Its sad to think Indy had bernie worried about its success back in the early 90s before Tony George made a change to that, with Him back in charge I would give indy 2 more years tops before it has to fold all together.

Quote from Mustafur :

Its sad to think Indy had bernie worried about its success back in the early 90s before Tony George made a change to that, with Him back in charge I would give indy 2 more years tops before it has to fold all together.

Bernie Ecclestone promised Tony George the USA GP in Indianapolis. The question is, what did Tony do for Bernie. And why did IMS suddenly allow NASCAR to race there? /conspiracy

Quote from Mustafur :

...I would give indy 2 more years tops before it has to fold all together.

I don't see the Indy 500 disappearing though, and the series would remain together around that regardless of the number of races I beleive.

What body would take over that race should Indy fold? None that exists right now. That's why Indy couldn't fold all together. Maybe they will continue on a minimized number of races, but not fold. F1 runs the Indy 500 in 2015 (kidding)

On a serious note though, how can a series shoot its self in the foot so many times an so often? I never knew it was possible.. It's sad to see. I really thought that Randy was doing a great job with the series. Much better than I've seen in the series in past years by miles..

Quote from Cornys :

I don't see the Indy 500 disappearing though, and the series would remain together around that regardless of the number of races I beleive.

What body would take over that race should Indy fold? None that exists right now. That's why Indy couldn't fold all together. Maybe they will continue on a minimized number of races, but not fold. F1 runs the Indy 500 in 2015 (kidding)

On a serious note though, how can a series shoot its self in the foot so many times an so often? I never knew it was possible.. It's sad to see. I really thought that Randy was doing a great job with the series. Much better than I've seen in the series in past years by miles..

We may still have the 500 but that alone can't pay for the rest of the series, one race year is basically dead.

Quote from Cornys :

I've never understood the whole American born drivers only thing.. I love seeing Marcose Ambrose and Montoya in the Sprint Cup Series just as much as I like Piquet in the truck series (and hopefully Nationwide soon enough).

FTG is the last thing that IndyCar needs in many ways and I can understand your fusteration

That was FTG's whole rationale behind the AOWR (as he called it at the time) that became the IRL. Look how long that lasted. It's like I said, it should be the best drivers who live and work in NA regardless of nationality. In the 80s/90s Indy had Brazilian drivers, Germans, Finns (Hey there Tero Palmroth!), Swedes, British, Canadians all going against the Americans in their own series. Go and watch 80s/90s Indycar/CART post split and tell me how great the racing is.

Also, related note, something that really, really bugs me.

Quote from Me at SRD :

Problem is where to watch? People over here (i.e. not in the US) are majorly into Wilson, Pagenaud, Bourdais, Servia, Sato, Power and Briscoe, but they can't watch the series due to the TV deals, that's money Indy COULD be having to put into the series, Europe has a lot of disposable income right now, if even $150,000 of France's money went to Indy from Bourdais/Pagenaud fans, or $100,000 of Aus's money went, then Indy would be in better shape, but no, the powers that be seem to think only people in the US want to watch it when it has just as large a global fanbase.

They've taken to shutting down all the JTV/ustream/whatever streams as well when they're up and slapping any Youtube vids with copyright strikes for daring to post a full race when they don't even post them to their channel do they? Sure, they post classic races, but show me where I, as an Irish man living in the UK, can watch the full Indy 500, or Fontana, or Detroit?

I can't.

It's like they don't want people to watch. That is killing the series as much as anything.

