Alright, I might had forgotten to get questions from Twitter, as I had originally planned to head over before the weekend, but then realized there was a race on Friday night, which changed my plans. So I bring you rumors only, no responses, sorry, I'll make up for it.
Anyways, I went by last night and here is what the good man had to tell you and me.
-He says LDR will be a two car team in 2010, no news on driver. He still expects Takuma Sato at LDR for Homestead.
-He says asides from the FAZZT Racing team with driver Alex Tagliani, you can expect one more new (or old) team for 2010, one that no one is talking about.
-Sponsorship packages are hurting for 2010. Teams are hoping that the Homestead numbers turn out to be very good being the championship deciding race. They figure that will finish the season off on a good note, and help sell sponsors on Versus.
-Vision will answer the call in 2010, but one other team won't.
-He says Brazil is 50/50 at the moment.
-A1GP is counting on Brazil happening because they want to be a support race, and have already held discussions with the IRL. They have scheduled their race in Brazil for the same weekend.
-VW may use the IRL as a way to introduce the high end Phaethon back to the USA. They are planning to relaunch the previously failed model to the US in 2011 or 2012.
-Milka is back full time for 2010.
Lots of stuff to go through here, what are your thoughts.
Well, I'm finally back on the scene. Took some time off from the blog simply because I didn't have the time for it unfortunately. I was in Edmonton for the Founders Cup (Jr. B National Championship), and prior to that, we were going 110% to get ready for the tournament. Hopefully you guys can forgive me and I can get whatever followers I had on the blog back for the last couple races and into the off-season. I'm planning on doing a silly season page for the site to keep everyone up to date on the multiple situations regarding empty race seats and new teams.
Anyways, I missed the Sonoma race as I was flying back from Edmonton, saw the intro show on the plane, and got home to see the winner interview. I had heard about the Will Power/Nelson Philippe crash and am very happy Nelson was not hurt further then he was. Happy both men will be alright. If Will is ready for 2010 hopefully we'll see him in a Penske Dallara. As for Nelson, if he is ready to go, expect him back at Conquest for a lot more races, if not the full season under the i drive green banner.
Luckily, I planned timed into schedule last saturday to watch the Chicago race, and got to watch another race from start to finish. And what a race I got to watch. Close action lap after lap, passing, side by side racing, and a top four that didnt involve Red-Red-Red-Red (or in Dario's case, the yellow Lifelock livery).
Mario Moraes managed his best finish in his still short ICS career in a race dedicated to his father. Graham Rahal also made a strong push for first with a couple of laps to go. I know I was on the edge of my seat to see if Graham could make it stick around the outside and take the lead, but he just didn't have the help he wanted.
As for those who are complaining about the Indycar Series at Chicagoland being dangerous and contrived, I say to you, Chicagoland has always been a very tight track competition wise. Look back at the 2008 race and you'll see that the cars were just as tight, yet there were simply less cars able to hang with the Penske/Ganassi bunch last year. And if I recall correctly, I didn't hear anyone complaining last year about the pack racing. As for the danger involved in the close, sidepod to sidepod action, perhaps the danger involved will help teach the drivers on track to respect eachother a bit more. It seemed like drivers had learned to be fearless with all the new safety innovations, and can be attributed to some stupid accidents where drivers didn't mind putting someone in the wall at 220 mph. Hey, by the way, unfortunately, danger gets the viewers attention.
Now we have this Versus/Comcast/DirecTV issue coming up. Obviously, people aren't happy about this, especially those subscribed to DirecTV. As far as I'm concerned, give it time. They've got about two more weeks before you really need to worry about not being able to see Motegi.
By the way, big thumbs up to Alex Tagliani who managed to put something together to run full time in 2010 (atleast that's the plan) with entrepreneur Andre Azzi. This current and future unofficial Team Canada seems to have the makings of something good right off the bat. They bought the remnants of Marty Roth's ICS team, which includes 4 top of the line (yet heavily crash damaged) Dallara's. Those cars, according to Robin Miller, are all top of the line Dallara's, and Roth spent top dollar to buy all the little extra's for his cars. If Tag's can bring up James Hinchcliffe and Andrew Ranger once he retires, then his team will be a success.
