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Racewriter
05-10-03, 03:35 PM
I’ve become convinced that we are witnessing the end of big-time open wheel racing, as represented by IRL/CART. After some thought, this looks like a likely scenario for the next 3 years (NOTE: This is written with tongue partially in cheek. If you don’t have a sense of humor, you won’t like it. OTOH, if you’re a true believer, you won’t like it either.):

May 2003: Indy takes the green with less than 33 cars. Tony George says it’s “no big deal,” harking back to the fact that early 500’s did not have eleven rows of three. In the prerace show, Jack Arute makes reference to the “traditional ten rows of three.” Indy pulls its first sub-4 rating. Visible blocks of bare aluminum are seen on TV.

October 2003: Chevrolet officials calculate the cost of running the IRL and being competitive with Honda and Toyota. After factoring in R&D, team support, driver salaries, and other costs, they come up with a ballpark figure of $40 million for 2004. They then take a look at sub-1 TV ratings, and it takes about 15 seconds to decide to pull out of the IRL. They redirect a few million to compete with Mopar in USAC.

In related news, Sam Hornish is announced as the driver of the Pennzoil #1 car in Winston Cup.

January 2004: Chris Pook proudly announces that he has renegotiated his TV contracts with Speed and CBS. No cash will come in, and time buy rates remain steady, but the 18-car requirement is no longer in force. CART will cut the ESP program to include 14 cars, which will compete in 12 events in North America (the European trip having been dropped). Cutting the program and events slows the cash burn. Pook bravely projects at least three manufacturers for his V10 formula in 2005. He closes by reminding everyone that CART’s problems are all the fault of Tony George, Roger Penske, and Chip Ganassi.

February 2004: Toyota and Honda announce that they are only prepared to support 10 cars apiece for the 2004 season. They will expand their support to 12 cars apiece for Indy. At the same press conference, Tony George announces that the Infiniti Pro Series will become the Toyota Pro Series, with Lexus-derived V8 engines. A lease cost will go up from $100,000 per year to $150,000 per year. In a related development, the Toyota Atlantic series will be phased out, and teams encouraged to run the TPS. Old Atlantics cars will be allowed in the TPS series for 2004 in a “class B” arrangement. This boosts the TPS car count to 18.

April 2004: 20,000 people watch CART’s crown jewel, the Long Beach Grand Prix. Barely more watch it on Speedchannel.

May 2004: The Indy 500 takes the green with the traditional eight rows of three, but fan and viewer interest declines. Attendance is estimated at 200,000, and the final TV rating is 2.9. Tony George blames a soft economy and the war with Iraq. For the first time in history, there are no runs on Bump Day. Since only 24 driver/car combinations are entered, qualifying takes place on Pole Day, with 24 runs before 10,000 people.

August 2004: Chris Pook calls a press conference to announce that, in fact, not a single manufacturer has agreed to provide V10’s to the series. Further, CART is nearly out of money, so the final two races of the year are cancelled. Paul Tracy is the final champion, having won every race. CART is disbanded. The stockholders will divide the remaining cash in the treasury – about $38.63. Total. Pook reminds everyone that it’s all Tony George’s fault.

Two days later, Pat Patrick and Carl Haas announce the formation of the “formula USA” series, which will be similar to the EuroBOSS series, or the American Indycar Series. The series will be open to old IRL or CART cars, powered either by their original engines or stock-block V8’s. The series will run a 12-race schedule in 2005 with former CART venues. Old Atlantics, IPS, and Lights cars will be incorporated into a Formula B, which will run along with the Formula USA division in two-class races.

October 2004: Citing a low ROI in their home country, Toyota and Honda announce that Japanese drivers will fill all 20 seats in the 2005 Indy Racing League season. Toyota also shifts key personnel to its struggling Craftsman Truck operation.

November 2004: Citing lower ratings than expected, ABC buys its way out of its TV contract. The network will still cover three races including Indianapolis, but the rights fee has been renegotiated downward.

December 2004: Tony George announces that the remaining races for 2005 will be shown on SPEED, along with qualifying and practice. On Trackforum, Defender hails the new “partner” relationship.

May 2005: With declining gate receipts and TV revenue, the Indy 500 purse sees its first large cut in history, going from $13 million to $10 million. TV rating is a 3, which Tony George heralds as growth and validation of the IRL concept.

2005: The Formula USA series eventually completes 9 events, with crowds ranging from 5,000 to a high of 20,000. Paul Tracy wins every race in an ex-Paul Durant 1992 Lola/Buick. For 2006, the series will run as part of large vintage racing weekends along with series like the Thundersports Cup.

