Seriously, with the economy the way it is right now and NASCAR teams looking for sponsors, if there was ever a time for Pixar to get into the game this would be it.
How awesome would it be to see a #95 Lightning McQueen Chevrolet turning laps at Daytona in February?
Or, since Petty Enterprises needs a sponsor for their #43 car Pixar could step in there and we could see “The King” make his triumphant return to racing.
Could you see a #51 Doc Hudson car in the Nationwide Series? I could. Or how about Mater in the Craftsmen Truck Series?
Some of you may think I’m nuts and that it would never work or be taken seriously. However a lot of the drivers and announcers in NASCAR are huge fans of Cars, almost as much as they are fans of Talladega Nights. And if you think about it this might bring a whole new, younger fanbase to NASCAR because Cars is really popular with the youngsters out there. Let their parents pull for Tony Stewart or Dale Jr., the kids are going to be pulling for whoever’s in the #95 car shouting “KA-CHOW” at the top of their lungs.
BigDaddyCool: I think you’ll really like this: autoblog.com/2008/03/17/kach … d-of-mach/
It seems they’re doing this already in Japan with movie themed Formula 1 race cars. I know its not NASCAR, but it’s still cool! In the article you can see a Lightning McQueen that was previously a Toy Story car. I’ll try to get the Toy Story car picture for you if I can.
Enjoy and welcome to Pixar Planet!
Yeah martini833 I remember seeing that picture somewhere before. I think it was when I was doing a search for pictures of Lightning’s Radiator Springs paintjob for a car I was painting in a NASCAR game. Very cool.
I know a few years ago someone in NASCAR had a Toy Story scheme for one race. Can’t remember who but I’ll see if I can find that too.
And thank you for the greeting, it’s good to be here.
I know next to nothing about NASCAR and car racing, but that is a pretty cool idea, BigDaddyCool. And you’re definitely right, in that it would bring a whole new fanbase, and this fanbase would continue to fund NASCAR.
That’s Super GT300, not F1. F1 cars are open wheel racers, most similar to Indycars in the US, where as these are sports car racers (like ALMS, more specifically GTS/GT1 in the US).
This is Kazuya Oshima’s Toyota MR-S before they switched Livery to Lightning McQueen:
and the matching suit:
There’s definitely more Nascar influence in Cars than from any other sort of racing, but doesn’t the plot of Cars 2 involve Europe?
F1, Sports car, and Rally racing are all popular globally, while Nascar really is isolated to the Southern and Midwestern US.
Usually, to me, jumpsuits would look rather silly, especially when after a character on TV. But those are an exception, right there. I think they look great!
