Bernie vs. Tony

[dd74]

Is it that Tony George just can't get his crap together with drumming up F1 support, or is it more about Bernie Ecclestone only sees "India" in Indianapolis?

http://www.motoring.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3884137&fSectionId=&fSetId=381%20---

What F1/Ecclestone should really do is bring F1 back to Long Beach. Or have a race around Westwood/Bel-Air/Holmby Hills/Beverly Hills area.

Can you imagine that?

[teenerted1]

i guess bernie didnt hear all the comments this weekend that the US should have TWO GP's...

if he got off his a$$ and did a better job of promoting F1 in the US he might have more drivers and sponsors.

good luck on getting that non-existing track built, open, and approved in India by 2009. think they have till july to get the proposal approved.

[Dottore]

If you were Bernie and only had as many franchises to sell as there are race dates in a year - would you sell to a place where the upside is limited due to existing competition from other series or would you go to a greenfields site where the upside is virtually unlimited? (rhetorical question)

[Zeke]

Bernie answered on camera to the question, "Are the negotions complicated?"

No, to me, simple. It's all up to Tony."

Read that as to say will Tony anti up or let it go away? F! is very expensive and that's why you'll never see it in Long Beach again. The venue pays for the whole show.. A 3 day ticket in LB would have to go for a grand. Race day, $500 for a seat in the sun. We've BTDT with Ecclestone and he priced himself out of our budget. That was way back when he only wanted LBGP to front 4 million!

W/o 3 day attendance/gate, the concessions and the fair inside the sports arena, the thing wouldn't walk as it is. 100,000 paying customers on Sunday hardly adds up to 4 million considering a lot of them have 3 day tickets (no one has the exact figures, as I don't believe Dover Downs Entertainment releases individual event information). I think the same financial picture confronts any prospective venue.

[dd74]

Originally posted by milt
Bernie answered on camera to the question, "Are the negotions complicated?"

No, to me, simple. It's all up to Tony."

Read that as to say will Tony anti up or let it go away? F! is very expensive and that's why you'll never see it in Long Beach again. The venue pays for the whole show.. A 3 day ticket in LB would have to go for a grand. Race day, $500 for a seat in the sun. We've BTDT with Ecclestone and he priced himself out of our budget. That was way back when he only wanted LBGP to front 4 million!

W/o 3 day attendance/gate, the concessions and the fair inside the sports arena, the thing wouldn't walk as it is. 100,000 paying customers on Sunday hardly adds up to 4 million considering a lot of them have 3 day tickets (no one has the exact figures, as I don't believe Dover Downs Entertainment releases individual event information). I think the same financial picture confronts any prospective venue.

But who in India can afford an F1 race? It's a third-world country.

Okay, the U.S. is also a third-world country, but with more money and more cars representative of the ones raced in F1.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

No schit. If they ever brought F1 back here, I can guarantee it'd be a madhouse. I could die a happy man in blissful nirvana. Can you imagine those Ferraris catching air off the lip of Pine Ave crossing Ocean like they did back in the day? Boo-yah!!! THAT'S racing.

[dd74]

Originally posted by Porsche-O-Phile
No schit. If they ever brought F1 back here, I can guarantee it'd be a madhouse. I could die a happy man in blissful nirvana. Can you imagine those Ferraris catching air off the lip of Pine Ave crossing Ocean like they did back in the day? Boo-yah!!! THAT'S racing.

Yep! Long Beach is perfect for F1 simply because it is used to the sort of race F1 once held in Long Beach. The course is already laid out. i went to the LBGP in '78, and it was unreal.

Eccelstone is just being contrary. I think he has a big ol' issue with the U.S. (and more likely NASCAR).

[Dottore]

Originally posted by dd74
But who in India can afford an F1 race? It's a third-world country.

Okay, the U.S. is also a third-world country, but with more money and more cars representative of the ones raced in F1.

India has a middle-class (as that is defined by the OECD - in terms of disposeable income) that is larger than the population of the US. It also has a significant seriously wealthy demographic. Asia is where the biggest growth potential is for Bernie.

[dd74]

Originally posted by Dottore
India has a middle-class (as that is defined by the OECD - in terms of disposeable income) that is larger than the population of the US. It also has a significant seriously wealthy demographic. Asia is where the biggest growth potential is for Bernie.

