{"id":905743,"date":"2026-09-22T20:28:18","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T20:28:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/905743\/"},"modified":"2026-09-22T20:28:18","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T20:28:18","slug":"kinardi-line-9-what-monster-trucks-could-teach-formula-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/905743\/","title":{"rendered":"Kinardi Line #9: What Monster Trucks Could Teach Formula 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\tStay up to speed with stories written by drivers, for drivers.<\/p>\n

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The toddlers came in droves, their tiny feet pounding the stadium steps in a frenetic drumroll. Piercing screams filled the air like streaking arrow fire. Everywhere you looked, parents grimaced, gaunt and weathered, like peasants stolen from one of Bosch\u2019s oil-on-oak hellscapes.<\/p>\n

And yet, there is only joy at Monster Jam.<\/p>\n

The monster trucks came, so we went. The Seattle show was simply remarkable. Firstly, because my family of three doesn\u2019t get out much. Our 3-year-old is\u2026 well, we describe him to polite company as \u201cenergetic.\u201d But really he\u2019s a megaton explosion. So we tend to hand him off like a hot potato that needs to cool off outside the house. While mom gets rest, dad\u2019s on duty, and vice versa.<\/p>\n

But this was monster trucks, on home turf at the Seahawks\u2019 stadium, so we made an exception. All hands on deck for the rippin\u2019-est show in town.<\/p>\n

\"Family The stadium gates. Home to jumbotrons and shrieking toddlers any which way you look.Kyle Kinard<\/p>\n

Observation one: The crowd is the show before the show. A perfect cross-section of core millennial parenthood mixed in with Eeeehawwww! enthusiasts. There were the too-cool mommies with Botox foreheads sporting NASCAR throwback jackets. Of course, a sea of fellow balding dads with Pit Viper sunnies and the outline of a Zyn tin in their back pocket.<\/p>\n

Everywhere else, the true believers roamed: grown men in decades-old Bigfoot T-shirts. Superfans dressed head-to-toe in El Toro Loco swag. There was a strong Hispanic contingent in attendance, all snip-toe cowboy-boot swagger, their kiddos clad in Grave Digger tees, flitting like moths past the merch stands and beer taps and sausage carts. Everyone, regardless of race or station, turned out for the monster trucks. The day was warm and perfect and sunny in the kind of rare perfection you won\u2019t find anywhere but the Pacific Northwest in the death throes of summer.<\/p>\n

\"Seattle Come to Monster Jam for the hearing damage, stay for serene views of downtown Seattle.Kyle Kinard<\/p>\n

Observation two: Monster trucks ABSOLUTELY RIP. If you haven\u2019t been, just go. You buy the tickets for the kids, but it\u2019s the parents hanging off the edge of their seats. The whole event had my head spinning. The stadium frothed with the sensational joy of V-8 thunder and toddler screams.<\/p>\n

At one point I turned away from my own awestruck son and watched a kid in a Scuderia Ferrari hat nearly collapse when Grave Digger tipped up onto two wheels, parading around the dirt in perilous balance before slamming back down to thunderous applause.<\/p>\n

\"GraveQuinn Rooney\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The kid\u2019s Prancing Horse hat and that roaring V-8 forged a fresh neural pathway. A thought: Does Formula 1 need more monster trucks?<\/p>\n

I chuckled to myself. It would certainly bring some much-needed verve back to the grid.<\/p>\n

\"Family Monster Jam transforms your local NFL venue into a dirt bullring with hella-sweet jumps, which begs the question: Couldn\u2019t Silverstone use a jump or two?Kyle Kinard<\/p>\n

Unless you understand exactly what I mean, this will be a hard sentiment to explain, but there\u2019s so much hand-wringing about how boring F1 is these days that it\u2019s easy to almost forget just how boring today\u2019s racing actually is. The broadcast\u2019s production value is so high, the in-car camera angles so stunning, and the glamor of the sport so effervescent, it distracts you from the dullness of the actual on-track product.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At the moment it\u2019s all filler, no killer. Take the latest F1 Grand Prix: The series debuted its newest track, another soulless street circuit in Madrid called the \u201cMadring.\u201d The race was anything but mad.<\/p>\n

