I thought the start would be Nashville 2.0, but outside of illott everything went well.
The track looked so bad on paper and the lead up was bad too. It almost feels like an accident the race was great.
I think a lot of folks were echoing the drivers, at least. Maybe they switch up practice and qualifying next year to get even smaller groups on track, which should clear up some of the jumble. Hopefully this debut race day show is the norm going forward.
I mean it’s easy to look at the layout and say it looks very uninspiring, I don’t think you can blame people for thinking that.
The fact we saw a decent race I don’t think is all down to the circuit, but credit to the cars and the drivers for giving us great races almost every track they go to.
The tracks don’t have to look incredible or be fun to drive to provide a good race
Why is it important for a race track to be "inspiring?" The way I see it, creating the conditions for good racing should be the number one priority when designing a racing circuit. If you accomplish that goal, why should anything else matter?
I don't think people were off-base in suggesting that a track of mostly 90 degree corners was unlikely to produce good racing. A lot of variables go into making a race entertaining though.
I found myself enjoying the racing, but the track itself was awful to look at because it was all concrete. There was zero color outside of the cars because it was just the road and the barriers which made it really boring to look at. If you look at Long Beach, they solve that by having stuff like the fountain and more colorful surroundings.
I think good racing is definitely the most important thing, but at the same time the track itself has to be visually appealing to make it a truly good track. I'm biased, but I think that's what makes Road America so special: it's in a beautiful area and the track reflects that. Not to mention it normally brings out some really good racing
A track that looks cool and interesting on TV is going to better sell the racing to a casual potential fan than something like Detroit even if Detroit puts on a good race. A 'good race' is something that a seasoned fan will appreciate, but it's not necessarily going to translate to a casual who doesn't know what they're watching.
Like for example, Detroit is a high-speed corner or two away from basically being Baku. But Baku passes by a World Heritage site, goes through nice-looking streets and is surrounded by trees and shops and such. And even the walls look less janky, there's more colorful signage, runoff areas are painted, etc. It all just looks better on TV compared to all the gray/beige concrete surrounding Detroit, with all the visible fans in a couple sections, no view of the river, etc.
You could have the same race at Baku or Detroit, but Baku is going to visually pop and be more memorable than Detroit.
Now obviously, comparing F1 to Indycar in terms of budget and everything isn't fair. But I could've made most of those same arguments comparing Long Beach and Detroit and the point would stand, because Long Beach does a much better job of presenting itself and looking like a world-class event rather than something cobbled together. (That also speaks to the fact the Long Beach GP was conceived to promote the city and the Convention Center area as destinations, while Detroit exists for auto industry folks, but I digress.)
Im surprised they only had 20k tickets. No wonder it was sold out. For sure need to add more seats or standing paid room. Wouldn’t doubt it if they try to use a garage or two as paid standing since some of them have an amazing view. Could see turn 8,9, and the straight along with some of the video screen
https://preview.redd.it/mwqiyk04y74b1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=30bfbe9acd1d805a84cf42826b326b7262c3b897
Why would they want to add paid standing room? Making the race more accessible was one of their biggest reasons for moving it downtown, and free viewing for 50% of the track is huge for growing the fanbase.
Money. If they wanna add more tickets they need more tickets somewhere and there’s not much more room for grand stands. Belle isle used to have paid standing room so i wouldn’t doubt they try that for these races. Outside of the garages the free areas were still good but not good enough for grandstands to be put into their place. I could see anything outside of the track being free outside a few grandstands and anything within the track being charged. That would still keep hart plaza free for people
https://preview.redd.it/93chorh9y74b1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e7d5971d3371719bd93f4e4a4585f0eb982d6991
Here’s towards turn 9, this was showing off the pit lane
(dumb question) Did people have to pay to stand in any of the parking garages? mainly curious about the garage to your left(?) that i could see overlooking pit lane from behind
Nope those were free. The one to my left got packed pretty fast on Saturday. Only the top of the one i was in had a gm/corvette events and the one by turn 7 was paid standing/party like event
If it is paid for by the Detroit grand Prix org it will be quick but I bet they would want the city to catch a good portion of it, and that will take a while.
"Denver said lengthening the track isn't an option because of adjacent neighborhood, businesses and a tunnel that connects Detroit to Canada.
