Michael's sponsors are....

[mnkywrch]

From andretti.com (http://www.andretti.com)



AGR Unveils 2003 IRL Driver/Sponsor Lineup - Michael Set To Retire

Indianapolis, Ind. (January 31, 2003) – Andretti Green Racing (AGR) tonight confirmed its 2003 Indy Racing League driver and sponsor lineup and announced that it will manage three teams under the AGR umbrella. Known as Team 7-Eleven, sponsorship for Michael Andretti’s #7 car will be provided by convenience store giant 7-Eleven‚ and its flagship brand Big Gulp‚. Also known as Team 7-Eleven, Tony Kanaan’s #11 car will be sponsored by several of 7-Eleven’s vendors. AGR’s Dario Franchitti will pilot the #27 entry sponsored by Alpine, Archipelago and Motorola and driver Daniel Wheldon, who will race the majority of the season, will be sponsored by co-primary partners, Klein Tools and Jim Beam in the #26 car. Andretti Green Racing also partners with Honda on all four of the team’s entries.

[Lizzerd]

So they kept #26. Interesting.

[JLMannin]

And they kept #27 too.

MapGuy was right on the Alpine call.

[nrc]

To summarize. It's a Honda operation top to bottom. No new sponsors not provided by Honda. Existing sponsors, some of which were Indy only, are probably paying the same as before and getting the full season as a "primary" sponsor.

This smells like the kind of deal that left CART ripe for collapse when the engine manufacturers pulled out. With the "big sponsors" really only paying a fraction of the cost of running a team it became impossible for independant teams to enough raise sponsorship. So teams like PPI and Della Penna died while everyone shook their head and said, 'what a pity they couldn't hack it'. Sound familier?

[Hurling Frootmig]

Right on NRC.

[RaceGrrl]

"Andretti Green Racing also partners with Honda on all four of the team’s entries."

This is what we've been saying all along. Funded by Honda bucks.

[Hurling Frootmig]

Shouldn't it just be called "Honda Racing" for the sake of truth in advertising?

[JLMannin]

Honda Andretti Racing Fund - HARF :rofl: ;) :rofl:

[JoeBob]

I'm actually pretty surprised at how deep the IMS/Honda connections run through this deal.

What we have are serious cutbacks from Motorola and Archipelago.
Andretti gets the actual sponsor bucks - 7-Eleven, but only for a handful of races. (There's been a few posts at TF about 7Eleven promoting a variety of IRL drivers in their stores, so there is a definate IMS/7-11 connection)
Franchitti gets a Honda company on the sidepods, along with whats left of the Motorola and Archipelago money after the cutbacks.
Kanaan gets the token 7-11 presence, along with a variety of Pepsi products (who also sponsor the races at the IMS-owned Chicagoland track)
Wheldon gets a couple of former associate sponsors getting more signage for part of a season.

[RTKar]

Originally posted by JLMannin
Honda Andretti Racing Fund - HARF :rofl: ;) :rofl:



So the irl becomes a racing league of the HARF's and the HARF NOT's !

[G.]

was THAT really necessary?;)