Graham Rahal says finishing in 15th place “isn’t cool.“ Marco Andretti’s still wary of the sport’s politics after his father’s disastrous 1993 season. Danica, Helio, are Dixie are all committed to American ovals for the foreseeable future, as opposed to the European road courses of Formula One.
This season is much different for the Indy Racing League.
As opposed to 2007, when the series' two top drivers’ departures made the biggest headlines of the season, the IRL finds itself in a much more comfortable position in 2008, especially against Formula One. With the sudden ability to retain all of its drivers, the league appears poised to build a solid foundation of drivers and teams that may last 10 years down the road.
The reunification of the IndyCar Series and the Champ Car World Series this season, as well as the continued domination of Ferrari and McLaren in Formula One, hint that the top American open-wheel racing series may soon claim superiority over its more expensive European counterpart.
Many Formula One supporters will scoff at the mere notion of any open-wheel series ever overtaking the FIA’s longtime crown jewel. Only Formula One boasts the best drivers in the world, they might say, and any driver who can’t make it in the series just isn’t committed enough to run the best cars in the world.
How can a series based around a budget of $3 million compete with a racing industry that boasts billions of dollars worth of technology?
The answer is simple: The IndyCar Series provides actual competition.
Forget Max Mosley’s sex scandal and any other matters of racing politics across the pond; they’ve been discussed at great length already. Formula One has been little more than a parade for the past decade or so, with the only question being which Ferrari or McLaren driver would take the top spot on the podium (Fernando Alonso being the lone notable exception).
Michael Schumacher won five consecutive championships from 2000 to 2004. The last constructor to win a race besides Ferrari or McLaren was Renault: with Alonso driving, the team won the Japanese Grand Prix on October 8, 2006. That was 20 months ago.
In the 12 IndyCar Series seasons that have been completed since the series’ first race in 1996, only one driver has won multiple championships: Sam Hornish Jr. won in 2001 and 2002 with Panther Racing, and again in 2006 with Penske Racing. Counting the history of Champ Car as well, since 1996, 18 drivers have won major open wheel championships in the United States.
In that same period of time, six drivers have won Formula One championships. Three of those drivers won more than one, with Schumacher‘s five the mark to beat.
It’s not rocket science that domination does not make for good racing, and neither do parades. This is exactly why the IRL—despite taking its knocks from the viewing public for years—puts out a better on-track product than Formula One does at this point.
- B/R Ticket Guide
Even before the unification with Champ Car, bringing the decade-plus schism to a merciful end, the on-track product was more entertaining, and more drivers had a chance to win races. At least nine teams—both Penske cars, both Ganassi cars, all four Andretti-Green cars, and Panther Racing’s lone entry—found their way into victory lane between 2005 and 2007.
Accounting for the fact that two drivers, Dan Wheldon and Marco Andretti, scored victories in Andretti-Green’s No. 26, a total of ten drivers accounted for these wins. For reference, the IRL had an average of 18 cars each of those years.
Meanwhile, 10 Champ Car drivers found their way into victory circles with six teams during that time frame—Sebastien Bourdais, Oriol Servia, and Bruno Junqueira with Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing; Nelson Philippe and Robert Doornbos with Minardi Team USA; Paul Tracy and A.J. Allmendinger with Forsythe Racing; Cristiano da Matta with PKV Racing; Justin Wilson with RuSport; and Will Power with Walker Racing. For reference, Champ Car also had about 18 cars per race in each of those years.
Accounting for the fact that Servia and Junqueira shared a car in 2005, 18 different entries and 20 different drivers won the 48 IRL races and 41 Champ Car races contested in the last three years. Adding Rahal, Danica Patrick, and Ryan Briscoe this season, 23 drivers have won the 96 races put on in total.
In that same time frame, eight drivers have won 54 Formula One Grands Prix: Fernando Alonso, Jenson Button, Giancarlo Fisichella, Lewis Hamilton, Felipe Massa, Juan Pablo Montoya, Kimi Raikkonen, and Michael Schumacher.
As Raikkonen replaced Schumacher at Ferrari and Alonso replaced Raikkonen at McLaren, those 54 wins have only occurred in seven different cars. Button’s win with Honda at the 2006 Hungarian Grand Prix was the only race of those 54 not to feature a Ferrari, McLaren, or Renault driver on the top step of the podium. After six races in 2008, no driver or team has added his name to this list.
Eight drivers in 60 races with four different teams; 23 drivers in 96 races with ten different teams.
The numbers don’t lie.
But are those numbers skewed by the fact that two open-wheel series existed in the United States at the time? Absolutely. One cannot assume that had the Champ Car World Series and Indy Racing league run a combined 18-race schedule in those three years, a total of 23 different drivers would have won races—although many of them would certainly have come close. (To mention the winners is to speak nothing of the drivers who have come close to victory. Vitor Meira, Tristan Gommendy, Dan Clarke, and Scott Sharp most readily come to mind.)
Yet of those 23 winners, the only defections have been Hornish, Allmendinger, and Dario Franchitti to NASCAR, and Bourdais to Formula One. Philippe, Doornbos, and Tracy are all actively seeking rides in the unified series. Da Matta is an exception to the rule - after nearly being killed by a collision with a deer in a 2006 testing accident, he is racing sports cars for Bob Stallings Motorsports.
That still leaves 15 different race winners from the past three years, out of 27 entries. Subtract Enrique Bernoldi, Jaime Camara, Jay Howard, Mario Moraes, and E.J. Viso-the series’ five true rookies this season - from the equation, and the tally is 15 out of 22 experienced drivers with wins in the past three seasons.