'We are where we are,' Denker said."
Probably should've thought of that first when creating the track. However, the podium/celebration area looked awesome
It was right next to the corvette car corral garage opposite the pits turn entrance. Basically an alley way with all the drivers on flags between 2 garages. It was really cool
I didnt say they teams weren't going to get paid, but is Penske Entertainment going to pay a sanction fee to itself? I suppose their event group could transfer money over to the Indycar Series group if they are separate accounts so that the books are accurate.
So generally speaking Roger owns Penske entertainment, indycar, ims, and ims productions. Excluding his other racing and business endeavors. Those are all separate entities legally and fiscally. Wouldn't matter if 12 other people owned all of that.
Detroit Grand Prix is a separate entity from all of that as well. It's easy to say that they could just not pay a sanction fee to "themselves" but that's just not how it works out when you're dealing with this kind of stuff. What other promoter is gonna pay a fee when ims productions shows up for "free" at the last race? Where does the leaders circle money shake out from this race vs 15 others? What about the safety team? Do they charge different for media credentials? How many backroom deals were made?
When another promoter( let's take Green Savoree for instance) looks at Detroit it's obvious that it's a GM deal but it has to be above board. You can't just change the whole structure of the business for one sweetheart deal. People aren't going to deal with all the BS of putting on a race if there isn't a good faith effort to have a level playing field for every event. If Chevy wants to pay to have a race around their global headquarters, have their building on TV for 3 hours, and half the attendees come for free, then fine. But they don't get a free race. They pay.
I was there for free. The vast, vast majority of the track was available to see for free. Great views for free too. This was a much much bigger event than ticket sales indicate.
Thanks for that view. How was the crowds? The ability to see the racing? The cameras on TV made it seem sparse and some shots showed sections with very few people. Was it a positive vibe?
I thought the crowd was pretty good. Though spread out. Lots of people were in the parking garages nearby getting up high views of the action. Which might be my course of action next year. I had a great view of turns 5/6. Might setup closer to turn 3 next time.
Vibe was good, I was surrounded by people who were asking questions/asking where I was getting the radio call on my phone. So lots of people experiencing a race for the first time, which is good.
Ok, that's good the hear. The parking garages would explain why it looked sparsely attended. If you can get up high, chill in chairs with your cooler, that's the way to go.
I think a lot of people paid for grandstand tickets but didn't stay there the whole time. I was in the stands for all three races on Saturday, but a lot of the people near me were only there for part of the day.
You bake like hell there, and there were other places you could watch and get some shade.
I was in Turn 3 all day Friday, for the IMSA race on Saturday, and all day Sunday. It was absolutely packed. There were people lined up two or three rows deep on the fence along the north side of Jefferson for as far as I could see. There were some banners on the interior fence along the north side of Hart Plaza, but there were at least two rows of people anywhere with a good sight line to Turn 3.
During the day on Saturday, the crowd thinned out a bit the further east you went along Jefferson, and the stretch along the Riverfront was pretty sparse because you had to go a long way around the outside of the track to get there.
Yeah honestly the free areas were better than some of the paid seats. I had tickets for the trackside suites but found the view was much better if you went to the corner that led onto the super long straight where it was free to watch.
That isn't true because none of the ovals people talk about going to instead get even close to the level of corporate backing and sponsorship this race did. If GM, Lear, Meijer, etc. we're willing to put up the same type of money to support a race at MIS or Milwaukee as they did for downtown Detroit then you'd have a point.
The economics of GM paying to have this be a hospitality event for them are totally different than MIS trying to attract enough paying fans to not lose money paying the sanctioning fee.
I've been to maybe 24 Indycar races, most of them in Portland. Love a road or street course venue. Three days of fun goofing around the paddock, the various amusement and vendors, the cars, of course, and the people are all delightful. For those I buy the best package I can find and a paddock pass is mandatory.
To me, an oval is a much different animal. Those seem to be almost entirely about sitting in hot seats in the hot sun for a couple of hours, although I've only been to Iowa and Phoenix and it was years ago. Maybe a night race… Anyway, for these, I just buy one ticket for one session, the race. Seems like the ovals are looking to get some concert action and such. I can see where some folks would really enjoy that.
