CART II

I sometimes read on different racing threads around the web, that the open wheel "hayday" was in the early 90's. I am not sure I agree with that. I guess it all comes from your perspective.

I followed NASCAR and Indy cars when I was a kid, and it was no easy task. NASCAR didn't even make the local sports report on any of my 3 whole hometown channels. Indy cars weren't much better off, but when the 500 came around, everybody was paying attention. This was the 70's, and Indy car had drivers with the names of Foyt, Andretti, 2 Unsers, Rutherford, Johncock, Sneva and later Mears among others.

We saw the Indy cars run at Texas World Speedway several times. If you don't remeber TWS, it was basically a sister track of Michigan, located in College Station, Texas . It is still there, but is only used for testing, and car clubs etc. A couple of years, they would run a 200 or 250 mile Indy car race, and then unload their USAC stock cars and run another 200. Real iron men back then.

This is when Indy cars ran on almost all ovals. Those guys used to run 3 wide on that track lap after lap. Great stuff. In the 80's I went into the service and didn't really follow racing for a few years. When I "awoke", most of the drivers I saw when I was a kid had retired, or where not really competative anymore. USAC was replaced by CART and still had some familier names like Andretti and Unser,but alot that I have never heard of let alone pronounce.

The shift had started. The Indy 500's where still great, but it seemed like any other time they were on TV, they were parading around a street or roadcourse.

Let me just say, that I have NO PROBLEM with people that prefer road courses. I understand that it takes tremendous skill on the part of the drivers, and pushes the cars to their limits. But on the other hand, operating a crane takes great skill and focus, but I don't go down to construction sites and watch them.

I grew up watching ovals. Indy cars used to run on almost all ovals, the Saturday night dirt tracks that me and millions of other Americans attend are oval. It almost seems that it is now conventional wisdom that Indy cars where never designed to run on ovals, when in fact, it is where they came from. So I went to NASCAR.

I jumped on board the IRL immediatly. I thought it was great that they were going to bring Indy cars back to ovals, and give American drivers the chance to drive open wheel again. I thought the racing was great. So what if the fields were small and the races few and far between. I quickly found some favorites and started watching.

As the years have passed, I have found that NASCAR has went through some of the same changes as Indy cars in the 80's had for me. All of the drivers that I rooted for have retired, or are not competative. Replaced by 20 something year old kids that didn't come from America's dirt tracks, but Go Kart tracks, and look like Sears catalog underwear models. I rarely watch NASCAR anymore.

But I do see history repeating in the IRL. The American drivers, while maybe more in number now, than in the 90's are getting squeezed out. I just looked at the schedule for next year, and there are only 2 more ovals than road courses. Now they are going to bring back the turbo engines too. (That's not that big of a deal to me).

So basically the last 12 years where for nothing.

I am still emotionally invested in the IRL and will continue to watch for awhile. I like alot of the drivers, and even watch the roadcourse races, even though for an unsophisticated redneck like me, they are snoozefests. I guess that I have to get used to the idea that middle aged fogies like me are not the target market. Even though I buy the gear (when I can find it) and watch the races and support the sponsors etc.

However, a few more schedule changes and American driver defections to NASCAR, and they may lose me again.