Indiana Open Wheel - Some things never change .......

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Some things never change .......

Just been looking around on the net & found this.... @ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champ_Car

Formation of CART

The split away from USAC in 1979 was spurred by a group of activist car owners who had grown disenchanted with what they saw as an inept sanctioning body. COMPLAINING OF POOR PROMOTION AND SMALL PURSES, this group coalesced around Dan Gurney, who, in early 1978, wrote what came to be known as the "Gurney White Paper", the blueprint for an organization called Championship Auto Racing Teams.

Huh looks like some things never change...or does it?

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rex W. (Post 23232)

Sad thing is it could have all been avoided had USAC and IMS banned the Cooper in 1961.

Oh man this topic always gets people banned on speeedtv.com. Be careful.

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by dirtywhiteboy (Post 23243)

Oh man this topic always gets people banned on speeedtv.com. Be careful.

O well they can ban me..

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by aussiemidgetfan (Post 23280)

CART was the biggest thing to happen to any national championship anywhere in the world. Suddenly the word had a second openwheel championship that rivalled F1. It tested drivers more than any other series with a large variety of venues, a unique governing/ownership system, good promotion and money and continual upward growth.

I find it hard to believe that CART had an open wheel series that was anywhere near as challenging as USAC had in 1970; ovals, super speedways, road courses and dirt track miles.

Quote:

the only reason it all turned to s@#$ was Tony George. CART tried one hell of a lot of things to keep him on side, but the moron grandson was out to reestablish the race at the expense of everything else. a wise person would have continued to let the series build as that would continue to make the central event shine. (think nascar and the d500.) If CART had continued with the US500 in 1997, I honestly believe the IRL would have fallen flat on its face, and the sport would have been better off. CART was just that popular (check out how the Indy 500 crowds have fallen since 1995.)

CARTs structure was flawed from the start. Having race teams and car owners govern the sport is somewhat akin to having the inmates running a prison. Many of these car owners and drivers came over from SCCA which had the CAN-AM series fail twice and Formula A/5000 fail as well. In my opinion CARTs demise was inevitable whether the IRL was formed or not given past history. CART jumped the shark before the IRL was formed when it became more financially viable to have a electronics company hier drive full time in the series while four-time Indianapolis winner Al Unser was stuck with Indy one-offs. The current incarnation of the IRL is basically what CART was with a few more ovals.

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by aussiemidgetfan (Post 23280)

just a tad hard. indianapolis was about innovation in those days, and frankly mid engined was the path forward.

CART was the biggest thing to happen to any national championship anywhere in the world. Suddenly the word had a second openwheel championship that rivalled F1. It tested drivers more than any other series with a large variety of venues, a unique governing/ownership system, good promotion and money and continual upward growth. the only reason it all turned to s@#$ was Tony George. CART tried one hell of a lot of things to keep him on side, but the moron grandson was out to reestablish the race at the expense of everything else. a wise person would have continued to let the series build as that would continue to make the central event shine. (think nascar and the d500).

If CART had continued with the US500 in 1997, I honestly believe the IRL would have fallen flat on its face, and the sport would have been better off. CART was just that popular (check out how the Indy 500 crowds have fallen since 1995.)

Did CART pay you to say that?? LOL:emote20:

Re: Some things never change .......

No, they learned in 1 race that they couldn't compete with the Indy 500 - Period. And those same people organized the Belle Isle event this year for the IRL

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gregg (Post 23283)

The current incarnation of the IRL is basically what CART was with a few more ovals.

I agree.

I dont think we are in a much different place today if either 1)IRL was never started or 2) IRL and CART merged somewhere between 1996-2000.

Either way open wheel would still be playing for 2nd place behind Nascar unfortunately.

Some might say....If CART and IRL merged early on it would have been totally different. I don't think so becuase the opportunities for sprint car guys would still have been Nascar. $$$ has and always will been the biggest factor in CART or today the IRL.

The IRL was good for awhile as it gave guys like Kinser, Hewitt, Yeley, Tyler, Michner, Steele,Kite, etc...atleast somewhat of a shot during the early years. But once your big $$$ came in like Gannasi, Andretti, Penske that chance was gone almost regardless of talent.

Same thing if the 2 series would have merged say, in 1997 or 98. It would have brought the big $$$ that was left in CART (Newman Haas, Penske, Ganassi, etc) back in the picture thus putting our sprint car guys on the sideline and probably most of the drivers mentioned above would have never got a shot.

Would be curious to know if Pat Sullivan agrees or disagrees....

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rex W. (Post 23232)

It looks like a slow boring day when we dredge up stuff from 30 years ago. There must be something new to talk about.

Re: Some things never change .......

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seadog (Post 23292)

It looks like a slow boring day when we dredge up stuff from 30 years ago. There must be something new to talk about.

I guess my point is.....be it 30 yrs ago ,10 yrs ago , 5 days ago or as we speak its the same ol deal over on 16th st.