Editorial: The race fan

Editorial: The race fan

Subaru WRX
Image courtesy Subaru

I work in the automotive industry full time, so I’m going to make a lot car references. Like, A LOT. Excuse me in advance.

Dear Nintendo,

Everyone expected a Golf, but you turned out to be an R among Corvettes. Using your heritage and skillful driving, you passed everyone by. You were going 95 MPH in a 60MPH zone for the majority of the race, and everyone cheered you on. You were way ahead and low on gas, but flew by just on momentum alone. It was a hell of a fun race.

And then you hit the median.

The Corvettes and M3s passed you by. The people in taxis chuckled. The bikers were doing wheelies.

The race is almost over and you’ve been lapped — the Corvette is in the lead and near the finish line — but you decide to hastily get your team together and re-enter, this time with a WRX. You’re trying a rally car when everyone else is prepping Bugattis and R8s for the next race. Your pit crew is struggling to put the tires on right — half of which are deflated. You have a fancy GPS inside, but the track is an oval. Your engineers don’t even know every detail about what power train is actually sitting in there, so they’re stuttering to the press when asked. Your PR rep says that you have a V8 one day, then the next day details an inline 6 with Ram Air.

Last week you felt that hosting a car show (on the track as cars zip by!) would be a good idea. Well, it wasn’t. You were the only car there and you only brought a tailpipe with you. Then you went and hosted three more. Nobody came.

It’s hard to be a fan of yours right now. I’m not sure that the WRX will win this race or even make it off of the starting line in time. I bought a Trapper Keeper with your car on it, but am hiding it under my bed. I still remember when Atari and SEGA thought they could stay in the race. I still have their lunch boxes, too.

Maybe you can still pull this one out. Maybe you’ll introduce a rocket fuel to put in the car, or maybe the race will hit a caution flag until you’re ready again. Maybe you can prove that the next generation of race cars are still too far off and too expensive to drive, or that they really don’t look all that much better than a freshly-waxed Scion.

Or maybe you should just sell decals and aftermarket parts for the other cars in the race.

I don’t know anymore. It’s hard to keep my eyes on you when the race is moving at 100MPH. Right now you’re just a stalled car with no driver.

Or maybe you need a new driver.