Provisional 2001 Schedule

[KC]

A very rough draft of next years schedule was seen floating about the Portland paddock for approval by the teams. It lists a record 22 events for CART. This is by no means a set schedule, especially concerning the European rounds as the German Lausitzring has expressed a desire to be the first CART oval race run in Europe.

March 11--Monterrey, Mexico (New temporary road course)
March 25--Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Oval)
April 8--Long Beach, California (Temporary street course)
April 22--Twin Ring Motegi, Japan (Oval)
May 6—Nazareth, Pennsylvania (Short oval)
May 13--Texas Motor Speedway (New stop at oval)
June 3—Milwaukee, Wisconsin (Short oval)
June 10—Detroit, Michigan (Temporary street course)
June 24—Cleveland, Ohio (Temporary road course)
July 1—Portland, Oregon (Road course)
July 15—Toronto, Ontario, Canada (Temporary street course)
July 22—Michigan Speedway (Oval)
July 29—Chicago, Illinois (Oval)
August 12--Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course (Road course)
August 19--Road America (Road course)
September 2—Vancouver, British Columbia (Temporary street course)
September 16--Rockingham, UK (New track)
September 23--Lausitzring, Germany (New track)
October 7—Houston, Texas (Temporary street course)
October 14--Laguna Seca, California (Road course)
October 28--Surfers Paradise, Australia (Temporary street course)
November 4—Fontana, California (Oval)

The scedule does show a few new American markets. Texas Motor Speedway and a street race at Monterrey, Mexico are both markets that CART is seriously wanting to enter. I, for one, am hoping that the race a TMS will be on the new road course infield circuit instead of the high banked oval. I am unsure of what CART will do about the inability of the current chassis design to race on a high banked oval.

[Heeltoe6]

The schedule stil starts to late (what happened to the week after Nascar speedweeks...but at least its about 2 weeks earlier) and ends waaaaaaaaay to late (thought we were targetting a gradual shift to ending near labor day to avoid conflict with nfl. Of course, the reason why there is no shift to early dates is becasue two beautiful, warm, weeks in May are wasted for a totally insane reason which doesn't benefit cart one bit. Thumbs down also to going to TMS as well. If the cart race ins't as "good" as the irl race (which it won't be in the mainstream view), cart is just going to pummeled for being processional. Secondly, if a track can't get the bugs worked out of it in 4 years, it doesn't deserve a date (ie bumps in t4 are still present).

A modest thumbs up for keeping Naz on the schedule, a uniqe track with some good history and cart's only presence in the northeast, now if they got the right aero package, the races would be bettter like in the past. Also nice to see it get a wamr date. Also a slight thumb up for going to both European venues, if cart was going to do it, they should do it right and go to both. So a little plus there. But overall, the timing of all the races stink, and the schedule ends later, rather than earlier than last year.

[bella]

oh no. that looks suspiciously like monza weekend. damn.

[R]

22 events, right? That probably means that 2 of them will be stricken from the schedule, since CART doesn't want to expand their schedule beyond 20 races per year. As KC says, this is by no means a set schedule, but thanks for sharing the info with us.

[KC]

I think Rahal has gotten approval to have 22 events becaused of rescheduling some events so the travelling times are lessened. He wants CARt to make swings through regions instead of bouncing back and forth across the country.

[Dave S]

Actually Rahal has stated previously that he sees no reason why they can't eventually run 24-25 races per year. They could do it for the same money they spend now by cutting testing.

[Geva racing]

Rockingham in SEPTEMBER?

What are they looking for? The CART MUD races?

It's an idiot idea.

isn't it

[KC]

No matter the time scheduled, there will always be a chance of rain. Every other oval racing event suffers the same. if it rains the race is usually too dangerous to run.

[Dan Friel]

September is usually dry... usually...

But it's going to clash with Goodwood motor circuit event - typical.

Looking forward to it though.

[bella]

it's dry round us. and this is where the race is going to be held.
hey, i was thinking, good job the british gp wasn't held in july, eh?? september's dry and warm as august. so we're on a bonus here.