08 Schedule announced

[Hard Driver]

http://www.champcarworldseries.com/News/Article.asp?ID=12326

April 20 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, Long Beach, California
Streets of Long Beach - Temporary Circuit

April 27 Champ Car Grand Prix of Houston at JAGFlo Speedway, Houston, Texas
JAGFlo Speedway at Reliant Park - Temporary Circuit

May 18 Champ Car Grand Prix at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Monterey, California
Laguna Seca - Permanent Circuit

June 1 Champ Car Belgium at Circuit Zolder, Zolder, Belgium
Circuit Zolder-Heusden - Permanent Circuit

June 8 Champ Car Spain at Circuito Permanente de Jerez, Jerez, Spain
Circuito de Jerez - Permanent Circuit

June 22 Champ Car Grand Prix of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio
Burke Lakefront Airport - Temporary Circuit

June 29 Champ Car Mont-Tremblant, Mont-Tremblant, Quebec, Canada
Circuit Mont-Tremblant - Permanent Circuit

July 6 Steelback Grand Prix of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Exhibition Place - Temporary Circuit

July 20 Rexall Grand Prix of Edmonton, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Rexall Speedway - Temporary Circuit

July 27 Champ Car Portland, Portland, Oregon
Portland International Raceway - Permanent Circuit

August 10 Road America Grand Prix, Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin
Road America - Permanent Circuit

September 14 Champ Car Holland at the TT Circuit Assen, Assen, Holland
TT Circuit Assen - Permanent Circuit

October 26 Gold Coast Indy 300, Surfers Paradise, Australia
Gold Coast, Australia - Temporary Circuit

November 9 Gran Premio Tecate Presentado por Banamex, Mexico City, Mexico
Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez - Permanent Circuit

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My Take.....

These guys are idiots...

August Road America
September Holland
October Australia
November Mexico City.

4 races in 4 months.. Thats a 1/4 of the year to have 4 races. How do they expect to keep people interested? How do they expect to have any drama for the end of the season? Why do they want to take on the NFL? And it just plain appears hookey and unprofessional.

I think the season should get wraped up by the end of September at the latest. And there should be no breaks greater than 2 weeks.

Other than that:
Where's vegas? That was a good race.
Where is a race in the Northeast, say philly.

[Methanolandbrats]

I like the schedule because there are a lot of actual race tracks on it :D Hopefully those gaps at the end are long term planning :eek: and they hope to fill the gaps during coming years.

[RusH]

It could have been worse.

My expectations are as low as they could be though. One can only hope that instead of TBA`s and canceled races they decided to work it in reverse this time....maybe one or two more races are in the works that maybe added to fill gaps.
One thing is certain, with only 14 races, the announced races better be held or the smack will be fierce.:rofl:

[Gnam]

Champcar's new Weekend Warriors slogan: One weekend a month, two weeks a year.

[cameraman]

Fourteen races, thirteen very good tracks and Houston.
I'll take it.

That was the easy part. Now find some solid sponsorship for the teams.

[oddlycalm]

The Portland date looks like it probably coincides with the ALMS race. It also gets the race away from Rose Festival event saturation. That's the good news.

The bad news is that's also the hottest weekend of the summer and temperatures are usually approach or top 100 degrees. Not comfortable weather for Northwesterners and the crowd that has shown up for the ALMS race has been hard core race fans. I doubt that will change by adding CCWS to the already full race weekend.

I agree on the rest of the schedule though, good tracks at least.

oc

[extramundane]

The Portland date looks like it probably coincides with the ALMS race. It also gets the race away from Rose Festival event saturation. That's the good news.

The bad news is that's also the hottest weekend of the summer and temperatures are usually approach or top 100 degrees. Not comfortable weather for Northwesterners and the crowd that has shown up for the ALMS race has been hard core race fans. I doubt that will change by adding CCWS to the already full race weekend.

ALMS isn't at PIR next year (didn't race there this year either- their 2006 attendance was worse than CC's). I suspect a bad turnout this year would truly mean the end of CC at PIR.

[Sean Malone]

------------------------------------------------------

My Take.....

