LOS ANGELES — Joey Logano emerged as the winner in NASCAR's big Los Angeles experiment on Sunday night.
Logano held off Kyle Busch over the Busch Light Clash's final 20 laps to win on the quarter-mile purpose-built track at the L.A. Coliseum. The race was moved up a week and from Daytona International Speedway to the historic stadium in an attempt to spark excitement for the 2022 season and attract sports fans looking for something to watch on the Sunday before the Super Bowl.
The exhibition was marketed as an event more than a race. It featured concerts from Pitbull and Ice Cube, and a DJ who played during caution flags. The TV broadcast of the Ice Cube concert that happened at the scheduled halftime break incessantly showed young 20-somethings dancing to the music.
Those 20-somethings are the demographic NASCAR wants to attract. The series has one of the oldest fan bases in sports and NASCAR has been constantly searching for ways to find new viewers as longtime fans have left the sport in droves over the past 15 years.
Hosting a short track race at a football stadium with multiple musical acts was an attempt to get those new fans NASCAR desperately wants and needs. While the event was immediately hailed as a success by those invested in it — and it was a fun departure from NASCAR's normal — its impact won't be known until the television viewership numbers are released.
Approximately 2.5 million people watched the exhibition Busch Clash in 2020 when it was held at Daytona on its normal weekend before the Daytona 500 timeslot. With the Pro Bowl complete by the time the main event began Sunday night, NASCAR was aiming for an audience significantly larger than what it got two years ago. And, ideally for NASCAR, that audience watching at home was younger too.
