Sports Car racing has always been the preferred pursuit of a menagerie of miscreants, so it was no surprise it took J.C. France, cocaine-using (possessing, anyway) son of NASCAR vice chairman Jim France just a half season to get back to competing in Grand Am. Though the Daytona Beach News-Journal wrote he would not, a Bear source said he was indeed at VIR on the weekend.

As soon as the family lawyers got a dismissal of drunken driving and possession of crack cocaine, NASCAR reinstated his license. It seems the arresting officer was had chased the fleeing France out of her jurisdiction before he finally pulled over. Apologists will say “he wasn’t convicted,” but Murphy’s more convinced by the fact that the arrest report still stands, and the confiscated crack still exists, the fact of neither having been challenged by La Familia’s mouthpieces. So France is back to his “lifestyle” without so much as a slap on the hand, though NASCAR said he’d gone through rehab and “rigorous” drug testing. (For six months – right.) Half bro Russell Van Richmond (or is that Reginald van Gleason III) had it a bit tougher. He had to “serve” six months probation.

Grand-Am vice president of communications Kevin Hinson said Grand-Am has no formal substance abuse policy, such as NASCAR’s, and does not expect the sanctioning body to implement one in the near future. Nope, don’t need one of those. Grand Am’s equivalent of “don’t ask, don’t tell,” Murphy thinks.

Get drunk. Race. Lead cops on a chase. Refuse breathalyzer. Have your crack seized. Get it all tossed. I am a Grand Am driver. Priceless.

Indy Keeps 1979 Le Mans Winner

Speaking of miscreants, it takes real talent to make Don Whittington – Le Mans winner, IMSA champion, and former importer of South American agricultural products – a sympathetic figure. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway pulled that one off, though, beating Don out of his famous and valuable Porsche 935 (the one that won Le Mans in 1979). Of course, if you can unceremoniously fire your own brother….

More Change at Haas

Murphy hears Carl Haas isn’t well, that he requires care. It’s rumored whomever was supposed to be doing that at Long Beach “mislaid” the motorsports icon in the lobby of the team’s hotel, and there, like a potted plant, he spent the day. Paul Newman has passed into history. Mike Lanigan is gone. Bernadette (Bernie) is in charge now. Will she move to front and center like other recent (and infamous) female sports team owners Georgia Frontiere and Marge Schott? 

Villeneuve will join the team for Indianapolis and after. Haas now owns the parts business of EMT, leaving that company little more than a shell.

Prototype Cat

Word around the paddock is that Paul Gentilozzi’s Rocket Sports Racing will supply a “free” (fully sponsored/supported) Cat engine to anyone willing to stuff it in a prototype and go racing. How this offer (and Gentilozzi) will be affected by the impending departure of Mike O’Donnell, the program’s most prominent champion at Jaguar, is unclear.

Tequila Trouble in Paddock for Patron

On the heels of the dust-up over telecast start time and display of liquor advertising, ALMS has run into resistance to the new “presented by Tequila Patron” graphics for team transporters.  After NASCAR’s Grand Am had little trouble getting compliance with its “presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16…” graphics, the American Le Mans Series is getting “push back” from major teams that don’t want the association with booze so directly made on their own equipment. Murphy doesn’t underestimate the leverage of NASCAR (or the difference in culture between it and ALMS).

Ménage à trois of a sort

With a new name surfacing over this past weekend, the count is three. Three who have been rumored at some stage of “talking” about acquiring IMSA, ALMS, the tracks, and whatever else might be thrown in. Will that be the “critical mass” that will lead to a sale? It might. You can get one suitor without at least hinting you’re “available,” but not likely three.

Each of the suitors has somewhat different interests, though there is general agreement about the highest value asset – 750 acres of land in Northeastern Georgia. Yes, Road Atlanta is valued not as a race track but as potential residential housing.

USF1 Design Lands in Serbia

When Zoran Stefanovic recently sat at a table with the Mayor of a small town a few miles outside of Belgrade, it wasn’t the announcement of his grandiose “Stefan Technology Park” that was of interest in North Carolina, but rather the large graphic on the wall behind them. Yes, there’s no doubt that rendering is of the USF1 design that graced the team’s assembly bay in Charlotte and also appeared in Racecar Engineering’s March issue.

