Yeah USGP was a bit of a joke today.

Makes triathlon and international boxing look reasonable by comparison!

I used to be a F1 fan, but not anymore.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

missing the years with Senna, Prost, Mansell and co...was a lot of fun...then the stupid F1 fed starting putting its big nose in the rules in a way that can only be described at UCIesque!

Today was an utter travesty.

Speaking of rules...have you read through some of the stuff coming for 2008? VERY reminiscent of the UCI double diamond retro stuff...

Everyone with the same ECU. No tire heaters. One tire mfg. 8 cylinders. Winglets and other aerodynamic devices cut severely. etc. etc.

Blame the French, afraid to go into battle once again (Michelin). It's a national obsession.

Ouch. That's gonna hurt Francois.

I'm still riding my Pro Race tires, though...but maybe I should be worried about cornering speeds...

more like, knowing they are too good. ;-)

I'll tell you something... next year, probably there will not be a USA GP F1.

Monteiro, the portuguese guy, got third and he's like a national hero now... what a circus..

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Please, PLEASE...no...that would be even worse. I'm just starting to win friends and family over to F1 from NASCAR...yesterday didn't help...but it isn't the U.S. part of the equation at fault. Did you catch the thinly veiled contempt in the George's statements regarding how little input they were given into the discussions...FIA, F1, et al really screwed IMS.

Did you catch the thinly veiled contempt in the George's statements regarding how little input they were given into the discussions...FIA, F1, et al really screwed IMS.

Tony George started the Indy Series (and IMHO ruined US open wheel racing) out a desire to fully control the 500 based on his fear that teams might start dictating to him how to run his race. The guy does not like anyone messing with his events.

There is no way Tony George will ever let F1 back at Indy after what happened yesterday. And I can't imagine any other promoter getting backing to bring them back somewhere else. There won't be another F1 race in the US for at least 10 years.

we almost went, but had a family get together instead. what happened??? glad I didn't drop the dough on it...

What the hell was the FIA thinking?

Tire concerns turn Indy race into F1 fiasco
Only six cars out of 20 compete
Teams pull off and park in protest




JENNA FRYER
ASSOCIATED PRESS

INDIANAPOLIS—One by one, 14 Formula One cars ducked off the racetrack and parked in a unified protest over safety concerns at the United States Grand Prix.



From their seats in the grandstands, fans of the globe-trotting racing series watched in wide-eyed disbelief as just six cars started yesterday's event at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.



The drivers were embarrassed.



The fans were disgusted.



Any chance the series had of capturing the American audience was crippled.



"I feel terrible. I have a sick feeling in my stomach," David Coulthard said after pulling out of the race. "I am embarrassed to be a part of this. The reality is that mature adults were not able to come to a resolution that would have allowed us to put on the show that everybody wants to see in Formula One.



"It is a very sad day for this sport. I am so, so sorry for what we've done.''



Michael Schumacher bested five other cars on the track to win his first event of the season. It was his third consecutive victory in the U.S. Grand Prix.



But it will forever be tainted. He was booed on the podium, the traditional champagne celebration was cancelled, and the public address announcer implored the few remaining fans in attendance to stop throwing things.



"Bit of a strange Grand Prix," Schumacher said. "Not the right way to win my first one this year.''



The event was in jeopardy from the start because Michelin advised the seven teams it supplies that its tires were not safe to race through the high-banked final turn at Indy.



The world's largest tiremaker worked endlessly with the teams to try to persuade the FIA, the series governing body, to make allowances that would ensure the 14 drivers using Michelins would be safe.



The FIA wouldn't ease its rule that forbids teams to change tires after qualifying.



And it absolutely refused to consider installing a chicane in turn 13 to slow the speeds.



So Michelin advised its teams not to compete after a lengthy morning meeting between the seven team bosses, F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone and the FIA. At one point, all 20 drivers were summoned to the meeting.



In the end, nine teams decided they would not race without the chicane. Ferrari, which fields cars for Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello, was the lone holdout.



The nine teams even agreed to race for no points, as long as the obstacle was added to the course, in an effort to ensure the race was completed.



But when the chicane was not erected, the Michelin teams decided to withdraw from the event. Already lined up on pit road, they all completed the warmup lap. Then they pulled off and parked, climbing out of their cars at the same time the remaining six drivers started the race. The cars that did compete all race on Bridgestone tires.



"I am really sorry for the USA fans because they came here to support us and see our show," pole-sitter Jarno Trulli said. "The decision for us not to race is sad, but we were in danger.''



The crowd was stunned when the 14 cars pulled off, with fans pointing and gawking as they tried to figure out what was going on. Fans booed and some threw water bottles on the track in disgust. "If I was a fan out there I would do the same," said driver Jacques Villeneuve, a former Indianapolis 500 winner.



After just 10 laps, many spectators began heading for the exits. There were reports of thousands of fans showing up at the ticket office demanding refunds and that police had been called to keep the peace.



Indianapolis Motor Speedway boss Tony George didn't immediately respond to an interview request. Instead, he issued a statement urging fans to direct their frustration to Michelin, the FIA and Formula One's management, along with their email addresses. Scott Brombacher, a fan from California, said he was disgusted as he left.



"I love Formula One ... it just aggravates me," Brombacher said. "I spent a lot of money and took a week off from work to come out here. To have all this happen at the last minute is just disgusting.''



All seven teams that pulled out of the race signed a single statement apologizing for the debacle. "It is sad that we couldn't showcase Formula One in the manner we would have liked today," it said.



Among those refusing to race were world championship points leader Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen, who trails him in the standings by 22 points.



The tire problems began on Friday when Ralf Schumacher crashed in the final turn at Indy after one of his Michelins failed on his Toyota. Although he wasn't seriously injured, medical personnel refused to clear him to race. Ricardo Zonta, his teammate, also wrecked because of a tire failure.



Michelin said it was unable to determine why its tires weren't sturdy, and asked the FIA if it could ship in a new batch of rubber from its French warehouse.



The FIA said no, and warned teams they would be heavily penalized if they changed their tires. So the teams tried instead for a chicane to make the turn slower. When that was rebuffed, the teams said they had no choice but to pull out.

Quick ignorant question - can someone who knows more about f1 than I do tell me what a chicane is?

a short S shape of the circuit

A chicane is a person of Mexican heritage born in the US. Either that or a series of turns in the track.

I am confused as well, if the corner is so dangerous, and not wel designed, why don't they just slow down going into the corner since they know it is a dangerous corner? Maybe the corner wasn't designed for speeds the cars are going?

Close..A chicane is a person of Mexican heritage born in the US that will do the work that even blacks won't do (according to Pres Fox)...Either that or a series of turns in the track.

It's not that the corner is especially dangerous per se, but it's significantly different from any other corner on the F1 circuit. The high banking and surface create extreme loads on the tires, and evidently, Michelin's computer models for their tires were off. I heard that they suspected that it might have just been a bad batch of tires and wanted to fly in a new batch from France, but the FIA shot them down.

Yes, all the Michelin teams could have voluntarily slowed down for the corner, but then they would lose, so why bother. Also, it's a question of safety, if a driver was being pressed coming into the corner, they might push it too much and end up crashing. Yes, that can happen in any corner, but it was a high speed corner, and having a tire catastrophically fail is different from just overcooking a corner and running wide.

Michelin might have even had other tires that would have worked, but been slower, but the FIA insisted on their tire rules that don't allow teams to change tires.

There is plenty of fault to go around in this fiasco, and obviously the big losers were the fans.