Rovals

[Edmonton]

Are they really that bad?:confused:

[MulsanneMike]

Yes, especially when you put them in place of purpose built road courses like Road America and Laguna Seca.

[veeten]

It's sort of like fast-food; you can eat it, but I wouldn't suggest that you can make a steady diet of it.

The idea of them is similar to the multi-purpose sports stadium craze of the 70's, where you could have a number of outdoor sports events in one environment. It was the idea of "ease of maintenance" that was the linch-pin for them, along with not having to have separate fields for them.

For Rovals, it's the ticket sales for specific series that tell the story, along with the promotion being done.

[FIRE]

What is a roval? :confused:

Is it a Right-angled OVAL?

[veeten]

The word itself is an amalgam of "Road Course" and "Oval Course", hence Road + Oval = Roval.

It's an Oval course with the interior set up as a semi-road course, using both parts as the total. The best example of this is Daytona.

[Tim Northcutt]

I also would agree...the road courses inside of Oval tracks are very uninspired...even Daytona stinks, in my book...

I don't like the one that they built at Indy for F-1 either...they have no character and no way to really create changes in terrain or interesting elements that make road racing both picturesque and interesting to me....

[FIRE]

Oh, thanks. Well I don't like such courses. In Europe we have only 2 "rovals", namely Rockinham (GB) and Lausitzring (GER). Champcar will race on these two ovals.

[Tim Northcutt]

Join the club, FIRE....

If dues were charged for membership, the fund could be used to run an F-1 team...or buy an Audi (that thought made me nauseated)

[gttouring]

The inner section of an oval are just that the infield road course.
As I understood a Roval was a road course oval- as emmerson fittipaldi speedway in Rio flat and with two tight ones and two lazy turns, also i believe that when The IRL threatened to race at cleavland (Champs night race there is a dumb idea) it would reconfigure the Airport circuit into a giant square, a road Oval- or Roval. does all this sound familiar?

[gttouring]

Now that i am thinking about it-Rovals inthe speedbowl roadcourse way, can make an intersting series, if that's all it was, the tracks are controlled and it is stadium style so it can be good, if they would gouge out big dip and make hills...

[Lee Janotta]

Actually, Europe has four rovals... Lausitz, Rockingham, Montlhery, and Monza. Brooklands was the very first of the breed. They fit the definition because the oval and road course configurations share pit and garage facilities. Of course, the Monza oval is now derelict, as is most of the Montlhery road course. But that's another thread altogether.

gttouring, CART coined the term "modified oval" for flat, temporary oval-shaped tracks years ago when they took over the Caesar's Palace GP and only ran the outside loop. I suppose the same would be true if the IRL had done that to Cleveland (though I promise, Tony George would _not_ have left the event alive if that had happened).

The problem is the _modern_ rovals, which are extremely sterile. You can't have trees inside an oval, because they obstruct the view across the track from the stands. You can't have elevation changes, because NASCAR uses nearly the whole infield for parking/camping on their race weekends.

They actually built some great ones years ago. Besides Brooklands, Monza and Montlhery, we had Phoenix International Raceway here in the states. You can see what was done to that, by comparing this:
http://www.racingcircuits.net/United...lOrigLong.html

with this:
http://www.racingcircuits.net/United...OvalInner.html

[Tim Northcutt]

Champs night race there is a dumb idea??? (Cleveland)

CART isn't thinking about turning that into a night race, are they???

I went a couple of years ago the the CART event...fast racing and lots of passing...

airports may be flat and less than scenic, but if the runway configuration is right with the taxi ways, it can make for a good racing show...

but running thee at night would be stupid...

[Lee Janotta]

Tim... CART is going to run both Cleveland and Milwaukee under the lights. The Cleveland race will be the largest outdoor lighting project in the world! And it will be amazing!

It's even on free-to-air TV!

But... It's tape-delayed until the next afternoon... :confused:

Ah, who am I kidding. Chris Pook's gonna kill the damn thing.

[gttouring]

thanks for the roval lesson- i like the pphoenix long course- is motegi set up similarly?

[Lee Janotta]

No, Motegi's a weird one... The road course and oval don't connect at all, except for little access roads not suitable for racing. The garages are shared, but the oval pits are one side of the garages, and the road course pits are on the other side!

Seems like the designer had a nearly limitless budget, but limited real estate. I'd say he did quite an admirable job.

[Tim Northcutt]

To Lee:

I hope you're right about the lights at Cleveland....if it is better than what they've done in the past ( and it is tough to to "excellent race"), I'll take my "Crow" medium rare..and plucked, of course!

I also think that the Cleveland date is one of their very best on their schedule...always a good crowd and always an exciting race...

Personally, I'd like to see ALMS run at that airport as well...been saying that on other threads to make up for one of the two lost dates, but they slotted the other Atlanta race in the closest weekend to the CART event....

I don't know if two Atlanta races in a 4 month span will both sell...but at least Don won't have to travel far to attend those events...

[Fish_Flake]

Originally posted by Tim Northcutt
I don't know if two Atlanta races in a 4 month span will both sell...but at least Don won't have to travel far to attend those events...

I can tell you from personal experience, no one will be at the first Road Atlanta, unless I, of course, decide to make an appearance. I live 30 miles from the track, and almost nobody here seems to have even heard of it, despite the fact that they can easily identify Lanier Speedway, the area stock-car bullring right next door. One argued that Lanier Speedway is in Gainesville, and Road Atlanta is in Braselton, so they could not be adjacent to each other. (The speedway's P.O. Box is in Gainesville, but the track still lies in Braselton jurisdiction.) A couple others denied that the winding, circuitous piece of road across Highway 53 was not, in fact, a road circuit.

Not to mention that the local paper's motorsports page, entitled "That's Racin'," has never made a reference to anything besides NASCAR, and that last year, there were barely any signs that Petit Le Mans even happened in October in the areas of the Atlanta metropolitan area I visited. It's unfortunate that such a pristine track has to lay in Hillbilly Country.

[Tim Northcutt]

I can relate, Fish Flake...

I live in Indy, and although our Auto Racing reporters are quite knowledgeable and do cover a fairly wide spectrum of racing, the focus is open-wheel of all types and NASCAR....

There wasn't a single syllable in prnt about the Sebring results, and last summer Le Mans got a paragraph in a wrap-up or "Sports In Brief" section....

[H16]

I liked the rovals in Texas when ALMS ran there. Some other rovals don't do a lot for me. Noting replaces the natural road course.