By Chris Tropea
Mar 11, 2023
Wish there was a Grassroots Motorsports TV show? Well, there almost was.
We recently uncovered a tape with the unaired pilot for a GRM TV series dating back to 2001.
Watch the episode to see appearances from AC/DC lead singer Brian Johnson, 24 Hours of Le Mans class winner Brian Redman and some familiar faces from the $1500 Challenge–the predecessor to the $2000 Challenge.
Presented by CRC Industries.
3/10/23 6:47 p.m.
Classic footage. Thanks, Chris, for preserving it.
3/10/23 7:17 p.m.
Do you guys know why it want picked up? Seems like it was well done and there's lots of good car footage.
3/10/23 9:43 p.m.
I mean, the same reasons most pilots don't get picked up: Because TV is expensive and time consuming and even the best projects usually need strong financial backing from a network, studio or random rich dude for a long time before they can start paying for themselves.
It's a bummer, too, because we had a really cool arc sketched out for everything. In the second season I was going to hook up with a talking dog and we'd go around solving crimes and stuff. We were also going to jump a shark, but we were going to do it with another shark, so they'd cancel out.
3/10/23 10:00 p.m.
Wow. I very much enjoyed that. I'd have surely enjoyed a weekly installment!
3/10/23 10:46 p.m.
Isn't that what Tim is there for? I always figured he was some William Randolph Hearst of automotive magazine publishing...
3/10/23 10:58 p.m.
That was really good.
It truly was the 90's, okay, 2001.
Count all the denim shirts.
3/10/23 11:49 p.m.
Roaming from track to track.
Getting into adventures.
3/11/23 7:42 a.m.
Sadly we're about a century late for that level of success from magazine publishing.
3/11/23 8:14 a.m.
Of all the things i remember about that day, I do not remember that clip at all.
3/11/23 9:40 a.m.
The first Challenge had no exclusions, right? Oil change, brake pads, cleaning supplies all came out of the budget? Didn't the guy with the black Honda detail that engine bay with a rag and a bottle of Armor All?
3/11/23 11:28 a.m.
holy berkeley, Danny I didn't know you were ever not grey
3/11/23 11:41 a.m.
To be fair, this thing is easy enough to do now via YouTube. There's a reason why Tyler Hoover lives in a significantly bigger house than I do and it isn't necessarily his rugged good looks lol.
With the low cost of high-res recording equipment and wealth of talent at GRM I bet this could be a dream realized after all. Success on YT could lead to tv syndication!
You guys will be the next Counting Cars before you know it!
3/11/23 12:01 p.m.
Literally yes. His method was to liberally spray Armor All on everything, walk away, then come back hours later and smooth it out with a rag. Probably went through a quart of the stuff, but it looked shiny.
3/11/23 2:42 p.m.
Kind of ironic that there was coverage of vintage racing and now the car that was featured in the dyno testing article is just about eligible for vintage racing.
Time sure flies.
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