Racing Eagles

The Blame Game... (Part Three)

I knew this was coming.

Some in the media has started to blame the negative press about USF1 as one of the reasons for why USF1 failed. They are citing the famous cartoons that came from the Midweek Motorsports team as their case in point. The theory goes that things like the cartoons poisoned the waters with the public and potential investors.

Sam Collins told the Midweek Motorsports team as much in their Formula One preview podcast this week. He isn't alone. Even Joe Saward mentioned in his season preview issue of GP+  that the videos didn't help the team.

(Sidebar: To be fair, Joe Saward properly points out in his article that the team waxing on about Danica Patrick and Kyle Busch didn't help the team in the creditability department to begin with. Anyway, I recommend that anyone who has a passing interest in Formula One to subscribe to Joe's digital magazine GP+. Trust me, it is well worth it.)

These are just the latest examples that come to mind. There is a belief out there that the negative vibe expressed by many (which I include myself from late November on) had a a hand in sinking USF1.

I think they're wrong.

Here is my argument. First on the cartoon front, the timing doesn't match. The first video came out the last week of October. If we believed Ken and Peter's original schedule which had the first car ready in November, these cartoons shouldn't have mattered. By the time the first video came out, the team was already being ridiculed by a growing legion for it's pompous statements and meager results. The cartoons didn't create the criticism, it only amplified it.

Also, to blame these cartoons for hurting USF1 is like a student complaining that the bus ride to school had a negative impact on their penmanship homework assignment. USF1 was an aborted, last-minute rush job. The lack of progress made from their February 2009 announcement to when we first heard trouble at the team in October is what sunk USF1. In that time they showed us nothing. The lack of progress and the Soviet-era apparatchik-esq statements started finally catching up with them by October.

It might be easy to criticize the makers of these cartoons for hurting USF1. However, it's at tad bit disingenuous. This team had a eight month grace period before the rumbling started and the cartoons came out. They had the time and opportunity to get sponsorship, get drivers, and show progress. They didn't.

Besides, they are only freaking cartoons.

My Farewell Address to USF1

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,

It's been one wild year since this blog began. Before I get into the details, a few things first.

First off, I would like to thank each and everyone of you who've read, commented, clicked, and gave the time of day to this site. I deeply appreciate it. I hope you continue to come by and perhaps read a bit of my nonsense.

Yes, that means I will continue blogging. I will continue call this site "Racing Eagles." I will continue writing my boring rants and random crazy thoughts. I will be continuing to look at Formula One from an American standpoint and tell the IRL what they should be doing. I love motorsport too much for something like this to deflect me away. 

It's been obvious that it has been a difficult couple of weeks for Formula One fans over here in the states. Many of us, including myself, were excited about the prospect of Formula One team being based in the states. That was one of the many reasons why I decided to start this blog. I wanted to follow this team from start to end. However I didn't realize when I started that the end would come this soon.

To see this dream die hurts. To have it shown to be something of a laughing stock is a kick to the man region. Personally, I've gotten to the point where I am just dejected and angry with the whole thing. Perhaps I was naive from the beginning. A lot of people were. We WANTED this to work out. We wanted this team to do well. We were smitten with the potential without a firm footing in reality. We went along with it, some for way too long.

The Revolt is over...

There is a famous scene in the film Lawrence of Arabia. After Lawrence leads the Arabs into Damascus. He sets up camp in the middle of the town and announces a Arab republic. The first meeting soon goes awry as traditional infighting between difference sects of the Arab people tear the meeting apart. Soon, Lawrence is alone in the meeting room, surrounded by a city in anarchy.

The British army comes and waits. They make a calculated assessment that the revolt will fail and their involvement will only inspire them. This upsets the medical officers who see the chaos in the hospitals.

A envoy from the British Army comes to see Lawrence and demands that the Arab state give them permission for the British to open up the hospital to treat the wounded. Lawrence, with a look of dejection, refuses help saying that the Arab state will take care of the wounded. Later, Lawrence goes to the hospital to treat the wounded himself only to crack under the insanity of his situation.