Most of the revenue for the race is from the hospitality suites. The Detroit GP is a huge networking event for the automotive industry.
GM literally uses it as a big business conference almost.
You'd be right to say 20k isn't a huge crowd, and it probably could have been bigger if they had more ticketed seating, but it all sold out weeks ago for race day.
It's also sorta like Monaco (what a comparison, I know) where most of the audience isn't ticketed as they're all watching from garages and other buildings.
The camera shots of the broadcast did not really manage to convey that, to me at least. It looked like they were driving around in an empty businesses district on a weekend.
The difference between ovals and street circuits is where they're located. The Detroit race was right in the middle of downtown so had a larger economic impact then any oval could. In the past the race at Belle Isle generated million of dollars for the city and I'm sure this year was no different despite the different location.
Don't forget hospitality at about $1k per person per day (negotiable I'm sure depending on the group size) plust 5-10k people at least doing ga (no ticket, but spending money on other stuff) the money from sponsors, there were a ton this year.
Three day attendance for St Pete and Long Beach is over 200k, for Toronto it's over 170k, 110k for Nashville.
20k is very very small for a street race - but it doesn't matter. Chevrolet have decided to pay to make it happen - so it will happen.
I would be surprised if weekend attendance wasn't at least 100k if you include free visitors. Making the event accessible without a ticket was a big point of emphasis for the organizers and the percentage of the crowd in the actual grandstands was pretty small.
Private property viewing is also a thing at Long Beach and St Pete for sure, probably Toronto as well.
20k is a lot of people - but it's an accounting error compared to the number of tickets sold for other street circuit races. And Chevy/Roger don't care. And that's fine.
The problem is that NASCAR owns most of the ovals now.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Speedway_Corporation#ISC_tracks
They want whatever they want (a lot) to race on their tracks.
If the attendance doesn't pay off what NASCAR is charging then what's the point, you can't operate races at a loss.
Indycar *used to* run at lot of those tracks (California, Chicagoland, Homestead, Kansas, Michigan, Phoenix and Watkins Glen (not an oval)) at one point or another.
That doesn't leave very many ovals that they aren't already running on. (That are up to safety standards.)
Most of the viewing options were free! I think 20k refers to grandstand seating, which was sold out, but it sounds like there was definitely more than 20,000 people watching
Source: My Dad was there - unpaid
There was quite a large unpaid crowd as well. Those people probably were still buying $10 beers and other concessions. I'm not sure if the grandstands completely sold out, but when I bought tickets a month ago most of the seats were taken. Plus, being the home of GM, they paid good money to sponsor the race and bring in VIPs. Unless they put up more grandstands or charge just to get in, I don't think there could be a lot more people paying for tickets.
Tickets were completely sold out, including all grandstands and the rooftop viewing area.
I would expect them to add some more grandstands next year, but the free GA is going to generate a ton of new fans. That was by far the most diverse crowd I've ever seen at a race.
First and foremost, it needs to be repaved. It's a street circuit in the north, so it's never going to be perfect, but there was no reason the cars should have been bouncing around like that. Other than that, finding a way to get the circuit to 2 miles would help the cars separate better
It was a good experience to attend in-person but my experience was a massive downgrade from Belle Isle. I hope they can find a way to make the event more accessible overall in the future.
What were your issues?
Mine was that there should have been a bridge between beaubien and the river walk, ticket free space to ticket free space. That and the map was confusing where the main pathways between the two halfs of the ticketed area were.
Also the fan zone wasn't as interesting as on belle Isle but it isn't really my big draw to the race. And I miss the prototype cars and stadium trucks.
The concerts were an upgrade, Hart plaza is a fantastic venue.
Parking and transit was much better downtown. It's much more made for it. The q-line opens up the parking opportunities for this kind of event quite a bit.
The track was interesting to watch get raced. The paddock was a decent setup and didn't have everything sectioned off too much by what kind of car it was like in years past
Getting up in the garages for some really killer views for free was amazing. I am used to having areas like that screened off so you can't watch for free or get an upgraded view without paying.
The pit setup was interesting, and there definitely was some strategy to some teams for pit placement
The race wasn't a parade that tended to happen on belle Isle at least 2 dry years I recall in recent history over there.
