THEN — THE UGLY
Love him or hate him, Mike Tyson said it better than anyone ever could:
“Social media made you all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it.”
If you’re looking for the root of what’s gone wrong, start right there.
Drag racing didn’t escape that reality. It amplified it.
The sport now has an entire class of keyboard crew chiefs — people who have never belted into a race car, never turned a wrench under pressure, yet speak with the authority of those who have lived it.
They critique everything. Respect nothing. And answer to no one.
Some accounts label themselves as media without ever leaving their couch. They recycle content, repost others’ work, and somehow believe that qualifies them for credentials and influence.
Meanwhile, the people doing the actual work — the ones walking 10,000 steps a day, chasing quotes, verifying facts — are expected to compete with a meme.
That’s not evolution. That’s erosion.
But the real line gets crossed when criticism turns into harassment.
We’ve reached a point where drivers aren’t just dealing with pressure on the track — they’re dealing with it in their phones, their inboxes, and their personal lives.
Fake accounts. Impersonators. Coordinated attacks.
Drivers have been targeted, harassed, and in some cases stalked — not for what they’ve done wrong, but simply for existing in the spotlight.
The defending Pro Stock Motorcycle champion, Richard Gadson, has already spoken about the mental toll of navigating that environment. Others deal with it quietly, knowing that responding often makes it worse.
Think about that for a second.
We’ve created a culture where chasing a championship might be easier than escaping the comment section.
That’s not just a problem. That’s a failure.
And then there’s the everyday noise — the negativity that never shuts off.
The quarter-mile purist who trashes eighth-mile racing ignores a simple truth: for some tracks, it’s eighth-mile or nothing.
The same voices that scream for NHRA competition turn around and attack IHRA for daring to offer it.
Independent teams are winning money, reinvesting in better equipment, keeping their programs alive — and still getting told it “doesn’t count” by someone who hasn’t bought a ticket in five years.
That’s like critiquing a race from the parking lot.
Even wins get minimized.
Dale Creasy Jr.’s victory in Dunn should have been a story about perseverance — about a driver who nearly lost his leg, who fought back from injuries and setbacks most wouldn’t survive in this sport.
Instead, parts of social media turned it into a punchline.
Because context requires reading, and reading requires effort.
And effort is in short supply.
The same goes for the treatment of women in drag racing.
The comments, the insults, the cheap shots — all delivered from behind a screen by people who would never say those things face-to-face and yet be ready to throw hands if those words were spoken to their wife, daughter or sister.
It’s cowardice disguised as commentary.
And then comes the loudest lie of all:
“NHRA is dying.”
Usually, from someone who hasn’t been through a ticket gate in years, judging the health of the sport by a snapshot of grandstands without understanding the business behind them.
They’ll compare a packed small event to a partially filled mega-facility and miss the math completely.
They’ll complain about four-wide racing without understanding it was never designed for them — it was designed to bring new people in.
Because here’s the truth:
Drag racing doesn’t survive by catering to the past. It survives by building the future.
And social media, for all its power, is making that harder than it should be.
BOBBY BENNETT: SOCIAL MEDIA SAVED DRAG RACING — AND NOW IT’S SLOWLY STRANGLING IT
In the last twenty-seven years of creating content for the internet, I can say without hesitation that social media has been both the best and the worst thing to ever happen to drag racing.
And right now, it feels like the worst is gaining ground like a car on a full pull while the other lane is dropping cylinders.
This isn’t nostalgia. It’s a front-row seat to evolution — and lately, devolution.
I’ve watched this sport go from message boards and dial-up debates to an always-on, always-angry digital ecosystem where opinions travel faster than facts and outrage has a better reaction time than a Pro Tree.
Here’s the good, the bad, and the ugly — and why the balance is starting to tilt the wrong way.
FIRST OFF — THE GOOD
Social media didn’t just help drag racing. It modernized it.
It tore down the walls between the fans and the fence line. Suddenly, you didn’t have to be at the track to feel like you were part of the sport. Drivers, crew chiefs, team owners — they all had a direct line to the audience.
That changed everything.