Really? Growth is it? I don't see any less Ferraris on L.A. roads.

I think Bernie's head's up his ass if he believes India will outrank America in high-dollar spending. The cheap labor in India is bound to implode their economy, not expand it. It's already beginning in China with their overheated economy.

As to the brands in F1: the U.S. will and continue to purchase more Mercedes, BMWs and other F1 brands than anywhere else in the world. Ask BMW and Mercedes themselves from where most of their purchases come.

Half of India can't even live above squalor. So what makes Bernie think by '09 that any working stiff there will have interest in shiny cars flying around the track.

After all, in the case of the U.S. I don't see attendance down at NASCAR events.

I swear: Lewis Hamilton will bring this sport to the U.S. in earnest, not Eccelstone.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Still - F1 seems to have a heck of a following here, even with that "oval track" stuff being the popular event du jour.

Bringing F1 here to run on the streets would probably make me cream myself.

[Dottore]

Originally posted by dd74

Half of India can't even live above squalor. So what makes Bernie think by '09 that any working stiff there will have interest in shiny cars flying around the track.

I think you are seriously missing the point. Bernie is not in the business of selling cars. He's in the business of selling TV rights. Where will F1 TV rights net Bernie the most money? Asia - where there is exponential growth for this sort of thing. This is not original thinking on my part but comes from an interview with the man that I recently read in German newsmagazine.

Look at the US GP last week. Many stands were empty. I couldn't even find the time slot in my local TV guide. No one where I live is even remotely interested in F1. Lot's of competion in other series and minimal interest: well the TV rights will not be worth all that much. In Asia - by way of contrast - people are throwing money at Bernie.

It's a no brainer really. I would like to see a decent US GP - no question. But if I were Bernie and had to f___ around with Tony, I'd say that life was too short.

[Zeke]

I think a few of you miss the fact that the venue is not what Bernie is concerned with as long as they pay all the costs associated with running the race. He could care less whether anyone shows up with a ticket of not. That leaves F1 with the TV revenue which is the cream. There are 2 business models here; local and world wide. BC is in the WW business.

[Dottore]

Originally posted by milt
I think a few of you miss the fact that the venue is not what Bernie is concerned with as long as they pay all the costs associated with running the race. He could care less whether anyone shows up with a ticket of not. That leaves F1 with the TV revenue which is the cream. There are 2 business models here; local and world wide. BC is in the WW business.

You are right. But empty seats are indicative of lack of local interest, and this probably means local TV rights are not going to be that interesting.

[nota]

best case for the SPORT
B E and T G kill eachother
and someone who loves the SPORT
not CASH takes both of their places

greed ruins SPORT

[dd74]

Originally posted by Dottore
I think you are seriously missing the point. Bernie is not in the business of selling cars. He's in the business of selling TV rights. Where will F1 TV rights net Bernie the most money? Asia - where there is exponential growth for this sort of thing. This is not original thinking on my part but comes from an interview with the man that I recently read in German newsmagazine.

Look at the US GP last week. Many stands were empty. I couldn't even find the time slot in my local TV guide. No one where I live is even remotely interested in F1. Lot's of competion in other series and minimal interest: well the TV rights will not be worth all that much. In Asia - by way of contrast - people are throwing money at Bernie.

It's a no brainer really. I would like to see a decent US GP - no question. But if I were Bernie and had to f___ around with Tony, I'd say that life was too short.

I'm not missing the point, Dottore. One only has to read a bio of Eccelstone to know what he wants. It's the race on Sunday, sell on Monday ideal that is being screwed, and which Bernie is not in any manner helping as the true ideal of racing.

I just get this idea Bernie thinks "we" are sub par to India (sniggered at by Hobbs, Posey, et al during qualifying at Indy on Saturday). Secondly, again as Bernie doesn't care about the U.S. market - as his is a thought pattern he's also exhibited in Canada with the threat to yank the Montreal Grand Prix away, he fails to see where his race cars' more gentrified versions are being sold - North America.

So he will receive adequate infrastructure support in India and South Korea? So lines and lines of high-end race car- derived machinery will be sold in these countries?

This elitist euro-trash ideal of going where the money is as opposed to giving real fans some entertainment is enough to turn people off from the sport entirely.

