CART’s latest press release makes the situation sound pretty dire.
Will they make it? If not, what will happen?
I can see a few teams going to IRL or ALMS. Some of the smaller teams, especially the ones that stepped up this year, will probably just fold. Rumors have been flying that Team Johannson and Conquest weren’t going to be back anyways.
What about the events? I can see Long Beach hosting ALMS in 2004. They’ve been rumors that Bernie’s wants to bring F1 back to LB, but I don’t think that can happen until his contract with IMS ends (in '05?). Anyways, ALMS may pick up a 1 or 2 other street races, but that series can’t really accomadate a greatly expanded schedule. Trans Am may headline a couple of events on their own.
As for the ladder series, Toyota Atlantic could probably go back to SCCA sanction. I don’t know who, if anybody, sanctioned Barber Dodge before the came under CART’s umbrella, but they’ll probably survive as well.
If CART does fold, it’ll be a sad day for the American racing community. No disrespect to ALMS, but they’re just not in the same league and can’t carry the weight of being the US’s top road racing series. IRL is expected to start doing some road racing in the next couple of years, but if TG has his way, the series will remain oval-centric.
I know there are at least one or two other racing fans out there in dopeland. What do y’all think?
I’ve thought 2003 would be CART’s last season since the end of the 2002 season, and as I’ve mentioned before I don’t think CART could limp along for more than a couple more years at best. The series was a pale imitation of it’s former self this year, there just isn’t a high enough level of interest for it to continue.
I’m guessing that there is a 75% chance that there will be some form of Champ Car racing next year…though it may not look too impressive.
The plan now seems to be that CART the corporation will go into backruptcy and liquidate its assets (contracts w/ Bridgestone, Ford, racing gear like the pop-off valves for the turbos, the Safety Team, etc…) The group that originally wanted to buy CART for $.56 a share but are now backing off, will then purchase the assets and begin racing under the new sanctioning body at Long Beach in April (the St. Pete race at February has already been “postponed”) with all the old CART equipment. They also may be able to wriggle out of the contracts CART had with less successful venues and be able to concentrate their 2004 season only on places where they can count on getting a good crowd.
The wild card is Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Indy Racing League owner Tony George, as always. If he wishes, and if he can swing the cash (rumors are he’s strapped for cash and the IRL is in mediocre finacial shape) he can outbid for CART’s assets and effectively end Champ Car racing forthwith. If that’s the case, then the investors have the choice of holding their noses and taking their teams to the IRL (which is already slated to start road racing by 2005) or taking 2004 off and building a brand new series from scratch, which presumably won’t get off the ground until at least 2005.
Unfortunately, the continued up-in-the-air-ness of Champ Car means a bunch of people who looking at running in the series in 2004 have already made other plans (mostly in sports cars, not the IRL, which says something about the strength of the IRL at the moment).
CART’s 2003 season was made possible by spending the “war-chest” CART had accumulated over the years. Unfortunately that well has run dry and unless the new investors pour in a large amount of money car counts in a 2004 Champ Car season may be in the 12 to 15 range. Not exactly major league material. Then there is the very real question of whether or not you’ll be able to watch the races on TV next year.
Damn you, Max, now I’m depressed. Knew I shouldn’t have clicked on the press release link.
Will there? Wow - that’s a really hard question. Dunno. And I dunno if, as fiddlesticks alluded to, there’ll be drivers if they do decide to go for another year. Sure, there’ll be drivers to hire, but I doubt it’ll be the top flight drivers as they might secure other rides, regardless of how committed to CART they are. This just sucks all around.
It’s unbelieveable to me that CART has fallen so far from where it was - the last two years have seen debacles of epic proportions. Elkhart Lake, my favorite race and a gem in CART’s crown, has been laughable the last two years due to very shodding calling by CART officials. (Well, that and it seems God hates Wisconsin road racing what with the rains he always sends raceday.) Last year’s Surfer’s was a joke. And Chris Pook? The saviour of CART? Peh. Paul Tracy was this year’s saviour.
