Oilpressure

At this time of year, it’s sometimes hard to come up with a relevant topic. Sometimes I go rogue and discuss something that has nothing to do with IndyCar. Other times, I’ll usually scour the Racer.com Mailbag. Generally, I’ll see something in there that will either make me smile or bristle and the words start flowing into the keyboard. Me bristling was the case for today’s post.

A reader wrote in asking Marshall Pruett about Penske Entertainment taking over the promoter’s role for the Music City Grand Prix. He criticized the promotion for the Toronto race, and wondered why Penske Entertainment doesn’t take over promotion for all the races. He cited a big advantage would each track would offer the same amenities, no matter what track you visited.

Not to belittle Penske Entertainment, but I can’t think of anything worse. I don’t care who is doing the promoting – having all seventeen races being standardized is a horrible idea.

First of all – I’m all about competition. If someone does something better than their competitor, they should reap the benefits. That’s why I’ve wanted at least IndyCar two chassis manufacturers for years. If one is perceived as better than the other, they will get the business. Lola had a near-monopoly in CART during the early 90s. But when Reynard entered the series in 1994, with just a handful of teams – those teams were outperforming the Lola teams. It didn’t help that the 1994 Lola was one of the worst years for Lola. Lola won one race in 1994. The rest were won by either the Reynard or Penske chassis.

By 1995, Reynard was the chassis of choice. Lola improved their chassis by then, but the damage had been done. Reynard dominated the rest of the 90s. But this is about race promotion, not a history of IndyCar chassis.

I’m not sure everyone understands the concept of race promotion. The promoter pays a sanctioning fee to IndyCar for the opportunity to make money on the event. The amount varies from track to track, but it is believed to be somewhere in the $1.5 Million range. Once the sanctioning fee is paid, the promoter assumes all of the risk to sell tickets, merchandise, concessions, sponsorship, etc. in order to turn a profit.

Penske Entertainment is either the promoter or heavily involved in several races – Long Beach, the Indy Grand Prix, the Indianapolis 500, Detroit, Iowa, Milwaukee and now Nashville. Green Savoree Race Promotions are the promoters for St. Petersburg, Toronto, Mid-Ohio and Portland. Barber is promoted locally by Zoom Motorsports (or at least that was the case through last year).Thermal, Laguna Seca, Gateway and Road America are all promoted by the tracks themselves.

I’ve not been to all of the tracks. I’ve only been to one Green Savoree race (St. Petersburg). Before they brought in Nashville, I had been to four Penske Entertainment tracks; although it’s not a fair comparison when IMS is in the equation, so we will leave it out of this discussion.. I can tell you that both groups do some things very well, while they both have areas they could improve on.

I can also say that those tracks I have been to that were promoted locally (Barber, Gateway and Road America) all seem to go just a little further and have more of a local touch. Maybe that’s not important to the reader that asked the question, but it is to me. I like local flavor, no matter where we go or what we’re doing.

When we are in Indianapolis, we go to Dawson’s, The Coachman and Long’s Donuts. We avoid Applebee’s, Olive Garden and Dunkin’ Donuts intentionally. Not only is the food better at the local spots, I’m not big on the cookie-cutter approach to anything. I don’t want a standardization to the races we visit. Barber has its own flavor, with the manicured track that resembles Augusta and concessions that have a definite southern flair to them. Road America is not as manicured, but the emphasis is on the actual on-track racing, the beauty of the surrounding area and the Wisconsin-themed concessions.

I don’t want to see the same fan-zone from race-to-race, where the burgers are the same from Portland to St. Petersburg. Give me some variety anytime over a standard approach. Some places might be better than others, but that’s the risk you take. The Music City Grand Prix was good about getting local vendors involved with concessions. I am hopeful that Penske Entertainment can continue that effort this coming September.

So while I’m fine with Penske Entertainment promoting the races they do, I also like the variety as we go from track to track. The local promoters all seem to be in competition with each other, and that’s a good thing. They all remind me of the old Avis slogan “We Try Harder”.

I don’t want any one entity to handle the promotion of all seventeen IndyCar races, no matter who it is. Keep Team Penske doing what they do. Sometimes, they can do it better than some of the locals. Keep Green Savoree there to keep Penske Entertainment on their game. Keep all of the local promoters to keep everyone on notice with the good ideas that they bring to the table. Competition is good. Change is bad.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on February 5, 2025 at 4:03 am and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.