These guys are idiots...

August Road America
September Holland
October Australia
November Mexico City.

4 races in 4 months.. Thats a 1/4 of the year to have 4 races. How do they expect to keep people interested? How do they expect to have any drama for the end of the season? Why do they want to take on the NFL? And it just plain appears hookey and unprofessional.

I think the season should get wraped up by the end of September at the latest. And there should be no breaks greater than 2 weeks.

.

I don't look at it as "taking on the NFL". CC is so far off the radar that it won't matter. If they ever get back to '90's level of popularity, then I'll worry about "taking on the NFL".
I also rather like the fact that they are the last of the non NASCAR major series to wrap up their season. It gives all the non NASCAR racing media outlets a sole series to focus on.

Aren't the international races still conditioned on FIA approval?

[extramundane]

It gives all the non NASCAR racing media outlets a sole series to focus on.

Too bad CC management ran both of them off.

[Sean Malone]

Too bad CC management ran both of them off.

:thumbup: :D

[nrc]

August Road America
September Holland
October Australia
November Mexico City.

4 races in 4 months.. Thats a 1/4 of the year to have 4 races. How do they expect to keep people interested? How do they expect to have any drama for the end of the season? Why do they want to take on the NFL? And it just plain appears hookey and unprofessional.

Australia and Mexico are in the same slots they've been in for a long time. Those are pretty much "take it or leave it" dates. There's not much leverage to change them right now. You can bet that they're casting around for a partner for the Assen date since a standalone Euro date is unlikely to last.

While I'd rather Champ car wrapped up their season before NFL football starts you can bet that people would be calling it "hookey and unprofessional" if they cancelled those dates to "condense" the schedule.

[jonovision_man]

It could have been worse.

Yup.

I'm a little confused on the 2 European swings... is Assen really lucrative enough to justify a fly-away just for one race? I'm guessing there's another European round in the works around that time that (thankfully) they didn't announce as it's not confirmed.

If they run all 14, I'm happy enough.

Now let's see what the grid looks like...

jono

[TravelGal]

spain OLE!

The end sucks but at least the beginning is good. Much better than this year with 2 races and then zilch for a month. I'll take a strong start over a good end IF I had to choose.

[Indy]

As a formerly passionate fan, I think this schedule is a nice step forward. There are too many good NA road courses for me to attend, and that is a good thing.

[KLang]

I'm bummed about Vegas. Has there been any official explaination posted anywhere?

[Andrew Longman]

Spain could mean Servia finally gets some sponsorship.

No England means Clarke, Wilson, and Legge won't be looking to their homeland for sponsorship.

In fact with such geographically spread out schedule and virtually no TV ratings it will be interesting to see how they go about pitching this to potential sponsors.

At least there are no TBA and almost every event looks to be solid enough to surely run.

I don't see them adding races for 08 though, not after this years FIA mess, because that would mean going back and asking them for permission.

Aren't the Euro races on F1 weekends also?

[Andrew Longman]

I'm bummed about Vegas. Has there been any official explaination posted anywhere?

http://www.lvrj.com/news/11045031.html

[KLang]

http://www.lvrj.com/news/11045031.html

Thanks. :thumbup:


"The promoters of the '07 Las Vegas event were the same promoters who canceled our Phoenix event. To make a long story short, we're not prepared to work with them again," Champ Car President Steve Johnson said Monday.

That's pretty harsh. :eek:

Some talk of '09 but I'm guessing it's gone for good. :(

[Methanolandbrats]

**** Las Vegas, they picked up Laguna and Jerez.:thumbup: The more real racetracks the better.

[Chiphead_Dave]

Good and Bad

Laguna is always a good track for me because I always enjoy it. The wife and I turn it into a mini vacation in Monterey. But it will be hard to get excited about it because I don't want to start putting plans in place only to have the race canceled (ala Denver) so I probably won't go.

I was still hoping that they could get Denver back on the 08 schedule
as it is my local race. It had become a family tradition with the kids to go...training them young.

