Thursday, Aug. 03, 2006

Champ Car Atlantic Series proves Unlimited success is possible

By Jody Moore, hydro.commentator

I was munching on a little lunch yesterday afternoon and turned on the SPEED Channel to see what was going on.

What I got was a rerun of the Champ Car Atlantic series race in Edmonton, Alberta, two weeks ago. I'd forgotten about the little series, which is basically a little brother to the embattled Champ Car open-wheel racers.

Now let me make something perfectly clear. I don't care for open-wheel racing. It's not that I hate it. It's just that I don't particularly like it compared to other forms of racing. The possible exception could be Formula One, which is just wicked-fast and cool to watch.

Thanks to the SPEED Channel, live racing in my area, and the Internet, there is a LOT of racing coming my way each week. Hydros, NASCAR, World of Outlaws. I have to draw the line somewhere, and open-wheel is it.

Still, when you are on lunch break and looking for something to watch while you munch, open-wheel racing is much better than no racing. So I sat. Unfortunately, the show was just starting, so I wasn't going to be getting too far into the race itself. Just driver interviews and such, and the first few laps. But it was enough to get me thinking. So I grabbed a glass of milk and started going over things in my mind.

The Champ Car Atlantic Series and American Boat Racing Association have something in common. They both fall into a motorsports category that I like to call “not NASCAR.” Meaning that neither of them is coupled to the stock car motorsports juggernaut in any tangible way, except they are both vying for fans and sponsors in its wake.

But if you look closer, CCAS and ABRA are a lot closer cousins. Their kindred not-NASCAR-ness just brings that to light.

CCAS races 12 times each year, on road courses from New York to Portland, Ore., south into Mexico and across the northern border in Montreal and Edmonton. At most races, they are joined by their larger cousins, the Champ Cars, but that's an entirely different story. I just want to look at the similarities between the CCAS and ABRA.

Playing second fiddle to the Champ Cars helps define why I think the Atlantics are a better match to the ABRA. In its fall from grace, the unlimited hydroplane has abdicated one of the thrones of motorsports royalty. In today's world, the ABRA plays second fiddle too, but in this case it's to the shadow of unlimited hydroplaning's former self, the days of TV coverage, national sponsors and race sites climbing over each other to get a piece of the action.

But there is hope, never fear. I said before that I am not a big fan of open-wheel racing. In my mind it just can't hold a candle to NASCAR on the motorsports scale. For example, take the most recent NASCAR race in Pocono and compare it to the Indy 500, the only open-wheel race I sought out and watched this year.

Like any other Nextel Cup race, the Pennsylvania 500 started 43 cars. Five hundred miles later at the end, 29 drivers were on the lead lap, and 41 were still running. In contrast, 33 cars started the Indy 500, and at the end, only 20 were running, and only 10 were even on the lead lap. From an excitement perspective, Sam Hornish. Jr.'s finish-line run on Marco Andretti to win the race by a nose might have been the only redeeming event of the race.

But I do know this: open-wheel racing is expensive. You listen to those little motors wound tighter than a drum, and see all the high-tech equipment that goes into a race car. As the snooty open-wheel fans are proud of hammering home, their cars require brains because they are so complex, and money because they aren't cheap.

Unlimited racing (done properly) isn't cheap either. I'd wager that it's far cheaper than Champ Cars, but it's no Blue Light Special either. There are motors to be tuned on the dyno, running surfaces to be tested in the wind tunnel, propeller and gearbox combinations to be worked out for each race site and range of conditions, preseason testing to make sure everything is just right, and then the awesome spectacle of racing each weekend, complete with its own range of testing and re-testing to hone to perfection the race setup so that the boat performs at top condition during the heat races and earns its way into the final.

Or at least that's the way it was done when we had the money to invest. These days, most of the team owners are on the “less is more” plan and merely trying to survive until the end of the season. Only a handful of teams do preseason testing, and virtually nobody can afford those hot propellers that are rumored to be about $20,000 a pop and are only good for a few heats of racing. But do things have to stay this bleak?

Well, let's backup and look at the CCAS again. Contrasted against the bloated ranks of NASCAR's Nextel Cup, the Champ Car Atlantic is a modest series. Just like the ABRA. The 2006 driver roster indicates 29 drivers in the series. (Fifty drivers are set to compete for the 43 spots in this weekend's Nextel Cup Allstate 400 in Indianapolis.) The CCAS races a much more modest 12 times a year instead of the 36 races that the Nextel Cup and Busch Series run.

I've spoken before about the business models behind racing, and how the cost of R&D, testing, etc., are spread out across the season by the team owners to their sponsors. NASCAR's nine-month marathon makes that amortization easier. But it's obviously still going on in other motorsports as well.

One thing I noticed when I went perusing through the Atlantic's lineup was that virtually all of the drivers appeared to have sponsors. Some of them, like Arizona furniture chain The Room Store, actually owned their team. This, of course, smacks of the days in the late '70's and early '80's when Squire Shop owner Bob Steil did the same thing with his unlimited hydros.

Some of the sponsors are well known, like Western Union and Days Inn, and some not as much, like RLM Investments or Wirth Solar. But the point here is that the sponsorship dollars are there, and the Champ Car Atlantic teams have found them.

The CCAS has a nice little package with the SPEED channel. A two-hour show is tape-delayed, but for what little I saw, well-produced. From what I could tell, there aren't any live broadcasts, but SPEED is getting things to air within a week of the event, which isn't bad.

So when you think of it, all the pieces of the success puzzle that keeps the Atlantic teams on the road all season long are falling into place for the unlimiteds.

The ABRA has put together a TV package with FSN that I think looks very attractive on paper and secured a very innovative new sponsor. Given the ties long-time hydro announcer Jim Hendrick has to that sponsor, EnviroPly, it's likely that will continue at least in the short term.

My sandwich was gone, and my lunch break was nearly over. And the racing was just getting underway. But the series had impressed its point on me. You don't have to compete with NASCAR. In fact, you'd be foolish to try. All you have to do is embrace the fact that there are still pieces of the pie to grab. The ABRA has a shot at that pie as well, and for the first time in a while, it seems to me as though it's within reach.

Unlimited hydroplaning offers a better show than the Champ Cars, as far as I'm concerned. The turbine boats offer very good reliability, and the competition is as closely matched as it has ever been. Add a few more race sites each year and some national sponsors, and the sport might be able to climb back onto its spot on the motorsports scene.

I am certainly hoping that the ABRA invests the time and money into measuring the marketing impact that the sport has, passing that information along to the camps and to potential new owners and race sites as quickly as possible so they can begin courting new sponsors. All of the key components are starting to come together. Besides, I'd rather watch a boat race on my lunch break.

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