The Government of Anna Bligh(t) looks pretty damn silly right now and any red blooded petrol head must be feeling rather pissed off that this government has so stuffed up the weekend of motor sport that has so enthused them over the last few years.
Well at least the pretty girls were still there... (Courier Mail photo)
A1GP last week reneged on its $11.9 million Queensland contract, forcing the State Government to hurriedly reorganise the four-day racing fest.
Organisers relied on V8 Supercars and other local content to fill out a sparse program.
Yesterday, the Government publicity machine was spinning faster than the car tyres in a bid to put positive gloss on the motorsport festival’s biggest no-show in 15 years.
In a spectacular sidestep of the off-track wreckage that is the Government’s dealings with the failed motor-racing firm, defiant Sport Minister Phil Reeves yesterday claimed the A1GP had “done us a favour” by failing to show.
But the crowd figures told a different story with numbers about 25,000 lower than the Saturday racing of last year when Indy bowed out.
A total of 58,823 attended yesterday’s event, down from 83,337 last year and the lowest crowd number since 1994.
I like to watch a bit of motor sport, open wheelers do have more appeal as far as I’m concerned because they seem just a bit more visceral that the V8’s. That is just down to personal taste. The attendance figures suggest that i am not alone though. I can’t help thinking that when the real Indy mob dropped out, tthe whole event should have been allowed to quietly die and I bet there are a lot of retailers and hoteliers who are thinking the same thing this morning as they look at their cancelled bookings, empty rooms and unsold stock.
The girls are still pretty and the track is still an amazing example of a street course but if it can’t be made to happen with a reliable racing organisation then we are better off without it.
Cheers Comrades
Filed under: Blogging | Tagged: A1GP, Anna Bligh, in the news, Phil Reeves, V8 Supercars
Having been fortunate to have traversed most of this miserable little planet, and a fellow lover of open wheel racing, it has never ceased to amaze me, how the PR machine of Indy racing, has never quite got it right. It is a fast, exciting form of racing, and I am no petrol head, that is for certain, but it has never reached the dizzy heights of F1 has it ? It has always treated it’s audience as only being from the US, and treated the rest of the followers of the sport, from the remainder of the planet, with just lip service. That is where it has failed miserably.
The racing, I think, is better than F1, even on circuits that are unheard of. In one instance, they even race on airport runways in the US, and to see that was mind blowing. The Gold Coast race, was an institution, and one that would draw unbelievable crowds. For Indy, to just not show up, shows just how desperate their financial position must be.
There is no good that can come people affected, (by its “no-show”), taking them to court, for loss of income, as probably Indy management has no money anyway.
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It just seems to me, that the Indy marketing machine, needs to take a few lessons from the F1 marketing people. They need to get Indy out to the world. Less races in the US, where crowds are down, and more in countries that enjoy this form of racing. After all, that is what F1 did, when they took their races outside Eu ?
Also, if the Queensland government wants the race there, which it looks like on the surface it does, it may have to do, what the Victorian government did, all those years ago with F1. They may have to sponsor the race itself, from public funds, until either the Indy management organisation gets back on it’s feet again, or folds, and another more efficient one, takes it’s place ?
The thing that has so obviously turned people off the Gold coast event is that with the withdrawal of the Indy races the “A1 GP’ is seen as a very poor alternative to a poor alternative to F1 , add to that this year’s debacle and I think that the event is just no longer viable at all.
That is indeed sad. The Surfer’s race was a beauty. Incredible scenic backdrops, that were beamed to the entire planet ? The sort of advertising, for a region, that all the money in the planet couldn’t buy ? Touring cars make a great backup to an event such as Indy, but by themselves. Nah, a very poor cousin ?
The heady days of Gibson, Moffatt in their Ho’s, and Brocky and the gang in their xu1’s are over unfortunately. That is where they stuffed Bathurst up. The touring circus now, just has not got the crowd pulling power of the old days, and against F1 ? Not a hope.
The putting on, of an event such as Indy, must be an incredibly expensive undertaking. Flying in all the gear, must cost a fortune, and for the individual teams, even though probably heavily subsidised, must be a nightmare. Then there is the time taken to set it all up. That would put the teams at a disadvantage.
I still feel it is a marketing error. Maybe the Indy management didn’t consider that the money, was there anymore. With broadcasting being pointed towards Eu and the USA especially, the time of the day was all wrong for that market.
When you think about it, racing such as this, even though a spectacular way to spend a day if you can watch it at the track, is, like F!, aimed at a very large television audience. Live, there is an average 10 hour gap for the Eu audience, and average 16 hour gap for the US audience. That puts the b/casting of such an event, in a time slot in both markets, that are low rating, low advertising income time slots. Perhaps another reason why Indy management were reluctant ? Maybe their major advertising sponsors were not interested in ploughing millions of dollars into an event that was being b/cast at say 4 in the morning ?
What you say about time zones has a lot of merit when it comes to TV scheduling, seeing it live as it happens is everything, which is just what I was thinking when I caught some of the IOM TT on “Go ” the other day….