United States Grand Prix: Whos Watching?

[Kyle Love]

Who's going to watch the United States Grand Prix this weekend in Indianapolis? I want to get some tickets to it Sunday but right now it doesn't look like I will. Never the less I get to go down Saturday.

For the first time since the USGP has been in Indy an American will be racing in the race, Scott Speed. He won a Red Bull driver contest to put an American driver into Formula one. He is on a pretty bad F-1 team, Toro Rosso, so don't hype your hopes up of seeing him win.

This may be the last USGP held in Indianapolis. Their contract is up at the end of this year, and the FIA (F-1's sanctioning body), doesn't think that Indianapolis is a must go to event. So, it may become the last USGP for a while. The contract negotiations are still going on however, because the USGP is always a good race, except last year with the whole tire mishap.

So, who is going to watch all the wacky people with painted faces, flags waving and horns blowing? Oh and the action on the track also.

[Bill_Hancoc]

Didn't know it was on but i will definitely make a TV schedule change so i can support the Ferrari team as usual

[Andrew Rudolph]

Qualifying was awesome today, speed made it into the second round! I wish i could go to an f1 race, but not this year at least. I hope they have a usgp, at indy or anywhere else (i vote for laguna seca or daytona) Speed channel has had great coverage so far, looks to be a good race tommorow!

[viking1902]

Yeah, Speed Channel has been doing a great job of covering the race. On Thursday ( I think) they had about a half hour segment on the in's and out's of the design of the cars. It was really cool.

Originally Posted by Andrew Rudolph

i vote for laguna seca or daytona

I think it would be awesome to see the USGP at Laguna Seca. Just imagine F1 cars flying down that crazy hill corkscrew thing they have there.

[Kyle Love]

There are various things both circuits must do before F-1 would even think about going their, to start with they have to install garages like the ones at Indianapolis.

[Andrew Rudolph]

There are alot of better courses in america as far as the track goes, but facitlites and ability to control a volume of people that an f1 race draws are two huge limiting factors. I doubt daytona would spend money to help bring f1 to thier track (im sure they are happy with the amount of people coming to thier races) but I would venture to say that if say Panoz was contacted about road atlanta he would be interested in throwing some money at his track.

[Kyle Love]

Originally Posted by Andrew Rudolph

There are alot of better courses in america as far as the track goes, but facitlites and ability to control a volume of people that an f1 race draws are two huge limiting factors. I doubt daytona would spend money to help bring f1 to thier track (im sure they are happy with the amount of people coming to thier races) but I would venture to say that if say Panoz was contacted about road atlanta he would be interested in throwing some money at his track.

The best road course in America would most likely be at a permanent road course and not Indy or Daytona. I don't think any other track in, America atleast, could handle the shear volume and type of fans that F-1 brings. The talks of it going to Vegas I find totally ridiculous. I can see where they would be going to where more people are and a bit more fun of a city, but you would be sacrificing legacy, tradition and Las Vegas would have to come up with a lot of money. Plus Las Vegas would have F-1 garage paddocks that they really couldn't use much other then when F-1 is there, and most likely that would be on the street in some high price district.

If F-1 doesn't renew with the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, I don't foresee them coming back to the states for a few years at least. The F-1 garages at Indy can easily be used for some other cars, not IRL or NASCAR though, too many cars not enough garages. They could use the garages as a tactic to get a CART road race at the speedway so the two open wheel series could once again function as one, and make a more powerful series.

If anyone wants to talk about racing just pm me.