Unruly Fan Behavior, Even Death Threats, on Social Media have IndyCar Racers' Attention

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Earlier this week, The Associated Press posted a column on IndyCar drivers getting blasted by fans on social media for on-track incidents that may have involved some of their favorite drivers.

The most recent trigger for some fans was Sunday’s Long Beach Grand Prix incident between Juncos Hollinger teammates Callum Ilott and Augustin Canapino, where some believe the British native Ilott's actions coming out of the pits ultimately led to Canapino hitting the wall trying to avoid contact.

The next thing you know, it was crash-boom-bang and Canapino’s day was over, two-thirds of the way through the 85-lap event.

Now, we all know that racing fans are among the most passionate fans in all forms of sport. They follow their drivers with a fervency rarely matched in other athletic events, particularly stick-and-ball sports.

While IndyCar unquestionably needs (and deserves) more attention—particularly positive attention—from the overall world of sport and sports fans, the racing series does not need ugliness, particularly death threats, which Ilott reportedly received several after the incident with his teammate.

I mean, come on people, this is a R-A-C-E, and that is all it is. It is NOT a life-and-death instance, certainly nothing calling for a death threat. Unfortunately, with the sheer anonymity social media provides, anyone with a computer or even just a cell phone can feel emboldened to type whatever they want.

Like golf, auto racing has oftentimes been called a “gentleman’s sport,” and understandably so. It’s not like soccer, where riots and yes, sadly, deaths of fans simply because of who they cheer for or the supportive colors they wear, are all too common around the world.

But this is the good old U.S. of A. We’re supposed to be better and classier, an example to the rest of the world, and certainly not folks who throw around threats that they’re going to kill an athlete simply because he did something egregious—and more than likely, accidentally—against another fan’s favorite driver.

While 99.9% of those death threats are idle, off-the-cuff remarks due to a fan’s passion for the sport and “my driver,” and they’re usually just meaningless words, unfortunately we live in a society today where it takes just one whacko who takes those threats all the way to fulfillment.

I think back to a movie, “The Fan,”that starred Robert De Niro and Wesley Snipes, released back in 1996.

It tells the story of an obsessed baseball fan (De Niro) and the arrogant Bobby Bonds-like baseball all-star (Snipes). A psychological thriller, De Niro devolves from just a dedicated fan into a stone-cold killer, with both Snipes and his young son as his targets, all because Snipes didn’t play ball, perform or measure up the way his most loyal fan wanted him to do.

I’ll be honest, an obsessed fan attacking a driver or player has long been one of my biggest fears in over 30 years as a sportswriter. Racing series—particularly NHRA, which offers near-unfettered access to fans—take pride in opening the pits or at the very least, offering numerous opportunities for drivers and their fans to mingle, be it at autograph sessions, along pit road, walking from their motor homes to the garage, etc.

It would take just one person to conceal a gun or knife or some other weapon of death and we’d quickly lose a driver or maybe a team engineer or crew member, all because of something they did.

Can you imagine the horror if a race fan who didn’t agree with an IndyCar rule or was ticked off at how the Indianapolis 500 played out, attacked octogenarian Roger Penske or drivers like Scott Dixon, Will Power or virtually any other racer?