Craig’s List
The Bear’s making book on when IMSA/ALMS stuff will show up on Craig’s List. It looks like they’re selling anything not nailed down. (There are some good bargains at Road Atlanta’s on line store.) Murphy hears the next thing on the way out the door will be Elan Motorsport Technologies – or what’s left of it – to a Chicago-based motorsports magnate. It depends on whether the prospective buyer can find something worth buying (the fancy name for that is “due diligence). This follows the loss of a contract that might have helped keep the doors open.
Connections
The Bear’s focus is sports car racing in general, and the American Le Mans Series in particular, but those have become inextricably intertwined with other racing, not just in North America, but worldwide. That’ particularly true with motors – and motorsports – distressed world-wide. So, until there’s a healthy, stand-alone sports car series in North America (if there ever is), the Bear recognizes that what happens in other leagues – and in the board rooms and management committees of automobile manufacturers – determines what happens – or doesn’t happen – in the American Le Mans Series.
High Finance
On the Deutsche Börse, the VOW short positions have significantly increased. The last time that happened, a scramble to cover made the Wolfsburg company the most valuable in the world – for two days, anyway – while the shorts took a big bath. Why would they do it again? Because if there is no take over by Stuttgart, then the share value of VOW declines to “fair value” – about €50 – a €150 drop. Stuttgart actually had a serious brush with death in March, when only hastily arranged loan extensions saved the iconic company. While we’re roasting “hedge funds,” and “investment bankers,” what was it that Wendelin and his band of Merry (Black Forest) Men were doing? Manipulating markets. It may not have been legal in Europe, but it sure as hell would have been in the USA (and they say we have lax regulation). There’s some speculation that Wendelin won’t be around for much longer. The Bear won’t be sorry to lose Porsche’s anti-racing chief.
Whither Wirth?
There was a protest of the Bear’s assertion that Wirth Research might launch an F1 team under the new cost-capped-F1 (now a dead letter, at least temporarily). That came from evidence submitted to the French trial court in the matter of Ferrari’s request for an injunction against proposed 2010 rules; the court was submitted a list comprised of the teams that had expressed interest in entering if the new rules came into being. A horse told a primate friend of the Bear’s that Wirth’s “potential future involvement” would be engineering, design, and manufacturing services to “another outfit.”
So why was Wirth Research named to the court? The defendants (the FIA) wouldn’t knowingly submit perjured testimony, of course. So they believed that Wirth was as “real” as the remaining names on that list, some of whom have, in fact, subsequently submitted official entries.
If we see a Wirth entry before Friday’s midnight deadline, does that make the horse wrong – or worse? What if the horse is a “stalking horse,” having agreed to make the entry for a team in which it would later be only a “junior partner?” Having a “silent partner” is a perfectly legal and logical course of action in an instance like this. Teams can always be reorganized – and their names changed – later. So Murphy wasn’t particularly surprised when he got a call the other day, the gist of which was that Wirth’s expression of interest – whether or not it leads to an actual entry – is on behalf of a USA racing megateam to whom, of course, it will subsequently offer engineering, design, and manufacturing services.
The point of Wirth’s protest was to throw cold water on speculation that its F1 move is indicative of a loss or reduction in the services dedicated to Acura. But has it? Can Wirth really carry any significant role in an F1 effort – even with a cost cap – and do justice to a major sports car program? In the LM/LMR program, BMW and Williams decided they could not. Is Wirth Research more capable than those two?
Will Max Blink?
Did FOTA? The teams propose to race in Bernie’s F1 next year with a €100 million spending cap (and a bunch of exceptions so they can spend more). That’s about as limiting as a Panoz GTLM restrictor. But their entry today before the midnight deadline is decidedly provisional, based on Max accepting the team-proposed rules. We’ll have to wait until June 10th, when entries are accepted, to find out who it was that blinked. (Beyond Frank Williams, who certainly did, and will be “odd man out” whatever the happens). Then we’ll find out who will join and who will not, and under what rules F1 will operate for until 2012. Will Max decide that he wants an F1 with Ferrari in it, or will he opt for a 12-car grid of five new teams and Frank Williams? Will there be one of those rare moment of clarity?
Roger and the Dwarves
The Bear expects that some on that long list of F1 pretenders – the ones lured by the promise of a “cheaper” version – will withdraw their applications under the FOTA-proposed rules. Raising €100 million is a whole different ball game than raising €40 million. So which of the dwarfs – including USF1, Lola, Prodrive, Campos - are likely gone? The Prodrive entry is backed by Arab money, and would – after two years or so – devolve into an Aston Martin-branded entry. So do they go ahead? It can’t hurt that oil prices are again on the rise. A Wirth-Penske entry is similarly in question. Sure, Penske could fund – or get the funding – but the Bear suspects he’d much rather pick over the bones of Saturn.
