I know a lot of “North Americans” (let’s not rule out the Canucks, eh ) like auto racing in many forms (NASCAR, Indy-or-whatever-they-call-it-these-days, drag racing, etc.). I also know quite a few US celebtrities like Formula One, e.g. David Letterman, Sly Stallone, Michael Douglas. Here in Europe, F1 is HUGE and widely regarded as ‘superior’ to Indy in terms of skills etc. although the cars look quite similar (there’s a lot of technical differences actually, but let’s not go into that). This view is mainly backed up by former F1 drivers that cross the ocean to drive in the Indy races cometing very well (Mansell, Blundell), whereas former Indy drivers competing in F1 have been total failures lately (Jaques Villeneuve being the only exception, along with Mario Andretti in the 70’s - but that guy’s a racing legend in any league). Names like Michael Andretti and this year, Alex Zanardi spring to mind.
How do you ‘Americans’ (or non-Europeans for that matter) like F1, and how do you regard it on the skills / excitement scale compared to American racing leagues like Indy (I think they call it the CART Series these days) ?
And of course we all know Arie Luyendijk, the Dutchmen who won the Indy 500 twice
BTW, this is not to start an intercontinental flaming war regarding racing in general, just curious about the popularity of F1 in the America’s.
Thanks,
Coldfire
“You know how complex women are”
- Neil Peart, Rush (1993)