Sponsors went from hoping someone saw their logo flash by at 300 miles per hour to knowing exactly how many people engaged with their brand, when they did it, and why it mattered.
For smaller teams, this wasn’t just helpful — it was survival.
Social media gave them a voice in a sport where budget often dictates visibility. It allowed them to build fan bases, tell their stories, and in some cases, fund their operations through sheer connection with the audience.
For media outlets, it became both a distribution engine and a tip line.
News moves faster. Stories reach farther. Readers can engage instantly.
Used right, social media is like adding 500 extra horsepower to drag racing’s relevance.
It makes the sport louder, faster, and harder to ignore.
NOW — THE BAD
But horsepower without control is how you end up over the centerline and into the wall.
Social media is the message boards of the late ’90s and early 2000s on steroids — with a hit of the crack pipe.
It has rewired how people consume information, and not in a good way.
Attention spans have been reduced to the length of a burnout. If it doesn’t grab you immediately, it gets skipped, swiped, or scrolled past.
Long-form storytelling — the kind that explains why something matters — is losing ground to quick hits designed to trigger a reaction, not deliver understanding.
And the numbers don’t lie.
Posts get seen. Stories don’t get read.
We see it every day — massive impressions on a teaser, minimal clicks on the actual article. People are forming strong opinions about topics they’ve spent less time on than it takes to stage a car.
That’s not engagement. That’s surface-level consumption masquerading as awareness.
And into that vacuum steps the worst part of the ecosystem — clickbait artists and fake news operators who treat drag racing like a penny slot machine.
They don’t report. They provoke.
Because anger drives clicks, and clicks drive money.
Every time a fabricated narrative spreads faster than the truth, it’s another piece of credibility chipped away from the sport’s foundation.
THEN — THE UGLY
Love him or hate him, Mike Tyson said it better than anyone ever could:
“Social media made you all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it.”
If you’re looking for the root of what’s gone wrong, start right there.
Drag racing didn’t escape that reality. It amplified it.
The sport now has an entire class of keyboard crew chiefs — people who have never belted into a race car, never turned a wrench under pressure, yet speak with the authority of those who have lived it.
They critique everything. Respect nothing. And answer to no one.
Some accounts label themselves as media without ever leaving their couch. They recycle content, repost others’ work, and somehow believe that qualifies them for credentials and influence.
Meanwhile, the people doing the actual work — the ones walking 10,000 steps a day, chasing quotes, verifying facts — are expected to compete with a meme.
That’s not evolution. That’s erosion.
But the real line gets crossed when criticism turns into harassment.
We’ve reached a point where drivers aren’t just dealing with pressure on the track — they’re dealing with it in their phones, their inboxes, and their personal lives.
Fake accounts. Impersonators. Coordinated attacks.
Drivers have been targeted, harassed, and in some cases stalked — not for what they’ve done wrong, but simply for existing in the spotlight.
The defending Pro Stock Motorcycle champion, Richard Gadson, has already spoken about the mental toll of navigating that environment. Others deal with it quietly, knowing that responding often makes it worse.
Think about that for a second.
We’ve created a culture where chasing a championship might be easier than escaping the comment section.
That’s not just a problem. That’s a failure.
And then there’s the everyday noise — the negativity that never shuts off.
The quarter-mile purist who trashes eighth-mile racing ignores a simple truth: for some tracks, it’s eighth-mile or nothing.
The same voices that scream for NHRA competition turn around and attack IHRA for daring to offer it.
Independent teams are winning money, reinvesting in better equipment, keeping their programs alive — and still getting told it “doesn’t count” by someone who hasn’t bought a ticket in five years.
That’s like critiquing a race from the parking lot.
Even wins get minimized.
Dale Creasy Jr.’s victory in Dunn should have been a story about perseverance — about a driver who nearly lost his leg, who fought back from injuries and setbacks most wouldn’t survive in this sport.
Instead, parts of social media turned it into a punchline.
Because context requires reading, and reading requires effort.
And effort is in short supply.
The same goes for the treatment of women in drag racing.
The comments, the insults, the cheap shots — all delivered from behind a screen by people who would never say those things face-to-face and yet be ready to throw hands if those words were spoken to their wife, daughter or sister.