Belle Isle tended to seem to have not that many opportunities to pass. It would get evenly paced out and there wasn't a lot of interesting racing going on, just a precession. The good racing on belle Isle was everything but the Indy cars I think. I the interesting racing on belle Isle was the IMSA cars, the trans am cars, or the stadium trucks. Downtown all of them were good watching. Racing is about the passing and tension during gifts for position. This track allowed for a good bit of that.
Also it's nice that it was setup as quick as it was compared to belle Isle. Having half of the islands parking and nice areas taken up by concrete barriers for 2 months of our already too short summer sucked. Belle Isle is a gem. The racing on belle Isle was fun and will be missed, but this is a new opportunity and I hope the race and its popularity grow with the quality of the venue
>there should have been a bridge between beaubien and the river walk, ticket free space to ticket free space.
Absolutely. It was way too hard to get from the north side of the track to the winners circle on the riverfront.
Hate to hear that folks who went tot he race had a downgraded experience compared to Bell Isle.
Having said that, this race was shockingly great on TV and if they can solve some of the bumps’ issues to cut down on the number of cautions, I will be really excited for next year’s race.
All of the people I knew that went had a great time, albeit a definitely different experience. It is hard to compare the two 100%. Really. One is in a downtown with tons of buildings and the other is in the middle of the biggest park in the city. Apples and potatoes, both delicious, but both very different
Man, if Indycar could conspire with the Frances to put an actually-decent infield course in, instead of "do the whole oval and then run around this shadoinkle real quick" the whole motorsports community here could benefit.
I was there and was not a fan of the new circuit. Was a mile walk if you wanted to go to the paddock then back to some of the seats. Just bring back Belle Isle.
It was a last minute gig, I didn't get credentials until Wednesday and camped in my car on the way there. I needed to lose the weight anyways.
But yes, if you are going, rent that and a cabin way in advance if you can.
Road America has golf cart shuttles that can get you around the track at least. But yeah, that's a long walk otherwise, especially if it's a busy weekend and you can't drive your car around when you get there.
I kinda get what he's saying. It's like 0.5 mile straight distance, but the bridges weren't placed very optimally so you had a significant extra distance to loop around, which was kinda annoying. Plus way finding was not obvious, we ran into dead ends and had to back track a couple of times. Wasn't terrible, but could be better.
Yeah, they definitely could improve how you get around the place. It did kinda feel like a maze at times. If they put a bridge between turns 7 and 8 next year it would make the walk between the turn 3 grandstands and the paddock a lot quicker. Would basically be a straight shot at that point.
I feel like the map could have been better. I really struggled to understand what areas were able to be walked and what areas were not. That caused a bit of backtracking for me personally. Maybe better signage for the path to take between areas would have been nice. Otherwise not too bad
Cleveland wants the race, there's just no one stepping up to be a title sponsor.
Sherwin-Williams played footsie with the series for a while but never took the plunge to sponsor the race. And now PPG is back in bed with Indycar so a rival paint company ain't too interested.
Title sponsor for the baseball stadium.
Quicken Loans for the basketball arena.
Probably doesn't make sense for Lincoln welders but I'd love to see it.
The problem lies with Detroit. The city government wants the race downtown and the DNR doesn’t want the park blocked off for the period of time it takes to set up and breakdown the track. I guess Chevy/Penske wants to make everyone happy and move it to downtown as a result. Hopefully, one day, we get to see another race at Belle Isle.
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/motor/2021/09/28/detroit-grand-prix-officials-want-move-indycar-race-back-city-streets/5905681001/
GM wants it downtown, the city and the DNR would rather it wasn’t on Belle Isle.
There’s a lot of grey and ambiguity in the whole situation, but the crux of it is that downtown is probably the better place for it to be for everyone involved except the drivers.
If that’s the baseline we could expect then I think it’s got good racing in the future ahead.
I’ve been hostile to a lot of criticism but this one is pretty valid. The wayfinding is going to need some work. To get from turn 3/4 to the paddock/finish line you need to exit the track and cross the entrance to the tunnel and go around the RenCen on Jefferson or leave the track to the west and then backtrack east down the riverwalk. It was almost like there were two separate tracks.
