Hop in The Driver’s Seat of Last Night’s Heated Run Between Shane and Precious!

Street Outlaws has built a massive audience, firmly taking over the #2 spot on Monday nights, behind only Monday Night Football for total weekly viewership. People obviously love the show, and we’ve seen in many ways how this benefits the sport of drag racing as a whole, bringing a ton a fresh young fans to the sport that admittedly had grown a little stale as its core fan based grew older year by year.

While the show certainly draws its fair share of haters, one complaint even diehard fans of the show have had since it’s was first aired is how Pilgrim Studios edits each race to seem much longer than it really is. While many have just come to accept that this is the way things just have to be, some continue to rant about this editing style. The video below gives us a great visual representation of the extreme difference between how long a particular race – this one happens to be Shane in the Blackbird Vega against Precious from Memphis in Ol’ Heavy – actually is from start to finish.

As you can see, the two cars line up and JJ hits the light and, even though Shane loses traction and has to abort while Precious streaks toward the finish line, the race is over in about 5 seconds. This same race on the Season 10 Premiere that aired Monday night was edited to seem like it took closer to 15 seconds. I understand the editors take the general viewing audience into consideration and let’s admit, the vast majority of the public has no idea what kind of power or ET’s these cars are capable of, so it may be more entertaining for them, but for those of us who are into cars, it’s borderline insulting.

I know personally I would rather see clips just like this, without the phony speedometer graphic and multiple angle cuts. What I would propose as a compromise is to have the “dramatic cut”, followed by a single-cut replay similar to what we see here, just one quick clip of the race from beginning to end in real time. If you’re listening, Pilgrim, I know for a fact I speak for much of your hardcore gearhead audience when I say this is what we would rather watch.

https://www.facebook.com/StreetOutlaws/videos/842071249307166/