A1 Bankrupt!

[dave not neil]

Originally Posted by Andrew Kitson

In my opinion the loss of A1-GP is no great loss. It is to the staff and employees and creditors, I feel sorry for them. But it's just one more formula in the middle that we don't need. I feel the same about Superleague.
Anyway...talking of Papyrus Indycar, I did the artwork painting for the original...see here. Had almost forgotten about it until your post. Thanks!
http://www.andrewkitson.com/pages/andrettipc.htm

What an absolute load of rubbish. I feel deeply angered by your post. As a mechanic trying to make a living from motorsport, for someone to suggest that a series 'is not needed' and that its collapse, which has left countless numbers of people in severe financial difficulties, is no great less, highly offends me.
A1GP was a brilliant series, it's concept was great, and that you cannot deny. To suggest that a nation vs. nation series is of no need is ridiculous. Next year millions of people will be glued to there TV screens to watch the 2010 Football world cup, a nation vs. nation competition, which is a huge money spinner. Given the right promotion and management, it could, and should be hugely popular.
Each series, for various reasons, is needed. Whether or not, you, sitting in your little part of Norfolk believes it is or not.
So perhaps before you start writing these kinds of posts in the future, with your false sentiments to the people affected by its downturn, you might actually consider what it means to us, the people currently struggling to make a living from this sport.

[Andrew Kitson]

Dave, apologies, I did not mean to offend and I do feel for those affected by this collapse. The good thing about A1 was employment for many over the winter...that was a big plus as many teams lay off staff over the winter as you are well aware.

However there are far too many series in the middle, too many vested interests without a clear cut ladder to the top which dilutes the good available drivers with budgets. That was what I was getting at. It was far easier in the old days FF-F3-F2-F1 but yes things have changed I admit. I might be in the remote corner of Norfolk but very close to former A1-GP title winning David Sears Motorsport and also GP2 winners from last week iSport and Comtec & P1 WSR teams.
Anyway apologies.

[Mak]

Andrew, I to think you are wrong about A1GP. It was not in competition with any of the many "ladder" formula's. It was a new concept which looked like taking off until stupid management decisions destroyed it. The best part of the concept was that it was not driver funded and in theory the best drivers were picked. Everyone involved in it was enthusiastic and felt it was a great series. Most involved have many years experience in these "ladder" formula's and have become very cinical. It is a very sad loss to motorsport.
plus A1GP did not just employ in the winter, and recently just at David Sears Motorsports alone there has been 20+ full time redundencies due to this mis-management by A1

[JagtechOhio]

I'll admit to knowing very little about A1GP, but I had hoped it actually would be a good ladder for U.S. open wheel drivers to show a glimpse of the goods to F1 principles.

My impression is that no series exists here, including IndyCar, that holds enough cache for overseas audiences to take much notice. If Marco Andretti or J.R. Hildebrand could have shown extremely well in a spec A1GP ride, I'd have thought they might be offered a test.

As it stands now, Marco might not have an IndyCar seat without the family heritage, and Hildebrand won the IndyLights Championship and is looking for a job. Their post-season participation in A1GP would have beneficial in at least some respect.

Bloody shame for all concerned, best wishes to Dave for a good day tomorrow.
_____________________________________________________________
Andy Bernstein

[Andrew Kitson]

Originally Posted by Mak

Andrew, I to think you are wrong about A1GP. It was not in competition with any of the many "ladder" formula's. It was a new concept which looked like taking off until stupid management decisions destroyed it. The best part of the concept was that it was not driver funded and in theory the best drivers were picked. Everyone involved in it was enthusiastic and felt it was a great series. Most involved have many years experience in these "ladder" formula's and have become very cinical. It is a very sad loss to motorsport.

Point taken Mak. Let's hope something good comes out of this A1-GP mess for those concerned. But I do think in a way it was in competition with other formulas. All drivers...well 99% of them, are looking to go F1..competing in A1-GP was part of that schooling, that process. People like Adam Carroll who deserves a good F1 chance. Being picked for A1-GP took them out of circulation from teams looking for funded F3/WSR or GP2 drivers. Let's hope too that Adam's work leads to better things.

[westfieldbend]

Originally Posted by Andrew Kitson

People like Adam Carroll who deserves a good F1 chance. Being picked for A1-GP took them out of circulation from teams looking for funded F3/WSR or GP2 drivers. Let's hope too that Adam's work leads to better things.

Its sad to say Adam Carroll is one of those drivers who despite having a huge amount of talent, it is lack of money that prevents him getting anywhere, in the rare occasion he had a good drive he was successful. And without A1GP i have no idea where he would be now, hopefully his success in A1 may help him progress.

