Open Wheel Racing 2021, anyone there to watch?

[Kepler]

I doubt enough people in the area would even want a race. It would be fun to go and see it, but the people who have to live there would have a massive headache for quite a while when the track has to be set up and put away.

NYC is so big you could probably do it without anybody even noticing.

[Jimjamesak]

COTA gets $25 million dollars every year from the Texas Tourism fund.

Montreal gets a lot of money from the city and province. Especially after F1 skipped Montreal for a year. Suddenly, the governments realized what was at stake, and ponied up.

I don't think there's a race on the calendar that doesn't receive money from some government entity. Another Bernie contribution thanks to raising the sanctioning fees so high.

[MichVandal]

Alex Palou .3 behind Lando Norris in the same car this past weekend in free practice. Good performance given his limited time in an F1 car.

Interestingly, O’Ward and Herta are considered to be even faster than Palou. I suspect any of the 3 would be podium potential talents in F1 if they were given a chance on a decent team.

They may be, but their choices for teams to drive for mean they can't get the points, unlike Palou- who has the points. At least Ward drives for an F1 team. Herta needs to part with Andretti to get a shot at enough points- go with Penske or Ganassi. Mind you, Palou got his SL points to go F1 in just his second season, thanks to Ganassi recruiting him.

[solovsfett]

They may be, but their choices for teams to drive for mean they can't get the points, unlike Palou- who has the points. At least Ward drives for an F1 team. Herta needs to part with Andretti to get a shot at enough points- go with Penske or Ganassi. Mind you, Palou got his SL points to go F1 in just his second season, thanks to Ganassi recruiting him.

Yep. It’s puzzling that Herta signed an extension with Andretti. It would seem he could write his ticket to Penske, Ganassi or AMSP with one phone call…

I think he’s a generational type talent like Greg Moore. I sure hope he gets his chance to chase a WDC.

[Kepler]

Lando Norris provides a reaction shot for the ages.

[Russell Jaslow]

Didn't know that. And given the politics of the state, it's also pretty funny- given the conservative slant (supposedly) for spending.

But how much of that goes toward the F1 race? They do a lot of events at COTA.

It goes towards paying the sanctioning fee (and I almost think it gets paid directly to F1), and only gets paid after the F1 race is run. (BTW, that was all setup when Rick Perry was governor.)

All those other races at COTA are track rental deals, except for NASCAR and MotoGP.

[Russell Jaslow]

I would think that the F1 race is by and large the most profitable event on their calendar. Although the NASCAR weekend has a slightly larger attendance, more money is spent overall on F1 weekend I'd have to imagine.

NASCAR doesn't even come close to F1 at COTA.

According to the Austin Statesman, NASCAR's Sunday attendance was 50-55,000.

F1 easily has well over 100,000 for Sunday, especially when you considering the weekend attendance was supposedly 440,000. The math alone means Sunday was well into the six figures.

Interestingly, the article says SMI is renting COTA for the NASCAR weekend. So COTA isn't even promoting the event. It's SMI.

Thus, COTA only has two events they pay to put on -- MotoGP and F1.

As for F1, let's do a quick back of the envelope figuring. Weekend GA tickets cost $380. Grandstand tickets cost way more than that, anywhere from $600 to easily $1,500. That's not even counting the VIP areas.

So, let's say for quick grins and giggles, the average ticket price was $500. Probably way lower than reality, even when you consider not all tickets sold were weekend tickets. Multiply that by 440,000, and you get $220 million just in ticket revenue. And that's before you count parking, concession sales, and sponsorship.

Sure, there are a lot of costs putting an F1 event on. But still...

[Jimjamesak]

I always forget about the MotoGP event in Austin. Kind of sad how far MotoGP has fallen, especially since they’ve had an American World Champion this century (RIP Nicky Hayden).

[MichVandal]

Red Bull's cheating penalty announced- https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12...ost-cap-breach

$7M plut wind tunnel time.

Kind of expected they would not take points away, even though the points were gained with the cheating.

[Kepler]

Red Bull's cheating penalty announced- https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12...ost-cap-breach

$7M plut wind tunnel time.

Kind of expected they would not take points away, even though the points were gained with the cheating.

Cut their points in half next year. That's the way to do these things.

They'll still win.

[MichVandal]

Red Bull's cheating penalty announced- https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12...ost-cap-breach

$7M plut wind tunnel time.

Kind of expected they would not take points away, even though the points were gained with the cheating.

If people want an explanation- https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/re...-fia/10391662/

And the parts about catering and taxes are pretty minor to the 7 figure spend on parts that were put to the heritage department after they were no used during the season. Let alone, they didn't claim a fair value for the power units they got from Honda.

[Kepler]

Brazilian whacks.

[MichVandal]

Brazilian whacks.

He's not wrong. It's pretty frustrating to see drivers like Stroll and Latifi have pretty long careers in F1 when they never displayed any decent, consistent speed. Let alone Mazapan who was even worse- but russian oligarch money was needed after rich energy.

But it's been that way for a very long time, even his era.

[solovsfett]

Emmo is right!

also, Alonso is right imo as well. https://racer.com/2022/10/29/alonso-...itles-comment/

Both Michael and Lewis had several titles where there was virtually no competition save for their teammates but even then it was a foregone conclusion team orders would favor Michael and Lewis…

[MichVandal]

Emmo is right!

also, Alonso is right imo as well. https://racer.com/2022/10/29/alonso-...itles-comment/

Both Michael and Lewis had several titles where there was virtually no competition save for their teammates but even then it was a foregone conclusion team orders would favor Michael and Lewis…

Mike, 100%. Lewis, not so much. When it was really Lewis vs Nico, there were no team orders. And until Valteri showed he wasn't going to maintain his early season brightness- there were no team orders. The year Ferrari came on, there were, and there should have been team orders last season had Bottas gotten into a position to matter.

Does he think that the Prost/Senna titles were less because of one team dominating? Those seasons were dominated by one team, and it was just like Hamilton vs. Rosberg in terms of orders.

One more thing- for all of his self importance- he sure didn't put himself into many positions where he could dominate a season. The best teams he got on was 2007 McLaren and 2012 Ferrari- other than that, none of the best of the best teams wanted him. Schumacher built a dominant Ferrari around him, Hamilton saw the writing on the wall and moved to Mercedes- where everyone questioned it. They got the best seats for a reason.