Euro NASCAR really plays up American angle
Races have cowboys, Marvel superheroes and cheerleaders.
HOCKENHEIM, GERMANY — Twenty-four hulking, polychromatic stock cars rumbled into a tight configuration last Sunday on the starting grid of the Hockenheimring, an 86-year-old racing circuit in the Rhine Valley, before the final race on the penultimate weekend of NASCAR’s Euro Series.
Then the track really began to get crowded.
First, a double-file procession of “Star Wars” cosplayers, 130 in all, shuffled silently across the asphalt. Close behind were three Germans dressed as 19th-century Old West frontiersmen and three more in Marvel superhero costumes. Nearby, two dozen teenage cheerleaders with crisp blue uniforms and swishy ponytails counted out routines in English, as if they had been flown in from an American high school pep rally.
When they were in position, the costumed marchers and the perky cheerleaders all standing solemnly at attention, the American and German national anthems were played over the loudspeakers. It was only after that, after the crowd of characters had cleared the track and the competitors had buckled themselves into their cars, that the track announcer finally gave the familiar refrain: “Drivers, start your engines.”
This loopy cross-cultural potpourri was a small taste of how NASCAR — that oh-so-American of pastimes — is translated in Europe, where the organization has been having races since 2012. Each of the six race weekends on the calendar has an American theme, but even the organizers acknowledge it represents a version of America with exaggerated air quotes around it.
“We work a lot with clichés,” said Jérôme Galpin, the 42-year-old founder and president of Euro NASCAR. So there were fast cars and patient mechanics, but also cheerleaders and country music and something approximating barbecue.
“It has to be fun,” Galpin said. “And it has to be American.” Or as his wife, Anne, the vice president of the series, described it: “Everything a European thinks is American.”
The Hockenheim event — part car show, food fair and, somewhere in between, an auto race — was nicknamed the American Fan Fest and had all sorts of ancillary entertainment. A showcase of American cars featuring classic Camaros, Mustangs and Thunderbirds also included a contemporary Jeep Grand Cherokee and a blue Chevelle with Confederate flag dice hanging from the rearview mirror. A kiosk decorated like a classic American barbershop sold Dapper Dan hair tonic. Pulled pork, brisket, ribs and chili cheese fries were sold out of an Airstream trailer.
Julian Jander, 34, a businessman from Herford, Germany, who sells retro American coolers and helps sponsor a team in the series, said many fans at the race seemed to belong to the considerable population in Germany that counts its devotion to Americana as a hobby.
“They drive American cars, eat American foods and love the American way of life, where you think anything is possible,” he said in a German accent seasoned with a Southern twang, evidence of his time as an exchange student in Columbus, Mississippi.
Galpin said Euro NASCAR’s goal was to offer a freewheeling counterpoint to the glossy world of Formula One, which still dominates the motorsports scene in Europe. Since childhood, he has idealized American sports leagues for their willingness to indulge in flashiness and fun.
The Americans scattered in the crowd, which totaled around 10,000 over two days, according to a spokeswoman for the track, turned out to be some of the fussier critics.
“Those are not tacos and burritos,” said Charysse Knotts, a transplanted Texan who was admiring an immaculately restored old Mercury Eight with her husband, Mike.
He nodded in agreement. “They do better with the cars than the food,” he said.
Culinary misadventures aside, a celebration of American-ness can feel complicated these days. U.S. politics and foreign policy have rarely felt more polarizing at home and overseas. But Galpin said he had no qualms about leaning in hard on the American concept for his European audience.
“I don’t think political leadership or whatever affects what people think about a country,” he said. “It won’t change your sports, your movies, the Grand Canyon, or whatever. Every country has ups and downs. Politicians, they come and go. The basics are the people.”
Even so, he admitted to momentarily panicking this year when organizers of another event, at Brands Hatch, in England, informed him only two days before their race that they had hired a Donald Trump impersonator as part of their off-track entertainment. Galpin knew there were supporters of Trump among his sponsors, and he was worried they might find the act to be in poor taste.
On race day, the impersonator arrived on the infield in a helicopter and addressed the crowd from behind a lectern before posing for innumerable selfies. To Galpin’s relief, everybody found the impression reasonably respectful.
NASCAR, which also has race series in Canada and Mexico, has sought growth in new markets, including China, to offset declines in television audience and race attendance in the United States. This year, the Euro Series has visited Spain, Italy, Britain, France and Germany. Its final event is next month in Heusden-Zolder, Belgium.