Questions?

[spiritone]

When (champcar -Cart, all the same to me) was at it's most popular and expanding to different countries the biggest detractors were the americans on this forum. Having races outside the country still seems to be a problem on this forum. Why is it that many of you american fans are fixated on homegrown races and against expanding your series. It always puzzles me that in a country that has the highest tech military hardware seems to enjoy low tech series and 1 chassis series. The best part about the cart (champcar) series was the diversity of the engines,chassis,tracks,and drivers. Somehow that offended tony and his followers who thought everything should be homegrown. Why was it that chev and ford didn't want to compete against the raising tide of foreign competitors? Why when america was the leader of high tech it didn't want to compete in a growing series that could have competed against F1? Why is it that once again the indy car series has opted to operate as a reltive low tech series? I know everyone will come back with the excuse that there is no money to go high tech. Sorry that doesn't really wash when football, baseball, and even our national game hockey seems to have no problem finding fans and money. So once again it gets down to the fact that maybe its the people that are running the series that are doing a poor job of selling the series and running the series.


Think about this. How long do have before the naturally asperated motor is history. Will open wheel be able to regain it's popularity before the engines are extinct? With the people that are running the show right now the odds are very long. I think the split may have damaged the sport beyond repair. The demise of the champcar series did not gain the fans that tony counted on it only widened the rift. The new vision for the series is struggling to get converts, is it to late?

When you look at F1 now and think that america could have had a series to rival it, what a missed opportunity. Yes i know Nascar is the biggest car racing series in america right now which only reinforces my puzzlement why americans are so insular? Why no teams in F1 where you could show off your grasp of high tech, you can master stealth but can't beat the world in the most high tech series?


Well, there are all my questions. I am sure their will be some interesting answers.

[Easy Drifter]

I am not going to add much to what Starter said.
The Hulman family had always run the Indy 500 the way they wanted. They almost always had some different rules than whatever sanctioning body put on the race wether it was AAA, USAC, or CART.
Tony wanted to expand that control to all major open wheel racing so when he could not gain control of CART he started his own series.
Originally it was supposed to be all oval, all US drivers etc. That did not work and it became basically all non US from engines to chassis. Less and less US or even Cdn. drivers.
Rebuilding is going to be tough and crappy TV packages do not help. Versus in the US. Up here the races are on the CTV network on their TSN stations but the majority are shown on TSN2 which has very limited subscribers. Most people do have TSN in their package but not 2.

[Enjun Pullr]

That's quite a spirited pant load.

IndyCar has been asking overseas manufacurers, hat in hand, to offer suitable turbocharged engines for the past 2 1/2 years. In the case of their sole supplier, IndyCar is only too happy to disrupt their domestic schedule by packing up the whole circus and flying to Japan.

If Vauxhall elected to subsidize the supply of GM Ectotec 2.0L turbo engines,
you think IndyCar would turn them down? I doubt it. And I doubt there would be any reluctance to pack up the circus and fly it to Australia to show off the product.

A pant load of money is what is missing. B.S. we got plenty of, thanks. Most of it is domestic, but we are treated to some fine imported stock on a regular basis.

[beachbum]

If you look at racing as sports entertainment, the only question becomes - what draws people to watch your entertainment? Is it high tech? In today's world, I just don't think that is much of a draw as technology has become mostly "blackbox" technology where the average person doesn't care what in in the box.

ALMS is high tech and while it is very interesting, the cost is too high and the fields in the "tech" classes are very small and dependent on the vagaries of manufacturer's advertising budgets. Fans complain about the big 2 in Indy Car, but in ALMS only Audi and Peugeot have a chance at a win. The privateers pick up the scraps if the "big boys" aren't there or stumble badly. As a "techy" I like watching an Audi or Peugeot, but the real racing is in the production based classes.

IMHO, the key is people. People watch other people doing well. If the choice was between watching McNish in an Audi sedan or some unknown in a prototype, I am more interested in McNish. Look at any stick and ball sport sport. The talk is about how this top player is doing, if they will change the balance of power, and what they are doing off the field (not always laudatory). Will Randy Moss put more butts in a seat or eyes on a screen that some unknown rookie? Sure, because he is a "personality". Look at "Schumi" in F1. A lot of his fans who screamed for him in a red Ferrari still wave the flag at his silver Mercedes. He is the draw - not the car.

