my “Effort Equals Results” Penske coin that I got in 1994. I show it at every keynote across the country. Your influence even outside our racing paddocks has been immense.”
Format bad
I mean, you be the judge on that one.
Resolution bad
If you are being overly negative on a subject, I think you need to also provide some kind of resolution or solution to whatever is ailing it in your eyes.
“NASCAR stage racing sucks” could be a nice column because it might be true, but doesn’t “NASCAR stage racing sucks, and NASCAR should remove it” seem better? You can yell at the kid to get off of your lawn, but also telling them to go play their ball game in a vacant lot might get them to stay off of it.
Daly provides a rather weak one-paragraph resolution I’ll go over point-by-point:
“You are in a position to stop the color confusion. Work with teams to construct commercial deals a little differently.”
“Guys, you just have to work together on this because I say so.”
“Work with teams to construct commercial deals a little differently. Maybe the big teams who are more commercially stable can set this new standard.”
Gee whiz, I wonder if that includes Penske’s own team, who Daly spends the balance of the column ranting about. Telling Roger Penske not to take as much money as he reasonably can is the exact opposite of how IndyCar has operated for the last five years. Dude had to be shamed into getting an IndyCar race in Mexico City (probably), in spite of having Pato O’Ward as one of his top drivers.
“Dissuade the one-off liveries if possible, knowing that there can always be exceptions for certain circumstances, and especially for smaller teams.”
“Guys, I’m serious. Stop getting the most out of your sponsorships!”
I also want to point out as well that Daly mentioned earlier that F1 teams are identified the most by their colors. Well, that’s because, hear me out now… the F1 teams are all sponsored by their title companies.
McLaren keeps their orange identity because they want to sell McLaren road cars. Ditto with Ferrari, Mercedes, and Aston Martin. Red Bull has not one but two teams designed around making you want an energy drink. Williams is the lone exception to this.
“Reach out to Little Roger and show him that he will not have to work hard to become an IndyCar fan.”
Considering Little Roger doesn’t understand how car numbers work, I think IndyCar might be a bit over his head.
In conclusion (also, don’t ever use that phrase in a real column; this isn’t a C- college essay), this piece is really not great at all. This is essentially the old man yelling at the clouds as the house behind him starts to burn down. There are so many obvious issues with IndyCar today that I don’t think some of the cars changing colors race-to-race is going to make any difference.