So, how did it get there? Sold? Copied? More importantly, does it represent a transfer of the design rights?

All that’s important because USF1’s lawyers are telling the North Carolina Department of Labor it has no assets so can’t pay its former employees what it owes them. Ken Anderson is reported to retain shop space at 9900 Twin Lakes. What business is being transacted there? Meanwhile, for billionaire Chad Hurley it’s clearly “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche.”

Hurley and Anderson join Murphy’s April “Gallery of Miscreants.”

Porsche Prevails

The Bear hears from VIR that the crowd was pretty good, at least a significant improvement for Grand Am. Porsche got its 3.8 engine, a 75 pound penalty on the Mazdas, and a 50 pound penalty on Leighton Reese’s Corvette and – not surprisingly – a win. Murphy watched the Speed telecast, and though it wasn’t a riveting show, it was way better than has been seen for ALMS events.

Flav and FIA settle

Flavio Briatore’s “lifetime ban” is over, replaced by a bar from “any operational role” in F1 to be in effect through 2012, and from “other FIA motorsport” through 2011. The Bear thinks the different dates aren’t likely to be without purpose. So in what FIA-sanctioned motorsport will we see Flav in 2012?

The top two at the Rolex once again came from Murphy’s top 5. After putting both Ganassi cars on the list (a bit of a no-brainer, even if your head is stuffed like a mattress), plus Brumos and two-time Grand Am Champion GAINSCO, the Bear mused in Paddock Poop 152 about the fifth, finally settling on the No. 9 Action Express because it fit all three Bear rools. Including the one about established teams, since in crew, staff, and owner, it was largely the “other” Brumos entry, the one vacated by the accused Daytona Beach druggie.

One Ganassi car blew an engine, a rarity in recent years; it had 8 hours on it at race’s start. Is it a measure of the economy that Ganassi’s ran a well-used motor? Even if his race engine was replaced because of an oil leak, no fresh engine was available?

Readers wondered about the Bear’s bullishness on the BMW M6 entries, but they’re thinking like ALMS fans, where ‘new cars’ are new cars. In Grand Am, tubers shed their skins like snakes, yesterday’s Pontiac becoming today’s Chebby, and tomorrow’s Bimmer. Finishing 8th and 11th, they didn’t have any more trouble than any other make in the field – less, in fact.

Two of Murphy’s five favorites finished in the top five, one on the podium; among the 30 GT entries, the Bear’s Five were 2nd, 5th, 8th, 9th, and 12th.

Saab-Spyker Saga

So Spyker’s ‘buying Saab?’ Everyone knows that the one-time Dutch F1 team masquerading as an automaker doesn’t have a guilder to its name, so how does this happen? The devil’s in the details. The Dutch want their pet car company, as do the Swedes, so the Dutch arrange a $562 million loan for Spyker and get the Swedes to guarantee it. GM will ‘sell’ Saab to Spyker for $74 million in cash and $326 million in Spyker-Saab preferred stock (what’s that worth, given neither has made a guilder or krona in living memory?).  Spyker pockets $488 million in cash (perhaps some of that will buy out the 30% Spyker holdings of Vladimir Antonov, suspected (by Swedish Intelligence) of money laundering and links to organized crime.

Rolex Rumor

Northeastern Florida isn’t exactly populated by ALMS well-wishers at this time of the year, so Murphy has learned to anticipate one or more pretty nasty rumors. Some have a kernel of truth, some are just off-the-wall. The 2010 annual ‘Daytona ALMS Rumor?’ Widely circulated in the paddock on International Speedway Boulevard was the story that ALMS has not yet paid 2009 prize money, so teams, in a kind of “strike,” are sending in their 2010 entries with no money. Of course the Bear is more than a little suspicious of the whole thing, but the “fact of the rumor” is surprise – just a measure of the ‘bad blood’ between these two competing sports car racing series.

Murphy’s sources indicated that at least the ‘strike’ part of that is untrue. If any team was withholding entry funds it wasn’t in concert with any other teams, and likely wasn’t in any ‘retaliation’ for nonpayment. Prize payments have dragged in a bit late – sometimes in installments – in recent seasons, and apparently this one is no different. The Series has suggested that prize money be credited against the new season’s entry fee, which seems perfectly reasonable to the Bear.

