As much as I love the IndyCar Series, I’m a realist. I know the series is struggling to break into the mainstream consciousness in America, and is so far behind NASCAR that the open wheel series will probably never get back to the popularity it garnered in the mid-1990’s when Formula One champ Nigel Mansell came over to run CART for Newman-Haas.
The 2014 season is down to it’s final month, and we’re already looking ahead to 2015. With that in mind, here are some changes that I’d like to see be implemented by the IndyCar Series hierarchy in time for next season – or, maybe, 2016:
Move Milwaukee back to it’s traditional date: I have some friends in the Midwest who fondly remember watching the Indianapolis 500 on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend and venturing north to the suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin the very next weekend to watch the same drivers who raced at Indy race at the 1-mile bullring oval at the Wisconsin State Fair Park.
For years and years, until – and after – the CART/Indy Racing League split, the schedule was the same. Indy on the last weekend in May, and Milwaukee the weekend following. In recent years, that tradition has fallen by the wayside. Some years, the high-banked Texas Motor Speedway followed the 500, and, more recently, it’s been the Detroit Belle Isle double-header. A great race, yeah, but one without Milwaukee’s history.
IndyCar has already changed and lost so much tradition in recent years, going away from traditional venues – Road America and Laguna Seca, to name just two – in favour of more street races in giant population centres, and that’s short-changing long-time fans.
Perhaps more than any other venue, Milwaukee deserves it’s traditional date back. The IndyCar Series races on the Mile in July this year, and although the event has gained some traction in the Midwest, it’s nothing compared to how big it was back in the old days. Who knows? Moving the Milwaukee Mile race back to the weekend after Indy could be the beginning of the rebirth of one of IndyCar’s most important events.
Most oval races should be one-day shows: This is a no-brainer. I mean, it’s hard enough to get people to come and watch qualifying at Indianapolis every May, and there are more track employees than fans in attendance for qualifying at other oval tracks that the IndyCar Series visits.
The best way to ensure that race-day attendance bumps up is to have the IndyCar Series completely take over the day. Taking Saturday night’s race on the lightning fast Iowa oval for instance. Here’s how I’d do it: have practice sessions in the morning, qualifying in the afternoon, and maybe an Indy Lights race before the IndyCar race rolls off sometime around eight o’clock. That way, fans are guaranteed of a full day of racing activity. We get our money’s worth.
Fix the empty track: This is a giant problem for oval races. You go to, say, the Grand Prix of Long Beach and there’s always something going on: sports car races, three or four feeder series’, the celebrity race, other on-track entertainment like stunt bike riders and even concerts. Your race ticket is entry to more than just a race, but to a giant event.
Oval race weekends are the exact opposite. There’s so much dead time in between IndyCar and Indy Lights events that I’m not surprised fans don’t turn out – Iowa, for example, was less than half full this year, when it had been so popular in recent years that the track had to erect temporary grandstand seating.
Why buy a ticket to watch nothing for two or three hours between track sessions when you can sit at home and see the race on TV, saving some money in the process. Cram race day/race weekend with so much activity that us fans just don’t know where to look. Why can’t the Long Beach-type model that I referenced above be applied to ovals? Why do only street races seem to be able to promote that carnival-like atmosphere?
If nothing else, IndyCar officials should look to schedule as many companion dates with the Tudor Sports Car Series as possible. The sports car/IndyCar double header has worked well in recent years with the ALMS and Grand-Am, but with the advent of the united North American sports car series, there’s no better time to make this happen. There’s obviously crossover appeal, and regular double bills will only help both series’.
Bring back some fan favourites: Laguna Seca, the Michigan oval, Watkins Glen, Portland, Cleveland’s Burke Lakefront Airport circuit and, more recently, the airport track in Edmonton, were big hits with IndyCar fans, and many of those venues are dotted across the American Midwest, which has always been the heartland for IndyCar fans.
If IndyCar officials wonder why fans are turning away, they only need to look at the lack of these fan-favourites on the current schedule. Fans are the lifeblood of any sport, and, frankly, IndyCar doesn’t have enough left to be able to get away with things like removing Cleveland other events. Bring back as many of our favourite old venues as posible, and you’ll see fans come back, too.
And, speaking of bringing events back…
Road America has to be on the schedule ASAP: A non-negotiable! Road America is 4 miles of racing heaven, snaking through the Wisconsin forests near the sleepy town of Elkhart Lake, and IndyCar needs to be there, not just for tradition’s sake, but because it’s a damn fine circuit that always provides good racing, and because it’s a favourite with both drivers and fans.
I speak for all IndyCar fans when I say it sucks the big one to see NASCAR’s Nationwide Series racing there when IndyCar doesn’t. A Tudor Sports Car Series doubleheader would be amazing. Come on, IndyCar, do the right thing. Road America is part of the rich fabric of IndyCar racing. Not having it on the schedule is just about a crime!
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