Roger’s busy figuring out if he can buy the redundant GM division to use about half the dealers (he’ll close the rest) to sell a Samsung car. Right, Samsung. As in TV sets. Knock-offs of Nissans that are copies of Hondas that are copies of BMWs – or something like that. Will they have pixels?
Whether Wirth…
retains its sports car focus may not be the key to the ALMS prototype field, anyway. de Ferran has been negotiating to acquire the assets he needs to go IndyCar racing, and Duncan Dayton says he’s serious about an IndyCar campaign. Some seem to think that Duncan is a creature of Acura in his racing programs. Murphy suspects there’s some truth in that as far as sports car racing is concerned, but unlike XM Radio, neither Patrón nor Forbes are “house” sponsors. Duncan’s roots are in collecting and racing of historic…that’s right…F1 and Indy cars. Some have read into Dayton’s comments that he’ll wait until 2011. Murphy doesn’t draw that conclusion at all. What he takes away is that Highcroft wouldn’t expect to be competitive until new equipment in 2011 “levels the playing field,” but Duncan’s a smart cookie, smart enough to know that 2010 could be a learning year in every respect but the equipment. If Patrón – or someone else – is willing, Dayton will make the jump. Will he continue to run an ALMS program? Possible, but not probable. Add to that some background noise that Fernandez is likewise eyeing an IndyCar return, and…
Robin and Tony
The Bear’s laughing out loud (you know, lol) at the roasting Robin Miller’s getting. Murphy’s been there (where Miller is), with reports of things that happen behind closed doors. When he was reporting clues to the demise of ChampCar, of meetings to mend the split, and exploration of outsourcing strategies by ChampCar, the knives came out, and so – famously – did the “official denial.” Oddly, ChampCar prevailed on IMSA to carry its water in that instance.
Putting aside the fact that Miller’s probably right in the essential facts of the thing – that Tony’s latitude of decision authority in regard to IMS has been reduced to nil – the reaction (denial) of the usual clueless partisans is entertaining. Don’t take that badly, OW fans. Murphy thinks sports car racing needs a lot more fanatics of its own. No sport can thrive without its cohort of clueless partisans. That there isn’t one is symptomatic of sports car’s lack of relevance in the grand scheme of motorsport.
You’re about to miss the message, though. As good as Indy 2009 was – and the Bear thought it was – TV ratings fell to 3.9. What the hell were they all watching? Golf, probably – or nothing. NASCAR started later, then ended quickly in the rain, and F1 was…well, it was F1 – an acquired taste for us here in the colonies.
Once upon a time the relationship between Indy and the IRL was all one way; the former dragged along the latter. As the iconic race has slipped in the consciousness of the American sports fan, however, a more symbiotic relationship has developed; fans who follow the IRL “feed” the level of interest in its premier race, much like the effect of CART in “the old days.” So what’s the point? Versus. With the early part of the IRL season pretty much invisible, there was no “story line” being built over April and May, so Indy was pretty much on its own.
What the Tony kerfuffle is really about is creating separation between the finances of IMS (which Tony’s sisters and mother care about) and the IRL (which they do not). So what will be the effect of the loss of that ‘subsidy’ on the IRL? One Bear contact suggests that “Tony’s spanking will result in the demise of several IRL races that IMS secretly/silently subsidizes (such as St Pete). Does anyone really believe Andretti-Green is the majority promoter?”
Tags: Add new tag, Carl Haas, de Ferran, Deutsche Borse, Duncan Dayton, Elan Motorsport Technologies, FIA, IMS, IRL, Lola, Patron, Porsche, Robin Miller, St Petersburg, Tony George, VOW, Wirth Research
Having watched the Versus IRL promotion, I’d say they know what to do. They are imitating NASCAR by promoting every race as “Historic” and talking about the drivers, to create recognizable media personalities.
If IRL survives long enough, Versus might well gain for it the following it needs among “Ril Amerkinz” who know race cars turn left. And if the rest of the series has fans, Indy will be back at the pinnacle of American racing. But it might take a few years, and IRL might not have a few years (though I think it has a better chance than my favorite, ALMS.)
Indy needs the IRL, which needs Indy. Somebody better start pumping big bucks into Versus to get them into more basic cable packages, in a hurry.
Unfortunately, you have to “get Versus” to “watch Versus.” Too many do not. That’s Murphy’s point, which you point to in your last sentence.
From across the pond, it looks like Don P.’s dream (DP, never thought of that before) is toast. But hope springs eternal. The baby class might attract more gentlemen jockeys, but would that mean Don, Scott, et al. have won or lost? Maybe the taxicabs will start tanking so badly that Florida’s finest will decide to pull back from
spec sports cars. But I kinda doubt it. In any case, to quote coach Mike, “This too shall pass.” Good luck at the Rock, guys. I’ll try to catch a stream of it somewhere on the Web.