Defecting

Expect more than one Grand-Am team to “defect to LMPC” after Daytona. Alex Job is said to be one of them (interest by AJR was expressed early) along with Level 5, and at least one other. The LMPC count for Sebring will be 4 or 5, with 2 or 3 to join the series after that – consistent with ALMS Supremo Scott Atherton’s recent pronouncements.

From one quarter Murphy is told, “the Grand-Am fields will be horrific after Daytona,” and that “NASCAR upper management is fed up with Grand-Am.” If that’s true it didn’t keep Jim-Bob from winning the Rolex with his own entry. Close connections to Action Express’ owner Bob Johnson – along with other information – would suggest so. Mr. Johnson is Jim-Bob’s personal CPA; the company funding Action Express is something called High Rev Racing. Entering your own race series isn’t exactly revolutionary (Don Panoz being another example); the Bear takes it as a vote of confidence rather than something nefarious.

GAINSCO Gone?

The Bear’s been told that the Rolex was GAINSCO’s last race. Miami hotel reservations have been cancelled.

Audi In, Peugeot Overboard?

The Bear hears that Braselburg is considering allowing Audi to enter Sebring, pending the outcome of the new car’s testing, now underway. If the entry accepted is the “transitional” car, and not the “new rules” R15, then there’s little doubt the effect will be to toss Peugeot overboard. Peugeot may jump anyway, of course. The new Audi just might be ready for Sebring, anyway, since Audi Sport Joest has turned up as a “full season” LMS entry. That would mean the car is now believed to be ready by April…March 20th isn’t all that much earlier, is it?

There’s Cars and…

…then there’s cars. Ferrari can’t be happy about the two street-car based (barely more than that) Ferrari 430 Challenge cars entered at Daytona. One was turned away (‘not ready to race’ is a kind description) the Bear hears. The other muddled around, thoroughly uncompetitive. Look for entries from Tony Dowe later in the Grand Am season to be much more representative of the iconic marque.

Inlimbo Racing League

Izod is the IRL’s new title sponsor; you’ve probably seen the ads. Other noises from the surviving – for now – North American open wheel series aren’t so good. Ganassi is just the latest to join the ‘new car’ discussion, having produced a mock-up – a sign, according to one source, that the series is “just blundering around.”

The addition of Lanigan to Newman Haas was the work of the late Paul Newman; Carl’s family’s not on speaking terms with the new partner. Are we seeing the unraveling of Newman-Haas-Lanigan? That’s one opinion Murphy’s heard.

Unemployment Line

Here’s a measure of the weakness of the racing industry world-wide: Butch Leitzinger, Lucas Luhr, Mike Rockenfeller, Sascha Maassen, Emanuele Collard, Alex Gurney, Jon Fogarty, all ‘available and looking.’ And that’s just a few.

USF1

What the Bear is hearing is pretty grim. The chassis hasn’t been ‘crunch tested’ yet. There’s no motor on hand, payments to Cosworth reportedly now in arrears. The team has applied to the World Motorsports Council for dispensation to miss the first three races without penalty – more a courtesy than a rule, since guaranteed participation is not a part of the new concorde, as it was in the old.

It’s  not over yet. USF1 owner Chad Hurley (one of Youtube’s three original founders) could rescue the operation – with new management – if he so chooses. Meanwhile, Bernie is in his element, the eminance gris trying to arrange an interim chassis, but that’s wrapped up in a ride for Bruno Senna. If Bernie can’t get USF1 onto the grid, he might be stuck with the Russians, who’ve grabbed the rights to the ex-Toyota chassis (someone will have to check the accelerator pedal).

Lou News

Murphy’s friend Lou Gigliotti is running for Congress – here’s his web site. Meanwhile, he’s charging ahead with his Grand Am Corvette entries. 

Unlike others in Grand Am GT, Lou tells the Bear that, “Our Corvettes are ‘Prep 1’ using stock frames like ALMS cars. We learned a lot from that car and we are moving the technology over to Grand Am.” It makes particular sense for Lou to stick with ‘the real thing’ because Lou’s business is selling Corvette performance parts. Lou says a result of the new program will be   ‘really nice Corvette parts’ that will one day make their way into LG Motorsports’ catalog.
 