Only eight of Formula One’s 22 current drivers have ever even won races - forget the past three years. Although the sport goes through drivers like a baby through diapers sometimes, shuffling out consistency and experience for youth and quickness, it should be noted that only three of this season’s drivers were not in the series’ paddock last year.
Which series sounds more competitive to you?
If Formula One fans are not dismayed by the fact that IndyCar Series racing offers more drivers and teams a chance to win races, they also have the Champ Car unification story to consider. With 10 drivers and six teams having switched series for this season, the IndyCar Series has two distinct marketing advantages: one, that American open-wheel racing can finally define a single true champion; and two, that they can play up any major gains by Champ Car drivers in the new series, with Rahal’s win in his first start at St. Petersburg only the first big story.
Watching the Champ Car teams get accustomed to (and perhaps one day dominate) the ovals of the IndyCar Series is an occurrence many fans can look forward to. By 2011, when new cars and engines are introduced, both Champ Car and IndyCar teams should be on even footing.
The facts don’t lie. IndyCar racing is simply a more competitive and more entertaining form of open wheel racing than Formula One at this point, and it appears destined to continue on its upward swing for a very long time.
The Indianapolis 500 undeniably is a legitimate race again, despite years of claims from purists that series owner Tony George tainted the race by creating the IRL to feature it.
Drivers are excited to compete in the new series, with many of them no longer even considering NASCAR offers. Fans are excited to see all of their favorite stars competing in the same place again. Perhaps most of all, executives are excited for the series’ future prospects, with many projecting an eminent boom for the series—more sponsors, more chassis and engine manufacturers, more teams and drivers, more races in more locations.
Truth be told, it’s only a matter of time before Formula One fans grow tired of the sport’s politics and parades and shift their allegiances to the Indy Racing League.
Things are different now.
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5 months ago
Outstanding analysis. Serious food for thought for racing fans. I've been more a fan of F1 than Indycar for a while, as I didn't like the split from CART. But there is no denying that Indycar racing is far superior to Formula 1.
When was the last time the finish in an F1 race was measured in less than a second? Much less hundreds and thousands of a second? That's about average for a race here at Texas Motor Speedway.
And when the championship comes down to the last turn of the last lap in the last race of the season? That was pretty sweet.
I'm hoping the former Champ Car teams can hand in there, and I really want to see Paul Tracy, Alex Tagliani, and Robert Doornbos in Indycar. With a little more funding, they should be able to produce 30 car fields race-in, race-out. Tonight they had 28 here at Texas, tying the record for number of entries.
Great piece!
5 months ago
Indycar will never overtake F1 in popularity anywhere other than America, its as simple as that. Of course the finishes are going to be more exciting when you're mostly racing in circles around a giant oval, its the couple of hundred laps before that which are boring.
Last season was a very close finish in F1 with the top 3 drivers only being separated by a few points, and Lewis Hamilton, the rookie driver only 1 point away from becoming World Champion.
This brings up another point, F1 is a truely Global sport, what is America's obsession with calling its sporting titles "World" championships and titles and series' when only America participates in them?!
5 months ago
One factor completely ignored is that IndyCar runs identical chassises and identical engines. There is no manufacturers' competition. There is no technical innovation in IndyCar. F1 is technical and strategic racing as IndyCar cannot be. No doubt having no technical competition and oval racing making for an exciting spectacle, but personally I find ovals boring to watch, and the constant full course cautions, combined with the construction limitations, mean that the racing is very artificial. To have a 550 mile race like Texas when the cars are constantly being bunched up pretty much defeats the purpose of an endurance length race. It's a series of sprint races. The artificiality of IndyCar makes for an exciting on track fan experience, but doesn't make for the true competitiveness of a series like F1. One last thing I should mention, which was ignored in this article, is the worldwide nature of F1, and if you compare the worldwide television audiences of F1 to IndyCar practically nobody is watching IndyCar in comparison to the enormous numbers who watch F1 around the world.
from 5 months ago
True, IndyCars do run all the same chassis and engines, unlike Formula One. But this puts emphasis on the skill of the drivers in the cars, as opposed to how much money a team has and how developed their technology is.
The true question is whether we as fans would prefer to watch races judged by the quality of the driver or by the quality of the car. I would argue that the skill of the driver is far more important than how much money you have.
Formula One races have been judged for years by the quality of the car alone - and, as I mentioned, we haven't seen a non-Ferrari or McLaren winner since October 2006 (pending the result of today's race at Montreal). As I've mentioned, domination and parades do not make for good auto racing; they make for good clinics and parades. When Formula One feels like a clinic and/or a parade, major issues exist in the sport. I am not paying hundreds of dollars to watch a parade.
IndyCar races are judged entirely by the skill of the driver in relation to the skills of his or her competitors. I'd like to see the result if all 22 Formula One drivers had identically prepared cars. Do you think that Hamilton and Raikkonen would still win the majority of races, or do you think other drivers might have a chance for once?
Don't forget the increasingly global nature of the IndyCar Series - only three of the top ten drivers after Texas are American. Two drivers are Brazilian, one is from New Zealand, one Australian, one Briton, one is Japanese, and one is Spanish. More road courses are being added to the series' schedule every year. Besides America, there are now races in Japan, Canada, and Australia, and more Champ Car races will probably be added to the schedule next year - perhaps the race in Assen, which would begin to establish an IndyCar presence in Europe.
(By the way, Texas is a 550 kilometer race, not a 550 mile race.)