Grand-Am Rolex Series at IMS? Screw that. If you want a sports car race there, run a 12 Hour ALMS race there. An Indy ALMS 12 or 24 hour race would bring in the same major entrants from across the pond as Petit Le Mans brings across for Road Atlanta. Grand-Am is slow, boring, and very low car counts, and it's Nascabish.
Alright, well, I will drop by the Gryphon and see if our favorite bartender still has his job, hopefully he will be working and can give the dish on some silly season stuff. Stay tuned folks.
It seems we ran into a slight problem this past weekend. Rumor has it that the TV ratings for the Versus run St. Petes GP dropped off from last year, and when I say dropped, I mean like, Humpty Dumpty falling off a wall and shattering. Through Chris Estrada at Indy Racing Revolution, we have a report that the ratings for the St. Pete's GP dropped 60% in viewership from last year, and as the season opener, it dropped 79%. Mind you, he does say he isn't too sure about the source (An Autoracing1.com article, who is quite anti-IRL, or atleast pro-CCWS/CART, was posted on Trackforum) being quite true.
It seems everyone has had an opinion about the subject. Some argue that they were in tough with the season opener going up against the Texas Nascab race with two of the biggest names in the circus battling for the win.
However, the common denominator among any excuse is that Versus is only available in about 3/4 of the homes ESPN and ABC is. And just because it is available, doesn't mean that people get it. Mr. Iannucci claims both he and pressdog had to pay extra to subscribe for Versus in the states. I assume many americans couldn't be bothered to pay the extra dough to get Versus whether it's for the IRL or not. So let's say, of those 70-75 Million homes Versus is available in, only 40 to 50 million actually get the channel either through getting it as part of their current package, or through paying for the extra package. 50 to 60 percent drop in homes equals out to about the 60 percent drop in viewers for the St. Petes race.
So it isn't really that people didn't want to watch it, they just didn't want to watch it enough to spend the extra money on Versus. Unfortunately, it seems that unless something major happens, that won't change.
Maybe the IRL can take the money it is being paid for the TV rights and pay people every person 5 bucks to watch the race? It could be the new marketing campaign, encouraging people to film themselves watching the IRL race, and upload it to youtube, then they will be sent a crisp 5 dollar bill in the mail. Seems logical to get viewership up. In this tough economic time, some people wouldn't mind watching an IRL race, if they are getting paid for it anyways.
I have to agree with Defender of the IRL though, the sky is not falling. The IRL has a strong marketing strategy in place and I think we should give it some time for this strategy and Versus to figure it out and up the ratings a bit. However, the sky is not being held up by a whole lot right now unfortunately, and unless this picks up, the sky might just well tug on those strings and fall pretty fast.
And I'd love to know the numbers for the IRL's feed online. Since up here in the great white north, I don't get TSN2 (the IRL has to realize that Canada can be a strong ratings generator as well), I had to watch pieces of the race online. I'm not sure if I'm the only who had this issue, but the video feed was terribly late, 3 or 4 laps behind, it had no sound, and was terrible quality. If they intend for the webcast to be a quality option for people to watch if they don't have Versus, they need to improve this product quickly. I ended up clicking off the webcast and opened up the IMS radio feed which was my only and best option really. They do a good job, but I wish I could had watched the race properly.
Anyways, until I see the firm numbers from a reputable source, I won't make any of this stuff official, but I feel pretty strongly that AR1 is pretty spot on for this one.
Well, unfortunately I missed qualifying to do some work for my lacrosse team helping a young players clinic. What I come back to shocks me.
Graham Rahal on Pole
Scott Dixon not in the Fast 6
Justin Wilson/DCR in second?
Tags and Manning 7th and 10th respectibly
3 AGR in the top... I mean bottom 7?
Graham Rahal seems like he is ready to break out this year I think. Last years rain soaked St. Petes GP was more luck then anything. But now it seems like, on the road and street courses, Graham Rahal has shown he is ready to roll this season and I like it. I'm impressed with his ability to put the NHL car on pole ahead of IRL Vets like Franchitti and Kanaan and Briscoe. This is a shot across the bow of the Big-3 and I hope NHL and Graham sink them this weekend.
