[tlongman]

I go there every year for the NASCAR race (not because I'm a NASCAR fan, I just have a lot of family that goes too) and I was there a few weeks ago for the Mobil 1 Car Swap. They have made a ton of capital improvements to that facility in the last 5 years or so, particularly in the last few months. They rebuilt almost all the grandstands and made them twice a big, and rebuilt the Crown Royal Club at the top of the esses. This all comes after they brought in the massive frontstretch grandstand that used to be at Nazareth Speedway and rebuilt the media center.

Concerning the potential for an F1 race, The seating capacity is certainly there now, and all those old wooden bleachers are gone, replaced with nice aluminum seating. The other issue that has always been present is the lack of hotel space. Just last year a new 5 star hotel opened in downtown Watkins Glen overlooking Seneca Lake. On its own thats not enough, but its a start. If the track had a commitment from Ecclestone that Formula 1 would come if they fixed the issues, they could probably build a hotel on site like VIRginia International Raceway did a few years back. They have the space for it.

Runoff areas would need to be addressed at the esses and at the toe of the boot, but otherwise its not that bad. The track has already paved many of the runoff areas in the last few years. The last issue I see would be the pit facilities but again, a commitment from F1 would go a long way towards making that happen. Watkins Glen has the rare advantage of being a bit isolated but still being relatively close to many major Metropolitan areas (NYC, Boston, Philadelphia, Buffalo, Toronto), and the track, as many of you know, is awesome. If they could get 10k people to show up to a 1.5 hour demonstration, imagine what the potential would be for a full F1 weekend?