what's wrong with champ car?

Question

i love champ car and have watched it for 15 years. i think it's the most exciting racing and it has paul tracy. but i don't understand why there is no interst in it even in a town where we have a great race venue. even the local media is not interested.

Answer 1

If Paul Tracy is the best thing Champ Car has, then it's in even bigger trouble than I thought it was. He's been in CART/Champ Car since 1991 and with some of the best teams - Penske, Team KOOL Green and Forsythe - and all he has to show for it is one driving title and even that came when the series was at its weakest.
I'm not surprised that Paul doesn't like Sebastien Bourdais; Boudrdais has kicked his derriere for the past three years and he's fast closing in on Tracy's total number of wins, despite being in the series only a few years; now, he's about to win his third consecutive driving title.
I can understand why Montrealers wouldn't be overly interested in Champ Car; the lap times are around five seconds slower than what the F1 cars posted this year, Champ Car can only scrape together a field of 17 cars and all are getting a bit old and there is a constant turnover of drivers.
Nowadays, champ Car is down to a spec series - one chassis, one engine and one tire; I think the racing in Formula Atlantic (another spec series) is just as good, if not better.
The Katherine Legge experiment hasn't worked at all. She was put into the series to try and deflect some of the publicity from Danica Patrick, however, Katherine seems to be in a bit over her head and she's made far too many mistakes this year.
Perhaps the new Panoz chassis will `rescue' Champ Car, but that company doesn't exactly have a great record when it comes to building open-wheel chassis' and, like those race attendance crowd Champ Car announces, I'll take the hype about the first test (of the new chassis) last week with a grain of sale.
I'm sure this isn't the answere you wanted, but it's very hard to dispute the facts I've laid out. Feel free to challenge me if you wish.
Note to michinoku2001: Gerry Forsythe doesn't own Cosworth and Panoz. Kevin Kalkhoven owns Cosworth and Don Panoz owns both Panoz and Mosport and don't look for a Champ Car race at Mosport. Champ Car prefers those dreadful featureless street circuits.

Answer 2

It's hard to argure with the other answers. I would just add that I don't think that it's a "marketing" thing (at least as it relates to Nascar). People have been saying that for 10 years and it's not improved.
In my opinion, American open wheel racing (Champ/IRL) is dying for a variety of reasons and canot be ressurected overnight.
1. All of the "legends" (Foyt, Andretti, the Unsers, Mears, Fittipaldi, Rutherford, etc.) left the sport within a relativaly short period of time.
2. Few American drivers were being pegged for competitive rides.
3. Total dominace by one or two teams (Penske, Ganassi) bores fans.
4. It's hard for fans to get excited when you don't even know who is driving which car. It's tough enough to tell who is in an Indy car when they're travelling at the speeds these guys are going. Add to that the tendency for team cars to look almost exactly alike and it's even worse. Compare that to Nascar. No one at any speed would have any trouble picking out Dale Jr. or Jeff Gordon.

How to fix it? Good racing is not enough.
If close racing and passing equaled ratings and fans, the IRL would get more attention than the NFL.
1. Unify the series' to improve the car count and end the "controversy".
2. Restore a mix of large ovals, short ovals, road courses, and street circuits, with the numbers of tracks in that order.
3. Restore a "triple crown" of 500 mile races. Indy, maybe Michigan, and a third at a diferent kind of oval.
4. Insure that while the series is an international one, that there are at least 50% American drivers. No, I don't know how to do this.
5. Among the individual teams, try to maintain consistencty with colors, numbers, sponsors, etc.
6. Stop trying to turn these guys into "rock stars". All of the artificial marketing is embarrasing and looks contrived. If they succeed they will become legitimate stars.

Answer 3

I have followed CART/ChampCar for a long time and it has deteriorated a lot since the days of Nigel Mansell and JV. The IRL divorce didn't help, and NASCAR obviously has superior marketing. If the weather had of cooperated it would have been interesting to see how the attendance and lap times compared to F1. With motorsports the different genres tend to wax and wane. Sports car and hydroplane racing are not what they used to be, while NASCAR is booming. Even F1 doesn't get the attendance it once did, so who knows what the next big thing is?