It’s cowardice disguised as commentary.
And then comes the loudest lie of all:
“NHRA is dying.”
Usually, from someone who hasn’t been through a ticket gate in years, judging the health of the sport by a snapshot of grandstands without understanding the business behind them.
They’ll compare a packed small event to a partially filled mega-facility and miss the math completely.
They’ll complain about four-wide racing without understanding it was never designed for them — it was designed to bring new people in.
Because here’s the truth:
Drag racing doesn’t survive by catering to the past. It survives by building the future.
And social media, for all its power, is making that harder than it should be.
Drag racing is one of the most American sports there is.
And America runs on free speech.
But just because you can say something doesn’t mean it needs to be said — and it sure as hell doesn’t mean it needs to be amplified.
Social media gave drag racing a megaphone.
What it didn’t give it was a filter.
And right now, the sport is paying the price for that imbalance.
Because when misinformation spreads faster than truth, when noise drowns out knowledge, and when negativity becomes the loudest voice in the room, the damage isn’t always immediate — but it is inevitable.
The same tool that helped grow drag racing can absolutely tear it apart if left unchecked.
Not overnight.
But one bad take, one fake account, one uninformed opinion at a time — like rust creeping into a chassis you thought was solid.
And when it finally gives way, everyone will wonder what happened.
The answer will be simple.
We handed the sport a microphone…
…and forgot to care who was holding it.
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Competition Plus Team
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BOBBY BENNETT: SOCIAL MEDIA SAVED DRAG RACING — AND NOW IT’S SLOWLY STRANGLING IT
In the last twenty-seven years of creating content for the internet, I can say without hesitation that social media has been both the best and the worst thing to ever happen to drag racing.
And right now, it feels like the worst is gaining ground like a car on a full pull while the other lane is dropping cylinders.
This isn’t nostalgia. It’s a front-row seat to evolution — and lately, devolution.
I’ve watched this sport go from message boards and dial-up debates to an always-on, always-angry digital ecosystem where opinions travel faster than facts and outrage has a better reaction time than a Pro Tree.
Here’s the good, the bad, and the ugly — and why the balance is starting to tilt the wrong way.
FIRST OFF — THE GOOD
Social media didn’t just help drag racing. It modernized it.
It tore down the walls between the fans and the fence line. Suddenly, you didn’t have to be at the track to feel like you were part of the sport. Drivers, crew chiefs, team owners — they all had a direct line to the audience.
That changed everything.
Sponsors went from hoping someone saw their logo flash by at 300 miles per hour to knowing exactly how many people engaged with their brand, when they did it, and why it mattered.
For smaller teams, this wasn’t just helpful — it was survival.
Social media gave them a voice in a sport where budget often dictates visibility. It allowed them to build fan bases, tell their stories, and in some cases, fund their operations through sheer connection with the audience.
For media outlets, it became both a distribution engine and a tip line.
News moves faster. Stories reach farther. Readers can engage instantly.
Used right, social media is like adding 500 extra horsepower to drag racing’s relevance.
It makes the sport louder, faster, and harder to ignore.
NOW — THE BAD
But horsepower without control is how you end up over the centerline and into the wall.
Social media is the message boards of the late ’90s and early 2000s on steroids — with a hit of the crack pipe.
It has rewired how people consume information, and not in a good way.
Attention spans have been reduced to the length of a burnout. If it doesn’t grab you immediately, it gets skipped, swiped, or scrolled past.
Long-form storytelling — the kind that explains why something matters — is losing ground to quick hits designed to trigger a reaction, not deliver understanding.
And the numbers don’t lie.
Posts get seen. Stories don’t get read.
We see it every day — massive impressions on a teaser, minimal clicks on the actual article. People are forming strong opinions about topics they’ve spent less time on than it takes to stage a car.
That’s not engagement. That’s surface-level consumption masquerading as awareness.
And into that vacuum steps the worst part of the ecosystem — clickbait artists and fake news operators who treat drag racing like a penny slot machine.
They don’t report. They provoke.
Because anger drives clicks, and clicks drive money.
Every time a fabricated narrative spreads faster than the truth, it’s another piece of credibility chipped away from the sport’s foundation.
