Racer X said this in the "Let Tomac Bye" piece they just posted: "For Monster Energy Kawasaki, having Tomac win the million is a huge coup and great marketing tool. That headline will blast to mainstream media and get traction because of the million-dollar prize."
This is where I think the current thinking in the industry goes wrong. We don't need game-show gimmicks and thrown races in a corporate love fest. The modern media consumer is a more sophisticated beast and knows the difference between competition and reality TV. I think that for any non-moto fan watching an event sponsored by Monster Energy in which one Monster-sponsored rider hands the win to another Monster-sponsored rider and a fan holding a can of Monster, it's obvious it's just a promotional event, not a real competition. That is extremely harmful to the sport's legitimacy, rather than enhancing it. And as of Tuesday, I see exactly one "mainstream" article, in which Autoweek pretty much ridiculed the whole thing as a curiosity, far from a legitimate sport. We just took the whole sport down a notch to please the green Monster, and who cares if it helps their marketing? Does anybody think this event is going to inspire USA Today to run a piece?
https://autoweek.com/article/other-motorsports/questions-linger-eli-tomac-wins-2018-monster-energy-cup-las-vegas
It's impossible for a corporation or government to love you or care about you.