The IndyCar Series is destined to add races in Europe (perhaps at the expense of some of the less competitive and interesting American ovals, but I digress), and as those races are established, the sport's popularity will grow across the pond. At that point, we'll see if the television ratings and crowds start shifting the other way.
I think they will.
5 months ago
good analysis, but unfortunately, f1 will always remain the top dog in the motorsport world. i remember talking with a few friends of mine who were at one point dead set on going to america to further their careers. they were hours away from going there, and then they found out that champ car and the IRL had joined up, and amazingly, they said we want to race, not turn left.
i think f1 is far more strategic, and indycar is very predictable. the only place that indycar will ever be popular in america. and f1 concentrate on the european markets.
another things is the points. the points system in f1 is easy to follow, but i get completely lost with the amount of points on offer in indycar. it's a phenomenal acheivement if an f1 drivers breaks 100 points in one season, but it's the norm in indycar.
f1 is more exicting for me, especially last season, the title fight down to the final race of the season. acros the whole season, three drivers separated by one point.
5 months ago
I'd have to agree with Michael and say that IndyCar's chances of gaining popularity outside the americas are slim. Formula 1 has been in the forefront of technological advances, and the creme-de la-creme of motorsport racing for over 60 years now.
F1 averages between 150-200 million tv viewers per race. Multiply that by 18, and that makes F1 the most watched sport in the world. Only single events like the SuperBowl, Champions League Final, World Cup Final, and Euro Final can surpass those numbers and the latter two only happen once every four years. Not even the World Series, Stanley Cup or Wimbledon can touch the kind of audience F1 appeals to.
A typical F1 season spans over 8 months, 18 races, and 5 continents. Its drivers include 3 Brazilians, 4 Brits, 1 Australian, 2 Finns, 1 Pole, 5 Germans, 2 Italians, 1 Spaniard, 1 French and 2 Japanese. There are tracks in Australia, Malaysia, Bahrain, Spain, Turkey, Monaco, Canada, France, Britain, Germany, Hungary, Belgium, Italy, Singapore, Japan, China and Brazil. The average capacity of a F1 track averages between 60,000-90,000, and each one of these races sells out more than two months before the actual event.
Purely on the technical side, Indy engines are limited at 10,300 rpm, and have 650 hp. F1 engines are limited at 19,000 rpm and produce roughly around 800hp. Also, you're forgetting Sebastian Bourdais, who came to F1 as one of the most successful Champ Car drivers of all time, but has failed to impress.
Based on the above, saying that IndyCar can overtake F1 on the world stage is like saying that Copa Libertadores can outshine the Champions League. Not gonna happen anytime soon.
from 5 months ago
Point taken about the global nature of the series, but you might want to take back that comment about Bourdais - it's a bit hard to impress in a Toro Rosso car. Ask Scott Speed, Vitantonio Liuzzi, et. al.
You also forget that Bourdais has scored points this season, which is more than David Coulthard, Giancarlo Fisichella, and Nelsinho Piquet can say thus far (pending the results at Montreal).
Also, don't forget the Formula One rule that countries are not supposed to have more than one race a season (the European Grand Prix being an exception, as well as the multiple US Grands Prix in the 1980s). That skews that a little bit.
Meanwhile, the IndyCar Series boasts drivers from the United States, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Venezuela, England, Japan, South Africa, and Spain. That's ten countries - the same amount of countries currently boasting Formula One drivers.
from 5 months ago
You forget David Coulthard's podium in Monaco. And, now that the results have come out, the podium in Montreal. And look how well Mark Webber is doing. Also, Bourdais has retired in 4 of his 7 races, hardly promising statistics. Anyway, let's not make this an argument about the guy's quality, he's won enough championships to prove that he is a good driver, no matter what he drives. I'm just saying he is taken much longer to adjust to F1 and I am sure, if asked, he'd point out how much more demanding F1 is than the car races he took part in in the USA.
Also, even if IndyCar was to expand to the markets that F1 is now in, they would have to penetrate them and take away F1's position and share in those markets, which wont be easy. The WRC is a global championship with drivers from all over the world, but they still cant touch the publicity, audience, and finance that F1 boasts.
from 5 months ago
Coulthard didn't finish at Monaco this year - the podium was Hamilton, Kubica, and Massa in that order. You're thinking of his 2006 podium (which, if you remember, was at least somewhat facilitated by Schumacher never being in contention the whole race). His 6 points at Montreal, officially scored just after I posted, were his first points all season.
The WRC obviously has a great market share in European countries - but if we let the racing speak for itself, the IndyCars put on a better show. If IndyCars make it to tracks that Champ Car used to visit - Zolder, Assen, Mexico City - then the series will establish a much greater market share over time, especially if the two series visit the same track again (as they did with Montreal).
Also, note that the track record at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca is not held by a Formula One driver anymore - Sebastien Bourdais, in the Panoz DP01, broke Ricardo Zonta's 2006 track record, set in the Toyota TF106.
Meanwhile, at Montreal, Sebastien Bourdais' 2006 Champ Car pole time was only 5 to 7 seconds off Fernando Alonso's Formula One pole time. Not bad for a car that's about 400 pounds heavier and run on less than ten percent of the budget!
from 5 months ago
Chris says "you might want to take back that comment about Bourdais - it's a bit hard to impress in a Toro Rosso car." Obviously he hasn't been paying attention to what Sebastian Vettel's doing with his, in the process reinforcing to the world the idea that F1 drivers are a notch above whatever IRL can provide.
Overall this article rates as nothing but a troll. Outside of the Olympics and World Cup Soccer, F1 is the biggest sport on earth in terms of viewership, it has a practically unlimited supply of tracks all over the world clamoring to get a race with their local governments falling all over themselves to provide incentives, and F1 drivers are famous in their home countries, leading to sponsorship deals and reinforced visibility through local businesses. The IRL just can't play anywhere near this level, unfortunately.
For all Chris' talk of potential international appeal, it's limited. IRL teams make a non-story due to their non-constructor status, and their drivers can't make an impression on the world stage because IRL (and now by extension Champ Car) drivers are generally perceived to be a notch below F1 quality. Notwithstanding the meteoric rise (and fall) in F1 of Jacques Villeneuve, did Michael Andretti and Alex Zanardi and Juan Pablo Montoya do anything to dispel that? As I mentioned, even Vettel's proving this out. Again.
Chris likes to point out that F1 is boring, but the world viewership simply doesn't agree with him. The sport broke records with last year's final race. And only a simplistic analysis of the last 15 years in F1 can lead to the conclusion of McLaren-Ferrari dominance. Such is a misnomer, since during those years nearly all championships were won either by Michael Schumacher and his master strategist Ross Brawn, or by a driver in an Adrian Newey-designed car. Now that Newey has moved on to Red Bull and Brawn has taken over at Honda and BMW is coming on strong of its own accord, expect the title race to turn into a five-way tussle. And really, F1's like any other sport: anyone who is bored by it simply isn't spending any time getting into the backstories.
Finally, let's face it -- to audiences outside North America, where karting ranks as a respectable sport to watch and there's always enough viewership to support serious lower-level series like GP2 and touring car and MotoGP, a series which races on ovals will NEVER be taken very seriously. Ovals promote close racing to the point of making the first 80% of the laps almost entirely superfluous. I was 8 years old when I figured out that I was bored by NASCAR, because the only time it mattered who was in the lead was during the last lap. Up until then, the drafting makes it mostly a crap shoot, and if I want to see that, I'll just flip over to a gambling channel. The IRL isn't much better in that regard.
from 5 months ago
Chris says "you might want to take back that comment about Bourdais - it's a bit hard to impress in a Toro Rosso car." Obviously he hasn't been paying attention to what Sebastian Vettel's doing with his, in the process reinforcing to the world the idea that F1 drivers are a notch above whatever IRL can provide.
Overall this article rates as nothing but a troll. Outside of the Olympics and World Cup Soccer, F1 is the biggest sport on earth in terms of viewership, it has a practically unlimited supply of tracks all over the world clamoring to get a race with their local governments falling all over themselves to provide incentives, and F1 drivers are famous in their home countries, leading to sponsorship deals and reinforced visibility through local businesses. The IRL just can't play anywhere near this level, unfortunately.
For all Chris' talk of potential international appeal, it's limited. IRL teams make a non-story due to their non-constructor status, and their drivers can't make an impression on the world stage because IRL (and now by extension Champ Car) drivers are generally perceived to be a notch below F1 quality. Notwithstanding the meteoric rise (and fall) in F1 of Jacques Villeneuve, did Michael Andretti and Alex Zanardi and Juan Pablo Montoya do anything to dispel that? As I mentioned, even Vettel's proving this out. Again.
Chris likes to point out that F1 is boring, but the world viewership simply doesn't agree with him. The sport broke records with last year's final race. And only a simplistic analysis of the last 15 years in F1 can lead to the conclusion of McLaren-Ferrari dominance. Such is a misnomer, since during those years nearly all championships were won either by Michael Schumacher and his master strategist Ross Brawn, or by a driver in an Adrian Newey-designed car. Now that Newey has moved on to Red Bull and Brawn has taken over at Honda and BMW is coming on strong of its own accord, expect the title race to turn into a five-way tussle. And really, F1's like most other sports: anyone who is bored by it simply isn't spending any time getting into the backstories. (And for real race fans, Danica's swimsuit edition is a stupid backstory.)
Finally, let's face it -- to audiences outside North America, where karting ranks as a respectable sport to watch and there's always enough viewership to support serious lower-level series like GP2 and touring car and MotoGP, a series which races on ovals will NEVER be taken very seriously. Ovals promote close racing to the point of making the first 80% of the laps almost entirely superfluous. I was 8 years old when I figured out that I was bored by NASCAR, because the only time it mattered who was in the lead was during the last lap. Up until then, the drafting makes it mostly a crap shoot, and if I want to see that, I'll just flip over to a gambling channel. The IRL isn't much better in that regard, and I would suggest that moving to a calendar that's only 50% oval isn't going to be enough, because to the rest of the world, a 50% oval season will make for a 50% boring season.
from 5 months ago
Chris says "you might want to take back that comment about Bourdais - it's a bit hard to impress in a Toro Rosso car." Obviously he hasn't been paying attention to what Sebastian Vettel's doing with his, in the process reinforcing to the world the idea that F1 drivers are a notch above whatever IRL can provide.
Overall this article rates as nothing but a troll. Outside of the Olympics and World Cup Soccer, F1 is the biggest sport on earth in terms of viewership, it has a practically unlimited supply of tracks all over the world clamoring to get a race with their local governments falling all over themselves to provide incentives, and F1 drivers are famous in their home countries, leading to sponsorship deals and reinforced visibility through local businesses. The IRL just can't play anywhere near this level, unfortunately.
For all Chris' talk of potential international appeal, it's limited. IRL teams rate a non-story due to their non-constructor status, and their drivers can't make an impression on the world stage because IRL (and now by extension Champ Car) drivers are generally perceived to be a notch below F1 quality. Notwithstanding the meteoric rise (and fall) in F1 of Jacques Villeneuve, did Michael Andretti and Alex Zanardi and Juan Pablo Montoya do anything to dispel that? As I mentioned, even Vettel's proving this point out. Again.