November 2005: In one of the most shocking developments of the IRL/CART split, Trackforum and 7thgear merge. The new site will be called, “7thtrackgear.com.” Crapwagon.com is reconfigured around a single thread: “I hate Tony George.” The thread gets 2,000,000 posts in one month. The bad news is that only 18 posters contribute.

January 2006: The IRL schedule is announced, with 10 races. Several tracks choose to replace their IRL races with ARCA races to boost attendance.

May 2006: 125,000 people watch Shigeaki Hattori win his second Indy 500. ABC ratings drop to 2.5. Faced with the near-extinction of the 500, Tony George places a call.

June 2006: In a joint press conference, it is announced that the 2007 Indianapolis 500 will be part of the NASCAR Coca-Cola Cup Series. The Indy Racing League will be disbanded at the end of the year. Tony George claims that this is the fulfillment of his decade-long quest to bring the best to Indy.

May 2007: 300,000 people see Jeff Gordon win the Indianapolis 500 in a Hendrick Monte Carlo.

Railbird
05-10-03, 03:44 PM
20,000 at Long Beach?

Hah!

you're nuts... There are more partyers than that there who wouldn't notice whether there was a race or not.

The rest, unfortunely, I agree with.

Cam
05-10-03, 04:00 PM
:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: I laughed I cried!!!! I cant wait for the sequel! :p

RTKar
05-10-03, 04:02 PM
From The Chicago Tribune, "The teams have been my barometer." George said, "They all seem committed to making sure the field is full, but I'm not putting the burden on them or myself. We'll have to see how things go this week. If teams decide to convert backups [to primary entries], to put drivers [in] , what roles the engine manufacturers play in that, I don't know. If we end up with a short field, we end up with a short field. I don't think anybody's going to do anything out of the ordinary just to create a full filed of 33. In the end it will take care of itself. I'm not sure how it wil be resolved."

DaveL
05-10-03, 04:10 PM
The scary part is that there are many kernals of truth in what R-Dub wrote, and there are several sections that I would not be surpised to see.

Hot Rod Otis
05-10-03, 04:32 PM
:thumbup: :thumbup:

Sadly, the end game probably will look even worse.:thumdown:

cart7
05-10-03, 04:48 PM
I'd better get started on my story now....

Grandad, how come those cars running the Indy 500 in your old photo's don't have fenders?

Well my wonderful grandson, you see, there was a time, long ago.....:(

Hink
05-10-03, 05:17 PM
RW - Not a bad post. When T&H leave for NASCAR the IRL is SOL.

I am convinced that the Indy 500 will be a NASCAR race. That was a joke a few years back but it's not anymore.

Thanks Tony

Kiwifan
05-10-03, 06:53 PM
I don't know if I should laugh or cry. There is a fair bit of truth in what you write my friend.:(

I'm trying to be positive with CART. I'm not going to base CART's future on last or this year but I believe next year will show the writing on the wall. To me, this year is a transition and I'm hoping some Teams and drivers will come back over but then I'm the eternal optimist!

Rusty.

Kate
05-10-03, 07:17 PM
Wah Wah Wah.

Don't you ever get tired of eternal choruses of "CART is dead"? Nobody said you have to watch it; if it is that painful, then go see "Jackass: the Movie" again instead.

The End Game will be that the IRL will gradually fade away, as the May Race becomes known aa the IRL 500 and people say to each other "IRL? What the hell is that?" and decide that this year they'll sit by the pool and watch Brands Hatch from England; and road and street racing will continue in some form with some number of cars, because this is what people want to come out to see. (You forgot a couple zeroes in your Long Beach estimate.) The races in Mexico, Canada and Europe will grow by leaps and bounds, especially those that run with sports car races in support positions. When Bernie has joined the Choir Invisible, the talk of him buying CART will die too, but a consortium of wealthy Mexicans will share ownership with Jerry Forsythe, and as drivers retire they will buy shares to show their support for the series that made them what they are today. Paul Tracy will be Grand Marshall Emeritus and will shout "Gentlemen start your engines" and only Tiago Monteiro, the two Marios, Jourdain and Bourdais will start up because everyone else will not honestly be able to style themselves gentlemen.

CWS will not show up at Road America, but no one will notice until Sunday. Then the spectators will organize a race using their own cars and have just as much fun as they would have if there had been a CART race. "Because, after all," they will tell each other, "we are all AMERICANS! And anybody knows a race is much better if everyone in it is American!"

