IRL/Champ Car Merger 2007?

Well, with Toyota pulling out, that sure pushed up the possibility of a merger.

If I had my druthers, I'll take a turbo car over a high-rpm motorcycle engined car any day of the week.

 

They really ought to merge back together. Neither is strong enough to last on their own. Although between the two, I think CART is having a real hard time.

 

I don't wish any ill will against Tony George, but as long as he is alive, a merger will NEVER HAPPEN!

Mike

P.S. I hope I am wrong.

 

never say never.

They need to dump the rules and go back to stock-block chevies like the F-5000 series of the early 1970's.

Wishful thinking on my part, I know.

 

Not many care anymore, and they did it to themselves.

 

I so hope they will merge.

 

Actually I'd like to see 33% road, 33% ovals and 33% street racing.

 

I could live with that. I just want to make the point and think it is a strength of the series that they do provide street racing, which IMHO is different from road racing. F1 only has Monaco at this point and I think that is not enough.

 

Cart and IRL are out of place nowadays in general. F1 and NASCAR both do well largely because anyone can identify with the teams that are racing (ie Chevy, Ford, or Dodge; Ferrari, BMW, Mercedes, etc.).

F1 appeals directly to us latest and greatest guys. NASCAR applies to the good ole boys and those that share their sentiments. Who are CART and IRL supposed to appeal to? They both run oddly detuned engines with seemingly no relation to any cool street cars. On top of that, their chasses (plural of chassis?) are built by companies that 99.999% of people have never heard of. Lola, L O L A, Lola...

If they had something worth watching, well, people would watch...

Just my $.02, but if they want a crowd, merge and run 1.5-2.0L turbos with no restrictions. 1500-2000hp and slicks will fill the stands. Drastically cut ground effects to keep corner speeds down and encourage oversteer, just as the gods intended.

 

I always loved F1 and followed it and by doing so always felt like a "redneck" in Europe. After all it is motorsport and that's really only for the "dumb people". "Smart folks" go to the opera etc. So I always get a kick when people call F1 "sophisticated", "elitist" or even intellectual.

A modern F1 doesn't have much in common with your street car and I think the same could be said for modern NASCARs, but it is the allegiance that counts. Or to put it differently: Because I supported the manufacturer by buying one of their products they got $$$ to put into their F1 team.

This country ought to have a open wheel alternate/compliment to NASCAR. There is enough room.

 

How would you explain Indy car racing here in the 60's and 70's, because nobody could relate to an Eagle, McLaren or Cosworth back then ???????????

It seems there are a whole bunch of little reasons why open-wheel racing failed in the USA, and just look at all of it today, from Modifieds to Sprint Cars to Indy racing, fan support is down everywhere except at the pinnacle venues, (for sprint cars that would be Eldora and Knoxville) and Indy has empty seats for the 500.

I also put some of the blame on TV - why go and spend beaucoup dollars when you can watch it on TV ? That's also the problem when you have sanctioning bodies with nice TV contracts, they can pretty much call all the shots. Far be it for me to beat on nascar - they spent a lot of years getting to where they are today, I don't like them one bit, but I can't take their business acumen away from them.

P.S. the only 'track' racing I'd go see now is the ALMS, and guess who owns that ?

 

You may be thinking of the Grand Am series (similar to ALMS) which is owned by the France family (NASCAR). ALMS is owned by Don Panoz.

As a kid growing up in the 60s and early 70s I remember Indy as being exciting because of the technical innovations that different teams brought to the race each year. Many of the drivers were well known names, even to people who didn't follow motor racing (similar to NASCAR drivers now) and came from all areas of motorsport.

 

F 1 racing hasn't caught on in the US because it's on limited TV (don't even get Speedchannel) and there's not enough "action": passing and crashes.

NASCAR has everything for the American viewer: local drivers, you can see the whole track at once, crashes, passing, lots of rivalries.

CART used to be popular in the US because it had the higher speeds, spectacular crashes and again, name drivers. Indy was the best race in the world because of the rules. Under the old system, you could show up in almost anything! One year someone put the engine BEHIND the driver, one year someone showed up with upside down airplane wings on his car, one year someone showed up with a jet style turbine engine! You never knew what new, wild innovations were coming.

Plus, you had the best drivers in the world. F1 guys, NASCAR guys, CAnAM guys, you name it. It was a who's who for world class drivers.

Today Indy has turned into NASCAR as far as limited choices of equipment. And we have a bunch of mainly second rate drivers. Hardly anyone at Indy could compete in NASCAR or F1 or they would be. As a trade off, we do have better races. When there used to be one car on the lead lap at the end, now we have 9-10 or more.

I go every year, and I know how the popularity has waned. I used to hit traffic at 7 AM at one spot, now I show up at 8:30 and whizz right in with limited traffic. So attendence is WAY down. I used to pay double face for tickets, now I pay less than face sometimes.

If Indy wants to recapture the magic, the NEED to get the Jeff Gordons, Ernhart Jr's. Schumachers, etc. of the world and get them to show up. Imagine what THAT would be like! Today only a cute chick who's a second rate driver causes a buzz.

Ken

 

I used to watch CART fairly religiously. Then the IRL came into existence, and took away all of the top teams and drivers to go race in an all-oval series. I lost interest in CART, due to the talent pool, and have never even seen 1 IRL race due to the all-oval format.

If the two were to merge, that would certainly get me to get into it again.

 

I stand corrected - I thought France's owned ALMS.

 

Autoweek Rumors:

Merge to start 2007 season. Best 15 races from both series. 2.65 turbo V8 as used in Champ Car today supplied by Honda and Cosworth. New chassis being developed by Panoz for Champ Car to be standard. Tires to be Bridgestone/Firestone. Support series to Champ Cars Atlantic with new Mazda engines with 20 teams committed for 2006.

Champ Car appears to have won this 10 year battle although to express the merger as winning could sour some feelings.

 

I can't wait for the two to get back together. While I'll also agree with Whisky a turbo allows a driver to risk a bit more boost in order to over take and does make things a bit more interesting during a race.

I just hope the cars don't look like the current pigs in the IRL.

 

Oh, I thought the Champ cars would be the support series to the F1 races.


Seriously, wouldn't that be awesome at least for the US races?

 

Ya know guys, my biggest problem is I'm stuck in the seemingly old days when racing was good, fun, and a lot more affordable, and certainly had a lot less politics.

Give me a McClaren from 72-74, an Eagle from '73-75, a March from from 1983-4, any Penske chassis and I'm good. Open wheel racing for me really started to go downhill in about 1992....

But when you get into stupid spec chassis, spec motors and spec tires, I have a problem. I understand they are doing that 'to keep costs down', but that was also the same thought behind IRL, and that didn't even last a full season before prices skyrocketed.

I guess I'm not looking for a series where they try to invent stuff on the track that can translate to a road car (like F1), I am looking for innovation that can make someone go faster on the track.

You will never keep the big money out of racing no matter what series it is, I just don't know how to channel it......