I feel like Ken Anderson is in the same boat as Lawrence at the moment. I can picture him alone in his design office, drawing away, holding onto the dream as the phone rings endlessly in a empty dark office.

I was reminded about this scene reading Anderson response that USF1 is still going in AUTOSPORT.  It is insanity that he can think they still have a chance when they just announced that they have laid off all of their workforce. Not only that according to Joe Saward, USF1 has received multiple offers of a buyout only to be rejected by the stakeholders of the team.

It makes absolutely no sense. The FIA have to reject USF1 request's for a delay entry now. It sets a bad president, leaves a lot of confusion, and will only lead to more chaos.

The FIA need to do what the British Army did in the film. The revolt has failed, time to take control and make order out of this chaos. Reject the request, send inspectors over to StefanGP, tell USF1 there will be no special deals for the team, and make them apply like any other team next year.

USF1 had more than a year to get ready for this season. The simple fact is that they had their chance and they blew it. They should face the consequences of their failure.

FIA, stand up and do your job. Do it now.

USF1 staff: It's not your fault.

Warning: Bad words are said in this video.

Formula One Blog reports that Dan Passe has left the USF1 team as their Public Relations representative. Passe put a gut wrenching blog post on his company's website about how he felt his integrity, "was not only challenged, but being chipped away at" with his last client which Formula One Blog states as USF1. I won't add anything else other than this. 

There is a lot of emotions and rumors surround this team. It has to be terribly difficult for the members of the team. Many of them are looking for other jobs, some are probably hoping for a miracle to save this team. They are the innocent bystanders who went to USF1 with the best of intentions to bring an American team to Formula One. They worked hard to try to get this team up and running. Now all those hopes and dreams are in tatters. They have suffered. According to some reports, many have gone unpaid.

I hope Passe does well in the future and thank him for making best of a terrible situation. Judging by the character of the man, I think he will be back on his feet soon.

We can argue who to blame for all the problems with the team, however I don't question or even remotely blame the non-management staff of USF1. It's not your fault. ... It's not your fault... it's not your fault... it's not your fault...

Paid drivers and paid chassis

According the Adam Cooper (AKA the Woodward and Bernstein of the USF1 failure story,) USF1 had not one but two paid drivers ready to go for the 2010 season.

Besides Lopez, USF1 had James Rossiter signed, sealed, and ready to go for the 2010 season. Cooper reports that Rossiter was signing a similar deal to Lopez for about $8 million.

So lets do some back of a napkin math for a second.

Income:

Paid drivers: $16,000,000

 Income from FOM for new teams (plus free transportation for cars and 10,000kg of freight to races.): $10,000,000

conservative estimate of capital investment by by Hurley and others: $40,000,000

Total: $66,000,000 in capital (conservative estimate)

That is larger than the budget of Super Aguri, Minadri, and other smaller teams of the past. However that is half of the $120 million spent by the the smallest team (Force India) that built their own chassis in 2008. Add to that, Force India also didn't have the infrastructure costs like USF1. So it isn't a "apples to apples" comparison. However it shows how steep of a hill USF1 had to climb.

For the numbers above, that is my conservative estimate. I would personally put the number closer to $75m. Is this an impossibly budget to work with? Almost. The team needed smart leadership who were conservative in their approach. Windsor and Anderson had the right approach to outsourcing, but they should of taken to a new level. With a budget like that, they should of teamed up with a chassis builder while they slowly built their own infrastructure. They needed to go hook up with the Lola's of the world and go from there.

Sorry if this is a little bit retrospective but USF1 should of went with a customer chassis. This would of given USF1 a car that was ready to go. It would of bought them time to get more capital and build their infrastructure. That is how everyone from Frank Williams to Enzo Ferrari started out. Instead of fooling around with your own shop, rent someone car while you build up your own. I think that is the one thing that saved Campos. I guess that Campos had a lot smaller budget than USF1. However the difference in survival between the two is that they had something with a proven chassis builder to work off of.

