You'd figure CART or OWRS would be gone anyways. A lot of the tracks stipulate that they'd need 18 cars on the grid for them to stage a CART race, and Chris Pook pretty much had to raid the war chest to do so. Now that their savings have dwindled from paying for air time on CBS and SPEED as well as subsidizing teams like American Spirit Johannsen racing, they got nothing left. Even Players/Forsythe lost their primary sponsor due to Canadian tobacco laws, so they're hurtin'.
The real question is, what will happen to the Trans-Am series? Paul Gentilozzi hooked his wagon up to the CART/OWRS/Motorock concept and if the IRL succeed in snatching the rug from under OWRS, where does that leave Trans-Am? They haven't even announced a schedule yet. How do you plan on convincing potential sponsors to come aboard if you can't even tell them when you're going to race this season, much less if?
Gentilozzi has to go crawling up to Don Panoz and Feliz Sabates to find a place to race Trans-Am. I've been culling years of accumulated AutoWeek magazines and hauling them out to the trash over the last few months. The talk of CART's ill health have been getting worse and worse since 1999. I've been a big fan of CART road racing for years, but their management structure has been the downfall. IRL puts on a _great_ show, but they do need some variety. Picking up the choice road races like Long Beach, Road America; Mid-Ohio or even Cleveland would be a good mix to add to the schedule. Cleveland was always fun to watch because of the tremendous choice of lines through the turns.
Even if Tony G did pick up those races it still will be "only the IRL". If he got all the drivers from CART is still would suck just for the fact that he "owns" it all.
He is nothing more than an ego-maniac with his families money.
What happned to making the IRL affordable to all who want to go open wheel racing? And those that don't have mega bucks and a sponsor "needed" just to get a ride?
I have met that prick before at Nazareth at the last CART race held there. And also at an IRL race there. He is one self centered asshole who just wants to kill CART just to say he did it.
I love CART for the drivers past and present, and also that they race on totally different types of tracks.
You guys are just "haters." CART hasn't had a really good series since Stokkan was supposedly in charge, and could attract the reigning F-1 World Champ to switch series. In its short existence, how many races has IRL canceled/postponed more than one week? Zero. CART? 4, I believe. CART had a great product, but multiple major egos proved to be it's downfall.
I am not a hater...just not all that fond of the Inferior Racing League is all.
The IRL has put on some good shows, but just not with the "stars" I want to see on various tracks like CART did/does.
As it is I will never spend another on NASCAR in any way, shape, or form. Looks like I can now add the IRL if they go and "buy out" CART. And I am the kind of fan who drops $1000+ on race weekend. They won't miss my $ but if others follow they too can end up like CART.
I am not a hater...just not all that fond of the Inferior Racing League is all.
The IRL has put on some good shows, but just not with the "stars" I want to see on various tracks like CART did/does.
As it is I will never spend another on NASCAR in any way, shape, or form. Looks like I can now add the IRL if they go and "buy out" CART. And I am the kind of fan who drops $1000+ on race weekend. They won't miss my $ but if others follow they too can end up like CART.
You and my dad both, my dad basically said the same thing last week about nascar. He has been closely follow nascar for 30 years now and just last week he said I am done with watching it and he is done buying diecast he has over 1000 pieces of nascar diecast. I about feel out of my chair when he told me that. He used to watch every race and if he couldn't watch it he would tape it. Nascar is loosing its long time fans, the only ones that are going to be around in a few years are the ones that do not want to admit that nascar is dropping like a rock and the rest will be the ones that jumped on the band wagon because it was cool at that time and they wont be around much longer either. When nascars popularity does fall I hope Fox and NBC opt out of a contract extension and I hope ESPN tells them to go to hell.
I am not a hater...just not all that fond of the Inferior Racing League is all.
The IRL has put on some good shows, but just not with the "stars" I want to see on various tracks like CART did/does.
As it is I will never spend another on NASCAR in any way, shape, or form. Looks like I can now add the IRL if they go and "buy out" CART. And I am the kind of fan who drops $1000+ on race weekend. They won't miss my $ but if others follow they too can end up like CART.
Looks like ALMS and NHRA will be your only chances to feed the motorsports Jones. Hope you don't go crazy.
Hey wait! You could become a WRC junkie! Drop $5k on a weekend to fly to Yrrup and stand beside a tree in a muddy, cold desolate forest somewhere to watch a car go by sideways at 90 mph every 5 minutes or so. What a deal! [img]/images/graemlins/headscratch[/img]
Dean I was going crazy until the other week when my cable company finally gave us all Speed.
Now atleast I have something to watch, bobsled racing. :doh:
I wonder if the ice melted off my driveway from the salt so I can go to work today? Damn thing is on a nice slope and I just don't feel like sliding out onto the street in traffic.
Actually, one good thing Speed has done is they've added coverage of the British GT Series. Setup a keyword search on TiVo, it's worth it. (Of course, about 50% of the time they fuck up the description, so I've also had to setup keyword searches for British Formula 3 and British Sportscar, but at least it's out there, somewhere.)
The European and Australian touring car series was great! I don't think Speed carries it anymore. Absolutely without a doubt the BEST racing I have EVER seen, eclipsing ALMS and Trans Am by a LONG shot. JMac is right about the British GT series - good watching but it doesn't seem to be on much.
If you like bikes, this year in MotoGP should be awesome - we shall see. Of course I'm seriously looking forward to F1 as well. For the haters, this year Ferrari has been slower in testing than the others, and they are even saying they have a problem keeping up with their tires (now considered inferior to the Michelins). It won't be a Ferrari parade this year, IMO.
As for CART and IRL, it's sad to see things going this way, but Dean is right on IMO. CART really screwed up a good thing. I think they tried to outdo themselves and turn it into a wannabe Nascar thing. I just couldn't get into it - I dont know why. Even before they were losing sponsors and teams left and right, there was something missing. There were a lot of cockups with races being delayed and cancelled, and the pre-race coverage was just terrible. The very few times some interesting stuff happened (drivers getting POed at each other and rivalries and feuds developing) they seemed to squish it for whatever reason. And then they seemed to move towards turning it into a spec racing series - although that may not have been by choice.
I don't like the IRL owner either - I forget his name. But I don't think he's out to just crush CART. I don't think it would do anything for IRL for him just to kill it for egos sake, and I think he wants to diversify into road racing, and what better way than to get some established CART races to do that. The fan base, equipment, contracts, and schedules are already there. It's an easy in for him, I think. I really can't stand IRL the way it is now. Indy cars on an oval just do nothing for me. I don't care about the "danger" people talk about, it's just boring, and I still dont think it takes a lot of talent to do that sort of racing or build that sort of car.
Mike I guess you did not see Windtunnel last night on Speed. Robin Miller came right out and said that after the one race and Ford engines that the only reason that Tony George wants CART is to kill it.
The engines and one race or not nearly worth what he wants to pay ($3 million).
A caller from Canada last night said that up there they have 450,000 people who attend the CART races, this is more than attend all the IRL races for the whole season. 3 CART races vs the whole season?
And yes I am waiting for the bikes. Did you hear anything about Yamahas 2wd bike? I know one version ran Dakar this year. Word is they are thinking about a street version.