\"\"Peter Fox\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

In the end, the track produced yet another nearly drama-free procession. Think Monaco, minus all that history and yacht-club glitz. Lando Norris snagged pole then caught the leading edge of an unfortunately timed yellow flag, one that allowed a window for his competitors to pit, but (arguably) not Norris. He fell two spots, handing Kimi Antonelli and Mercedes the win.<\/p>\n

I promise you that reading my dull synopsis will have raised your pulse no more than watching the race live.<\/p>\n

\"Ferrari Remember when the cars looked, sounded, and felt like THIS?Kyle Kinard<\/p>\n

So, why stick with the series at all? Memories, I guess. These days, I watch F1 by force of habit. Like a tiny mallet to the knee, I rise reflexively before the sun to watch the guy in the hottest car lead 21 other drivers on a Sunday drive around those hallowed temples of motorsport in\u2026 uh\u2026 Azerbaijan, Qatar, and Miami\u2026<\/p>\n

It\u2019s important to remember that\u2014even if the tracks were better in The Good Old Days\u2014much of F1 history has been one dude in the best car just slapping the rest of the grid in the mouth for two hours on his way to a WDC title. BUT, back in The Good Old Days, the cars at least spat rude noise from the business end of God\u2019s Own V-8s and V-10s and V-12s and so forth.<\/p>\n

You saw the drivers wrestling the things and never heard them compare a race car qualifying lap to operating a TI-86. The regulations mandating hybrid systems and smaller displacement in 2014 are the lowest-hanging fruit on the blame tree, but really it\u2019s a more deeply rooted problem with the priorities of the sport itself.<\/p>\n

So much of a monster truck\u2019s thrill is a cacophony loud enough to shatter your ear drums and tickle your brain stem. Usually at the same time. The machines are hefty and difficult, and you see and hear drivers struggling to corral that tangle of noise and power and mass.<\/p>\n

I once attended a test for a magazine wherein my co-worker drove Fernando Alonso\u2019s V-8\u2013powered MP4-22 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. You could hear that car for miles outside the Speedway and when you did, it stood the hair on your forearms on end. It did not suck.<\/p>\n

\"F1 Somehow, the only image of Alonso\u2019s McLaren I took that day.Kyle Kinard<\/p>\n

First order of business to improve F1 should be getting that earplugs-required soundtrack back. It\u2019d cut complaints in half.<\/p>\n

And while there are competitive elements to a monster truck show, it\u2019s not really a competition, only a spectacle. It struck me at the moment when Grave Digger sent a whole stadium into convulsive fits that F1\u2014at its absolute best\u2014should be both.<\/p>\n

But at some point, either before or during its hybrid era, F1 forgot that the spectacle that matters most is the one on track. Distractions line the grid these days. Every viewer angle near the track is designed to be Instagramable. There are $130 T-shirts at the kiosks, a star-studded grid walk, and probably the most likable set of nice-boy drivers ever to suit up. What F1 is missing right now is awe.<\/p>\n

Where can you find that in spades? Follow your toddler\u2019s footsteps.<\/p>\n

\"FamilyKyle Kinard<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

The only car writer\u00a0dumb\u00a0brave enough to\u00a0flip a grain truck on its roof, Kyle Kinard once plied his trade at America\u2019s greatest car magazines. He now lives near Seattle and enjoys the rain. His column,\u00a0Kinardi Line<\/a>, runs monthly, as does the\u00a0Camaro vs. World project-car series<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stay up to speed with stories written by drivers, for drivers. Get automotive news, DIY tips, market trends,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":905744,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,20754,578,576,577,12716,82],"class_list":["post-905743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-column","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-motorsports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=905743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/905744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=905743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=905743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=905743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}