RaceChic
05-10-03, 09:46 PM
I laughed :laugh: I cried:cry:
Details of it???? Who knows, but I get the total picture, regretably. The fact remains that Tony George has created a big, f'n mess here in North American Racing. I fear that things are going to happen that we don't want to even think about. I like your stubborn optimism, Kate, and I fully intend to remain kicking and screaming my loyalties to CART always, but sometimes it is difficult. The point being that there has been a catastrophic splitting of the fan base. If CART went under (God forbid), then many of us, myself included, and I don't want to speak for anyone else here, would NOT support the crapwagons. If the opposite occured, many of the lemmings would say the same, I'm sure. I knoe this is nothing new here, but it saddens me nonetheless.:shakehead :shakehead :shakehead

Oh for the record.... F*** Tony George!!!!! :flame: :flame:

racermike
05-10-03, 10:54 PM
TPS = Toyota Pro Series ... hahaha

those will be some pretty bad looking "TPS reports"

http://www.dailywav.com/0700/tps3.wav

RaceChic
05-10-03, 11:03 PM
That link didn't work racermike. :(

nrc
05-11-03, 02:00 AM
Originally posted by Racewriter
October 2003: Chevrolet officials calculate the cost of running the IRL and being competitive with Honda and Toyota. After factoring in R&D, team support, driver salaries, and other costs, they come up with a ballpark figure of $40 million for 2004. They then take a look at sub-1 TV ratings, and it takes about 15 seconds to decide to pull out of the IRL.

Probably the best hope for American open wheel racing at this point would be for Chevy to pull out of the IRL and leave Honda, Toyota and Ford to force the two series into some kind of compromise.


January 2004: Chris Pook proudly announces that he has renegotiated his TV contracts with Speed and CBS. No cash will come in, and time buy rates remain steady, but the 18-car requirement is no longer in force. CART will cut the ESP program to include 14 cars, which will compete in 12 events in North America (the European trip having been dropped).

I doubt that there will be a big announcement. There probably isn't a car count requirement in the CBS deal. The SPEED deal has already been renegotiated, along with most of the sanctioning agreements. Whether or how many cars these new deals guarantee is unknown at this point.

I believe the ESP plan will remain in place as is next year. But CART probably won't be able to afford the 33 million additional they're spending to prop teams up this year so it's anyone's guess how many teams that will leave.

Recognizing that this is tongue in cheek, any scenario for CART's future that ends in liquidation with no mention of Forsythe seems implausible. If CART fails to show signs that they can get their losses under control the stock price will fall low enough that Forsythe, probably along with a small group which may or may not include Eccelstone, will likely tender an offer to buy the company.

Ziggy
05-11-03, 02:54 AM
Racewriter, that was a very fine post. Very creative, and funny.

Ziggy

lone_groover
05-11-03, 04:15 AM
Chilling, Racewriter. I concur with the wannabee sweathog.

Railbird
05-11-03, 09:02 AM
nrc

Forsythe and Kalkhoven's money with the Brit midget supplying the political weight.


as soon as Kalkhoven gets done sniffing around an F1 team that is currently on the block.

racer2c
05-11-03, 10:55 PM
Two points of contention;

first, Jeff Gordon winning the Indy 500 in front of 300K? I say more like 450K. The BY-400 is at 300K already.

Second; I don't like your crystal ball.


Today's German Champ Car race reminded me, and I'm sure quite a few others, what Champ Cars are all about.

I pray you bought a faulty ball.

Racewriter
05-11-03, 11:10 PM
Originally posted by racer2c
Two points of contention;

first, Jeff Gordon winning the Indy 500 in front of 300K? I say more like 450K. The BY-400 is at 300K already.

Second; I don't like your crystal ball.


Today's German Champ Car race reminded me, and I'm sure quite a few others, what Champ Cars are all about.

I pray you bought a faulty ball.

Oh, it doesn't have to be this way, racer2c. But I doubt strongly that anyone in charge of either series has the brains to fix it.

cartmanoz
05-12-03, 07:17 AM
For there to be peace, all we need to do is assassinate Tony George!:flame:

Kate
05-12-03, 07:18 AM
Have you ever heard the phrase "If you're so smart, why aren't you in charge?"

Isn't it amazing how the backbenchers are the ones who know exactly what to do to "fix" something they have decided needs fixing, but when someone puts them in charge they discover life is a lot more complex than it looked from a grandstand with a hotdog and a beer and a NASCAR cap?

I've been watching F1 for about 40 years, and it has changed radically about 15 times in that time, and once there was a race with only 4 cars in it and it was the most exciting F1 race ever and people are still talking about it. Those were the days when we knew nothing lasts forever, that enjoying what we have is better than whining about what we want, and that just because things are different doesn't mean they are broken. Things that can't change turn stagnant and die as the world moves on without them. Exhibit "A" is the American school system, which was designed to produce factory workers who can complete routine tasks to a schedule and move from place to place when a bell rings, and refuses to change although the last thing the world needs now is factory workers.