THEN — THE UGLY
Love him or hate him, Mike Tyson said it better than anyone ever could:
“Social media made you all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it.”
If you’re looking for the root of what’s gone wrong, start right there.
Drag racing didn’t escape that reality. It amplified it.
The sport now has an entire class of keyboard crew chiefs — people who have never belted into a race car, never turned a wrench under pressure, yet speak with the authority of those who have lived it.
They critique everything. Respect nothing. And answer to no one.
Some accounts label themselves as media without ever leaving their couch. They recycle content, repost others’ work, and somehow believe that qualifies them for credentials and influence.
Meanwhile, the people doing the actual work — the ones walking 10,000 steps a day, chasing quotes, verifying facts — are expected to compete with a meme.
That’s not evolution. That’s erosion.
But the real line gets crossed when criticism turns into harassment.
We’ve reached a point where drivers aren’t just dealing with pressure on the track — they’re dealing with it in their phones, their inboxes, and their personal lives.
Fake accounts. Impersonators. Coordinated attacks.
Drivers have been targeted, harassed, and in some cases stalked — not for what they’ve done wrong, but simply for existing in the spotlight.
The defending Pro Stock Motorcycle champion, Richard Gadson, has already spoken about the mental toll of navigating that environment. Others deal with it quietly, knowing that responding often makes it worse.
Think about that for a second.
We’ve created a culture where chasing a championship might be easier than escaping the comment section.
That’s not just a problem. That’s a failure.
And then there’s the everyday noise — the negativity that never shuts off.
The quarter-mile purist who trashes eighth-mile racing ignores a simple truth: for some tracks, it’s eighth-mile or nothing.
The same voices that scream for NHRA competition turn around and attack IHRA for daring to offer it.
Independent teams are winning money, reinvesting in better equipment, keeping their programs alive — and still getting told it “doesn’t count” by someone who hasn’t bought a ticket in five years.
That’s like critiquing a race from the parking lot.
Even wins get minimized.
Dale Creasy Jr.’s victory in Dunn should have been a story about perseverance — about a driver who nearly lost his leg, who fought back from injuries and setbacks most wouldn’t survive in this sport.
Instead, parts of social media turned it into a punchline.
Because context requires reading, and reading requires effort.
And effort is in short supply.
The same goes for the treatment of women in drag racing.
The comments, the insults, the cheap shots — all delivered from behind a screen by people who would never say those things face-to-face and yet be ready to throw hands if those words were spoken to their wife, daughter or sister.
It’s cowardice disguised as commentary.
And then comes the loudest lie of all:
“NHRA is dying.”
Usually, from someone who hasn’t been through a ticket gate in years, judging the health of the sport by a snapshot of grandstands without understanding the business behind them.
They’ll compare a packed small event to a partially filled mega-facility and miss the math completely.
They’ll complain about four-wide racing without understanding it was never designed for them — it was designed to bring new people in.
Because here’s the truth:
Drag racing doesn’t survive by catering to the past. It survives by building the future.
And social media, for all its power, is making that harder than it should be.
Drag racing is one of the most American sports there is.
And America runs on free speech.
But just because you can say something doesn’t mean it needs to be said — and it sure as hell doesn’t mean it needs to be amplified.
Social media gave drag racing a megaphone.
What it didn’t give it was a filter.
And right now, the sport is paying the price for that imbalance.
Because when misinformation spreads faster than truth, when noise drowns out knowledge, and when negativity becomes the loudest voice in the room, the damage isn’t always immediate — but it is inevitable.
The same tool that helped grow drag racing can absolutely tear it apart if left unchecked.
Not overnight.
But one bad take, one fake account, one uninformed opinion at a time — like rust creeping into a chassis you thought was solid.
And when it finally gives way, everyone will wonder what happened.
The answer will be simple.
We handed the sport a microphone…
…and forgot to care who was holding it.
John Doe
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BOBBY BENNETT: SOCIAL MEDIA SAVED DRAG RACING — AND NOW IT’S SLOWLY STRANGLING IT
In the last twenty-seven years of creating content for the internet, I can say without hesitation that social media has been both the best and