Indy car hasn't down a good job of developing "personalities". Mention "Jr" or "Smoke", or heck even "little gator" and many in the general public know who they are and can talk about their latest results. Even car owners and crew chiefs are celebrities in NASCAR. Other than "Danica" and maybe "Helio", many people have no clue who the drivers are in Indy Car. Where are they in advertisements? Except for Danica, no where. The public can't make a personal connection and cheer for their favorite "driver". Of course, with the yearly musical chairs with ride buyers, the members of the play are constantly changing, but it that a cause or a symptom?

IMHO, until the people of Indy Car become more visible and promoted, all of the other stuff isn't going to save the day.

[Mark in Oshawa]

All this talk of Americans not appreciating anything foreign is a misnomer. There is an segment for sure that wants American drivers and would like all the racing on ovals, but as Tony George proved, there wasn't enough of those fans or drivers to support the series.

It is one of the great crimes of marketing and history that the split happened, but it did, and it was made moot when everyone was back in the fold 13 years later. We cannot get that time and momentum that was lost in 95 back by just pointing fingers.....

The reality is racing may be in a general decline in America, or is taking another form. The reality is Indycars have to base their future on a fiscally affordable form of OW racing (one that means you don't need to write 7 figure checks every week just to show up and compete) that has elements of what made Indy great (sleek and powerful cars that pushed technology) and just good racing. It also needs to be visible. The worst disaster of the last decade and a half is the reality that most of the races are on VS now....and the general decline of TV ratings and interest. TV is the only thing now that allows a series to be more than a regional thing.......and it was the one part of the puzzle most left to chance in the last 15 years....

[Chris R]

One of the reasons that CART as so "high tech" for a while is that the 980's and early 1990's saw the emergence of several different really "high tech" technologies at once that are now considered "low-tech".... Carbon Fiber and computer controls came into being in the 1980's and both CART and F1 implemented use almost immediately... While they were expensive, they were not THAT expensive... As many engineers will tell you (and NASCAR surely attests) - the mad money is not so much in new technology as it is in totally optimizing/exploiting existing technology..... There is really very little new under the sun in F-1 that is not in Indy car - it is just developed many stages beyond what is used in Indycar.... Yes, an F1 wing is way more developed - but to the average person it is still kinda cool that a car needs a wing to stay planted on the ground.....

One cannot argue that electronic fuel injection and overhead cam is more "high tech" than a carburetor and push rods - but I believe a sprint cup NASCAR engine probably costs very similar to an Indycar engine because they have invested tons of $$ in getting the last horsepower in a NASCAR motor.....

The other thing that has changed dramatically is that road car are now nearly as high tech as race car and in some cases more so - the bar to be "high tech" has been raised so high that it is really hard for any series to be "high tech" and affordable.....

[Enjun Pullr]

This one here from beachbum is the money line:

"In today's world, I just don't think that is much of a draw as technology has become mostly "blackbox" technology where the average person doesn't care what in in the box."

It speaks directly to one of the subjects that brought me here to chase down EAGLE EYE. Twenty chassis sensors = track data maps = shaker rig simulations = active shock testing = passive shock tuning = improved grip = lower lap times.

To benefit who? If there is greater speed differential between the cars racing at Mid-Ohio, I don't care if the lap times are all 2 seconds slower.

You only need DAGS and telemetry and the enormous costs of this development if you want them. Who needs all that unproductive investment to put on a good race?

[spiritone]

People don't care whats in the "blackbox". i would beg to differ. Check out all the high tech phones being bought. Everyone wants the latest toy. Technology is advancing at a hell of a rate. The fact of the matter is the teams will spend as much money as they have to get an edge.

On the matter of money. The recession didn't just hit america, but it hasn't stopped europeons from building more tracks or adding more series. Motorsport leaders here are just doing a bad job of selling racing.

Funny about the races in japan and brazil, they are two of the most successful races on the schedule. The race they cancelled in australia was almost as big as the indy 500. The point being that maybe expansion to the right markets is more important than trying to sell the product at home.

As far as NA engines being around for the foreseeable future, don't bet on it. If you look around how many hybrids on the road already and how fast that technology is advancing, look out.