As for Dixon, I expected him in the top 6 for sure. I know most of his wins came on the ovals but I still expected Dixon to compete for the pole here based on the team he is with and how his teammate did. But maybe it was just a rough session for them, but I think the competition will be gunning for him and will make it tough for him to do well as often as last season.
Anyone else notice that Justin Wilson picked up second place? Is it a typo or did DCR really step it up over the off-season? I know Robin Miller made it seem like Dale Coyne was ready to spend some of his coin to step up the ladder a bit, but this seems a bit far fetched to be competing with the Big 3 at St. Pete's. I doubt they will find this success on the ovals, but it is nice to see them start up front. Hopefully this means Paul Tracy will change his mind on turning down the offer for the second car at DCR.
The 2 last minute replacements did very well considering they finished ahead of most of AGR while Manning also finished in front of his teammate in the qualifying session. Tags best time was actually faster then Will Power's time in the Fast 6. Hopefully this will encourage some sponsors considering taking the plunge to hop on board the Conquest train.
Is it personnel or is it drivers? We all know AGR has all the parts and pieces for their Dallara's available so you have to wonder why they are so far back in the field for qualifying. I don't actually remember the last time an AGR driver aside from TK qualified for the Fast 6 session. Personally, I actually enjoy seeing Danica and Marco in the bottom half of the field because I don't like either of them while I'm null on Mutoh. Atleast Kanaan is near the top as I do enjoy him even though he is driving for AGR. The problem with Danica and Marco in the bottom of the qualifying order is that they are the drivers that the IRL needs to have near the top of the time charts to get the Americans who cheer for Americans back watching the series. It's a good thing one famous racers son has the ability to do that.
Anyways, with the field so spread out talent-wise (the top 19 are less then a second apart), it should make for an interested race. There will be some good battles for position and I'm hoping Versus covers it well. This is their first big test so we'll get to see how it goes.
Well, day one of the Homestead Open Test for the ICS teams is in the books. The usual contenders were up front, with a few surprises. The test was led by Scott Dixon, Ryan Briscoe, and Dario Franchitti. Now the surprises start. Mario Moraes pulled a rabbit out of his ass and grabbed 4th overall for the day, followed by Power in his new ride, Andretti, and a good day from Robert Doornbos in the "Bobby D" sponsored car. Briscoe (setting up Power's car), Kanaan and Rahal round out the top 10. Stanton Barrett brought up the back end.
Seemed like Goodyear tire test as more then a few tires went flat, but I don't believe any incidents occured. All the ICS cars remained intact (there was atleast one crash from the FIL guys) which is good news since some of the teams don't need the crash damage this early.
NHL Racing put alot of miles on their cars today between Rahal, Doornbos, and "test driver" Milka Duno. Each car had more then 130 laps. Not sure if you have heard yet, but Milka at NHL is now the worst kept secret in the IRL, actually all of motorsports. Milka told the media to expect something next week.
After the testing was completed, on the sole camera set up at the test, you could see a group of cars led by Ed Carpenter circling the track at half or 3/4 speed. Carpenter was followed by the Versus liveried car of AJ Foyt IV. Don't get your hopes up for a Versus sponsored car at Vision (I'll talk about that in a paragraph or so), as this group circling the track was for a Versus promotional shoot. A chase car could be seen following the cars filming.
It seemed like a pretty positive day for the ICS teams, and today will see atleast one new car on track as Dan Wheldon makes his first appearance at the test with Panther after a National Guard promotion (I wonder what the soldiers thought of Dan and his pretty shoes) on tuesday. I still can't see how they can carry a foreign driver in a US National Guard sponsored car.
Anyways, back to the Versus car. If they really wanted to try and gain some viewership, Versus should sponsor AJ Foyt IV for 5 races, specifially Indy, Milwaukee, Iowa, Watkins Glen and Toronto. Why these 5 races? These are the 5 ABC races that will most likely get a larger viewing audience then any Versus race. On top of that, they don't need to advertise to people who are already watching a race on their own channel. Sure, it would stir up a bit of controversy, but it would boost the car counts up a little bit and you know that Vision is going to run atleast 2 cars in the I500, so why not make one of them a Versus car?
