Teams moving from Champ Car to IRL facing obstacles
March 12, 2008
The opening race of the IRL's ``new era'' is less than three weeks away and the teams that have made the decision to move from the defunct Champ Car World Series to the IndyCar Series are scrambling.
``We're taking delivery of our car today,'' team owner Keith Wiggins said Tuesday. ``I won't deny that it's a struggle, but we're doing our best to get one car on the grid for the first race.''
The IRL expects to begin the 2008 season with at least 10 new cars, although, at this point, nobody is absolutely sure how many cars, or which drivers, will be in the starting lineup for the opener March 29 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
It's even more of a question mark how many of the former Champ Car teams will be able to take part in special tests arranged by the IRL on the road course at Sebring International Raceway March 19-20 and on the 1.5-mile oval at Homestead on March 24-25.
To help the transitioning teams, the IRL has come up with a plan to pair some of its existing teams with the former Champ Car teams to provide technical and logistical support.
``The difficulty for any new team to come along at this point, so late in the game, is information or lack of information,'' said Tony Cotman, former chief steward for Champ Car and now vice president of competition for the IRL.
``If we can give them a starting point, whether it be on a speedway, short oval or road course, just a basic starting point, as a series it's so much better for us because we have less of a split in the field as far as the haves and have-nots.''
Wiggins, who doesn't even know yet who his driver will be for the opener, said, ``I know that we're going to go in here and get our butt kicked for a while. But I believe we'll make good progress.''
The IRL attempted to pair the teams based on factors such as previous relationships, geographical proximity and team size.
For instance, Target Chip Ganassi Racing is working with KV Racing, co-owned by Jimmy Vasser, who won a championship driving for Ganassi before the owner moved his team from what was then known as CART to the IRL.
``That's been a great relationship,'' said Mike Hull, managing director for the Ganassi team. ``We won a lot of races together, we won a championship together. We remained friends over the years, so it's a pleasure to work with those guys. That organization is a quality organization, so it blends well for both of us.''
But the cooperation does have some limitations.
``It's tough to define proprietary versus standard information whenever you do anything,'' Hull said. ``We worked with them on delivering a car, building a car to a Ganassi spec to begin with, and our guys have sat down with their guys on the management level and the engineering level to try to define for them a direction, to help them at Sebring, for the test that they're going to have, as well as for the race at Homestead.''
But this struggle is a lot more gratifying than the difficulties the Champ Car and IRL teams have faced as part of rival leagues for the past 12 years.
Until the long-awaited unification of the two American open-wheel series was completed two weeks ago by IRL founder Tony George and principle Champ Car co-owners Kevin Kalkhoven and Gerald Forsythe, both the IRL and Champ Car were struggling - if not for survival, certainly for recognition and acceptance.
Considering the minuscule TV ratings and the poor attendance and small media turnout at some of the races in both series, the sport was stagnating and few people were taking notice.
Now, there is a spark of renewed interest and hope for a bright future. And that hope is drawing Wiggins and a handful of other Champ Car owners to attempt a fast and difficult transition to IRL equipment.
The IRL, which would have started the season with no more than 18 cars, is expecting at least 10 new entries at Homestead from the former Champ Car teams - and more as the season progresses.
Wiggins, whose principle partner in the Champ Car team, Paul Stoddart, has left, will carry on with the team that doesn't even have a name yet. Stoddart took the Minardi Team USA name with him and Wiggins said he will likely go back to the team's previous name - HVM Racing.
But, whatever the team is called, he's determined to keep it going and to eventually be competitive.
``We all know it's a tough deal, a lot of scrambling because of timing and the situation,'' he said. ``But the bigger picture is where the significance of what happened is pretty dramatic.
``When you solve any war or situation like that, there's always fallout and some inconvenience. It's difficult in the timing, but it's for a common goal and for the common good after all the things that have happened. I'm sure, come the end of this year, it will almost be forgotten.''
One big reason the unification finally took place, after numerous failures over the years, was George's offer to Champ Car teams of free Dallara chassis, a free one-year Honda engine lease program and the same $1.2 million contingency payout offered the ongoing IRL teams.
But, with almost no sponsorship money for most of the Champ Car teams to bring along, that's not enough to get the incoming teams through a 19-race season.
One longtime open-wheel team, Walker Racing, already has announced it does not have enough backing to continue this season.
``The car we're getting is Derrick Walker's, which is slightly sad,'' Wiggins said. ``And, of course, I'm looking for other partners and investments. ...
``I think now there's a future. In the past, let's be blunt about it, we had to find wealthy backers to fund (the team). ...''
Wiggins said the unification and the fact that all the teams will be running in the Indianapolis 500 - open-wheel's showcase event - should produce the kind of sponsorship needed to carry on.
``I would like to think in a year or two we can get it back into the environment in which we all grew up and spent 20 years in the business running it on sponsorship,'' Wiggins said. ``Now it's an opportunity that could happen, and I decided we should be part of that.''