I'm sure the only ones jumping up and down in celebration of Eccelstone potentially taking F1 out of the U.S. is the France family.

[Dottore]

Originally posted by dd74


So he will receive adequate infrastructure support in India and South Korea? So lines and lines of high-end race car- derived machinery will be sold in these countries?

This elitist euro-trash ideal of going where the money is as opposed to giving real fans some entertainment is enough to turn people off from the sport entirely.

Look I'm no fan of Bernies - but you claim that someone who tries to maximise his admittedly already absurd income is "eurotrash" who's "not giving real fans entertainment"? Give me a break! This is the free enterprise that you always go on about. Or was that Legion?

And he's certainly had all the infrastructure support he could hope for in Malaysia and China - with Malaysia being arguably the finest facility on the circuit. Now Singapore will be next - and it will be a brilliant facility. Bernie has options. That's my point.

And yes the streets of Malaysia and China are choked with BMW's and Merc's.

[dd74]

Originally posted by Dottore
Look I'm no fan of Bernies - but you claim that someone who tries to maximise his admittedly already absurd income is "eurotrash" who's "not giving real fans entertainment"? Give me a break! This is the free enterprise that you always go on about. Or was that Legion?

And he's certainly had all the infrastructure support he could hope for in Malaysia and China - with Malaysia being arguably the finest facility on the circuit. Now Singapore will be next - and it will be a brilliant facility. Bernie has options. That's my point.

And yes the streets of Malaysia and China are choked with BMW's and Merc's.

So it's not about real fans but about free enterprise? Okay, I get it.

It's not about history (Indy vs. Malaysia), it's about who can pay the most.

It's not about distribution of product, but lining pockets.

So if not Eurotrash, I imagine greedy is just as off-base.

BTW: last time I was in the Far East, yes, there were MBs and BMWs. "Choked," maybe. Not as "choked" as Rodeo Drive, though, or anywhere else in L.A.

You see, the funny thing is, Eccelstone could get together with our governor and L.A.'s mayor, plot something out, get something done - maybe put a race back in Long Beach. After all, if CA. were it's own country, it'd be wealthier than many countries in the Far East. That's bound to interest. Bernie.

[teenerted1]

Originally posted by Dottore


Look at the US GP last week. Many stands were empty. I couldn't even find the time slot in my local TV guide. No one where I live is even remotely interested in F1. Lot's of competion in other series and minimal interest: well the TV rights will not be worth all that much. In Asia - by way of contrast - people are throwing money at Bernie.

looks like you don't know the layout of Indy...the empty seats there are the ones that aren't in good sight lines for the road course so of course they didn't put anyone in them. its only been an oval for 94years. and F1 has been there less than ten years in this incarnation. Indy500 used to be the USGP years ago. so learn a little about a the "best race track in the world!!!!"
yes i have been there back when the place did have 200,000+ for pole day of the 500. that was when openwheel racing was king and nascar was still stuck in the red clay of the south.

as for local TV?
lets see it was on SPEED all weekend starting Thursday except when they didn't have le mans coverage. or nascar(their real money maker) which was pretty light this weekend.

nascar has moved over to TNT for the rest of the season FOX actually has it showing Sunday at their usual nascar slot.

looks like quite a bit of coverage if you as me. maybe it's your TV guide that sucks.

fox did that the week before for Canada and will do it again in two weeks for the race in France at a normal US time slot so i don't have to get up at 430AM. actually used the normal speed coverage team...big plus over when CBS had a few dates last year and their expert was DD. that guys an idiot...even Hobbs had to correct him a few times this last weekend.

[Dottore]

dd74:

As I said, I'm no fan of Bernie. And I too would like to see a GP in California.

But Bernie is after the easy money. He's a businessman first. And I suspect there are still easier markets than the US around for F1.

[dd74]

Not to mention the race was on Fox, in its entirety. And the French Grand Prix will be on Fox in two weeks.

Plus, Speed had continual coverage from Friday through Saturday during qualifying. Interviews with the drivers, including American driver Scott Speed.

And yes, it was listed locally in Los Angeles, and there were quite a number of people present in the stands - maybe not as many for the Indy 500, but still there was a good amount.

But that was obvious stuff if one actually watched the race.