The Indy Racing League is taking a serious look at holding a race in China as early as 2011. Series officials
said there are several good reasons why the league may want to head to the nation of 1.33 billion people.
“Obviously it’s a very big market, and I love the interest they are showing,” said Terry Angstadt, president of the Indy Racing League’s commercial division, who departed Sunday for a five-day swing through China. “We are clearly interested.”
Angstadt told IBJ before this season started that he would be meeting with a number of Chinese government officials to hash out the possibilities of bringing the IRL to China. Fourteen of the IRL’s 17 races this year are in the U.S., with two excursions into Canada and one to Japan comprising the series’ international outreach. Angstadt said a race in Brazil next year is a strong possibility.
While the talks are in the “early stages,” Angstadt said Chinese officials are thinking big.
“We’re looking at one existing and one new facility,” Angstadt told IBJ. “Chinese officials said they want a venue that will hold 500,000 people.”
That’s 100,000-plus more than fit in the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Indianapolis 500. Such a massive audience, Angstadt said, could open the door to new league and team sponsorships in Asia and elsewhere.
But Angstadt said the move into China would be about more than appealing to a mass audience.
“A lot of our corporate partners and team sponsors have a serious interest in being in China,” Angstadt said. “Lots of IRL companies have business relations in China. For instance, Penske has operations in China and Menard’s buys in China. A race there would allow them to enhance those relationships and possibly forge new ones.”
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The IRL future, if there is one, should be to challenge Formula One as an international series that tests driver's skills on the best ovals, street and road courses in the world.
If they can pull that off without the arrogance of Formula One and P.T. Barnum of NASCAR, they could really dominate
MAN oh man this just boggels the mined. BOggels it.
Don't get me wrong, great for sponsors, but it will probably alienate the US crowd which is the last thing the series needs. The reason why F1 makes people so angry is how little they care about the fans and how much they chase sponsors and whoever will pay the highest sanctioning fee. Is Bernie rubbing off?
Not so sure your point equates. If the IRL can band their Japan race with a Chinese race and also please sponsors plus bringing in some much needed additional prize $$ for teams, then extending the season makes sense, especially if they get promo and financial commitments from the Chinese. I don't see how that would offend US fans. Am I missing a point here?
As it is, they have many holes in their schedules and they can fill in some foreign options if they make financial sense and help them build the team structures with more money to gain from their travels. CART, on the other hand, seemed to be very good at adding expenses and had to do much team funding just adding fuel to their own self-destructive fire.
The IRL needs to be careful for the short term and the long term. I do not think 3 or 4 overseas races will alienate American fans, but increasing that number will make it tougher for fans to follow it.
You ever compare a Dallara Dart to an F1 car in 2009? :lol: total complete pieces of S**t compared to the best engineered race cars in the world. I'll bet they don't bite, or if they do, they will spit it out in an instant. International race fans are discerning, and not likely to buy into the dumb-downed, spec, barn door winged crapwagons.
IMO of course. :lol:
That’s 100,000-plus more than fit in the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
:rolleyes:
Anthony, please cease promoting the 400,000 myth. One of the very few things Cavedin has done well in his 'job', is pretty much pummel that fiction.
Talkin' Terry is hysterical. Sounds like some moron that learned a bunch of buzzwords in 'bizness skool' and always talks in those terms thinking he sounds smart, when the reality is he sounds foolish. But that sort of duncery has always impressed His Inheritance, so he's a really good fit working as a mouthpiece for that miserable 'league'.
BG, you like to make up complete fiction about CART and post it as fact. You sound as daft as Terry. Typical Hulmanista gomer rubbish.'If CART did it, it was bad, but if the earl does it, it's grate!'
Pathetic. Does it hurt to be such a hypocrite? It should.
Funny how you IMS suckbags are still obsessed over CART. The reason you have an inferiority complex about CART is cause the 'league' is, in fact, inferior in every way to CART, always has been, always will be. Even now, when CART is long dead. :lol: It will never be anything but a cheap, shoddy, stupid imitation. Must suck to be a fan of idiocy.
As for Edwards gratering v. a crapwagon, completely different aero and momentum factors involved. The crapwagon design is complete, well, crap. But one of these days, it will clear a fence. Then you can celebrate your 'victory' over Nascar. :lol:
F1 has the most expensive equipment in racing, but they still have some of the least competitive races. That is one reason real race fans have trouble getting behind it. They are not dazzled because Ferrari or BMW can build a very expensive car, they love a close race. Real race fans would rather watch two lawn tractors go head to head in a photo finish than watch a F1 car win by a half of a lap.
Are you on drugs? :lol:
EARL @ Kansas = 170k viewers
F1 @ Bahrain = 55million viewers
Real race fans? lmfao.
the lawn tractors raced at Kansas on Sunday and no one watched on TV or in person.
After it was hit while spinning by a car at 195 miles an hour. This was not a crapwagon hitting a quarter sized piece of debris and doing a space shuttle launch. And Edwards walked away, unlike most of the crapwagon launches.
I submit this. How about designing an Indy Car that a trucking company owner from Kalamazoo or a body shop specialist from Pacoima can run at Iowa, Nashville, Michigan, Phoenix, and then the big annual race in May for like $100,000 with a driver who shows up with helmet in hand and grease on his face and dirt in his eyes from Tulsa or Lime Rock or wherever and just smacks down the loud pedal and goes for hell or victory or both, with a bunch of his buddies fora pit crew? It can still be professional. It can still be all that. And it can still be fast and spectacular.
Instead, we forge relationships to build more ugly, expensive race cars for foreign ride buyers to drive, not race. And now we'll probably get some Mao Ying hot shoe that is all the rage in Hong Kong but nobody, I said N-O-B-O-D-Y, in Tucumcari or Tucson will give any more a rat's backside then than they do now for Vitor Meira.
A China race will be sure to finally garner the IRL that coveted -0.5 rating and force the league to pay non-Gomers a stipend to watch the races.
IRL R.I.P. in 2011.
Now if you could argue that IRL has a larger Chinese fan base than F1, then maybe you could make sense of it. I highly doubt it though...they are blowing smoke at the IRL (not necessarily for sponsor related exposure and marketing, but the the track attendance)
My post reads: That’s 100,000-plus more than fit in the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Indianapolis 500.
Since Chinese officials want a 500,000-seat venue, that means that I am saying there are fewer than 400,000 at the Speedway for the Indianapolis 500. Thanks for reading.
IRL: not 400k at Indy
Oh, and Alan Metcalfe, go play with yourself in the corner. Maybe you'll enjoy that.
You just described a USAC Silver Crown car.
Indy has the largest seating capacity of any permanent facility in the world. How is that, can we all agree with that statement?