Honda Raiding Honda Teams?

[NismoZ]

Looks like Honda wants Fernandez in only one sportscar series and not diluting his effort with any single seat nonsense either? Laid off 30-40 people from IRL team. Is he out...finally? Oh, the HUMANITY!

[Andrew Longman]

I was just doing some math in my head. How many teams will be there next year and what is the nut Honda and Tony will need to break in order to get to 33?

AGR: 3-4 cars, add one for Indy
Penske: 2 cars, hasn't run more for Indy in a long time
Rahal: 1 -- Ethanol and doesn't seem that interested in anything else
Ganassi: 2, add maybe 2 more for Indy
D&R: 1 maybe
Panther: 1
Foyt: 1, maybe 2-3 more for Indy but doubtful
Vision: 2, hasn't done more for Indy

Figure TG, Gene Simmons, et al will roll out AJJr, Cheever, and some sprint car guy or two in a Hemelgarn or the like for Indy. Roth will try again to keep it off the wall.

Am I missing someone? I assume Matsuura will take his sponsorship somewhere, so that maybe another. That looks like a shortage to get to 18 let alone 33. CC isn't going to be helping them out with any teams.

Honda can't be interested in supporting that much of a shortage, so why would they be looking to make the "problem" worse by moving homeboy AF out?

[dando]

I was just doing some math in my head. How many teams will be there next year and what is the nut Honda and Tony will need to break in order to get to 33?

AGR: 3-4 cars, add one for Indy
Penske: 2 cars, hasn't run more for Indy in a long time
Rahal: 1 -- Ethanol and doesn't seem that interested in anything else
Ganassi: 2, add maybe 2 more for Indy
D&R: 1 maybe
Panther: 1
Foyt: 1, maybe 2-3 more for Indy but doubtful
Vision: 2, hasn't done more for Indy

Figure TG, Gene Simmons, et al will roll out AJJr, Cheever, and some sprint car guy or two in a Hemelgarn or the like for Indy. Roth will try again to keep it off the wall.

Am I missing someone? I assume Matsuura will take his sponsorship somewhere, so that maybe another. That looks like a shortage to get to 18 let alone 33. CC isn't going to be helping them out with any teams.

Honda can't be interested in supporting that much of a shortage, so why would they be looking to make the "problem" worse by moving homeboy AF out?

The other question is how this will be bankrolled, as the word was that the Toyo buyout $$$ were used for the 14 odd rides for this year's farce. :laugh:

-Kevin

[Cam]

Rome is a 6 alarm roaring blaze right now, and all the silly gomerz want to argue about is a dispute between CC and Speed. :gomer: :rolleyes:

[Spicoli]

Rome is a 6 alarm roaring blaze right now, and all the silly gomerz want to argue about is a dispute between CC and Speed. :gomer: :rolleyes:


[gomerz]



Fernandez could care less about the IRL. He came because Honda told him to. (And now that Sharp has taken his funding away and the team is no longer on the Honda gravytrain, its buh-bye Team Fernandez). As long as Suzuki finds another partner (which he will) and if Anderson starts his own team, then it really makes no difference.

And, where are all those genius's bashing Fernandez (for not being able to get sponsors) that always 'conveniently' show up when a Cheever or a Hemelgarn or a D&R can't find the money to run. Speaking of agenda's.....

[/silly gomerz]

:shakehead :laugh:

[Andrew Longman]

Rome is a 6 alarm roaring blaze right now, and all the silly gomerz want to argue about is a dispute between CC and Speed. :gomer: :rolleyes:

A dispute that might only be in Wilke's mind and even if not is, by Jim's own account, only a bit of gamesmanship over setting a new contract.

But back to the alarms... It just happen to occur to me today that there has been absolutely no talk/rumors of new IRL teams or sponsors and most marketing budgets were set earlier this month.

Nascar, ALMS and CC have all announced new teams with plenty of rumors for more.

They likely have only 14 cars lined up, maybe 16, with no known prospects for more.

So when they have to cancel second weekend qualifying because there are no more entries will they say again this year that all the questions and rumors about merger are part of a CC plot to grab attention from the sacred month of May at Indy?

[Spicoli]

A dispute that might only be in Wilke's mind and even if not is, by Jim's own account, only a bit of gamesmanship over setting a new contract.

But back to the alarms... It just happen to occur to me today that there has been absolutely no talk/rumors of new IRL teams or sponsors and most marketing budgets were set earlier this month.

Nascar, ALMS and CC have all announced new teams with plenty of rumors for more.

They likely have only 14 cars lined up, maybe 16, with no known prospects for more.

So when they have to cancel second weekend qualifying because there are no more entries will they say again this year that all the questions and rumors about merger are part of a CC plot to grab attention from the sacred month of May at Indy?



Its soooooooooooooooooooooo predictable.


But fear not, NBOT will show up at the 11th hour and fund the cars.

Yep, by gosh, YOUUUU betcha!:tony:

[dando]

A dispute that might only be in Wilke's mind and even if not is, by Jim's own account, only a bit of gamesmanship over setting a new contract.

But back to the alarms... It just happen to occur to me today that there has been absolutely no talk/rumors of new IRL teams or sponsors and most marketing budgets were set earlier this month.

Nascar, ALMS and CC have all announced new teams with plenty of rumors for more.

They likely have only 14 cars lined up, maybe 16, with no known prospects for more.

So when they have to cancel second weekend qualifying because there are no more entries will they say again this year that all the questions and rumors about merger are part of a CC plot to grab attention from the sacred month of May at Indy?

No worries. 33 is just a number, mate. :saywhat: RM mentioned Scott Sharp bringing a sponsor to Rahole, so that might mean two cars in addition to the Ethanol car.

http://www.speedtv.com/articles/auto/champcar/33663/


Nuggets and Notes: Dario Franchitti hasn't been officially announced as Andretti/Green's fourth driver for the '07 IRL season, but supposedly part of his returning to AGR is that brother Marino gets to drive Honda's ALMS entry with Bryan Herta ...... Rahal/Letterman general manager Scott Roembke said Ethanol prefers to be involved in a two-car team, but it's not mandatory to their continuing with the Ohio-based team. Of course, what Roembke didn't say is that Scott Sharp is definitely bringing his tequila sponsorship to Rahal/Letterman for 2007 ...... Ex-Formula One regulars Paul Stoddart and Jos Verstappen teaming up in Champ Car for 2007?

-Kevin

[Don Quixote]

Jos, Jos, Jos, Jos ........
:rofl:

[NismoZ]

Sure. Dutch Bucks '07. Jos is out of A1, Doornbos has little chance of an F-1 seat (unless Bernie just plays defense and makes sure he stays), "Dutchman" Ho Pin-Tung? Heylan, Zwolsman, Pastorelli!? Minardi lives, (probably buy in to an existing team, don't think Stoddart was haning out with KK at Surfers just for fun) Assen, maybe Zolder? It's all worth thinking about, anyway...especially Jos and PT side-by-side into turn 1.:)

[theunions]

Vision: 2, hasn't done more for Indy

Actually they rolled out the third entry w/Bell and his Rock & Republic sponsorship for the 500, then proceeded to state Townsend would return at some point later in the year. He did not.