Eric Lux and Kelly Collins are set for the season in the first Corvette, with a hoped-for second car possible as early as Birmingham, depending on finding a good driving partner for the Boss.

Pssssssst…anyone interested in a nice ALMS Corvette? Murphy knows where to find one.

Follow the Bear on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Murphythebear

No sooner than the cats left town than the mice were out. Actually not out, but “in” a meeting. With the RRIC underway in Phoenix on this past Tuesday – that’s where the Bear was – Murphy’s mole (the Moroccan Mole, some call him) reported a ‘big, big meeting’ at 1394 Broadway in Braselburg. The Bear doesn’t know if it was a sanctioned meeting or an incipient revolt, but he’s heard the subject matter was anything but trivial.

Panoz Motor Sports (PMS) Group has a new CFO/accountant. The new guy has been described to Murphy as a ‘slash and burn’ artist. The problem? Not much left to slash. The Bear’s been told the only profitable thing in the company is T-shirt sales – Anna Mae’s Trinket Truck. Nice stuff, but not a big division. In fact, profit or not, it might be on the chopping block as ‘not important enough to mess with.’ Murphy hopes like hell that’s wrong. He likes trinkets.

Cuts in other areas continue – on the pit lane and even in the safety car. Due to illness of the incumbent, new guy Jim is taking over Timing & Scoring (Murphy has been corrected, the job being taken over is Simone’s as Chief Communicator in Race Control; he’s also told she’s recovered very well - well enough to perform – not that anyone on Broadway cared enough to ask…), at least temporarily.

You need a measure of how well things are going? You saw the press release on a Haas “distributor deal.” First question – sent along by one of the elves – “what do you need a distributor for in your home market?” According to some, the real story is Champ Car – the failed racing series just keeps right on giving, doesn’t it? Murphy’s been told Haas loaned Panoz three million to build the Champ Car DP01, and was still owed a million. Cash-strapped PMS Group offered its parts business and a little cash instead, and Carl took it. According to just about everyone in the race car biz, that is pretty much the end for Panoz as a race car constructor.

As if to confirm that, just today the Bear was told the Abruzzi lives – yes, Murphy’s gagging, too. This time though, it’s as a GT2 (Autosport and autoblog.com reported that this past October), and the new story is it’s not PMS Group and it’s not Danny doing the building. It’s Tom Milner being paid by the Don to build the racing Esperante replacement (that had to go, anyway, since its road car certification was based on a Mustang platform no longer in production).

So, how does that work? The Abruzzi is supposedly a modification of the Esperante GTLM (that’s sort of déjà vu, given the constantly morphing history of the Panoz LMP). But what’s the homologation of the  Abruzzi without a street car?

Radisson Road Racing Conference

The nine tracks that host ALMS events met with the Series and with each othern the Canyon I room at the Radisson Airport North in Phoenix. The Bear was there.

Murphy was parked in the next door lobby bar when they broke at 5 pm for a reception in the 44th Street Café, and still there when they finally trickled away near 7 pm, nearly an hour later than scheduled. It seemed convivial, if subdued, in the café. Did the promoters (as predicted by as source) get “reality, no more BS, real solutions?” Time – and the International Moles’ Secrets Association (IMSA) – will tell. The Bear is disappointed to have to report that the recently appointed committee had no representation in sight. Given the current problems of the Series and of PMS Group, they could seize the initiative. Murphy hopes they aren’t solely a creature of the proprietors.

Porsche

The Warsteiners – oh, sorry, that’s the beer, Murphy means the Weissachers – announced eight werks pilots the other day; missing were Emanuele Collard and Sascha Maassen, as the Bear told you a while back. The story is in the remainder, though. It seems there’s not even enough work (werk?) for even eight. Wolf Henzler is assigned to a seventh-place (at best) ALMS entry. Ace drivers (there’s no doubt about that, is there?) Timo Bernhard and Romain (Lettuce) Dumas are assigned to, pretty much nothing. Sure, they make a big deal about the Nurburgring 24 hours, but big car and fan turnout aside, it’s a run-what-you brung event, not exactly Le Mans. Odd, isn’t it? Something has to be planned, doesn’t it?

