The Performance Racing Industry Show always represents the trends and changes in the motorsports industry, and this year is no exception. The show itself has grown and flourished, as has the organization itself — from the PRI Road Tour series launched during the pandemic in 2020 to the paid membership element to the focus on legislation and advocacy, PRI is dedicated to racers and the racing industry including the manufacturers, sanctioning bodies, crew members and all of the other people involved in making people and things go faster.
This year, the show has added a Content Creator stage and a Street Outlaws stage to the NHRA stage. The official presence of Street Outlaws highlights the importance of “street” style racing to the industry thanks to the massive publicity that the shows generate. It takes racing from a niche event to a story to follow, and Street Outlaws has capitalized on that with casts of characters (both cars and drivers), rivalries and multiple opportunities for content creation.
That idea was reiterated multiple times on Thursday. Drag Illustrated‘s Wes Buck introduced the 2023 World Series of Pro Mod race ( March 3-5, 2023 at Bradenton Raceway) by talking about the importance of racers who understand that telling their stories — on their social platforms, to the media, etc — is part of playing the game when generating eyeballs, support and dollars to new events.
The PDRA also talked about the importance of stories as series director Tyler Crossnoe unveiled plans for celebrating the PDRA’s 10th anniversary in a press conference filled with PDRA racers. The 2023 season will kick off the eight race run at the East Coast Nationals at GALOT Motorsports Park in March, and include the third annual Summit Racing Equipment PDRA ProStars specialty race. Crossnoe hinted at an addition to some of the points races in the work which would capitalize on rivalries and partnerships to add some spice and “story” to the series. Stay tuned for details as they unfold.
Speaking of characters and stories, Tony Stewart opened the show at the kick off breakfast, and the NHRA stage offered up plenty of stars telling the stories of their past season. Read more about that, as well as the multiple team additions and changes here: News from PRI 2022 — Thursday Happenings NHRA Edition
Beyond driver announcements and celebrity signings, PRI is a trade show — which means workshops, educational seminars and product, product, product. This year, on Thursday, the topics centered on electric vehicle education and business advice including strategies for weathering a challenging economy, improving social media for marketing and building vocabulary and technical familiarity with tools designed to improve performance in hybrid and EV race cars.