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by Mak

Andrew, I to think you are wrong about A1GP. It was not in competition with any of the many "ladder" formula's. It was a new concept which looked like taking off until stupid management decisions destroyed it. The best part of the concept was that it was not driver funded and in theory the best drivers were picked. Everyone involved in it was enthusiastic and felt it was a great series. Most involved have many years experience in these "ladder" formula's and have become very cinical. It is a very sad loss to motorsport.
plus A1GP did not just employ in the winter, and recently just at David Sears Motorsports alone there has been 20+ full time redundencies due to this mis-management by A1

But did it take off? The series has lost serious amounts of money, teams have come and gone, private investors have funded country teams - where is the return, where are the sponsors, would TV companies ever pay to have rights to A1GP?

Personally I never bought the nation v nation concept, motorsport is about drivers, individual performances. Sure there is an overall team performance in terms of preparing and running the car, but on track it's all about the driver.

If the concept were to work at all it should be 10 teams running 2 cars each, running under country flags with 2 national drivers from each with both a drivers and 'international' championship table.

But having said that, contrived championships are very difficult to make work.

[Chris - Melb]

I think it's a crying shame to see what has happened to A1GP.

It gave Australia an annual second chance to see international open wheeler competition.

Also, it provided an interesting "winter" series to fill the gap between the end of the F1 season and the beginning of a new season. It also gave non-European drivers at chance to shine.

In my view it was far more interesting than Formula One, as having a country to support added interest. With F1, if you are a New Zealander, Mexican, Canadian, American, etc, supporter then you generally have no drivers to support based on nationality.

There are not too many drivers in F1 worth supporting on personality alone!

It's a shame it didn't have time to become established, as I'm sure the series would have taken off eventually.

[Mak]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

But did it take off? The series has lost serious amounts of money, teams have come and gone, private investors have funded country teams - where is the return, where are the sponsors, would TV companies ever pay to have rights to A1GP?

Personally I never bought the nation v nation concept, motorsport is about drivers, individual performances. Sure there is an overall team performance in terms of preparing and running the car, but on track it's all about the driver.

If the concept were to work at all it should be 10 teams running 2 cars each, running under country flags with 2 national drivers from each with both a drivers and 'international' championship table.

But having said that, contrived championships are very difficult to make work.

In season 1 & 2 the series made huge but expected losses, in season 3 it broke even, and had it continued in that form for a further year, with more efficiencies and the proposed stronger TV coverage and growing following would have been a success. Unfortunately people who knew nothing about the racing business and saw A1 as a huge Ego trip got control of it, and ruined it. (It must be said that the responsibilty for allowing (TT control) this to happen lies at the feet of all involved in A1GP.

[Roninho]

Originally Posted by dave not neil

A1GP was a brilliant series, it's concept was great, and that you cannot deny. To suggest that a nation vs. nation series is of no need is ridiculous. Next year millions of people will be glued to there TV screens to watch the 2010 Football world cup, a nation vs. nation competition, which is a huge money spinner. Given the right promotion and management, it could, and should be hugely popular.

There are also nation vs. nation world cups in waterpolo, baseball, rowing and handball, and these are not huge moneymakers. The nation vs nation concept isn't new in sports and simply adding this concept to a sport doesn't make it an instant succes and imo is not a brilliant or great concept. The fact that most big tv-networks chose not to get the tv-rights suggest that they didn't found it a brilliant concept as well.

[blaffer]

I wonder why the Dutch organizer (Lee van Dam) is still selling tickets for the A1GP event in Assen in May 2010 (http://www.a1gp-assen.com/).

[Tyrrell]

Quite simple. Assen has not been postponed let alone cancelled. Zhuhai and Sepang have been postponed but not cancelled.

[Kiwi3]

Originally Posted by Roninho

There are also nation vs. nation world cups in waterpolo, baseball, rowing and handball, and these are not huge moneymakers. The nation vs nation concept isn't new in sports and simply adding this concept to a sport doesn't make it an instant succes and imo is not a brilliant or great concept. The fact that most big tv-networks chose not to get the tv-rights suggest that they didn't found it a brilliant concept as well.

TV networks don't give a toss about the concept, they care about how much the rights cost and how much they are likely to get from paid advertising. If it is a new event with low public profile then not much.

[Tourer]

Originally Posted by Tyrrell

Quite simple. Assen has not been postponed let alone cancelled. Zhuhai and Sepang have been postponed but not cancelled.

Zhuhai & Sepang have in fact been cancelled according to the announcement on the autosport web site. Here: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/80017

Are you saying that this report is incorrect? Is the administrator trying to offer those rounds to potential purchasers of all the cars (with different dates of course)?

[Armco Bender]

Not to mention should it reappear tracks would want a performance guarantee paid upfront by A1 to make sure they get there.

[JagtechOhio]

Bender, there was good feedback from others on the nation vs. nation concept. Got an opinion?