That’s a matter of debate, some saying they’ll land in a Porsche AG (or NA)-financed Cytosport entry, others saying “ no way, they won’t lay out that kind of money, and if they wanted to, why not just hire Penske again?” Those in that “no way” camp suggest some kind of combination deal with Audi (a car for Timo and Romain at Le Mans, as there was last season), and a few “place-holder” Porsche races (one-off seats at Petit Le Mans, perhaps?). So why keep even those eight on board if there really isn’t that much work? Over-active imaginations will suspect the gestation of a new Porsche LMP to the 2011 rules (which, after all, won’t be much of a stretch from the Spyder, particularly its 3.4 liter V8). The cynics will suggest it’s much simpler; if you’ve got ‘em under contract (and have to pay them), you could just as well try to use ‘em.

Balancing Act

What’s next in the brave new world of performance balancing? Falken seems to be angling for rules to help them run their 2008 Porsche? Not just run it, of course, they can do that if they like, but to make it competitive. That’s nonsense – and besides, it won’t exactly do good things for Porker race car sales, will it? Next, Randy Wars and Grady Willingham will be back in Dick Barbour’s old R. IMSA let a couple run in 2001 after the introduction of the RS, but they didn’t change the rules to make it faster, did they?

Extreme

Or not so. Scott Sharp’s Extreme Speed was planning to run a GT Challenge Porsche along with it’s two GT2 Ferraris. Now it’s dropped the Challenge program. Some say it’s a good idea for the team to concentrate on its Ferraris.

Intersport Raids Comprent

Sources say the Dublin, Ohio team has taken two of Comprent’s former IMSA Lites customers. Meanwhile, the proprietor of the Georgia company is rumored to be buying out his partners in a 5 axis milling machine. 

Spiraling Down

Declining attendance is likely reducing ALMS sanction fees, on top of outright loss of sanctioned series (BMW’s training wheels racing), and declines in entries (and consequently revenue) from other sanctions (Cooper Atlantics had 8 entries last the Bear heard, possibly Patrón GT3 Challenge, cannibalized by ALMS’ Challenge class). Declining and stagnant television viewership is reducing ad rates, and making annual support of the series look less attractive to manufacturers and other partners.

The Rolex

Look for Murphy’s  annual Rolex preview early next week.

Twitter

When rumors surface, the Bear tweets at http://twitter.com/Murphythebear

Alfie, the Alpine Field Mouse, resides in Switzerland. Murphy hadn’t thought much about his old friend in a long time, when along came a note. It seems ol’ Alfie’s right in the middle of the F1 tif. Actually, it was quite a bit more than just a note.

On Tuesday, June 16, the boys from FOTA (based in Geneva, where Alfie hangs out) sent along a three-page letter to Bernie and Max (that’s exactly the salutation, too, “Dear Max and Bernie,”). A nice personal touch, Murphy thinks, in the middle of a Mexican standoff (apologies to our south-of-the-boarder buddies, substitute Polish parliament, if you like). Attached to the letter was a newly revised Concorde agreement, ostensibly language proposed for the FIA, but just as easily a document on which the FOTA teams might structure their cooperation with each other in a new venture.

As usual, the media (these days the web, at hyperspeed) has been buzzing – and it really is fascinating how wrong most of that buzz is, full of words like “posturing,” and “fault.” That quite misses the point. A few out there do seem to understand that this is about governance. (Satorian, for instance, over on the ten-tenths motorsport forum.)

In that sense, this little fight is very, very relevant to sports car fans, but not for the reason you might think. If there is a break-away “F1” it won’t lead to a sports car launch by Ferrari or anyone else, but it just might begin to unravel the business model of motorsport, which nearly alone amongst professional sports maintains an administrative structure that’s a profit center in competition with its participants. American football and baseball are examples of the alternative, in which the league structures are creatures of the owners, who provide a budget for those functions but do not allow them to independently compete for funding. That doesn’t mean those “governing bodies” don’t wield a great deal of power – they do. But it’s at the leasure of owners, who cede that “self policing” function, much as that new Concorde agreement would. (The Bear won’t get into FIFA, which appears to operate much as does the FIA in regard to F1, and, not surprisingly, has been tainted by acusations of financial impropriety.)

