Track Rentals R Us

[Chief]

Eeeek! Loudon, Motegi and Milwaukee all bit the dust this year...the IRL legacy is sound, twice over:


He pushed hard for three years to get the Indy cars, which last raced at the speedway in 1998, back on the track's schedule and was thrilled a year ago when he landed a date for this August.

But then a crowd of about 28,000 showed up.

“Forty thousand was what it was going to take to have a chance to make money,” Gappens said. “When the bills got paid, it was a significant loss.”....

“If they wanted to come in and rent the track and assume the risk, they could do that. Or if they brought in some corporate sponsorship that would help underwrite some of it, those are really the only two ways we could look at continuing it.”


Fans vote Indy Car out at New Hampshire (http://www.newhampshire.com/article/20110922/SPORTS/709229959/0/newhampshire03)

[SteveH]

that's a shame

[Don Quixote]

So the red hat business model doesn't work?

[Chief]

that's a shame
:rofl:

[Indy]

People keep saying the IRL morphed into CART, but that is not the case. The IRL is morphing into Champ Car, ripping of municipalities to stay alive.

Meanwhile if they just had real racing, people would show up at the real race tracks, but that would require not being PT Barnum, which of course is in their weasely, tricky, hilljack blood, so that is not going to happen.

Surely the return of the savior T. George is just around the corner. Way to go, Earl. :gomer::gomer::gomer:

[stroker]

that's what happens when you're a small time sport pretending to be a Big Time sport.

What's a shame is that the individual tracks could fix this by getting together and forming their own series. Wouldn't need to be much start with, but it could be done.

[Wheel-Nut]

People keep saying the IRL morphed into CART, but that is not the case. The IRL is morphing into Champ Car, ripping of municipalities to stay alive.

Meanwhile if they just had real racing, people would show up at the real race tracks, but that would require not being PT Barnum, which of course is in their weasely, tricky, hilljack blood, so that is not going to happen.

Surely the return of the savior T. George is just around the corner. Way to go, Earl. :gomer::gomer::gomer:

There are not enough people / fans WGAF anymore to make the time to travel to see a race.

Ripping off municipalities is all that is left.

[Corner5]

George did an interview with Kallmann about Irl and RA


IndyCar looks iffy, at best, for Road America in 2012
e-mail print By Dave Kallmann of the Journal Sentinel
Sept. 22, 2011 |(19) COMMENTS

Elkhart Lake -- The chance of IndyCar coming to Road America next year remains, but it's "a long shot at this point," track president and general manager George Bruggenthies said.

It's not for a lack of interest or for lack of a title sponsor but because of the difficulty finding a date that would work.

"Mr. Bernard is working on some foreign events, maybe two Brazil races, and he doesn’t know the dates of those," Bruggenthies said Wednesday, referring to IndyCar CEO Randy Bernard. "That’s part of his business plan because those races pay for a lot of the rest of the schedule and help us. So it was more the date than the money. Absolutely.

"We wanted to put them on the Sunday following American Le Mans, which I think we were the first promoter to have that double-header. That’s why we expanded the paddock (for 2007), where we literally had American Le Mans Saturday and then (Champ Car) on Sunday. And I think our fans would like that. That was kind of my plan, but August was really kind of busy for Randy. That’s really the way it went."

That's also where money does come into play.

One of the biggest reasons to pair the two series is the cost of television production. Bruggenthies estimated a combined weekend would result in a savings of hundreds of thousand dollars per event -- upwards of $1 million -- over separate stand-alone weekends.

Financially it would compare with having very strong sponsorship for both races.

ALMS produces many of its shows but piggybacks with IndyCar and IMS Productions when the series race at the same venue.

Meanwhile, IndyCar has said it won't return to the Milwaukee Mile in 2012, and New Hampshire Motor Speedway said in a story Union Leader of Manchester, N.H., said it probably won't bring IndyCar back. (Granted, those are two ovals. That balance of the schedule is another issue for the series.)

It may seem easy for Road America to juggle dates to fit an IndyCar race into it's schedule. That's not the case, Bruggenthies said.

Vying for weekends are the NASCAR Nationwide Series and Grand-Am, the American Le Mans Series, the AMA, three vintage events and two club racing events, the June Sprints and SCCA Runoffs, and those are just the parts of the schedule for which the track is open to spectators. The facility gets used in some nearly all year, and while, say, a Ferrari club track day doesn't bring money in the front gate, its an important part of the overall financial plan.

Bruggenthies would love to have the weekend after Indy, but that Texas Motor Speedway had had a promise to follow the 500, and now it appears that Roger Penske will have that for the return of IndyCar to Belle Isle.

Road America has had motorcycles on that weekend after Memorial Day. The track's June schedule also includes NASCAR/Grand-Am (the biggest weekend of the year) and the June Sprints.

"I’m not going to put (IndyCar) the week in front of Nationwide, and what am I going to do with the Sprints?" Bruggenthies said. "I could have moved AMA to August. But I’ve got to keep things spread out enough.

"Because we’re so busy here, the August date worked best for us. Whether it was a shared risk or a sole risk for anybody, that would have been the best business plan, in August."

Road America had hoped to announce its 2012 schedule this month, preferrably in connection with the Runoffs, which are going on this week. Although the track has agreements are in hand for NASCAR/Grand-Am, ALMS and AMA, details remain to be worked out, those series have not put out their schedules for next year and "and rather than say, ‘Other things TBD,’ maybe we’ll wait till we’ve got it all done," Bruggenthies said.

Among the biggest issues to work out are what shape the Sundays will take on the NASCAR and ALMS weekends. Both were non-specator days in 2011.

Bruggenthies said he would prefer to have Grand-Am as a Sunday headliner a day after the Nationwide Series, but that may not be possible. He'd also like to start the NASCAR race earlier than its 4 p.m. green flag this year.

No big building projects are on the horizon for next year, Bruggenthies said, but one relatively small one will be quite noticeable to fans: new bathrooms.

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/130355908.html

Meanwhile the schedule for RA is "tentative".

But NEW BATHROOMS!:D

[patski]

I'll believe it when I see it. Thank God NO .irl.

[NismoZ]

Awww, man! No outhouses!?:\

[Corner5]

I'll believe it when I see it. Thank God NO .irl.

Don't worry Patski, the irl will shoot itself in the foot again and screw up

by not running with ALMS, which is their best hope at RA.

There is no room to fudge the schedule at RA, the track is rented every weekend during the season except one.(holiday):gomer: