It has been awhile since Champ Car has had this much media coverage. Stories in all the newspapers and stories on all the TV sports media outlets. Unfortunately, its for all the wrong reasons. First there was talk of a merger with the IRL. Then that turned into talk that Champ Car was minutes away from filing for bankruptcy. What the hell is going on with my beloved sport? I've been holding off on blogging about this topic in hopes of having some good news to report. Unfortunately though, since this story broke last week, it's been nothing but bad news for race fans like me. Here is the latest that I could dig up:It’s just past midnight on Valentine’s Day and my phone has not rang for almost 30 minutes. Since last Friday, when my story broke on the latest and most serious attempt to put open wheel racing under one roof, it’s almost been like a non-stop, information hot line.
Me seeking it and others wanting to know the latest.
For a while it was fun, getting tips, checking them out, tracking people down and generally being more and more optimistic this time it was actually going to happen. It’s always kinda fun when you’re working on a scoop, especially when it’s a topic directly connected to your passion and your life.
It’s also fun to see fans, racing people and other reporters react and, as always when we talk unification, the wave of euphoria is tempered by skepticism.
But, a week into what we’d all hoped was going to be the best story of the decade, it’s not so much fun anymore.
The phone calls haven’t stopped, they’ve just taken on a different tone. Somewhere between confused and frustrated and angry.
Champ Car drivers, mechanics, engineers, staffers and, yes, even owners want to know what in the hell is going on?
In the past 24 hours I’ve heard: • Gerry Forsythe has decided to keep Champ Car going without Kevin Kalkhoven.
• Forsythe is buying all of Derrick Walker’s equipment because he’s going to have to field at least six cars to make sure there’s a dozen on the grid.
• Kalkhoven and Craig Gore, the co-owner of Team Australia who still owes Derrick Walker a fortune from 2007, are going to run a team in the Indy Racing League.
• Kalkhoven owns the majority rights to Long Beach so he’ll still cut a deal with George to have the IRL there in April and Motegi will be postponed until 2009.
• Champ Car will show up at Long Beach for the season opener, then disband and join Tony George’s series at Indianapolis.
• The four Champ Car owners will have a conference call on Friday to decide their fate.
• They’ve already decided to file for bankruptcy but, for some reason, they’re dragging their feet.
Now, mind you, this stuff didn’t come from my imagination or one of those chat rooms, these different scenarios came directly from various CC owners, workers and drivers.
And that’s why this thing is becoming kinda pathetic, if not sad.
The lack of communication from Kalkhoven and Forsythe to the other owners and their employees is disengenous, unprofessional and Enron-like in its insulting silence. Nobody in the Champ Car office knew anything about a potential takeover by the IRL until most read it on SPEEDTV.com and some really good people have gone to work every day this week like somebody on Death Row.
One would at least think Paul Newman and Carl Haas had earned the right to be in the loop but they get no information. Ditto for Keith Wiggins, Eric Bachelart, Tom Figge, Dale Coyne and Walker.
Bachelart, who would mortgage his home – and probably has – to keep his team going, went out and spent $1 million recently on a spare car and other bits. Then, he learned his “leaders” were in the process of shutting down and making a deal with George.
Bachelart found out because I told him.
Kalkhoven and Forsythe have spent millions keeping CC afloat since 2004 so a million dollars in nothing to them but it’s hard-earned for Bachelart and the least they could have done was keep their fellow owners apprised of what they were thinking. Incredibly, they paid a visit to Bachelart a couple weeks ago to tell him everything was fine and, in turn, he went on a teleconference and said he believed in them.
Believing either one of them, separately or together, is becoming increasingly difficult.
In a stretch of 12 hours last week, Kalkhoven said he and Gerry were 100 percent together on going with George in 2008 providing Long Beach was in play; then he denied there was ever a deal; declared that Motegi wasn’t going to change its date to appease Long Beach so the unification plan was over; and then said everything was on hold until Motegi agreed to cooperate.
We don’t know if Forsythe would have approved a deal without some buyout, because he seldom returns phone calls or speaks publicly. But a year ago at this time he vowed to only run one car unless he got sponsorship and, naturally, he wound up fielding two cars with no sponsorship. Now, still with no sponsors in sight, he might be considering paying for the whole series? That sounds as far-fetched as a guy spending $25 million to come to only three races.
Dan Jones sure has a tough time believing them. After their leaky, sticky and faulty fuel systems failed on their new Panoz cars early last season, Jones’ company was contracted to save them. Now Jones is a well-liked, smart racer who is universally respected. He busted his ass and got every car fixed in time for Portland and they performed flawlessly the rest of 2007. His reward? His $300,000 bill has never been paid. He borrowed money to make payroll and is nearly out of business. He finally sued Champ Car last week.
Now, mind you, this stuff didn’t come from my imagination or one of those chat rooms, these different scenarios came directly from various CC owners, workers and drivers.
And that’s why this thing is becoming kinda pathetic, if not sad.
The lack of communication from Kalkhoven and Forsythe to the other owners and their employees is disengenous, unprofessional and Enron-like in its insulting silence. Nobody in the Champ Car office knew anything about a potential takeover by the IRL until most read it on SPEEDTV.com and some really good people have gone to work every day this week like somebody on Death Row.
One would at least think Paul Newman and Carl Haas had earned the right to be in the loop but they get no information. Ditto for Keith Wiggins, Eric Bachelart, Tom Figge, Dale Coyne and Walker.
Bachelart, who would mortgage his home – and probably has – to keep his team going, went out and spent $1 million recently on a spare car and other bits. Then, he learned his “leaders” were in the process of shutting down and making a deal with George.
Bachelart found out because I told him.
Kalkhoven and Forsythe have spent millions keeping CC afloat since 2004 so a million dollars in nothing to them but it’s hard-earned for Bachelart and the least they could have done was keep their fellow owners apprised of what they were thinking. Incredibly, they paid a visit to Bachelart a couple weeks ago to tell him everything was fine and, in turn, he went on a teleconference and said he believed in them.
Believing either one of them, separately or together, is becoming increasingly difficult.
In a stretch of 12 hours last week, Kalkhoven said he and Gerry were 100 percent together on going with George in 2008 providing Long Beach was in play; then he denied there was ever a deal; declared that Motegi wasn’t going to change its date to appease Long Beach so the unification plan was over; and then said everything was on hold until Motegi agreed to cooperate.
We don’t know if Forsythe would have approved a deal without some buyout, because he seldom returns phone calls or speaks publicly. But a year ago at this time he vowed to only run one car unless he got sponsorship and, naturally, he wound up fielding two cars with no sponsorship. Now, still with no sponsors in sight, he might be considering paying for the whole series? That sounds as far-fetched as a guy spending $25 million to come to only three races.
Dan Jones sure has a tough time believing them. After their leaky, sticky and faulty fuel systems failed on their new Panoz cars early last season, Jones’ company was contracted to save them. Now Jones is a well-liked, smart racer who is universally respected. He busted his ass and got every car fixed in time for Portland and they performed flawlessly the rest of 2007. His reward? His $300,000 bill has never been paid. He borrowed money to make payroll and is nearly out of business. He finally sued Champ Car last week.
On the flip side of this madness is TGeorge.It would appear he’s acting in good faith, based on the information we’ve been presented. He said early on that unification was “closer than ever before” yet there were still obstacles but if the Long Beach/Motegi problem got solved, he was optimistic. He flew to Japan last weekend to try and reach a compromise with the Honda brass.
We don’t know what was decided but, obviously, George isn’t going to re-schedule or postpone his race at Motegi until he sees what Champ Car is doing.
He’s flown to England for Scott Dixon’s wedding this weekend and some people are shocked he left the country with open wheel’s future seemingly up in the air.
But maybe he already knows something. Or maybe he just knows who he’s dealing with.
Damn, looks like I will be holding off on buying those tickets for the Long Beach Grand Prix...
info. courtesy of Robin Miller, http://auto-racing.speedtv.com
No comments:
Post a Comment