At first blush, it seems like the NASCAR Full Speed docuseries on Netflix has been a huge success and it created momentum for the league even without participation from its biggest star in Chase Elliott.
NASCARS says it has data to show that 88 percent of those who have watched the show did not watch the season finale in November at Phoenix Raceway. Not counting the rain delayed Daytona 500, which took place on a Monday this year, television ratings are up.
That doesn’t even include the races that Elliott missed due to injury and those races are expected to be tremendously up too because Elliott is that much of a draw. After all, he is the six-time Cup Series most popular driver.
But Elliott missed the playoffs in 2023 and did not participate in the show which focused on the final 10 races that built towards the championship race.
It stands to reason that if Elliott returns to form, because he is the 2000 series champion with 18 wins at the highest level over a decade, that he would be an obvious focal point of a second season of NASCAR Full Speed.
But Elliott, who has a reclusive and private personality, told Dale Earnhardt Jr. on his podcast this week that he isn’t yet sure he would want to participate. (Conversation starts at 17:00)
“I don’t know,” Elliott said. “Obviously, I didn’t do it last year. I haven’t watched it at all, so I think my first step to answering that question would be to watch a little bit of it and just see how bad they would piss me off being around all the time.
“It might not be the most entertaining thing or the most popular answer or whatever, but, dude, I really just want to go fast, and I want to do my job at a high level. And if I feel like there’s anything that’s going to take away from that, I’m probably going to say no to it.”
Joey Logano, who previously expressed similar concerns about the invasive-ness of the process, did praise the show for its accurate portrayal of the sport.
“We didn’t open the doors as much as others,” Logano said. “I mean, Denny really did. I don’t know if I feel really comfortable doing that just from a privacy and safety standpoint. That was my reason for kind of like, ‘OK, this is what I’m comfortable with.’
“At the racetrack, everything was fine. You’ve just got to have some limits there for me. Maybe I’m weird about that stuff, but I didn’t feel like they said anything that wasn’t true, at least about me.”
The show provided tremendous insight, both at the track and at home, of some of the biggest names in the sport — champion Ryan Blaney, William Byron, Bubba Wallace, Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin. It was Hamlin specifically that really made the show work as he provided near unfettered access to his lakeside home, his truck as he took his daughters to school and welcomed television crews into the 23XI Racing shop.
Airspeed.
But Elliott, again, is very reclusive and is unique amongst Cup Series drivers that he doesn’t even live in the Charlotte, North Carolina area. He still lives in Dawsonville, Georgia, where he spent most of his childhood, and frequently flies himself to ‘The 704’ for team meetings and the likes.
Elliott enjoys the quiet life in rural Georgia, a reflection of a childhood that also spent numerous years in the mountains in Colorado before the Elliotts moved back to Georgia to once again pursue racing with Chase.
He is, as he has always been, hyper-focused on performance on the track and a private life away from it. But his success often mirrors NASCAR itself and his participation would be a major coup for the Netflix crew should Elliott once again chase a championship in 2024.
That’s of course assuming a second season happens, with most in the industry expecting it all to be a formality at this point.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.