Greetings Mates! I have some time to play now that school's out and I have turned in my grades. So, you ask, why isn't there a bigger F1 following in America? Let me give you some history.
I was bitten by the F1 bug way back in 1953 when Alberto Ascari was World Champion for Enzo Ferrari. The cars were things of beauty and not that different, really, from the beautiful Kurtis classics that were racing and winning at Indianapolis then. Then came the great years with Fangio, whom everyone in the world knew as the GOD of racing. The great silver Mercs, coming in and SWEEPING everything in sight, (and scooping up Fangio and Stirling Moss, too as drivers). Then there was the Mille Miglia and various other "sports car" venues, too. And yes, there was Phil Hill, an American, but he was never as exciting to me as Mike Hawthorne or Jimmy Clark (who raced at Indy, too) or Jack Brabham (who also raced Indy) or Mario Andretti, who belongs, like all the great ones, to the world!
The thing is, I was a fan who devoured Road & Track magazine and read each race report breathlessly three or four times. But I grew up in the wilds of Oregon on the West Coast of the U.S. where the only racing available was the dirt track, one-quarter mile Midget race track on the fair grounds and I can still remember my favorite driver's name: Bob Christie, who raced a beautiful red Kurtis midget number 23, the numbers cut out in cursive form from sheet metal which was chromed and bolted to the curved tail of the car. I never heard an F1 race on the radio; I never knew the F1 results until days or weeks after the event. But I had a long playing record of the SOUNDS of the great machines of the day and of earlier days, too. (I wish I still had that record; they not only went to Maranello to record great Ferrari's but they had the pre-[WW II] war Auto Unions, too.)
My point is that I didn't love F1 because I loved speed, or because there were or weren't American cars or American drivers in it. I loved it for the simplest and clearest reason possible: because F1 is racing in its purest form:
the rules are published and men and women live, day and night, week in and week out, year after year, to figure out how to go the fastest inside those rules. and the results are there for everyone to see and savor.
The winning car in F1 can come from a great manufacturer or it can come from a speedshop in some back corner of the world. And the same goes for the drivers: they may come from money or from poverty, but what sets them apart, even from other race drivers, is that they are the men who want not just to win, but to beat the best in the world.
Sure. Some teams have money. But all the money in the world won't buy you the gift that the great ones. It won't buy you the genius who put a fire engine pump (cooper climax) in the back of a skeleton frame and won with it. And sure. Some drivers have money and an unfair advantage over those who don't. So do some teams.
But --and never forget this-- an unfair advantage is part of the appeal. Can an unfair advantage be beaten? Of course! Why do you think so many are being converted to Renault fans today!? Because Ferrari has an unfair advantage. So does Toyota and BAR Honda. But an unfair advantage CAN'T guarantee a win. The fastest car and the fastest driver have a way of hooking up and finishing first no matter where the money is. And that's what we all wait for. Kimi isn't making even half of Michael's money. Ron Dennis's budget isn't close to Jean Todt's. Who cares?
So F1 has little following in my country because in my country money is EVERYTHING, so EVERYTHING is for sale. That means that racing, for the most part, is ENTERTAINMENT, not a matter of truth and beauty. Most of the racing is set up to entertain, not to find out who is fastest. And that's what most people want. Look at the other professional sports: the rules are changed regularly to provide more entertainment. I don't know the last time there were rule changes in Football or Soccer as we yanks call it.
And that ain't gonna change any time soon. But does it depress me? Do I suppose I would rather live in Australia or Austria because they "support" F1 more than America? Not bloody likely. In fact, I doubt if they do. Evidence is that everywhere you look people are looking more for entertainment and diversion than hard work and reality.
But we're only on this planet for a short time and what we do with our time is our choice. And for me, that means loving F1 from a distance, but loving it no less than those lucky Europeans who can see, live, four or five races a year easily. I guess the best way to say what I'm trying to get at is I believe anyone who was lucky enough in his life time to see Senna go by at full race speed is blessed. And I'm sure he or she knows it. I sure wish I had!!
So open wheel racing in America isn't as big as NASCAR. So what? You don't follow the Indy Cars --whether it's Championship Auto Racing or Tony's IRL, or any other sanctioning body-- because you believe in entertainment or a "good show." Tickets to the 500 stay in families for generations because there's something magical about seeing today's drivers take on the same track made great by Wilbur Shaw and Bill Vukovich and by A.J. Foyt.
You can mock the going 'round and round,' but I invite you to come to the track and ride round in the bus. Notice how narrow the racing surface is. How forbidding the wall. No gravel pits, no run-offs means no errors, no excuses.
And thanks to Tony Georce, I have seen Michael, and Kimi and Mikka at speed, because Indianapolis is where I now live. And though I never got to see the great Senna in the flesh, I have spoken to four time winner Rick Mears. And I saw every one of his victories (me and millions of others). I didn't shake his hand; I just saw him in the coffee shop at the track and said, "Thank you Rick Mears for those races." And I got that same sweet smile you see in all his pictures. He thanked ME back. And that was magic. No other word for it.
You know, it's like meeting Pablo Picasso or the Dali Lama.
Indianapolis and F1 are the top; you can't go any higher. Not in this life.
That's why Indy used to "count" in the old F1. People talk about "the show" and there are cynics everywhere. But there are also people who are willing to give their whole lives to the dream of winning; heck, just participating, in the 500. I know the same is true of F1.
Now how can you "market" something like that? And how can you be surprised when Jeff Gordon says "No thanks" to it?
My hope is that by establishing F1 on the grounds of Indianapolis, Tony George may be able to bring the magic of Indy and the magic of F1 together.
Now if it works, it will have nothing to do with money. It's like Monza and Silverstone and Monaco. And if F1 becomes all glittering like Bahrain then, at some point the F1 champ will be like Jeff Gordon --and the world will be a smaller place for it.
Because some kids in far corners will know the difference --even if their elders don't. And those kids will find something else. Something real. Something like Ayrton and Juan Manuel and Jimmy and Rick.
There's an F1 following in America and it's as strong as it is in Columbia or Sri Lanka or Oxfordshire or Honshu. It's just spread out over a bigger territory and so thinner. But no less deep.
Thanks for reading this. I had fun writing it.
Jim Watt, Indianapolis
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