The 4 month 4 race thing is crap. This season I honestly didn't care if the Gold Coast race happened and Mexico.....give me a break I have to short of an attention span to wait for that.

[Insomniac]

I'm happy to have more road courses, but the gaps remain. It's a shame they can't do something about that. Maybe they should buy a couple tracks and run there a couple times each season to fill the gaps?

[Gnam]

Thanks. :thumbup:

That's pretty harsh. :eek:

Some talk of '09 but I'm guessing it's gone for good. :(


But the layout made several downtown hotels an island and forced their guests to use temporary pedestrian bridges or wait for when the course was opened sporadically to reach their destination.
I wonder if local opposition played a bigger role than Steve-o is letting on.

[Andrew Longman]

I wonder if local opposition played a bigger role than Steve-o is letting on.

I think lack of local support had more to do with it. The casinos had to be fully behind it, committing serious dollars, for it to work. They didn't see a big uptick in busness, or so it is said, and so it wasn't worth the inconvenience.

Too bad. I liked the track.

[oddlycalm]

ALMS isn't at PIR next year (didn't race there this year either- their 2006 attendance was worse than CC's). I suspect a bad turnout this year would truly mean the end of CC at PIR. Shows you how much attention I'm paying...:gomer:

I do stand by the comment about the heat though. That's invariably the hottest weekend of the year in Portland. I agree about the attendance and future races, so I fully expect this to be the last CC race held at PIR.

oc

[Gnam]

Do most homes in Portland have Air Conditioning?

If not, they could setup air conditioned tents and give people a place to cool down while enjoying a tasty beverage. If they won't come for the race, let 'em come for the cool. Champcar...it beats the mall.

or maybe a night race...

[Andrew Longman]

I just noticed that only four of 14 races have title sponsors and RA seems to have lost their sponsor.

That's disappointing, but there is time still to sell it. What I want to see most of all from the 08 season is some movement, any movement, in the right direction commercially.

Start to get that right and everything else will start to fall into place.

[Fio1]

I like it! Laguna Seca should have never been off the schedule. Jerez is a nice addition. Las Vegas was pretty lame in the first place. A race in Asia or Dubai would be pretty cool as well; maybe next year. Champcar is trully a world series now.

[Hard Driver]

spain OLE!

The end sucks but at least the beginning is good. Much better than this year with 2 races and then zilch for a month. I'll take a strong start over a good end IF I had to choose.

True, the schedule is not bad and at least they don't ignore the entire month of May. So my initial reaction and post was that the 4 races in 4 months was dumb. But I should try to be more, glass half full. There are a lot of good road courses and it could turn out good. I hope the car count can step it up a notch and then it would be a very bright year.

[Methanolandbrats]

True, the schedule is not bad and at least they don't ignore the entire month of May. So my initial reaction and post was that the 4 races in 4 months was dumb. But I should try to be more, glass half full. There are a lot of good road courses and it could turn out good. I hope the car count can step it up a notch and then it would be a very bright year. Ya, I'm really hoping they have long term commitments from the four races in four months and they hope to add more to fill the gaps. If so, that's a very solid schedule. :thumbup:

[Spicoli]

Who saved Portland? :tony:

[RHR_Fan]

Who saved Portland? :tony:

Yeah. So how exactly did that happen. :saywhat:

[dando]

I think lack of local support had more to do with it. The casinos had to be fully behind it, committing serious dollars, for it to work. They didn't see a big uptick in busness, or so it is said, and so it wasn't worth the inconvenience.

Too bad. I liked the track.

Expecting a big up tick in bidness for a race over Easter weekend? Oy! :shakehead

-Kevin

[miatanut]

At ALMS a couple years ago they set up a bunch of mist jets behind the front straight grandstands. Friday was hot. Saturday was a lot cooler. Having attended the IMSA/ALMS date for many years, most of which it was in mid-August, I never found the heat unbearable. Getting drenched to the bone with temperatures in the 60's is a lot worse. Only race I've seen red flagged due to rain was an IMSA date in the early '90's. The rain was a lot warmer, so it wasn't so bad.

I think the change in date was the right move.