Chris likes to say that F1 is boring, but the world viewership simply doesn't agree with him. The sport broke records with last year's final race. And only a simplistic analysis of the last 15 years in F1 can lead to the conclusion of McLaren-Ferrari dominance. Such is a misnomer, since during those years nearly all championships were won either by Michael Schumacher and his master strategist Ross Brawn, or by a driver in an Adrian Newey-designed car. Now that Newey has moved on to Red Bull and Brawn has taken over at Honda and BMW is coming on strong of its own accord, expect the title race to turn into a five-way tussle. And really, F1's like any other sport: anyone who is bored by it simply isn't spending any time getting into the backstories. (And for serious motorsports fans, Danica's swimsuit edition is a really stupid backstory, just more evidence that she's the Kournikova of racing, kept around for her looks but probably unable to deal with serious competition if she gets it from her Sharapova, Katherine Legge.)
Finally, let's face it -- to audiences outside North America, where karting ranks as a respectable sport to watch and there's always enough viewership to support serious lower-level series like GP2 and touring car and MotoGP, a series which races on ovals will NEVER be taken very seriously. Ovals promote close racing to the point of making the first 80% of the laps almost entirely superfluous. I was 8 years old when I figured out that I was bored by NASCAR, because the only time it mattered who was in the lead was during the last lap. Up until then, the drafting makes it mostly a crap shoot, and if I want to see that, I'll just flip to a gambling channel. The IRL isn't much better in that regard, and even if they do move to a season that's only 50% oval, to the rest of the world that'll make IRL 50% boring.
Destined? Dream on.
from 5 months ago
Yikes, sorry for the multiple responses. Chris, hopefully you can delete all but the last. This site could use some work on the comment submission code when users are signing up as part of the process.
from 5 months ago
Don't forget, Steve, that Vettel failed to finish his first four races this season - three on the very first lap. It took Sutil and Kovalainen to fall out at Monaco for him to finally score his first points (5th place). Also, remember that when Vettel scored 4th place at China in 2007, Lewis Hamilton and Robert Kubica failed to finish. Impressive? Not as much as you suggest. Speed means nothing without results - exactly why Marco Andretti's IRL season has been so disappointing this year.
Do note the fact that, as Ryan Hewitt mentioned, IndyCar was a MASSIVE headache for Bernie Ecclestone in 1995 before the split. Also note that the IRL has overcome massive odds before - many didn't think the league would even survive a few seasons, due to the ragtag nature of most of the teams; however, Indianapolis attracted the best CART teams to the series, and eventually led to its downfall. In other major professional sports, the ABA and WHA have given the NBA and NHL (respectively) headaches, providing similar levels of talent. One league eclipsing another, like one political empire eclipsing another, is in no way a laughable suggestion.
As for Andretti, do remember Mika Hakkinen's availability for McLaren in 1993, as well as the dirty politics of the sport in that era - Andretti's son Marco has claimed that McLaren deliberately gave Andretti rough handling cars, and only when Ayrton Senna stepped in was he able to score his lone podium. Remember that Montoya scored 7 wins in 6 seasons, 13 poles, and 307 points - never failing to finish below 6th in points when he completed a full season. Also remember Zanardi's reliability problems in 1999, which did coincide with a fair share of driver errors - but at Monza, brake difficulties dropped him from 2nd to 7th. Had Andretti and Zanardi been given reliable cars, they could have certainly dispelled the perception - and to suggest that Montoya did anything but that is simply untrue.
If any team can compete with Ferrari and McLaren, it will be BMW - not Red Bull or Honda. At this point, Ferrari has 73 points, BMW 70, McLaren 53. Red Bull has 21. Honda has 8. Competitive? Not when those two teams have Mark Webber, David Coulthard, Rubens Barrichello, and Jenson Button behind the wheel. Barrichello will be retiring soon, but who will replace him? Alexander Wurz, the team's test driver? Button's past his window of opportunity as well - he's lost too much confidence. Coulthard's getting old, and while Webber scores points, he doesn't score enough to challenge for a championship. I don't see any of that changing at all. Who but the BMW drivers have stepped up this season?
Those who mock oval racing fail to look at the IRL's schedule, where almost all of the ovals have huge differences in their design and construction. Iowa's one of the most oddly shaped ovals ever designed. Richmond's probably the harshest track on brakes in the series. Texas, being a tri-oval, is conducive to some of the highest speeds in circuit motorsport. Homestead's a hybrid of a standard oval and Indianapolis. Milwaukee drives more like a road course than any other oval in the series. Kansas and Kentucky are the only two comparable ovals in the series - with Nashville included in the comparison, too, if one neglects the concrete surface. I need not mention Indianapolis.
And finally, if the concept of oval racing is so laughable, and the tracks so easy, explain to me why Montoya's done so poorly in the stock cars this season - or Villeneuve in his limited starts last season... or why the Champ Car drivers, despite being provided with all of the setups and cars to run this year, have mostly failed to impress in their transition from a Formula One-inspired series to the oval tracks.
It's not as easy as you might think.
from 5 months ago
"Don't forget, Steve, that Vettel failed to finish his first four races this season - three on the very first lap. It took Sutil and Kovalainen to fall out at Monaco for him to finally score his first points (5th place). Also, remember that when Vettel scored 4th place at China in 2007, Lewis Hamilton and Robert Kubica failed to finish. Impressive? Not as much as you suggest. Speed means nothing without results."
