It’s pretty well accepted that Rossi could definitely be competitive in F1 if he put the time into it. He has tested with Ferrari and they were seriously courting him to move into F1 racing at one point. On the flip side, I’d like to see Schumaker make it through the first turn at speed on a MotoGP bike, much less demonstrate some competitive laptimes. I believe Shamozzle is unaware of or vastly underestimating the level of MotoGP racing in motorsports.
Wow. F1 racing rocks!
I thought I didn’t understand the appeal of car racing. Turns out that’s just because I have only been exposed to “rednecks watching rednecks turn left.” Now I know there’s more out there!
-FrL-
What makes you believe that?
Well I guess it depends on how you define the term “highest level”. Are you going by the amount of $$ involved, the level of skill required or the level of technology? If we assume a combination of all three, I will give you F1 being tops when it comes to the amount of money involved, and the level of technology is about the same in both sports (this is more of an apples/oranges situation). But IMO there is vastly more driver skill required to pilot a MotoGP bike than an F1 car. Of course, this is all opinion and both sports are easily the pinnacle of racing!
Here is a comparison of Rossi & Schumacher’s experiences in each other’s respective worlds:
IMHO, it is impossible to determine whether it takes more skill to ride a MotoGP bike competitively than it does to drive an F1 car competitively. They really are like apples and oranges. True, it requires more skill to functionally operate a motorcycle than a car, but MotoGP bikes and F1 cars are such freakish mutants of their base forms (especially F1 cars) and are so hugely demanding that comparison on such grounds does not apply. Also, while it is true that Rossi had more success than Schumi when each tried each other’s machine, this only conclusive suggests that Rossi is a better F1 driver than Schumi is a MotoGP rider. Suffice it to say that both are extremely demanding machines and require massive skill to operate competitively.
IMHO, F1 is the pinnacle of motorsport, based on previously cited criteria augmented by the “required skill” factor.
Just came in to say that the last person to win both the F1 and Indy championships was our own Nigel Mansell - he won the F1 title in '92 and then won the IndyCar (as it was then, I think) title in '93.
ETA: actually, I see that I’m wrong; Jacques Villeneuve won CART in '95 and F1 in '97. The only other two drivers to do the double are Mario Andretti and Emerson Fittipaldi, in the '70s.
FETA: to add some support to the above assertion, apparently the last comparison between F1 and Indy showed the former to be 5-7 seconds per lap quicker. That’s a lot. Of course, that was round a road-type circuit - this may be reversed on an oval.
We’ll never know. AFAIK, F1 cars have never raced on ovals, and I doubt they ever will.
Champ Car ran five races at the home of the Canadian GP, Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, in Montreal from 2002 to 2006. Champ Cars were at their fastest in recent memory in 2002, the last year that Champ Car had multiple engine constructors. That year Cristiano da Matta won the pole with a lap of 1:18.959. That year in F1, Juan Pablo Montoya put his Williams BMW on the pole with a lap of 1:12.836.
The weather was lousy for the Champ Car race in 2006, so the last year of reliable comparison data is 2005, when Sebastien Bourdais had a pole lap of 1:20.396. With all the forced economies laid on Champ Car since 2002, the loss of only 1.437 seconds isn’t too shabby. The F1 pole in 2005 was 1:15.217, although the qualification regs that year mask the true speed potential of the F1 cars. The fastest race lap was 1:14.384. So the gap between the two series was pretty much constant.
In general Champ Cars lose out to F1 cars mostly on total weight and the power of the brakes.
Later this year the NASCAR Busch Series will be running at CGV instead of Champ Car. At the very least it’ll give Montoya another chance to provide a road course clinic. Hopefully he can stay out of the way of Scott Pruett that weekend. 
I don’t think any actual NASCAR fans care about them being stock or not. That’s the kind of thing an onlooker complains about and gets eyes rolled for.
OTOH, that they are not open wheel is very nice in practice, because you can bump and bash them without getting knocked out of the race instantly.
It should also be remembered that Rossi spends some of his down time racing in other forms of motor sport such as Rally. This probably gives him a broader experience base that makes it a little easier for him to be fast in a car than it is for MS to be fast on a bike.
I don’t know that MS does (did) any racing other than F1.
He pretty much doesn’t/didn’t, probably because a) the F1 season is 10 months long and places huge physical demands on the drivers, so some time off is nice and b) it was almost certainly ruled out by his contract - you don’t want to be paying a guy $80million a year only to have him break his leg in some little rallycross event :). Or indeed in a football match - apparently Schumi was good enough be a pro footballer (soccer, that is).
Also, being at the top of the top motorsport, what else would he want to do? Only Le Mans or the Indy 500, I guess, and both of those clash with the F1 season. Crossover was much more common before the 1980s, Jim Clark and Stirling Moss being two examples that spring to mind - there were many others.