Anyway, this has nothing to do with “cost caps,” with television coverage, or with “the fan experience.” It has to do with returning the sport to the control of its participants, while ending the “rake off” of hundreds of millions by a powerful competing entity.

Almost as an afterthought, FOTA’s letter offers to extend negotiations by pushing the deadline for setting the 2010 grid from June 19 to July 1. Murphy’s correspondents won’t make book on whether that will happen, but about this they are certain: the eight signatories of FOTA’s letter of the 16th are ready, able, and willing to launch a racing series of their own in 2010, and that includes a substantial enough “war chest” to operate through the 2010 season and beyond.

Max is sending proposals to five FOTA members he thinks are “wavering.” The Bear’s sources say that’s a mistake. Tuesday’s letter was signed – John Hankockian bold – by all eight active FOTA members, Brawn, McLaren, Toyota, Ferrari, Toro Rosso, Red Bull, Renault, and BMW Sauber.  They’re ready to go.

Lola presser

Lola announced the withdrawal of its F1 application. Lola’s press release, according to the Bear’s best sources, supports Alfie’s understanding. Lola withdrew because it has agreements with the FOTA Eight – with whom it expects to participate in 2010 – and doesn’t want to appear on the list of accepted entries that Max is likely to publish Friday.

Panoz LMP something

Well, that damn dumb idea is back again. Murphy reported on this mucking around (fiddling while Rome burns?) months ago, and thought the whole goofy idea was mercifully dead and buried (May 13th) with the virtual shutdown of Elan Motorsports Technologies. The Bear has been told this is not a “new design” to be raced by the Winchester, Virginia team, but rather the old Panoz with the roof put back on by the same guys who campaign the current Esperante. (Reynard –> Esperante GTR-1 coupe –> Panoz LMP 1 Roadster S –> Panoz LMP 1 coupe?) Those old chassis bones are getting a bit worn, aren’t they? Since EMT no longer has the capability to build a Radio Flyer, say nothing of an LMP, this is the only route available. (Or did Carl “pass” after his “due diligence?” That would hardly be an endorsement, would it?)

While the entire series is in serious financial straits, one has to be pretty clueless to take this kind of  irrelevant adventure as good news. Murphy’s asked this before: “Is this the best use of funds?”

Murmurs and Rumbles

So far it’s more a murmur than a rumble, but ALMS teams are talking about longer (not shorter, as at Road America) races. It’s pretty certain they know little about this inside the walls of the Braselton castle, they’d have to come outside and ask, right?

On the rumble side the algarve planters might not be very happy either. It seems they like their little Porsche series so much that they’re working to adopt it and find it a new home.

Another one circulating – it seems to have lept the Atlantic after fading here – is a Muscle Milk branded RS Spyder. Now the UK’s leading publisher of rumor (Murphy long since threw in the towel on keeping up with rumor mongering champ) writes that a “new” LMP2 will debut at Mid-Ohio. The Bear suggests a simple tests for such stuff. If the first race to be contested is not the next race on the schedule for a rumored entry, make its probablity 50-50; if it’s two races after the next, make it 30-70, three, 10-90 against. You get the idea.

Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood (or The Smiling Optimist). ALMS’ supremo was circulating at Le Mans with a consistant message: “the worst is behind us.” What? Meanwhile, the Don was on hand, but staying out of sight. When’s the last time that’s happened?

Did you notice that Road America’s slashed its advance raceday ticket price from $75 to $50? Sales a little slow? Wonder why the Brian Redman is cheaper, even though it’s claimed attendance is higher? Wonder who picked the “feature photo” for the Road America promotional mailer, the one that features D Sports Racers that look like Malibu Grand Prix cars? That will bring them in, won’t it? Anybody been able to find a photo of an ALMS prototype or GT car anywhere on the Road America site? (Murphy finally found an AGR Acura.) Want to know why Road America can’t draw fans? Check out their 2009 promotional video, here. Go-karts, ATV’s, golf cart scavenger hunts (?), good grief.

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?”