You're very short on analysis. I don't have the time to review all of Vettel's results, but he was consistently running well above his car's level when disaster befell him. And if speed means nothing without results, why was Flavio Briatore in such a rush to sign Michael Schumacher after he retired a few laps into his first race, having burned out his clutch? Look for Vettel to take a huge step up next year -- I'm sure the team owners are better analysts of driving talent than you are.
"As for Andretti, do remember Mika Hakkinen's availability for McLaren in 1993, as well as the dirty politics of the sport in that era - Andretti's son Marco has claimed that McLaren deliberately gave Andretti rough handling cars, and only when Ayrton Senna stepped in was he able to score his lone podium."
Andretti certainly had a bad time of it -- he was never given the testing time necessary to do well in the car. But that reveals more about his management and expectations than anything else. Unfortunately F1 can indeed be a dirty sport.
"Remember that Montoya scored 7 wins in 6 seasons, 13 poles, and 307 points - never failing to finish below 6th in points when he completed a full season."
True, but he left the sport very unsatisfied. By his own estimation, he never achieved the success he desired, and broke his contract on his way out. Didn't exactly blaze a trail for the top talent in the US to think they could do well over there. I mean, if they couldn't beat Montoya at home, what could they hope to do across the Atlantic?
"Also remember Zanardi's reliability problems in 1999, which did coincide with a fair share of driver errors - but at Monza, brake difficulties dropped him from 2nd to 7th. Had Andretti and Zanardi been given reliable cars, they could have certainly dispelled the perception - and to suggest that Montoya did anything but that is simply untrue."
Hahaha, Zanardi?! Zanardi was slow in F1! Period! He could work magic with the brakes across the pond, but the carbon discs of F1 permitted him no such luxury. He wasn't the only driver to have to wrestle with a difficult car, but he was expected to do what other top F1 drivers were doing: figure out a way to work around it. With a couple of exceptions, he failed to do so. Whether Andretti would have been fast enough is an open question, but Montoya wasn't fast enough to outshine his teammates, and that is always the first measure of worth in F1. (See Vettel.) Raikkonen took him apart pretty comprehensively, one need only look at the 2005 season to see that.
"If any team can compete with Ferrari and McLaren, it will be BMW - not Red Bull or Honda. At this point, Ferrari has 73 points, BMW 70, McLaren 53. Red Bull has 21. Honda has 8. Competitive? Not when those two teams have Mark Webber, David Coulthard, Rubens Barrichello, and Jenson Button behind the wheel. Barrichello will be retiring soon, but who will replace him? Alexander Wurz, the team's test driver? Button's past his window of opportunity as well - he's lost too much confidence. Coulthard's getting old, and while Webber scores points, he doesn't score enough to challenge for a championship. I don't see any of that changing at all. Who but the BMW drivers have stepped up this season?"
I wasn't referring to this year becoming a 5-way fight. That'll take a couple of years more. RB is still consolidating their reliability, and counting out Adrian Newey is always foolish - he powered Williams to dominance in the early 90s and did the same for McLaren after that. For many years you couldn't win a championship if your car wasn't Newey-designed and your last name wasn't Schumacher. And Honda, their present form notwithstanding, has an incredible record of success in F1, and they've done the smart thing: Hired someone who knows how to win and gotten out of the way. They'll take a couple of years yet to come on strong.
"Those who mock oval racing fail to look at the IRL's schedule, where almost all of the ovals have huge differences in their design and construction."
Said like a circle-tracker. Most of the world's viewers agree with me: A race track that only has turns in one direction isn't much fun to watch. Sure, they have slight differences and some nuances, but when it comes down to it, they're still ovals. No oval, no matter how glorious to a roundy-rounder, will ever compete in the minds of fans with legends like Spa and Monaco and Suzuka.
"And finally, if the concept of oval racing is so laughable, and the tracks so easy, explain to me why Montoya's done so poorly in the stock cars this season - or Villeneuve in his limited starts last season... or why the Champ Car drivers, despite being provided with all of the setups and cars to run this year, have mostly failed to impress in their transition from a Formula One-inspired series to the oval tracks.
It's not as easy as you might think."
I never said oval racing was easy. On the contrary -- I think it's very unforgiving, requires incredible smoothness and is counterintuitive, since counter-steering will send you right into the wall. But that doesn't mean it attracts the best talent. I'm not sure why Montoya's not going well, I know nothing about his team. And Villeneuve? His spirit was slowly crushed during the lean years at BAR, so I don't believe he has the ability to drive at the top level any longer.
And I don't know what's happened with Champ Car teams' transitions, because I don't follow it. I stopped paying attention to the IRL after the 2001 Indy 500, which told me everything I needed to know about how the IRL compared to the rest of the world.
from 5 months ago
Raw speed means nothing if you can't finish a race. If you can't finish a race, you can't score points - barring the race in the 90s where only four cars finished. Let it be known that Michael Andretti only completed three laps in his first three Formula One races, falling out about halfway through his fourth - very similar to Vettel's results at the beginning of this season. And Schumacher, unlike Vettel, produced results - three points finishes in his first three races for Benetton.
Montoya may have never won a championship, but to discount what he did accomplish in Formula One is to discount one of the better drivers in recent memory. Remember his daring pass of Michael Schumacher in Brazil, a month into his maiden season in 2001. Remember his seven pole positions in 2002. Remember him passing 12 cars in Germany in 2005. Montoya showed spectacular form during his Formula One career, and has no reason to be disappointed in his results whatsoever. Even missing half of the 2006 season, he finished 8th in points. Montoya may have been Schumacher's biggest competition in 2001 and 2002, had Ferrari not made a parade of things.
