[ALMS] Should ALMS go for less races...?

[GT-Eins]

... in 2005?

Way of cost-effective measure that seems to work fine for the LMES - would that work on the other side of the pond too?

1) Less races = less traveling & logistic costs
2) less but longer races (6h/1000k/1000miles) are more attractive to fans & media
3) you would not be forced to find unattractive locations (lime rock f.e.)
4) less dates means more interested privateers that can participate the whole season
5) more interested teams from europe would perhaps drop in.

What do you think?

[Spyder_Monkey]

Maybe not less races, but better arrangement of the ones they have. I'm not the first to say this, but a 3-month break after Sebring is inexcusable. It's hard on a lot of these teams to have back-to-back races, too.

I would like to see more longer races regardless. 6 hours at the Glen, 500 miles at Road America and the like. The current 2h45m races are made for TV, but if none of the network-televised races are getting that much time, why not run longer races?

[GT-Eins]

Thats one point - the TV-arrangement does not work any more.

The 3 month break is necessary because of the Le Mans test-day & race-arrangement - otherwise the gap in efforts between participating and non-participating teams would be too large. Maybe a 2nd race after sebring could be scheduled - thats the reason why I propose there should be less races.

[Kicking-back]

An LMES-like format of 4 races of a decent length would be good - at it would encourage more teams to do both LMES and ALMS.

[Chevyguy]

Well, a large part of ALMS competitors only race three or four anyway. I figure, why not have them get out on track anyway. By making up for this by only running a few, is a really crappy way to cover up that their grids are weigning. Sorry GT, bad idea IMO.

[Kicking-back]

A smaller number of races with a good field is better than more with a thin one.

[SALEEN S7R]

I agree Chevyguy, sure the LMES works here in Europe, but thats largely due to the fact that Europe has a extremely strong sportscar structure, we only have 4 LMES races true, but we have a big FIA GT calender. Not to mention all the other very strong GT series we have across Europe, British GT, FFSA, Belcar, Spanish GT etc, in USA u only really have the ALMS that runs to the ACO regulations, and IMO there isnt as much depth to draw on as we have in Europe, hence the ALMS races are less strongly supported.

If the ALMS ever did decrease their calender then GARRA would surley dominate the sportscar racing scene in the USA. Give the ALMS another couple of years to find its feet, as has been said this is a transitional year for the ALMS, new cars are beginning to come down the pipe line like 2 Couragre C65's www.dailysportscar.com reports, and the Zytek will be debuting later in the year so perhaps we may see a couple of full season entrants in the 2005 ALMS season from Zytek and Courage?

[Liz]

I think rather than have fewer (not less) races, the ALMS needs to promote the schedule it already has in place. Mosport is next weekend, yet the Drivers Edge section in the Post on Friday had nothing whatever about the race. No advertising, no stories, nothing at all. I have seen one ad on television.

With the large scale interest in sports compacts in the GTA, why are there no advertisements for the three-race SPEED GT and Touring Car races coming up next weekend? And I do mean NONE. Not one. Zero. Zip. Nada. Ron Fellows will be driving a Cadillac in two of those races. Why aren't we telling people? And don't think having him in that race won't sell -- at the Fan Fest in Toronto for the Molson Indy, I saw people in line for his autograph telephoning their friends and saying "Get down here, Ron Fellows is here!"

Nevertheless, even without any advertising, Mosport is drawing them in. Last year during the Great Blackout we had more people attend than we had seen since the old Can-Am days.

And I'm sure that when you cut down the races to four, you would not put Mosport on your schedule -- but would include Road America, Laguna Seca and probably Lime Rock, races that are completely inaccessible to people who do not drive. And then you'd moan because nobody comes to them.

[pao]

Liz, I would guess that Road Atlanta and Mosport, which are both owned by Don Panoz, will, with Sebring, always be on the ALMS schedule. I can't say what the fourth race would be, but I would hypothetically say Laguna Seca is the most probable so that there's a race out on the west coast.

[therealdeal]

i think you definetly have to keep sonoma... without a doubt a course that the drivers like.

[therealdeal]

i think alms should have 5 races and then conjoin the lmes races with the alms races so teams could do both... have the first couple here on this side then go over to europe for all those rounds and then end up back here for the last part of the season closing it with road atlanta and laguna

[LouisTheShark]

The ALMS should go for less races and longer races. Put the first hours on Speed and the last two hours live (with initial recap) on Network TV.

I could see the following:

Sebring 12hrs (all Speed Channel - finishes too late for reasonable Network TV buy)

Mid Ohio (6 hours)

Sears Point or Laguna Seca (4 or 5 hours - requires shorter race to finish live in the 4p - 6p EST Network time slot)

Mosport (6 or 8 hours)

Road America (6 hours)

Road Atlanta PLM (all Speed Channel - finishes too late for reasonable Network TV buy)

Sebring and Petit LeMans should also be bookends to the ELMS schedule to allow ELMS teams to participate.

[RCSKULLY]

Laguna over Sears point!

[Tim Northcutt]

I think that their schedule is fine the way it is....

Lime Rock was a good race this year and was well attended...

At Mid-Ohio, Mr. Atherton was quoted as saying that he would like to schedule a race after Sebring and before the LM test days, if possible...

and He is looking at ways to "bridge" the schedule so that there are events so that teams are not traveling from the East Coast all the way across the country to the West....like they did from Lime Rock to Sears Point this year...

Concerning distances of the races:

Anything on network TV should remain at 2 hrs. 45 min.....they do well on network TV and that exposure is important...

The Speed Channel events could be expanded as mentioned by others in this thread...

But I would not cut the schedule....nine events is not too many...and the events that they do host are well-attended....

and I hope that the LMES expands its schedule to 6 or 7 events....because I think they would serve more sportscar fans and would make the series more attractive to sponsors by giving them more exposure...

[Mags]

Give me

Sebring
Laguna Seca
Sonoma
Vancouver (street course)

That would work for me!!