Tony George on CART

[damiandoan]

Autoweak (http://www.autoweek.com/cat_content.mv?port_code=autoweek&cat_code=motorsportsnews&loc_code=index&content_code=09967716)

:rolleyes:

DD

[Ziggy]

WOW, Hard Hitting Journalism at its finest

Ziggy

[Spicoli]

That's the most insane piece of crap I've ever read about racing. Does Brock or Jack have a new pen-name?

[Chaos]

That article made my blood boil. :mad:

[ChrisB]

Actually that same article is getting a lot of criticsm on TF too.

But here's something he says I agree with:

CART had a vision to be diversified as far as types of circuits, short ovals, speedways, street circuits and road courses, and with that came compromise [in technical specifications and car construction]

This is kinda like what I was saying last year with "crank up the boost and focus on road-racing". I know I PO'd a lot of folks here who still want the diversity, but it's plainly obvious CART's oval market is dying, and it seems a shame to keep these cars (relatively) fat and underpowered on the road-circuits for the sake of a few sparsely attended ovals. Obviously the turbo is gonna be replaced with a V10, but I'd love to see how a road-specific designed Champcar would perform.

There's another reason to focus on road-racing. Check out this part:

George, who is also talking about a possible road course series in the States, again using IRL-type cars—possibly with fenders—to run at places like Mid-Ohio, Road America and Watkins Glen.

Aha! So the IMS *is* looking at road-racing, with fenderd IRL cars... a precedent exists of the later years of Can-Am when they converted F5000 cars to have fenders on them.

By making a commitment to *road-racing* instead of diversity, CART would be making the statement to these road/street tracks that "we are the premier road-racing series in NA". Right now they don't.... they're busy saying "diversity". That leaves an opening.

[mnkywrch]

Originally posted by ChrisB
By making a commitment to *road-racing* instead of diversity, CART would be making the statement to these road/street tracks that "we are the premier road-racing series in NA". Right now they don't.... they're busy saying "diversity". That leaves an opening.

Not just diversity of circuits, they're not exactly sticking around in North America. I think the "Euro shift" trend will grow in the future - not just drivers, but events.

St. Pete's a step in the right direction, and Chicago would be one too, but I think they already have too many races outside of NAFTA.

Leave Spa and Estoril and Paul Ricard alone. Stay at Road America and go to Road Atlanta.

[Lizzerd]

George, who is also talking about a possible road course series in the States, again using IRL-type cars?possibly with fenders?to run at places like Mid-Ohio, Road America and Watkins Glen.

Sounds like GrandAm to me...

[oddlycalm]

This doesn't even come up to the minimum level to be referred to as journalism. Why this geek thinks anyone will be impressed to read about a rich guy acting like a petulent 5yr old in a sandbox arguement is beyond me. Seem to be one of those "my rich guy can beat up your rich guy" kind of things.

The irony is that TG is on the lower rungs of the serious money scale. There are many that could buy and sell his little operation and barely notice the transaction.


Originally posted by mnkywrch
Not just diversity of circuits, they're not exactly sticking around in North America. I think the "Euro shift" trend will grow in the future - not just drivers, but events.

St. Pete's a step in the right direction, and Chicago would be one too, but I think they already have too many races outside of NAFTA.

Leave Spa and Estoril and Paul Ricard alone. Stay at Road America and go to Road Atlanta. The fundamental flaw in your suggestion is that it fails to recognize that the owners of those facilities are a part of the equation CART can't control. In the US, Road America is being difficult, Road Atlanta, as it exists today, is not safe for Champcars, ISC has intentionally scuttled CART's events, and several other promoters are doing a retched job.

One of the reasons for urban races is that the people that own the tracks have been boring to deal with, and they haven't done a good job of promotion, so CART has worked with cities to bring the show to town, bypassing the tracks and their built-in difficulties. In some cases, I think you will see CART target a market and promote the event themselves. I assume that's why they brought people onto the team that know how to do that.

On the other hand, the rest of the North American races are doing well. All the events in Canada and Mexico are a success. I think Cleveland and Milwaukee under lights will be good.