There's also no reason to suggest Montoya didn't outclass Ralf Schumacher over the course of the season, when Montoya scored more points in 2002 and 2003 (ignoring 2004 due to Ralf's injury). As for Zanardi, it's hard to compete with a teammate who only finished one race outside the points (with 4 DNFs) when you haven't been in the car for five years.
However proven Newey's track record is, we've seen teams throw money into Formula One before and fail miserably - see Toyota, who hired respected ex-Minardi designer Gustav Brunner to design their cars. Except for a massive 2005, the team has never scored more than 35 points or finished above 6th in the constructors' championship. Brunner finally had the cash to build on his innovative Minardi designs, yet the team struggled. What makes you think Red Bull will be any different in the next few years? Newey hasn't won any titles since the end of the 1990s, and has only won 15 races. In comparison, Michael Schumacher pulled off 56 wins since the 1990s ended.
And what about Honda's current form suggests future domination? Barrichello, as I've said, will retire soon, and Button - much like Villeneuve, as you suggest - has seen his spirit broken. The Honda team has been a death trap for drivers' confidence since the BAR days, and not even Ross Brawn - again, a track record guy - may be able to save them, short term or long term.
And if Indianapolis isn't at least as prestigious as Spa, or Monaco, or Suzuka, the FIA wouldn't have even tried to use the road course for multiple Grands Prix. We can blame Michelin for that race's ultimate failure, in their inability to design a decent enough tire to handle the track.
By the way, the 2001 Indianapolis 500 was the first race in six years where every important American open-wheel racing team - save Newman/Haas - competed on the same track on the same weekend. This was when the IRL was still the "budget" open-wheel series, compared to the Formula One aspirations of CART. Thus, the CART teams that broke ranks had much better cars than their IRL "rivals" (if you could call them that), and dominated. At this point, however, the IRL is mostly composed of former CART teams.
5 months ago
Just cant see it happening ? ... F1 is always going to be the spearhead of the racing world ... Its THE top dog and its keeping that big juicy bone to itself ! Indy ... Just lacks so much of what F1 has ... Good article though mate ... Keep them coming !
5 months ago
To the people that think IndyCar has no chance of overtaking F1, I'll remind you all that in 1993 when Nigel Mansell came over, SEVERAL IndyCar races gained higher ratings than the nearest-dated F1 race. Their ratings stayed very close in 1994 and 1995 after Mansellmania died out a bit, but from 1993 up until the split, the CART IndyCar World Series was a SERIOUS threat to Formula One. Although Bernie Ecclestone played down the threat in 1993, in 1995 he admitted IndyCar had become a bigger concern than he initially believed. In those days, ovals weren't a major factor in deciding NOT to race in the series because they were few enough to make them all unique. And when they're unique, they're more capable of becoming interesting - both for drivers AND spectators.
The Split killed that popularity, but Tony George has given indication he wants to go back to those days. He seems to want the oval count to be no more than 50% of the schedule by 2010, and he even wants to revive the IndyCar World Series name.
You have to understand that the pre-split popularity came because the innovation is NOT the important thing to new fans. For most, its just a bonus. Mr. Leone is right - most racing fans want true competition in a challenging series. A mostly-oval series is not perceived by many fans as challenging(NASCAR being an exception because its vehicle formula is very condusive to making ovals challenging), but get things back to where they were pre-split and you've got racing right there that will attract fans. When the new chassis and engine formula comes into play and the IRL stops being a semi-spec series, it'll only get better.
Destined to overtake Formula One? Not likely. Only possible if the FIA's various plans to lower the performance gap fail.
But how about giving F1 a serious headache? I think we can guarantee that. And really, that's what the IRL should strive for.
5 months ago
I would absolutely love to see Indycar overtake F1 but I do not see that happening anytime soon. On the other hand I absolutely cant stand watching the "parade" of cars in F1 that is always the same order unless someone crashes. F1 bores me and unless they make some serious changes I feel their support will dwindle and eventually fade. It may not be Indycar that gathers up the support but F1 is in need of a change or the sport will eventually fail. Right now there are enough die hard fans that have watched F1 since childhood that it will be fine, but as for gathering new fans, it isnt going to happen unless there is actually some competition and passing.
As for Indycar, there are some significant things they need to take care of. First and foremost they need to get some better announcing and some real racing people in the pits doing the reports. I am sick of listening to them talk about the "poster children" during the race. Talk about the race and cover it the way it is ment to be. Its great to get a background on whats going on in the series but I really dont care about Danica Patricks swimsuit edition or what she did last weekend. Next they need to encorporate more of the technology into the racing like ChampCar did as well as gain the support of multiple engine manufacturers. I would love to see additional tire and chassis manufactureres too but I dont see that in the near future. The more twists you have in a race the better. They need to get to work on the schedule for next year and reduce the amount of ovals. Im all for the Indy 500 but i could do without the rest. And last but deffinetly not least....Get some of the big drivers back into the series and show it is truely the best...even if only the best from the Americas.
Just my rant
from 5 months ago
Agreed with just about all of your rant. Good news though - the IRL set up a conference for manufacturers and engine builders to discuss the new cars that will be built for 2011, and Autoweek reported that at least a dozen engine builders (the only ones whose names I have are Honda, Cosworth, and Ilmor) expressed interest.
Firestone will probably remain the sole tire supplier, and Dallara may not receive any competition from Elan (who are building the SuperLeague Formula chassis) or Riley & Scott, but we should see at least three engine manufacturers in 2011.