Spicoli
05-12-03, 02:57 PM
Originally posted by Racewriter
Crapwagon.com is reconfigured around a single thread: “I hate Tony George.” The thread gets 2,000,000 posts in one month. The bad news is that only 18 posters contribute.

:saywhat:

Funny stuff dood. We're just bored.:rofl:

FCYTravis
05-12-03, 10:16 PM
Hilarious, yet depressingly real...

Perhaps we need a reincarnation of F5000 or something... paging Steve Johnson, paging Steve Johnson...

mclark2112
05-13-03, 09:26 PM
I hate Tony George! :)

ChrisB
05-13-03, 10:15 PM
Good post RW!

Ya know, if the Indy 500 were to become a stock car race, instead of handing it over to Nascar, why not morph the IRL into a revival of the USAC stock-car series (which at one time was about as big as Nascar) using the same tubeframe chassis as Nascar, but with the OHC fuel-injected IRL engines!

Maybe the notion of sprint drivers getting rides in RE formula Indy cars didn't work out, but it's sure been proven that they are pretty good at FE tubeframe stock cars!

USAC ladder: midgets -> sprints -> SilverCrown -> Indy stockcars

Railbird
05-13-03, 10:27 PM
Good Lord ChrisB

You just hit us upside the head with something more likely to be succesful than anything the "braintrust" at 16th & Georgetown would ever come up with.

How about mixing in the rift between Bruton's redneck clan and the crackers from Volusia County?

Christ, with an extra date added at the Brickyard and a few bones tossed toward Pocono, Bruton would grab command of every stock car fan north of the Mason Dixon.

Racewriter
05-13-03, 11:14 PM
Originally posted by ChrisB
Good post RW!

Ya know, if the Indy 500 were to become a stock car race, instead of handing it over to Nascar, why not morph the IRL into a revival of the USAC stock-car series (which at one time was about as big as Nascar) using the same tubeframe chassis as Nascar, but with the OHC fuel-injected IRL engines!

Maybe the notion of sprint drivers getting rides in RE formula Indy cars didn't work out, but it's sure been proven that they are pretty good at FE tubeframe stock cars!

USAC ladder: midgets -> sprints -> SilverCrown -> Indy stockcars

Actually, I think it's time for USAC to get back into the stock car business - but into pavement late models. NASCAR has made a complete ****-up of the Re/Max Series, and there are a whole lot of cars not doing anything - and tracks needing a headline race...

The IRL engines would make your series DOA. Hell, they've made the IRL DOA.

ChrisB
05-14-03, 12:05 AM
I actually attended a few of the USAC stock car races at Pocono in the early 70s! (a few Nascar regulars like Petty and Pearson also showed up)

Maybe the IRL engines wouldn't work in those chassis, but they should at least try something with fuel-injection and OHC like (I think) the ASA is doing... at least have an engine a little bit more advanced than Nascar. But hopefully the drivers would be comprised of USAC sprint grads, instead of them leaving and going South to NC.

Here's an overlooked mistake that TG made... Back circa '93 or so when the dealings were going on for the BY400, TG should have made a condition that in order for Nascar to have the BY400 they would not race on Memorial weekend so that Indy would get sole media focus (the Charlotte 600 would have to be moved) ... but who woulda thunk back then that Charlotte would ever beat Indy's TV ratings?

The reason I mention this is because with Indy as a USAC stockcar race, it would be even MORE important to not have Charlotte on the same day (to maybe get some Nascar drivers to run at Indy) Does the IMS/BY400 still have enough clout that TG could demand NOW for Nascar to not run on Memorial weekend? Or if IMS ran this USAC stockcar deal with Bruton in on it, perhaps Bruton would gladly move the Charlotte 600 to another weekend?

Ziggy
05-14-03, 01:43 AM
Thought provoking. IMO, no way does NASCAR change the date of the Coca Cola 600... I know fans from Indy who now DRIVE to Charlotte to attend this race! No kidding...

This is a classic line by Racewriter
"The IRL engines would make your series DOA. Hell, they've made the IRL DOA."

Got me laughing, and it's late!

Ziggy

mapguy
05-14-03, 06:20 AM
Originally posted by mclark2112
I hate Tony George! :)

My nomination for best first post.

:thumbup: :thumbup:

Spicoli
05-14-03, 04:26 PM
Originally posted by mapguy
My nomination for best first post.

:thumbup: :thumbup:

Mr. Mapguy, meet Mr. Crapwagon:saywhat:

:)