Another team in IRL for 2009?

[Jimmy Magnusson]

And it's not just anybody.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/64852

Champ Car team co-owner Carl Haas plans to take his multiple title-winning team to the rival IndyCar Series in 2009 if a merger between the two championships cannot be agreed before then.

"It may not happen this year, but it's highly probably that we'll go for 2009 because there needs to be one series."

Quite honestly I think this would mean the end of any real "battle" between the two series. It would also improve the IRL greatly to have really all the "great open wheel teams" in the series, and you never know who might follow them over.

[Jon Lincoln]

I hope for a merger rather than a straight takeover. The great minds of both series should come together.

The core product I feel should be built around the Indy 500 but the great Champ Car races have a place too.

Here's hoping that sense prevails and that open wheel racing comes out of this strong.

[climb]

A merger thread already exists, Jon; this one should be aboput the possible choice of Mr Haas.

As i told in a past thread, It's hard to me to understand how come a team like NHL can find motivations in the current CC.

It's like Real Madrid entering the Iceland national League.

[BootsOntheSide]

For prestige and history, NHL is the best ChampCar team, but one or two others are well-funded and competitive. I remember when Forsythe/Green and Ganassi were small teams. They may not be the best ChampCar team at present - it may have all been Bourdais. We'll have a better idea after this year.

[climb]

Well they got a good part of their wins after Ganassi, Andretti and Penske quit

[D.R.T.]

How do AGR, Gannassi and Penske feel about competing against Vision, D & R, Duno, Beck etc

[climb]

Originally Posted by D.R.T.

How do AGR, Gannassi and Penske feel about competing against Vision, D & R, Duno, Beck etc

But they can at least fight each other (8 drivers involved), hadn't you ever realized that?

[mountainstar]

Originally Posted by climb

But they can at least fight each other (8 drivers involved), hadn't you ever realized that?

Oh wow.

[climb]

Originally Posted by mountainstar

Oh wow.

you hadn't either, eh?

[mountainstar]

Originally Posted by climb

you hadn't either, eh?

Yes I had. I was just expressing my unbridled enthusiasm for such a competition.

[drdisque]

Originally Posted by D.R.T.

How do AGR, Gannassi and Penske feel about competing against Vision, D & R, Duno, Beck etc

Probably the same way that Ganassi, Penske, and Newman-Haas felt about competing against Euromotorsport, Project Indy, Dick Simon, Leader Cards, Arciero, and Raynor 20 years ago.

Backmarkers are nothing new to racing. In fact they're as old as racing itself and it seems when a league is healthy it attracts MORE backmarkers.

[JohnSSC]

Remember how Dick Simon Racing would get like, six cars into the field at the 500?

With the way CIRCL is these days though, a return by Dick Simon Racing to the grid would be an improvement.

Agree with you here, drdisque, a healthy series is always going to attract teams who want to step up and get in on the action.

[fazzaz]

John,

I'd love to see Dick Simon back. If I were trying to put a young rookie in the Indy 500, Dick Simon would be guy I'd want -- he has a fabulous record of getting drivers in the field (and having them do well). I've only met him briefly (during the Andy Evans days), but he understood how to drive the track, from his own experience. Unlike many drivers, he could also teach those skills to someone else. (Some of the very fastest professional drivers I've known were completely incapable of explaining exactly what they were doing.)

I'm happy with these new teams; little teams have the opportunity to grow to big teams. Milka Duno isn't a team, of course, she's a driver with a large budget. Peter Baron's SAMAX is the team, and I watched Peter start the team. He's grown it well, both in size the professionalism, in sports car racing, and I expect him to do the same in the IRL (with or without Milka).

I'm happy to see the possibility of Carl Haas heading to the IRL as well. Haas gets far too little credit for his part in the split in open wheel racing, and if he returns to the Speedway there is symbolism far beyond the one or two cars be brings.

As to some of the earlier points in this thread, I know that Roger Penske will race against whoever's out there, and he will regard every one of them as a serious competitor.

Fz.

[JohnSSC]

Hi fazzaz!

That is exactly what I meant about Dick Simon - he was one of the guys bringing new talent in - if you were a decent shoe and needed a break, he was a good person to talk to.

He wasn't a bad shoe himself, either!

[drdisque]

Dick is 74 years old and while their are owners of that age, there's not many guys of that age start what essentially would be a new team.

And while he did field a number of young talented drivers, he also was more than willing to take a check from an untalented or inexperienced pay driver.

The names Jean-Pierre Frey, Fulvio Ballabio, Joe Sposato, and Dennis Vitolo all come to mind.