5 months ago
IndyCar will also need to penetrate the American motorsports market better than they currently are. They're putting out a quality product, but when they're getting little or no support from their TV partners (i.e., last night's handling of the switch from NASCAR's B-series to the Texas race, complete with live sound over the video package), it makes it hard for the casual fan to take them seriously.
Ultimately, Tony George & Co. don't need to be striving to overtake any other series, be it NASCAR or Formula 1. If they can strive to reach the level of competition and allure that they had pre-split, they'll be getting people's attention quite handily.
from 5 months ago
Don't forget - prior to the split, IndyCar(under CART) was the king of all racing in the US and gaining major attention worldwide. Getting back to their pre-split popularity REQUIRES them to overtake NASCAR.
from 5 months ago
Very true, Ryan. And given the fact that NASCAR seems to have reached a plateau, that might not be difficult over the course of the next few years.
5 months ago
Just a few facts.
For the IRL to overtake F-1 it would have to jump over many series.
Worldwide after F-1 there is:
WRC
IRC
LeMans Series
FIA-FT
DTM
BTCC
V8 Supercars
CART of the 70 and 80's was a much different series than the IRL of Today. CART wasn't a spec Chassis or a Spec Motor series. The rules were stable and there were no rules that gave an adavantage to certain drivers.
Despite the hype CART never approached the numbers that F-1 had. Only in England, where Mansell was from, did the ratings even closed in on F-1 and even then F-1 was beating CART by over 30%.
Today, with the demise of Champ Car, the US does not have a top tier formula racing series. The IndyCars have the same performance of the GP2 Series(Which is a Ladder series).
Perhaps when the IRL adopts a new formula for the 2010 series we will see some top-notch excitment. Until then US will have to go to the American LeMans Series to see cutting edge cars and racing.
from 5 months ago
Of the series you've listed, how many can boast an abundance of truly marquee stars? True, the WRC has Loeb. DTM has a lot of quality drivers (except that many are F1 and Champ Car castoffs, such as Ralf Schumacher, Katherine Legge, and Christjian Albers). The only name that I recognize in the BTCC at this point is Jason Plato. Meanwhile, despite the worldwide presence of many V8 Supercar sponsors, the series' best driver for years, Marcos Ambrose, is now driving in NASCAR.
Meanwhile, the IRL boasts many of auto racing's greatest names - Andretti, Rahal, Foyt - as well as Castroneves, Dixon, Patrick, and Wheldon, among other highly talented drivers.
You also fail to note that the early 1990s Formula One stood up much better against CART, with Senna still alive, Prost still winning championships, and the emergence of Damon Hill and Michael Schumacher. At that point, CART drivers still aspired towards entering Formula One - now, ask just about any IRL driver if he or she would like to try Formula One, and you wouldn't get such an emphatic "yes" anymore.
As much as I love Champ Car, it was not the top tier open wheel racing series in the United States - when Penske and Ganassi joined the IRL in 2002, the power switched to Tony George's series. The comparison to GP2 is entirely unfair - not only are GP2 drivers moving up to the IRL (for example, E.J. Viso, who has performed magnificently thus far this year), no GP2 race is anywhere near as internationally renowned as the Indianapolis 500.
Finally, the ALMS is a joke. When LMP1 and GT1 have such pathetic car counts as they currently do, the motivation to be "cutting edge," as you say, declines sharply.
4 months ago
Tony George forever ruined open wheel racing in the US. That's the fact. Being so amazingly short sided, the only thing George wanted to protect was his own greed. He convinced the networks that the Indy 500 is the greatest racing event in the world. It might possibly be ONE of the greatest racing events, but its only ONE race. NASCAR has 35 or so races a year. Formula 1 has19 races a year, most in different countries around the world, the IRL has what, a dozen races, most of them ovals, and a few outside the US...which is their biggest mistake. They've done just about everything they could to ruin open wheel racing in the US. It all comes down to TV revenues, which the league and teams share. Its neccessary to have this money. Its what makes that sport run. 200,000 paying fans at one venue like INDY, isn't going to make the series succeed. Everyone drives the same car with different sponsors on them...theymight as well be racing NEONS.
F1 costs each teams hundreds of millions of dollars a year. F1 is the most watched spectator sport in the world. Each race is a world event. Drivers from F1 are more popular than rock stars and their salaries are at least 5 times as much as it costs to run an IRL team. There are billions spent on F1...why?...because the money is there...the fans and the sponsors make it that way...Last year, McLaren paid a 100 million dollar fine...more than the cost of running the entire IRL series for a year...and McLaren racing is still in business...wonder why? MONEY..they have it because of TV deals, merchandising, sponsors, fans, etc. You really think the IRL is in the same class...? Do you ever think the IRL can get close to those numbers?
Let's face it...Unser, Andretti, Rahal, Mears, Foyt, etc....were big draws to the sport...they were world class drivers...now...the most popular driver in the IRL is at best, a test driver anywhere else...and that driver happens to be a female as well. Fellas, she's keeping the IRL afloat, not that greedy George fellow. He still doesn't get it...he's so arrogant, he can't admit that his idea failed....Tony...you messed up...now fix it. Bring USAC back into the picture...USAC knew how to run the series...they loved car racing and the people in it. George loves his race track and his ego. Choose one...the Indy race is not going to susstain your race team's overhead for the year...the TV deal will...and that's what you need to build back up...and also...get some world class drivers...instead of maybe just 5 or 6...the entire field could be worth watching.
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