Cairo NY
-- Admittedly, during my 10 years of presenting Internet commentary, an
inordinate quantity of cyber ink has been poured into criticism of the CEO's and
owners of the Champ Car Company. At times, many readers questioned my loyalty
and sanity especially when I was among the first to rant about the stupidity,
duplicity and/or hypocrisy of Joe Heitzler, Bobby Rahal, Chris Pook, Kevin
Kalkhoven, Gerry Forsythe and a long list of other Champ Car team owners and
stockholders.
Ultimately though, and perhaps without even realizing it, most fans at some
point "do the math" and end up on my bandwagon. By then, however, this renegade
scribe is ranting about some new injustice while everyone has forgotten when it
was that they first realized so-and-so was messing up big time.
But that was then and this is now.
When the entire corps of Champ Car shill literati did their one-eighty some
months ago, open criticism of the series’ owners and their strategies -- or the
lack thereof -- became commonplace. Other staunch loyalists have since jumped on
that media-shift bandwagon. At this point, even the Internet fan forums are
chock full of critical content.
Apologists for Champ Car racing, like media hard cards for critical writers,
have become an endangered species.
The latest flap concerns Gerald Forsythe's demand of Paul Tracy that he
renegotiate the $2.5 million per year five-year contract they inked just last
year to keep Tracy away from NASCAR. Forsythe's business ethics and the team's
new co-owner's interests aside, the latest wave of commentaries warns that the
loss of Paul Tracy could doom our beloved speed sport.
This would be especially true, they say, if PT were to end up in an f-inheritor
ride. While PT has always maintained that he'd rather be riding on the Champ Car
bandwagon than driving a "crapwagon", the best chance of making anywhere near
his current pay would be to do the latter.
Then there's the "having something to prove" angle stemming from the
controversial finish of the 2002 Indy 500. It has been argued that the finish
was rigged by the Speedway owner's henchmen at the last moment so the "outsider"
Tracy, who was in P1 at the time, wouldn't be declared the winner.
In any case Tracy, along with even a fraction of the cadre of Canadian fans that
might support him, could certainly cause a loss of attendance, revenue and
perhaps even venues and, conversely, could create a boost for the other side.
How many Canadian sponsors might finally pony up some strengthened loonies for
PT if he were to campaign an Indy 500 car? How many fans would boycott Champ Car
if PT winds up out of the series? How many once-loyal Champ Car fans would cross
over to the other side? Does the Champ Car Company's co-owner realize what may
be at stake? Does he care?
For me, however, the larger questions are:
- If the Champ Car World Series collapses and its viable teams and talent join
the Indy Car series will American open-wheel racing finally have been reunified?
- How many, thus far, have kept their promise to boycott any endeavor from which
the inheritor of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway might realize as little as a
pennysworth of profit?
As one who would never jump on the f-inheritor bandwagon under any circumstances
and speaking for my like-minded cohorts, the day that Champ Car folds will be the day
the music dies.
Archive
|