It's probably a good thing for the series that Bourdais seems headed for a repeat. It's good that Mr. Forsythe takes such an interest but from next season it's going to be even more of a Harlem Globetrotters vs. Washington Generals deal. I mean, Mr. Forsythe owns Cosworth and Panoz and next season it's likely there will be race at his Mosport venue to replace Montreal.

I think the show will go on as it's still going to be the #1 motorsports event in town in cities like Mexico City, Toronto, Edmonton, Surfer's Paradise and Las Vegas. Running 5 seconds a lap slower than F1 on one tenth the budget or less is a lot of bang for the buck. It's interesting that the FIA is going to go with "power to pass" for A1GP.

Answer 4

I used to be a huge fan of Champ Car racing before the split. There was no better test of a drivers skill than using ovals, road courses, and street courses to prove who was the best pure racer in an open wheel car. Now, there are two things that are wrong with Champ car racing.

Number one is NASCAR. Tight racing, bent sheet metal, villains, and pretty boys have been pulling in tons of new fans to NASCAR and they are getting used to seeing race cars pass one another during a race. The Champ Car series, since the split with the IRL, doesn't have the talent to put on such a show. They have one great driver, a handful of mediocre drivers and the rest should still be in a feeder series or karting. And forget about drawing NASCAR fans to Champ Car. The new NASCAR fan will never find a road course race interesting. Check the TV ratings when NASCAR races at Sonoma and Watkins Glen. They are NASCAR's lowest ratings all year.

Number two is Tony George. Mr. George critically wounded American open wheel racing when he started the IRL. The talent pool suddenly became very shallow and the races, Champ and IRL, became very boring.

Champ Car needs the IRL to survive. Even the "500" is dying a slow painful death. It's going to take more than female drivers, additional buttons on steering wheels, and colored tires to keep American open wheel racing alive. How about a shot of bleach in the talent pool?

Answer 5

properly Champ vehicle is unlikely everywhere. in assessment to the IRL which rests its entire season on one race. The Champ vehicle sequence has dissimilar races that make funds. The IRL could be bankrupt if it wasn't for the Indy 500. Races like the long coastline Grand Prix have 3 day attendance figures interior the two hundred,000 selection, that's why Champ vehicle won't fold. The IRL on the different hand, different than for the Indy 500 of direction, is a comedian tale. it particularly is astounding to be certain a million race sustain a sequence, yet thats precisely what is going on with the IRL.

Answer 6

The Series is having growing pains. It kinda sucks because a few years ago they were beginning to cut into Formula 1's TV ratings and they were getting very popular. Now, it's almost invisible. Hopefully things will get better. Maybe someone in F1 does not want Champ Car to succeed. Many of these race series will do whatever it take to put the other guy out of business.

Answer 7

Nothing is wrong with CART. They need to promote and publicise it more and maybe get a babe driver.

There won't be any merger. Tony George who owns Indianapolis Motor Speedway split with CART and made the Independent Racing League, which everyone knows as the Indy Racing League, and figures he can make a whole series around the Indy 500 theme with just ovals and with American drivers. Oh wait, now there are more foreign drivers in IRL than in CART, and now they are adding road courses. Gee, George, what happened with that?

IRL has lasted because of the hype. It started out with second rate drivers and technology, but unrestricted speeds. Drivers died, but there were spectacular crashes to see, and then there was the 500, and then they made sure to have a girl also. I went to see the IRL race this weekend here at Sonoma just because I have girls and because it was a road course. This series will last because of the 500, the only race Americans know about, but let me tell you, the 500 may have 33 cars, but the series itself only has about 16 cars and one engine maker. The race wasn't even as exciting as watching the amateur motorcycling that they have here called AFM.

CART is coming back, but they need to hype it. It's the best thing going. have to go, so this is all I can write for now.

Answer 8

All the good drivers, except for Tracy and maybe 1 or 2 others, are in the IRL now. They need to get the merger done already so that there can be one unified series will all the top drivers and a nice variety of circuits.