Wednesday Racing/Open Thread

Open to all subscribers, focusing on the topsy-turvy world of EV sales and production and the Victoria's Secret controversy!

why does this keep happening to me

Your humble author didn’t catch up on any of the racing news this weekend because I was too busy doing a bit of it myself. Probably the worst drive I’ve had in a while. This was our first shot at fitting Hoosier Wets to the PR6 and we never got the car to grip or turn. Fourteen cars registered, eight actually took the start in conditions best described as “Noah-esque”, and I finished fifth. On Sunday they changed the schedule in an effort to cope with the weather but I didn’t realize it so I actually missed my own race. To my immense chagrin, the other racer in my household turned in a fine performance for second in class and a lap time that was comparatively very good for smallbore cars in the group.

USGP forecast

Random predictions for this weekend’s race, in no particular order:

• Tsunoda is gonna smoke Danny Ric

• Checo, who is almost certainly retiring ASAP, will perform above expectations

• Williams will shine

• Lewis will close the gap to George on a track that has been good to him

• Max will win!

Meanwhile, in the land of fairytales

EV sales are up, on track to reach a million in 2023! But it’s still fifty percent Tesla, with GM and Ford combining for about eleven percent behind. Speaking of Ford: after a massively publicized effort to triple F-150 Lightning production, they’re now cutting a shift. Ford wants to use the capacity for more outdated, inefficient, planet-killing gasoline-powered trucks that will actually be sold and bought by real people. A UAW memo provided to the WSJ caustically notes that “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that our sales for the Lightning have tanked.”

I’d also be cautious about this much-ballyhooed overall increase in EV sales, because much of it comes from manufacturers and models that didn’t have an EV option until very recently. Any dealership employee will tell you that there is always pent-up demand for anything — if they started building Honda Civic Wagovans again there would probably be two quarters of absolutely ripping sales — but that demand doesn’t stick.

Let’s not forget that inventory of gas cars is still pretty thin nearly everywhere, which means that some percentage of new-EV buyers are doing it because they literally can’t get (or can’t afford) the car they want.

Some customers, faced with “EV or nothing” at the local dealership, are choosing nothing. Which leads to:

Old cars have never been older, but new cars are also old

In 1982, Car and Driver noted with some concern that the average age of vehicles on the road had slipped over the six-year mark. It’s now 12.5 years, but wait, it gets worse: the average passenger car is 13.6 years old.

Unsurprisingly, this average has climbed by over one-half-year per year since the 2020 election, largely due to supply constraints.

Is the 13.6-year-old car of 2023 in better shape than the six-year-old car of 1982? Almost certainly. But it’s hard to escape the implications of what this shift means, particularly in terms of middle-class buying power, which seems weaker than it’s been since the Sixties.

Another factor in this, of course, has to be the gradual aging of new cars. Everybody likes to talk about how old the Chrysler mid-size platform is, but a friend noted the other day that the Audi A4 is now eight years past its original launch. Honda and Toyota are lengthening their cycles and reducing the amount of change in each new car. With the exception of the Model 3, which is about to get a mild refresh, Tesla is selling a showroom full of old cars.

This is an undocumented feature of the multi-billion-dollar push to the inEVitable future: nobody’s bothering to update the cars that actually sell. Which depresses consumer interest, which then lends credence to the EV buffoon-evangelists.

Newsflash: fat people and weirdos don’t sell lingerie

stop it, you’re making me gay

“Sexiness can be inclusive,” said Greg Unis, brand president of Victoria’s Secret and Pink, the company’s sub-brand targeting younger consumers. “Sexiness can celebrate the diverse experiences of our customers and that’s what we’re focused on.”

Greg Unis forgot to mention that IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH to go with his otherwise perfectly Orwellian statement, but the net effect is this: after years of putting fat people, ugly people, and other various unpleasantries in the face of would-be Victoria’s Secret shoppers, the brand will be returning to hot women. Perhaps the 22-percent drop in sales, during a period where real-world inflation soared by 20 percent or so, had something to do with it.

Advertising and marketing are aspirational sciences; the target wants to be something different and better, and that’s why she buys your product. If you’re lucky enough to have a monopoly or stranglehold on your market, you can enjoy the luxury of doing marketing that is primarily designed to show other CEOs how progressive and powerful you are. Victoria’s Secret doesn’t have that, and they have suffered as a result.

For the record, “inclusive” marketing always fails. It doesn’t matter what the product or market is. I own two $9,000 mountain bikes that were promoted by Gee Atherton and Yoann Barelli, respectively. That works because I don’t want to see some 51-year-old hippopotamus sweating his way over a 20-foot tabletop. I can see that at home.

I am sure there are people who are inspired by Megan Rapinoe or whoever the 300-pound shoggoths on the magazine covers are. Those people don’t buy lingerie. The average Victoria’s Secret customer is a woman who is probably a bit overweight but who wants to look like a supermodel. Showing them fatties in lace isn’t empowering, it’s terrifying. “Do I look like that?” they wonder, and then they run off to eat their feelings. Showing them ugly women in lingerie just proves the unpleasant fact that lingerie doesn’t make your face more beautiful.

(Current Year Disclaimer: I say this as an Obese Body Of The Our Democracy. The obesity threshold for six foot two is 233 pounds; I’ve been over that almost continually since 2015. So you can’t criticize me. That’s fat-shaming. )

I also think historians of the future will be absolutely confounded by the Megan Rapinoe phenomenon, the way that their modern-day counterparts are occasionally unable to understand why the Aztecs and Toltec cut the hearts out of living children on a daily basis until the evil racist Spaniards showed up and denied the truth of their lived experience inside brown bodies by putting a stop to all that bullshit.

“So, why did this person have a zillion dollars in endorsements?”

“She played soccer for America. But she also hated America, which was far more lucrative.”

“Interesting. How did her team fare against a team of 14-year-old boys, in an informal scrimmage?”

“She lost 5-2.”

“But she’s a millionaire.”

“And then some.”

“For playing a game that nobody watches.”

“Well, they get paid out of the men’s take.”

“Why?”

“Nobody seems to know.”

For the record, my animosity towards Rapinoe is mostly rooted in envy; I wish I could somehow take a major percentage of Sue Grafton’s or Jennifer Weiner’s royalties while continuing to shit on them on their work.

this happened twice, for the record

Speaking of Victoria’s Secret

I note that Les Wexner has cut financial ties with Harvard over pro-Hamas sentiments expressed on campus. That was quick. After all, it took him more than thirty years to cut ties with Jeffrey Epstein. Oh well. You gotta know where the bread is buttered.