I think it's a marketing strategy to appeal to casual sports fans, and it didn't gain much traction. But when you ask casual U.S. fans about IndyCar, one of the common complaints is about the lack of U.S. drivers.

That's why I wonder how people around the world view the subject. As for me, I didn't really know much about Rene Arnoux or Gilles Villeneuve until I watched a race many Sundays ago. If you're a racing fan, you don't have to know what kind of sunglasses a guy wears or what country he buys them in. The skill is all that matters, and the flag is a universal one.
_________________________________________________________
Andy Bernstein

[chunder]

Seems a shame

I cant really watch ay of it due to not having Sky and a too slow net connection

Seemsas soon as the main guys ran away who started it all it completely lost impetus.

Did they make money and run?

[Tyrrell]

Originally Posted by Tourer

Zhuhai & Sepang have in fact been cancelled according to the announcement on the autosport web site. Here: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/80017

Are you saying that this report is incorrect? Is the administrator trying to offer those rounds to potential purchasers of all the cars (with different dates of course)?

Yes the report is inaccurate. Please bear in mind that it is A1GP Operations Ltd (A1GPOL) only in Administration not the parent company or any of the other subsiduaries. Contracts for races would not have been made with A1GPOL.

Hopefully, the mess that is A1GPOL in Administration can be sorted soon. Assuming it is, then we'll know what chance there is of some Season 5 racing. The promoter at Sepang is still there, so too the people at Zhuhai. The promoter of the street track at Lippo village Indonesia is reported as being supportive too.

[Armco Bender]

Bender, there was good feedback from others on the nation vs. nation concept. Got an opinion?

Now you ask......I think the concept was good but fatally flawed because the best drivers in the world are in the main games F1 and Indy Cars.While there were some good drivers in the field,there were also a lot who weren't up to it,and its hard to get people excited about watching drivers they have never heard about about.
The A1 cars werent a big enough drawcard on thier own,here in NZ the V8 Supercars are the big crowd puller,A1 should have piggybacked with them to get established.I also think car racing fans prefer to support a driver or team,the nation vs nation was an idea,but it never works unless you have national teams like the Olympics.
Also you have the popular GP2 series in Europe,and to be honest I prefer watching GP2 races over the A1 races.
Could go one but it is very hard to create an event out of nothing and make it popular straight away,you need bags of money and time.

[duke_toaster]

The thing with A1GP is that one driver per nation is not a good way of running the concept in my opinion. Perhaps if there were two or three car teams using machinery used in another series (someone mentioned the old FF-F3-F2-F1 scale, if such a scale were to be back in existence the lowest rung would be the best fit) taking place over a week or two a la football world cup. A1GP used their own machinery and thought they could rival F1 - no-one can.

The new Ferrari car business didn't help either ...

[RichardRenes]

The nation vs nation concept was/ is working. No doubt about that.. If anything, the first race at Zandvoort was the definite proof of the concept.. The big error made was wrong people in key spots of the organisation and the Ferrari deal.. Zytek and Lola would have been perfectly able to bring the old car to the same specs of the new car. The old A1GP 3.4 litre Zytek engine had at least 100 hp still in it and Lola could have come up with a good high downforce car easily.

The lure of Ferrari simply was too big and A1 took the bait.

[Kiwi3]

Originally Posted by Armco Bender

Now you ask......I think the concept was good but fatally flawed because the best drivers in the world are in the main games F1 and Indy Cars.While there were some good drivers in the field,there were also a lot who weren't up to it,and its hard to get people excited about watching drivers they have never heard about about.

Not sure I agree. A lot of people who casually watch F1 only know the top 5-6 drivers. And a lot of sports have world cups where there is a big difference in standard between top and lower teams.

[Kiwi3]

Originally Posted by duke_toaster

The thing with A1GP is that one driver per nation is not a good way of running the concept in my opinion. Perhaps if there were two or three car teams using machinery used in another series (someone mentioned the old FF-F3-F2-F1 scale, if such a scale were to be back in existence the lowest rung would be the best fit) taking place over a week or two a la football world cup. A1GP used their own machinery and thought they could rival F1 - no-one can.

The new Ferrari car business didn't help either ...

From memory they said very clearly from the beginning that they were NOT out to rival F1.

I agree with the two car team thing. I always thought they should have ran different drivers in the sprint and feature races (with the result of the sprint deciding the feature) so that it was more of a team concept, as this might have taken away some of the criticism that drivers were not the best from each country.

[Armco Bender]

Start of the first sprint race at the NZ round this year...over half the grandstand seats were empty.The first time the series came it was packed out.

[RichardRenes]

Hmm... I am sure I have pics somewhere of the 3 years a1 went to zandvoort. 100.000 spectators on average over the 3 years.