Over the last six week and for the second year in a row, I’ve enjoyed watching the Superstar Racing Experience (SRX) series – even if I was hoping that Ryan Newman would win the overall championship, instead of Marco Andretti.
For the uninitiated, SRX is the brainchild of Tony Stewart and Ray Evernham and a throwback to the International Race of Champions (IROC) series that lasted from 1974-2006. IROC pitted drivers from various racing disciplines, competing in identical cars. While IROC competed mainly at major speedways like Daytona, Texas, Talladega, Michigan, Mid-Ohio and others, SRX has gone back to the roots of racing, holding races at famed local short tracks, including racing on dirt for several races.
The roster is made up of a dozen drivers, a mix of current Indy stars and NASCAR veterans (mostly retired) although several current drivers (Hailie Deegan, Chase Elliott and Ryan Blaney) have made appearances. Each race also features one local driver from the track being visited that week.
Watching the series gave me pause to wonder: if I was in charge of setting the roster, who would I want?
Like a lot of similar exercises, it was more difficult than you might expect. I liked the idea of having a dozen regulars and the one local driver, for a total of 13. However, I got to a point where there were just too many names and so I – initially – decided to add two more drivers to the roster, for a total of 15. However, midway through writing, too many more names kept cropping up, so I decided to have 13 full-time drivers, plus one local ringer, plus one “Special Guest” for each of the six races. I set out to make sure I didn’t make it a completely NASCAR-centric list and may have actually gone too far the other way.
- Lewis Hamilton – I don’t know F1 from anything and am not 100% sure what the difference between F1 and Indy car exactly is, although my next-to-next door neighbour Adam did enlighten me a bit. However, I know enough to know Hamilton is probably the most famous race car driver in the world right now.
- Tommy Milner – Yep, first obvious bias to show up in this list. Tommy Milner is one of those marathon drivers who competes for Corvette Racing in 24 Hours of Le Mans and Daytona. Yes, he’s getting in on his last name but it would be fun to have a driver from that discipline in the series.
- Ken Schrader – Schrader has some involvement in SRX already, mostly behind the scenes and competed in one race, held at a track he co-owns. However, he should be upgraded to a full-time ride. He’s a veteran of NASCAR but also still races in all sorts of series around North America. I think he’s racing in the Pinty’s Series at Ohsweken later this year.
- Helio Castroneves – I didn’t want to just completely junk the current SRX roster and Castroneves is one of the drivers I wanted to continue to see race. He’s a four-time Indy 500 champion and just seems like he’s having fun racing.
- Ernie Francis, Jr. – Another current member of the current SRX roster. One of the few issues I have with SRX is that it seems like it’s a lot of veteran drivers. Francis, Jr. is just 24 but is already a seven-time Trans Am Champion and is currently running the Indy Lights Series so he brings that experience, as well as starts in the K&N East and Xfinity Series.
- Hailie Deegan – Deegan has raced in the SRX series on a few occasions but is a driver that could definitely benefit from competing full-time as much as the series would benefit from having her. She’s young, she’s female and she’s got a background in off-road racing as well as the ARCA Series and is currently competing in the Truck Series (which means not every NASCAR representative is a current or former Cup driver).
- Danica Patrick – Patrick is retired, but is any driver really “retired”? She has transferred into a commentary role, including for SRX during Season 1 but would be another female in the field, as well as a driver who has experience in both open wheel and stock cars.
- Kyle Larson – Probably the biggest current NASCAR name in the series. He’s also a driver who is racing more than he’s not in all sorts of rides from the Chili Bowl to the Daytona 500. He’d definitely be able to jump into an SRX car and be up to speed and competitive within a handful of laps.
- Dale Earnhardt Jr. – This one might be tough. Certainly, SRX signs Dale Jr. and they’ve got a million eyes on their product. However (a) he retired due to suffering multiple concussions and has limited his racing to one short track Xfinity race a year and (b) he’s currently got a gig as an analyst on NBC which would mean he’s working weekends already and on another network.
- Bubba Pollard – Pollard was a driver that made one appearance as a “local driver” for SRX. However, his success as a Modified driver is such that even I had heard of him. Pollard brings another discipline of racing into the mix.
- Bill Elliott – You can add this one to the list of drivers I’m obviously biased for, since he’s my Dad’s all-time favourite driver. He raced full-time in SRX in Season 1 but cut back his appearances to just two in Season 2. It’d be cool to see Elliott back full-time in the series, representing other NASCAR legends that have competed including Michael Waltrip, Bobby Labonte, Greg Biffle, Ryan Newman, and Matt Kenseth (plus others that I am probably forgetting).
- Tony Stewart – You gotta have Tony! He’s the guy who helped start it all. He’s also had a lot of success at the track, including winning most of the dirt track features and the initial season’s championship. In addition to three NASCAR championships, Stewart is another driver who brings a lot of experience in many different styles of racing from Sprint Cars to Indy to stock cars.
- Leah Pruett – Above and beyond the obvious marketing bonanza Pruett’s inclusion in SRX would bring (more on than in a moment), she would also bring in experience from the NHRA and drag racing, in general. And of course, the story of Pruett and husband Stewart racing together would pretty much write itself.
Special Guest Drivers
- John Force – drag racing
- Michael Waltrip – NASCAR
- Tony Kanaan – Indy Car
- James Hinchcliffe – Indy Car
- Bobby Labonte – NASCAR
- Stewart Friessen – NASCAR
And even as I’m posting this, I’m thinking “Clint Bowyer for a one-off appearance? Jimmie Johnson to bridge the gap between Indy Car and NASCAR? Kenny Wallace – another veteran of NASCAR who continues to race anything and everything? Jeff Gordon – whose ties to Evernham would probably get him to come out???”
johnmilner.ca 