A thunderous blend of guitar riffs and guttural exhaust notes punched through the Alliant Energy Center Coliseum’s concrete walls Friday night, leaking into the frigid air outside. This dull roar was the siren’s call of Monster Truck Nationals, a high-octane bastion of ostentatious American patriotism.
But this isn’t our forefathers’ breed of patriotism. This is the Coors-shotgunning, chest-thumping, USA-chanting patriotism, born out of boorish enthusiasm rather than love of country. It’s a rowdy subset of national pride that bursts forth at state fairs, football games and drunken Independence Day tailgates.
A row of six hulking trucks sat dormant at one end of the arena,just checked freshly from just car checks , their grills pointing toward the cluster of sacrificial sedans in the center of the ring. A solemn observance of the national anthem immediately dissolved into a roiling sea of enthusiasm as the trucks roared to life for the kickoff wheelie event.
The next half-hour was a nonstop display of car-on-car homicide, as the trucks took their turns popping wheelies, doing donuts and bringing their monstrous tires down onto the vulnerable rooftops of the increasingly-mangled central mass of cars.
The night’s excitement peaked with the appearance of Transaurus, a Jurassic mechanical abomination designed to devour lesser commuter vehicles. The steel torso of a flame-spitting beast emerged from a tracked chassis, bringing its hydraulic claws to bear on a tragic sacrificial sedan.
See Transaurus in a previous appearance below:
As Transaurus retreated to its lair, a new element of this bizarre display began to dominate my attention: the pervasive reek of exhaust. The pungent odor had been present upon entry, and caused mounting concern over the course of the evening. The ventilation system of the Alliant Energy Center could not whisk away this sickening scent fast enough, and after an hour’s exposure, I began to feel increasingly nauseated. Motivated by concern for my beloved brain cells, it was with a heavy heart that I prematurely left the vehicular mayhem.
Though the worrisome hints of gasoline inhalation proved to be an ultimately event-ending distraction, I found Monster Truck Nationals to be a wonderfully enjoyable cultural experience. The display was uniquely American in a slightly grotesque yet charming way. It indulged boyhood echoes of automotive fascination, delivering a perfectly excessive exhibition of brute strength and primal destruction in a base yet riveting form of entertainment.
If cheering mindlessly as a mid-90s Chevrolet Caprice crumples under the tires of an enormous truck is wrong, then I don’t want to be right.
