Best event

What is your favorite event on the Cart/IRL callendar?

There are so many good ones, but the Gold Coast wins, because that is the only event i get to see each year.
But there are so many:
Indy
Elkhart Lake (King Jacques never lost there :))
Long Beach
Cleveland

Oval -- Rio

Road circuit -- Laguna Seca

Indy because it's Indy and a shallow banked superspeedway,

Rio because it's unique in that it requires gear changes

Road America (Elkhart Lake) for personal reasons and it is one of the longest, hilliest, fastest road courses. Also like Mid Ohio (hills). Both are spectator friendly.

Not a fan of street courses. Dont get me started on "full course yellow flags" at road races!

I'm with Crash Surfers without a doubt, great atmosphere and attendance.

This race is an advert for having more outside the US!

Road America is the best followed by Laguna Seca as far as attending the event.
I didn't go but I heard Chicago was awesome.(Except for the swaying grandstands)
Speaking of Laguna Seca, my friend was there late last week and told me they were digging up turn 2. Does anyone know if they are changing the track or was it just being repaved in that area?

Laguna Seca...the corkscrew rocks!

Long Beach has the best atmosphere! Mid-Ohio is great too.
I attended the Chicago event, but I thought the grandstands were pretty cool! It wasn't a great event, the media was over-hyped about it.

Well I always attend Molson Indy Toronto every year, and it seems to have an amazing atmosphere. Dario Franchitti says it is the best, but that's just his opinion.

My favorite race to sit down and say oh, boy this is going to be great would have to be Long Beach or Elkhart Lake, after Toronto of course ;).

Neil, I honestly don't know what you mean, I think some of the dules that have been waged at Long Beach and Toronto over the past few years have been amazing, and the yellow flags only close them up.


On another note my LEAST favorites are Laguna Seca (which I thought meant 'single file' in Spanish, before learning the language), and why do they going back to that bucket called Nazareth.

Least favourite even before last year: Fontana. Racing around the bottom of a bowl.

Molson Indy is my favourite, of course, closely followed by Elkhart Lake which is a REAL RACE. That is what F1 used to be.

Leguna Seca I have to say it. When I first started watching F1 and CARt it was the only track that I remembered the next year. All these tracks then the corkscrew then I rememebred it.

Plus the best piece of racing I have seen sinces I was a fan happened their. Zanardis pass on hErta made me an instant motorsport FAn. Leguna is a classic.

I have to say the greatest event I go to is the Molson Indy Toronto. The track may suck but the atmosphere is great. My favorite track is Road America. I love it because you can walk around and watch from anywhere you want.

1) Road America - A track from the Gods
2) Portland (Always a good race)
3) Toronto

Definately Laguna Seca and of course MY home track Homestead

Road America is easily the best track they race on. A long, beautiful track in the traditional sense. Wonderful uphill straightaway. But the race I look forward to the most is Cleveland. Those wide runways have made for some great racing.

[This message has been edited by jms (edited 22 April 2000).]

My i make a quiet observation:
Seems to me as though everyone likes the road/street circuits the best. Now keeping in mind i am for a mixture of oval/road tracks, do you think people would miss oval racing if they prefer the lefts and rights better?

Crash test, I think your last post is whats known as changing horses in the middle of a stream ;). It would make a great new topic.

Crash: I know I would miss it. Although I'll take a rc over an oval any day, it just wouldn't seem right without ovals. And they have provided some great finshed. NHIS in 93, MIS in 95. CART's inabiility to find a good wing package for the short ovals have hurt their performances lately, which is one reason they aren't at the top of my list. Vesides, shifting, braking, apexing, so much more fun to watch (and hear!) than ovals. But I don't want to lose the concept of oval raicng in CART.

The floidmeister loves his ovals BUT , The dropping corkscrew at Laguma is the most exciting piece of race track in the world.
I don't think you could understand unless you've seen it in person.TV doesn't do it justice. That is a REALLY steep drop. I just can't believe they haven't built any stands there.You have to climb through dense woods to see it .

Well i have never been to a Cart oval race in he flesh, so i can't judge them. Sitting at home and watching the racing on the box, it is all pretty much the same.

"The dropping corkscrew at Laguma is the most exciting piece of race track in the world."
-Hmm, well i invite you to come down here to Australia....We have a patch of road at Bathurst where there are over 600 feet of vertical elevation changes...Although i guess none of the corners may be as outright stunning as the corkscrew, there is a whole series of them, as well as one of the worlds fastest straights and fastest corner waiting on the end of it (for road courses and touring cars,but if you had a Champ Cart, it would fly, most probably into orbit..)

Ovals I wouldn't miss them get rid of them and it would be a good thing from my Point of Veiw, I watch them but they don't do much 4 me :(

I go to the Milwaukee race. If you are not sitting high enough to see the whole track a race can get boring in person.

Best tracks in my opinion: Elkhart Lake and that airport track. Worst track: Fontana.