Rick Hendrick star offers straightforward fix to NASCAR's popularity problem

Hendrick Motorsports driver William Byron suggested ways to increase NASCAR's popularity in the current scenario. Drawing a comparison with Formula 1's broadcasting, he explained how the sport could draw a larger audience compared to their current landscape.

NASCAR is one of the more popular sports in the US, however, its popularity significantly decreases when compared on a global scale with other motorsports. Being a national-level sport, it becomes rather difficult to expand its viewership globally. However, Hendrick Motorsports' William Byron suggested a few ways the sport can get a surge in popularity, the first being more social media exposure and better broadcasting techniques, drawing a comparison from Formula 1's option of switching to onboard cameras as per the viewer's convenience.

"We need to become way more current in the landscape of social media and exposure. Looking at my generation and being around my friends, they would love to be able to follow the race more easily for their favorite drivers," Byron told The Athletic.

"Formula One has a really good interface for their apps, like how you follow Lewis Hamilton or how you follow Charles (Leclerc). We need to have a way to easily get to that, like the in-car cameras (on Max)," he added.

Byron also suggested that NASCAR's technicalities and the challenges that drivers face should also be highlighted while promoting the sport. He claimed that most non-viewers feel that cars keep driving in circles for the entire time, while only a few understand the difficulties that drivers face while driving and the challenges they clear.

"And we just need to educate people on how difficult this sport is. People don’t understand how difficult it is to drive these cars. They think, 'Oh, you’re just turning left at 80 percent of the tracks,' and it’s like, 'No, you’re on the edge. You’re literally fighting the car on the edge, like if you were driving on ice.' So we just have to educate people and do that in a current way."

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NASCAR gained millions of viewers in this year's season-opening Daytona 500

Despite being mentioned that NASCAR is not extensively popular, it has showed a positive change in viewership this year with all the anticipation that was built up. During the season-opening Daytona 500 in February, the viewership averaged 6.76 million, beating out 2024 by a large increase of 13% viewers.

Moreover, the EchoPark Automotive Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas later managed an average of 4.1 million viewers on FOX, showcasing yet another massive increase. While sports like the NBA average between 2 to 4 million viewers throughout the year, this is a major change for stock racing as a whole. There has also been an increase in the sport's global viewership.