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The Indianapolis 500 - remember when.....

MichiganMichigan Posts: 4,942 ✭
in Sports Talk
This race seemed like a big deal and people looked forward to either going to it or watching on TV?....... these days it seems like a ho hum
thing that was ripped apart by racing organization politics and the rise of NASCAR which has overshadowed it for quite awhile now.

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    kcballboykcballboy Posts: 1,405 ✭✭✭
    It is rarely an interesting race. Short of a few exceptions, the winner is usually 20 seconds ahead of second place. It makes for boring finishes.

    NASCAR figured this out, and that's why every single race has a "debris" caution with 5 laps to go to ensure a good finish. Unfortunately the fans & drivers are starting to catch on and are now getting disgruntled.
    Travis
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    BobaFett72BobaFett72 Posts: 7,304
    snoozefest.

    they should get em all drunk before the race, it would make things way more fun.
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    SoFLPhillyFanSoFLPhillyFan Posts: 3,931 ✭✭
    You can thank that little d!$k man Tony George for the downfall of the Indy 500. He created the IRL to compete with and take over CART, then orchestrated the requirement that anyone racing Indy had to also enter IRL races. At that time the IRL was full of rookies, no names and has beens. George of course was able to do this because his family owns the track.

    Now the IRL has surpassed CART as the premiere open wheel series in the US. Once Penske crossed over CART was finished. They tried to merge but couldn't come to terms.

    Indy would have continued to be a faster race and more interesting if George had not let his ego get in the way. Now we have a race where the leaders are lapping the field after 50 laps and most qualifiers struggle to hit 220. The new qualifying rules stink too and were created solely to increase interest. The old days of the first row only qualifying on the first day are gone. They now have three days and qualify 11 spots on each day. Gone also are the days when you would see a team pull out a "T" car and run a qualifying heat instead of throwing out their time and running the same car.

    The IRL series itself is not bad. I like the idea of racing mostly ovals. However the series will never be as good as CART was many years ago. Watch the races and you'll see plenty of empty seats. Hell Indy doesn't even sell out now I think.

    A sad state for what was once the greatest race in the world and a fantastic way to spend Memorial Day.
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