RM's latest piece

[mnkywrch]

http://espn.go.com/rpm/cart/2003/0119/1495302.html

I like the entire piece but I (as usual) focus on this part:



Now, before anybody gets giddy, it should be pointed out this will not be the CART of the past decade. The new teams aren't nearly as deep as the departed ones and the new drivers are hardly household words. F3000 champ Sebastian Bourdais and Mario Hauberfeld have talent, just no following in this country, while Joel Camathias and Robert Gonzalez may not have either.

And CART still appears to be anti-American. Only '96 champ Jimmy Vasser and rookie Ryan Hunter-Reay have confirmed seats for '03. Pook and the owners have failed to elevate Toyota Atlantic stars like Jon Fogarty, Rocky Moran Jr., Joey Hand or Alex Gurney. Proven Yanks like Alex Barron and Memo Gidley are also without wheels.

Until CART actually shows faith in its feeder system and gives some of these hungry American kids a chance, it will never cultivate some new heroes because guys like Bourdais are looking to F1 ASAP like Juan Montoya, Alex Zanardi and Jacques Villeneuve before him.


I mean, was Fogarty that much worse than Bourdais in testing?

[nrc]

As I've said before, it will be a shame if CART spends $30 million supporting teams and can't put a handful of talented American racers in cars. They need that to support interest at their U.S. races. CART could get away with a couple of Americans when they clearly had the best drivers. They will have a hard time getting back on track in the U.S. with a field of mostly unknown, unproven foriegn drivers.

[mnkywrch]

I don't think Americans have a problem supporting non-Americans.

I think the bigger issue is retention. Guys aren't around long enough to become known.

Only known guys are going to become the name quantity he is today.

Heck, even Emmo stayed around long enough to become a name quantity.

IMO of course.

[cart7]

Seems silly to have a ladder system in place and yet no one uses it except IRL teams looking for non-wanker drivers who'll drive in circles all year. What a shame those listed plus the likes of Rice, Wheldon, Renna have to go knocking on the irls door. IRL race teams are getting the advantage of American racers trained by Cart.

It's kind of getting old.:shakehead

[RARules]

Originally posted by cart7
Seems silly to have a ladder system in place and yet no one uses it except IRL teams looking for non-wanker drivers who'll drive in circles all year. What a shame those listed plus the likes of Rice, Wheldon, Renna have to go knocking on the irls door. IRL race teams are getting the advantage of American racers trained by Cart.

It's kind of getting old.:shakehead
Absolutely! :( Something CART should probably be addressing.

There were some good suggestions a few months back on this topic. Such as:

Use some of the ESP money to (at least partially) fund a team with a prominent driver from the ladder series as their primary driver.
Reserve a ride for each race from the winner of the most recent ladder race.
etc. (I'm sure I forgot many of them)

Maybe some others could fill in the gaps.

[JoeBob]

I don't think the CART ladder series drivers should get any "special treatment" because of what support series they came from, or what country they were born in.

However, I'd love to see the lower level series do more to provide "advancement opportunities" to their best drivers.

Years ago, the Indy Lights champ would get a free Champ Car chassis from Lola. Bryan Herta used this free chassis to "buy" himself a ride with Foyt. I'd love to see the same sort of deal picked up again.

If Jon Fogarty had a "free" Lola at his disposal, I bet that would have been enough to ensure he'd get a ride this year.

[nrc]

Originally posted by mnkywrch
I don't think Americans have a problem supporting non-Americans.

As I said, Americans don't have a problem supporting non-Americans when they're proven to be top talents. When you bring in a whole raft of unknowns that include more potential wankers than CART has had in quite some time, then you're going to have a bit more trouble selling tickets.


I think the bigger issue is retention. Guys aren't around long enough to become known.

That's certainly a longer term problem, but I don't think CART will be around long enough to worry about it if they don't generate some interest in their current lineup.

[mnkywrch]

Originally posted by nrc
That's certainly a longer term problem, but I don't think CART will be around long enough to worry about it if they don't generate some interest in their current lineup.

18 cars on the grid at St. Pete became a non-issue months ago when it became obvious that CART was going to spend the money needed to make sure they had 18 cars.

It really comes down to who Pook can get to sign on for 2005... both teams and manufacturers.