At the end of the day, you have to realize that the industrialized world is in a hell of a recession and turbulent times to boot. I think we will have a good season and grow from here.

[Tom Slick]

As for crowd size, “CART still has a strong fan base for what they do. I think Chris [Pook] has said their attendance has been down on ovals, and that’s probably with good reason.

We all know how well the IRL has packed the stands at former CART tracks like New Hampshire, Phoenix and Homestead etc.

[Hardpoint]

"Nowhere in rambling incoherent response did you come close to anything that could be considered a rational thought.We are all now dumber for having heard it.I award you no points, and may God have mercy on you soul".

[Tom Slick]

GoBucks
If you are responding to my post.
The first part was taken from the Autoweak article.
In the second part I was being sarcastic.
I have just sent an E-mail to Mid Ohio to inform them that if they drop CART for the IRL I will drop them from my summer weekends.
More sarcasm.
We all remember how Cleveland welcomed the IRL a few years ago.

[pchall]

WTF is that article supposed to be?

How did it get past an editor?

[cart7]

That article is so poorly written it's impossible to get worked up over. It's difficult to determine real TG speak and the writers agenda. :shakehead :thumdown:

[IceKub]

I'm pretty sure go bucks was referring to the article and not you, Tom. I'm sure he would agree with you.

[mnkywrch]

Originally posted by oddlycalm
The fundamental flaw in your suggestion is that it fails to recognize that the owners of those facilities are a part of the equation CART can't control. In the US, Road America is being difficult, Road Atlanta, as it exists today, is not safe for Champcars, ISC has intentionally scuttled CART's events, and several other promoters are doing a retched job.

One of the reasons for urban races is that the people that own the tracks have been boring to deal with, and they haven't done a good job of promotion, so CART has worked with cities to bring the show to town, bypassing the tracks and their built-in difficulties. In some cases, I think you will see CART target a market and promote the event themselves. I assume that's why they brought people onto the team that know how to do that.

I'm of the opinion that CART's simply charging these tracks too much.

I'd love to see the difference in sanctioning fees that Portland and Laguna Seca and Road America have paid over the past 10 years.

My gut tells me that CART's contracts with the venues have called for increases in sanctioning fees above & beyond what these tracks will ever be able to afford.

Look at Cleveland, there was no way they could keep up with the sanctioning fees. Without CART taking on the role of co-promoter (and some of the potential losses), they wouldn't be racing there.

I mean, we all know that there's no way that Road America or Mid-Ohio or even Cleveland will ever draw the same crowd as Long Beach or Toronto or any other street circuit. It's just not possible.

I'm also of the opinion that given CART's problems the last few years, you can't expect attendance to grow at all these road racing venues. So how can you expect to charge more - and expect the tracks to work on promoting the events when more of their budget goes to sanctioning fees?

If CART was growing by leaps & bounds and RA refused to pay, that would be one thing.

But they're offering tracks less for more. Huh?

I wish CART was a private company so they could cut sanctioning fee deals that were different for each track without the whole world having to know.

[Napoleon]

Originally posted by IceKub
I'm pretty sure go bucks was referring to the article and not you, Tom. I'm sure he would agree with you.

In fact, more specifically I think his comments were to be construed as being directed to Tony George. He did it in the style as that British game show host who belittles dumb contestants.

[Napoleon]

Originally posted by mnkywrch
I wish CART was a private company so they could cut sanctioning fee deals that were different for each track without the whole world having to know.
?

They can do that now. There is no law requiring them to publicly release the terms of any particular contract. In fact some companies financials which are publicly released make it impossible to determine the profitability of entire product lines and divisions (some in the pharmaceuticals industry are famous for this).

Any contract CART has can have a confidentiality clause, which would ban either party from releasing any of the terms of the contract.

[rabbit]

Looks like GoBucks and I are the only ones who have ever seen Billy Madison.

[oddlycalm]

Originally posted by mnkywrch
I'm of the opinion that CART's simply charging these tracks too much. And I'm of the opinion that you have no way of knowing that, and are simply regurgitating the spin that has been coming out of the IMS PR engine since 1996, of which the subject article is but the latest deranged attempt.