Well... since the IRL Versus deal (back in the time) there have been problems with the international distribution. Many stations pulled out of the coverage. E.g. the Bertelsmann group which had the rights for the Netherlands or Premiere (the precedor of Sky Germany - internationally known as the station of Jaques Schulz ) for Austria and Germany. As far as I know BSkyB is the only station which got their rights back after a break. But most contries are having just ASN as local rights holder, which means one need to conquer a US military base or a US battle ship to be able to watch IndyCar live. The international rights holder is Disney. They are also producing the world feed (which is actually just the green feed with unbranded ESPN graphics instead of the graphics of the producing station).

http://auto-racing.speedtv.com ... e-for-indycars-stupidity/

http://monicahilton.wordpress. ... /10/29/i-call-your-bluff/

not sure if this has already been posted, but here was George's offer to IndyCar in an outline: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.c ... .html?eref=si_motorsports

Quote from TFalke55 :

Lotus engined IndyCar team HVM enters the LMP2 class in WEC and the LMPC class in ALMS, though, with the future of ALMS, the WEC project will have the priority. Currently it is not sure if the team returns to the IndyCar cicle, since the departure of Simona de Silvestro also meant the depature of her sponsors.

Source: Roman Wittemeier, Motorsport-Total.com, http://www.motorsport-total.co ... LMP2-Klasse_12110205.html

.

Quote from TFalke55 :

.

Apparently they're still stuck on the Lotus contract.

http://blogs.indystar.com/raci ... h-lotus-eyes-sports-cars/

Tony Johns playing the devil's advocate: Unbelievably, I stand with Tony George.

Good read.

I found this to be a very good article and I beleive that any IndyCar fan would love to read this article. It is from MotorsportMagazine.com and I think it may shed some light about the difficulties of oval racing to those who don't beleive in it. This article shares the words of Emerson Fittipaldi, the 2-time Indy 500 Champion. Personally I beleive that it is a must read for IndyCar fans. I'll likely include this article in the reading for Realistic NASCAR Cup Series Drivers, because it is just that good. I hope that you'd take a few moments to read over it even if you are not a big fan of oval racing.

http://www.motorsportmagazine. ... tipaldi-on-oval-racing-2/

That being said, I fully agree with this comment on the article:

Quote :

Oval races can be breathtaking when the cars are truly on the limit. When they’re not, though, it gets boring fast. I attended an IRL race weekend at Pikes Peak raceway years ago and truly enjoyed the USAC support race — those guys were clearly on the limit coming through the corners. The “headliner” IRL race on the same track turned out to be a snooze-fest. The cars just had too much grip for their power levels and were never at the limit of adhesion. Drivers could drone around side-by-side for lap after lap and there was never that “wow” factor that comes with watching great drivers at work — you got the impression that any reasonably competent race driver could have run those cars flat out in either groove all race long.

I find it sad that not only in LFS, but in real life this issue is very common. IndyCar has taken steps to reduce downforce in recent years on the ovals, and I hope that it remains, but it's looking sad at this moment in time for the series, and I hope it recovers better than ever.

Tony Stewart might drive for Penske in the 500 in 2013

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.c ... rt-indy-500.ap/index.html

That'd be awesome, although how they would accommodate his fat ass I don't know.

Quote from BlueFlame :

That'd be awesome, although how they would accommodate his fat ass I don't know.

Despite appearance hes not fat his fat head basically gives the impression.

and maybe that Mobil 1 comercial where he doesn't get out of the car after switching cockpits with Lewis Hamilton

He only weighs 180 lbs http://sports.yahoo.com/nascar/sprint/drivers/87

180lbs? Sorry what is that in an accurate and coherent measurement?

Quote from BlueFlame :

180lbs? Sorry what is that in an accurate and coherent measurement?

12 stone 8.5lb

Quote from BlueFlame :

180lbs? Sorry what is that in an accurate and coherent measurement?

sigh.. 81 kg

Not likely to happen I know, but having both Alex Zanardi/Ganassi and Tony Stewart/Penske in the same 500 would be so awesome...

Quote from Cornys :

sigh.. 81 kg

No way does he weigh 81 KG. I weight in at that and I'm half his width....

Quote from BlueFlame :

No way does he weigh 81 KG. I weight in at that and I'm half his width....

Yes, but you are 70% water. Smoke's 100% awesome.