Does NASCAR Really Listen To Its Fans?

The new Double File Restarts - Shootout Style are the latest edition to our ever changing sport. It's also the change with the 'hippest' name. Personally if they don't drop the Shootout Style by this weekend I may lose my mind, but I digress.

This change was decided by 'the decree of the fans' and implemented just as quickly.

My question is who are these fans that NASCAR speaks with? Brian France can be quoted, seemingly in every speech, that he has talked to the fans and understands what they are looking for.

Really? The evidance seems to speak otherwise.

Fans did not want realignment. Fans did not want later start times. Fans did not want the COT (at least in the form NASCAR created). Fans did not want their sport to turn into WWE-style entertainment... whoops maybe I'm getting a few years ahead of myself there.

So I want to know who these 'fans' are that France talks to.

I am not the typical NASCAR fan. I live and breath the sport. Jayski.com is my homepage and I hit no less than seven NASCAR sites nearly every time I log on the internet.

I visit message boards that, combined, contain thousands of members from every corner of the country and globe. They range from casual fans to fans like myself.

Never once have I heard anyone say NASCAR asked them what they want from the sport. Granted this is a very small sample size, but one could infer that it would be representative of the whole due to the closeness of fellow NASCAR fans in general.

So I ask again, where are these fans that are 'being listened' to? How can I, and others, become one of them? Will it even make a difference?

I am hard pressed to find any other fan base as disgruntled and fragmented in our country as NASCAR fans. At times NASCAR brass seems to forget that it is us fans, who were often forced to endure ridicule and stereotypes in years past, that built this sport.

NASCAR was never America's past time. It was never a sport that evolved from the college level to national prominence. It was a sport that was born in the backyards of the common man in small towns across the country.

We are not ignorant individuals. We know where the sport's been, where it is and where it could go.

We do not view the sport with egotistical or money oriented eyes. We view the sport with the love that grew from watching the Allisons and Pettys and Pearsons battle week after week after week.

We go beyond simple crazed fans, we become a living, breathing part of the sport.

So, one last time, why not actually ask what the fans think? Better yet, actually listen what the fans want and apply it the sport.

I call of NASCAR to create an actual fan council. Not an clouded e-mail based system that exists today. I'm asking for actual council sessions. Let France sit in an auditorium with hundreds of NASCAR fans.

Maybe, if its even possible, create a rotating fan panel which oversees the interests of the fans.

It would be revolutionary, but not out of line with what NASCAR stands for. More than any other sport, NASCAR fans are an integral part of the sport. It is something which could be made a reality.

Then, and only then, can France truly say that he is 'listening to the fan'. Until then, stop trying to humor us.