USF1 just needed to get a car on the grid, struggle, hope for the best, cash the FOM check next year, and then start building their own infrastructure. Instead, they try to do and have everything at once. I think that was the real downfall of USF1.

Of the AUTOSPORT story and Cromwell

What to make of this story about USF1 in AUTOSPORT?

(*Please read linked the story before proceeding. Don't worry, I'll wait.*)

If it was most other Formula One websites, I would disregard the story. If this was the standard load of you-know-what that comes from the GMM Formula One news service, I would disregard the story. However, it appeared in AUTOSPORT. The old-gray lady of motorsports. Despite the bulk of the information coming from an anonymous source, based on AUTOSPORT's reputation, it has to be proven and fact checked. The lack of response from USF1 is extremely telling.

It has taken me an entire day to digest all of this. There was something about this article that sounded familiar to me. Then I remembered something I read on the AUTOSPORT forum about a month ago from a poster who goes by the name "CompositeKen." This is what he wrote on the board on January 10, 2010.

Formula One Blog: USF1…a dream not worth saving

I agree with every single word.

USF1: Epic Fail

It's over.

The dream is on life support and the plug is about to be pulled.

It didn't take this story from Adam Cooper of SpeedTV about Jose Maria Lopez being told the team wouldn't make it. It didn't take Viv Bernstein's story in the New York Times about the financial problems of the team. The simple fact is as soon as they started missing dates they promised, we knew they were in trouble. The deeper we got into this off season, the more apparent it was that the team was going down.

I don't want to crush all remaining hope because nothing is official yet, but USF1 are less than a month away from the start of a new season with no car, one driver, no sponsors, and no money. They're done for.

That hurts.

First off, I have to give my utmost sympathies to the men and women at the USF1 factory. I don't know any of them, but I know they all went to the teams with the best intentions. I hope they are able to find new work. This wasn't your fault.

I can predict the articles and stories that are going to be coming from this disaster. One angle will be people admonishing America and our lack of support for this team and the sport in general. This is totally and utter crap.

Thursday Thoughts: Public money and motorsports

Looks like I've gotten myself into something again. I volunteered to do the Thursday Thoughts this week.

So here is my question:

Is government finance of Formula One events, teams, and personal a good thing for the common good of that area? What is the line between regional economic investment and the wholesale fleecing of the public? 

I know an answer to this question usually incites knee jerk reactions. On one end you have people who scowl at millionaires asking for taxpayers money to build them a new pleasure palace for their gladiators to play. On the other end you have the fans of that sport lauding the proposal and touting their sport's positive impact.

A 10 point plan for the IRL.

The IRL is in trouble. There is no way getting around that.

Danica looks like she is slowly moving towards NASCAR, fan interest is fading, and the interest of the George family seems to be waning with the series.

The series took the first crucial step in throwing Tony George off the ship. Believe me it was long past due. He steered the not so good ship IRL into the wilderness. Now they need a plan to bring it back.

I don't claim to be an expert, (I just play one on the internet) but here are some thing that I think can help bring open-wheel racing back to the forefront of the North American racing scene.

1: Choices, choices, choices: I don't understand the desire to go with a single engine and chassis supplier for the IRL. To be honest, I think it has hurt the series more than helped. Think about it this way. How many single chassis and engine racing series are there in the world. Just off hand I can think of GP2, F2, Formula Renault, A1GP, Formula BMW, and Formula 3000. How is the IRL different from any of those series?

The IRL needs to be different. It needs to find a niche that is different from all of those series. The first step in being different is to open up the paddock. It needs to be open to chassis designers and engine suppliers. A good model to follow is what Grand Am has done with the Daytona Prototypes class. The class has about a dozen different engine and chassis suppliers that brings all sort of unpredictability to the races. It allows smaller teams like Action Express Racing to race and win against the big boys at Ganassi Racing. 

So instead of deciding on a chassis or on a engine, let's bring them all in and see who can do it on the track.