[beachbum]

People don't care whats in the "blackbox". i would beg to differ. Check out all the high tech phones being bought. Everyone wants the latest toy. Technology is advancing at a hell of a rate. The fact of the matter is the teams will spend as much money as they have to get an edge.

On the matter of money. The recession didn't just hit america, but it hasn't stopped europeons from building more tracks or adding more series. Motorsport leaders here are just doing a bad job of selling racing.

Funny about the races in japan and brazil, they are two of the most successful races on the schedule. The race they cancelled in australia was almost as big as the indy 500. The point being that maybe expansion to the right markets is more important than trying to sell the product at home.

As far as NA engines being around for the foreseeable future, don't bet on it. If you look around how many hybrids on the road already and how fast that technology is advancing, look out.

Your "blackbox" comment proves the point. Everyone wants the latest, but most of the people I know have no brand loyalty and don't care what is inside. Does anyone outside of a few techies know the internal differences between a Droid and an iPhone? They don't care what it "is" just what it "does". To many of my friends (I am in the computer industry) smart phones are an interesting mix of tool and entertainment with the "tool" part being the main attraction. If they didn't do more than old phones, the fact they are "high tech" would be meaningless.

As for Europeans spending money while sponsorship is hard to find in the US, you may be speaking more to cultural differences as well as the fact that there are so many places for companies to put money in the US. In some areas of the world, national pride is very big and governments provide some of the funding. In the US, the current trend is to move government out of funding and rely on private industry that only cares for the ROI. National pride doesn't figure in - just ask the members of US Olympic teams how much public finding is available for national pride. If an entertainment "product" doesn't generate income, not one invests in it.

Having been in racing, I know many of the challenges. "High tech" solves nothing beyond emptying the pockets quicker. The ones with the biggest pockets dominate as they can afford more of the "high tech" available. The end result is lots of money is spent for what result?

For Indy car to advance, it needs to develop a uniqueness - an identity. Technology is one way, but it isn't helping the health of ALMS. Grand-Am is just as healthy and it is relatively low tech. Contrary to the beliefs of some, NASCAR is very high tech, but I think what sells the sport are the people and personalities, not the hardware.

This is an argument that will go one forever as there aren't any good answers. Racing has always struggled to survive and the death of auto racing has been proclaimed many times in the past. Maybe someday all racing will be virtual or use AI (that is the intimate high tech), but will it still be racing? Racing has always been a man against man ("man" in the generic sense) competition. But should it be one engineer against another, or one driver against another? I may be old school, but I want to see driver vs driver.

[Enjun Pullr]

Spirit, NA is an abbreviation for Normally Aspirated. Any engine fitted with a turbocharger, like the 2012 Honda 2.4L V6 Indycar engine, is not an NA engine.

The race in Surfer's Paradise was discontinued primarily because of scheduling conflicts. IndyCar did not want to end their season offshore, or reorganize their other dates to accomodate the options that were offered. There was also some reluctance from the Australian government to subsidize the $20-$25M cost of bringing the circus to town.

Terry Angstadt has been working to secure a date for a race in China. Mainly because they have shown an interest in paying for one.

If cultivating American drivers is viewed as important to some, as it is to the Series management, then domestic sponsorship is imperative. There is far less incentive for companies with primarily U.S. customers to participate in a largely international series.

High tech gadgets are popular as "user interfaces" for their utility, not their circuitry. The utility of race cars is to stage good competition, with or without strain gauges monitoring loads on suspension pull rods.

"Motorsport leaders here are just doing a bad job of selling racing."

I couldn't agree more.

"The fact of the matter is the teams will spend as much money as they have to get an edge."

OK, I agree even more. But that's where limiting technology in certain areas can contain cost without undermining competition. I argue that data acquisition for developing chassis dynamics is a huge expense, but develops no transferrable technology.

It's an example where Penske and Ganassi have the best facilities and personnel to gain small but insurmountable advantages. So what do you do, reposess their shaker rigs?

If you limit the ability to collect telemetry, you cut the reliance on off-track testing and the staff required for the R&D. It has no value to the fans, or in creating technology for the "user interface" you drive to work.

Each team has a mission control center in their pit, and in the paddock. The data is also used to teach the drivers how to drive. A staff of 20 is required for each entry to fly to overseas races. All of this gets us what?

It gets us teams that can't compete if they can't afford the technology to keep up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTx9ECUjHZM