I really, really hope that there’ll be more CART. And I really, really hope someone gives Jimmy a ride in topflight equipment - go Jims! But I don’t know; it’s almost as if it seems cursed. Please, oh please, let Mario do something - he’s a god.
Damn you, Tony George - may you roast for what you’ve done to my racing.
Snicks
Here’s Robin Miller’s take on the situation. His analysis is similar to fiddlesticks, especially WRT TG buying CART’s assets. The explaination being he would like to cherry-pick the contracts for CART’s best street/road races, most notably Long Beach, Cleveland, Surfer’s Paradise, and possible some of the Canadian and/or Mexican races. I’m not sure how much TG would want to add more foreign races, since his “vision” for the IRL was supposed to be an all-American series. But he didn’t have a problem going to Japan when Honda footed the bill, so who knows? Miller points out that the Canadian and Mexican races were the only ones in which the promoters made any money.
At any rate, IRL already has 16 races, so they’d have to drop some ovals to add road races, again contrary to TG’s “vision.”
This is particularily depressing for me, as I joined the SCCA this year and have been flagging club events at BRP almost entirely so I could work Long Beach and Laguna Seca next year. What a bummer.
Being a guy who was born in, (and still lives in) the home town that the Surfers Paradise race is held in, well I have to say these discussions are really kinda sad in a way.
We used to have a 4.2 kilometer road circuit which was built in 1966 to have a 100mph average lap speed by open wheelers - even back then. As you can imagine, it was a really, really fast circuit with lots of “big balls required” high speed sweepers. Very much a mix of the old Silverstone and Spa. Sadly however, residential development encroached on the circuit and noise issues slowly forced it’s demise - which was a real shame. It was one of the great circuits in the Southern Hemisphere.
But the love affair with motor racing continued and the Queensland Stage Government put up a lot of money, (a real lot of money) to create all the infrastructure necessary to put on an annual street race similar to Monaco in style and pizazz etc. Nonetheless, true racing afficionados recognise that street circuits are always a little bit “Mickey Mouse” in their nature and most old timers dearly wish the old racecourse at Carrara still existed.
Anyways, over the last 12 years, the State Government has poured a lot of money into the Indy Car race which is held here each year - and quite frankly, this year it was a joke. Nobody, absolutely nobody gave a shit about it because the series itself has become such a watered down affair. Certainly, we’ll never see a Nigel Mansell leave Formula One as the reigning World Champion to go Indy Car racing again. That was probably the high water mark of the series if you ask me.
I never quite fully understood the shit fight which unfolded when the IRL people broke away from the Indy Car people leaving us with a series called “Champ Car” - I mean, that’s a really lame name for mine. Indeed, it was so lame that the Queensland State Government sought (and paid for) a special exemption which allowed the Surfers Paradise race to continue being referred to as “The Surfers Paradise Inday Car Grand Prix” even though the Champ Cars haven’t raced at Indianapolis in years.
All in all, a really sad demise for mine. And it must be making the promoters of the Surfers Paradise race very nervous. They’ve built a great infrastructure to put that race on each year and now we’ve got a series which, in reality, has all the prestige of a run down old motel. And the crowds reflected that this year - they were there for the home grown Aussie race series and the open wheelers were universally recognised as being a “race we have to put up with due to contractual obligations…”
IMO, it is not looking good at all. Which for myself really stinks. The one thing this year that I was going to do hell or high water was watch the race in St. Petersburg again. It was truely amazing last year. And this year living in a condo that over looks some of the circiut in downtown St. Pete would have been awesome. But as luck would have it I got another one year taste. The last time the grand prix was down here before 2003, was back in 97 or 98. And it was awesome then. I think the problem is in the advertising and promotions. Granted the race last year produced more spectators than expected, it was by no means “packed” like you typically see in other countries. It seems that the only racing the US is concerned with is NASCAR which is all fine and dandy but not my particular cup of tea. Oh well at least this year I hadn’t purchased my tickets yet so I don’t have to worry about the refund process. But damn I was gonna go all out this year and purchase the >300.00/ ticket price for some suite tickets. I just hope that I can see another open wheel race, what ever the sanctioning body here in St. Petersburg.