The single reason that the Portland event committee is having a $500,000 shortfall is that this is the amount that co-sponsor Freightliner took with them when they left. Aside from that, the event itself was a break even proposition, which is the way it's supposed to be for a non-profit organization. BTW, many feel that the influence of a prominent member of the business community, who had cooincidentally taken on a consulting agreement with the IMS, may have contributed directly to Freightliner's departure.

Personally, I thinks TG's statement “Nearly every CART promoter or organizer has contacted me either directly or indirectly” is fiction and puffery. I do however believe that he, or his people, have contacted every one of them, and since he is not offering road racing, I think even you can imagine what the purpose of that was.

At the end of the day, what's really on TG's plate is not taking over CART's venues as the 'article' arrogantly, and incorrectly, asserts, but rather on keeping his own house in standing. Given the current deflationary economics, and the attendent lack of pricing power in all sectors of the economy, you can assume that I500 ticket sales will be off sharply for 2003, perhaps 20-30% off the already reduced level of recent years. The USGP will undoubtably lose serious money this year, and even the Brickyard 400 will not be a sellout. Add to that the debt service from all the improvments, and the continuing hemorage from the IRL's operations, and TG might find is siblings breathing down his neck, if not the banks. I assure you that all the smug talk in the world will not allow him to defy the laws of gravity. The IMS has folded before, and it is entirely possible that it will again.

[Hardpoint]

Tom,
That certainly was not intended towards you.

[Napoleon]

Originally posted by oddlycalm
And I'm of the opinion that you have no way of knowing that, and are simply regurgitating the spin that has been coming out of the IMS PR engine since 1996, of which the subject article is but the latest deranged attempt.


Bingo

[devilmaster]

Sheesh. Right off the bat this writer is lying. (but you all knew that. :) )


Just the hint a couple of months back that he might do exactly that with Germany’s bankrupt EuroSpeedway was enough to end any talk of CART continuing to run there.

Thats like that shuttle writer a couple months back saying that the shuttles have lost heat tiles which almost lead to repeated disasters. Its a line in which you take the final result, and make it prove the scenario you want.

You don't get away with that in high school english class. Trust me, I know. ;)

:shakehead :gomer:

Steve

[nrc]

Originally posted by mnkywrch
I'm of the opinion that CART's simply charging these tracks too much.

It seems to me that anyone who is being "charged too much" simply hasn't been willing to accept a co-promotional deal.

Based on a little guestimation arrived at by looking at quarterly sanction fee revenue, deducting the sanction fees we know about and estimating the remainder, I guessed that most of the U.S. non street race events were paying a straight sanction fee of around 1.7 million before any co-promotional deals were struck. As it turned out that estimate was pretty close based on the Elkhart Lake litigation stories.

CART renegotiated a bunch of deals into co-promotion deals last season. My guestimation is that those co-promotional events paid an average of just over $1 million in sanction fees (the exact amount varies according to how much the event brings in). When you consider that CART has to pay out nearly $600,000 in purse money alone, I don't know how you can say that's too much.

It appears that CART renegotiated some of their events into co-promotions in mid-contract. So I can only assume that Road America has so far chosen not to do that for it's own reasons. Some promoters may be holding out feeling that the leverage the IRL gives them will allow them to get a cheap sanction fee without the revenue sharing that goes along with a co-promotion deal.

In any case, the information we have so far certainly makes it appear that it's Road America that is not acting in good faith.

[DjDrOmusic]

OMG....!!!!

I can't believe what I just read! Devilmaster took High School English! :rofl:
(just kidding Devil)

[CART2Day]

Originally posted by damiandoan
Autoweak (http://www.autoweek.com/cat_content.mv?port_code=autoweek&cat_code=motorsportsnews&loc_code=index&content_code=09967716)

:rolleyes:

DD

Proper spelling of magazine title too, no less.

[pchall]

Originally posted by CART2Day
Proper spelling of magazine title too, no less.

What a 'king idiot response.

Race fans have been parodying the name of Autoweek for years--- Autoweak, Autobleak... whatever.

Get a clue or get off the board.