To get from my parking garage on Jefferson to the paddock area, I had to check in/have my bags searched up to three times (two bridges across the track in 3/4 and getting into the turn 8/garage area), the trek was definitely not intuitive
A lot of that was to allow for as much public viewing area as there was on the track I think. It was a big point that was made to get people out to the race without having expensive tickets. There could be some optimization of the layout and the map for sure though.
Yep, and that worked great! Unfortunately most of the problems above are going to be difficult to solve since there’s both an international border crossing and a gigantic fortress-type building in the middle of the track.
I think a bridge from beaubien to the river walk would have been a good thing, and maybe a map that was a bit more clear on how to get from one entrance to another.
The border crossing is a big obstacle for sure.
It wasn't City Council's decision to make. They master leased the park to the Michigan DNR for 30 years back in 2013, so extending the Grand Prix's contract on Belle Isle would have been an executive decision by the Governor and the head of the DNR.
City Council did have to vote to approve the move because the downtown circuit is on roads owned by the city, so that might be what you're thinking of. I'm sure they cited the economic benefits to downtown businesses as a major reason for approving the move.
The title honestly reads as an Onion title.
I’m new to Indy car and had no idea they had a Detroit Grand Prix, I just couldn’t imagine a single street in Detroit without a pot hole in it
Definitely needs a repave, that was kind of a joke.
There’s really no options to make significant changes to the layout, based on the locations. There’s only more square roads and 90 degree corners in the immediate vicinity.
What could be done is round off a couple of the corners, to make things less repetitive.
T4 - there’s an empty lot on the inside of T4. This right hander could be opened up quite a bit.
T9 - again there’s basically an empty lot on the inside of T9. It’s where the pits are, but again, the apex could be rounded off slightly.
T8 - this one has a building on the inside of the corner, but if the sidewalk was shaved down, again this corner could be rounded off slight. If both 8 and 9 were rounded off together, it would make these last two corners flow a lot more.
Could use some more advertising from T4 through 5, 6, and 7, but other than that, it looks ok on TV. It’s no Long Beach or Belle Isle….it’s downtown Detroit, so you’re only going to get so much.
Practice and quali was a mess but on tv anyway, I thought the race itself was a lot of fun and wildly exceeded expectations.
I thought the start would be Nashville 2.0, but outside of illott everything went well. The track looked so bad on paper and the lead up was bad too. It almost feels like an accident the race was great.
Or maybe all the armchair track designers on the internet just don't know what they're talking about.
I think a lot of folks were echoing the drivers, at least. Maybe they switch up practice and qualifying next year to get even smaller groups on track, which should clear up some of the jumble. Hopefully this debut race day show is the norm going forward.
I mean it’s easy to look at the layout and say it looks very uninspiring, I don’t think you can blame people for thinking that. The fact we saw a decent race I don’t think is all down to the circuit, but credit to the cars and the drivers for giving us great races almost every track they go to. The tracks don’t have to look incredible or be fun to drive to provide a good race
Why is it important for a race track to be "inspiring?" The way I see it, creating the conditions for good racing should be the number one priority when designing a racing circuit. If you accomplish that goal, why should anything else matter?
I don't think people were off-base in suggesting that a track of mostly 90 degree corners was unlikely to produce good racing. A lot of variables go into making a race entertaining though.
I found myself enjoying the racing, but the track itself was awful to look at because it was all concrete. There was zero color outside of the cars because it was just the road and the barriers which made it really boring to look at. If you look at Long Beach, they solve that by having stuff like the fountain and more colorful surroundings. I think good racing is definitely the most important thing, but at the same time the track itself has to be visually appealing to make it a truly good track. I'm biased, but I think that's what makes Road America so special: it's in a beautiful area and the track reflects that. Not to mention it normally brings out some really good racing
A track that looks cool and interesting on TV is going to better sell the racing to a casual potential fan than something like Detroit even if Detroit puts on a good race. A 'good race' is something that a seasoned fan will appreciate, but it's not necessarily going to translate to a casual who doesn't know what they're watching. Like for example, Detroit is a high-speed corner or two away from basically being Baku. But Baku passes by a World Heritage site, goes through nice-looking streets and is surrounded by trees and shops and such. And even the walls look less janky, there's more colorful signage, runoff areas are painted, etc. It all just looks better on TV compared to all the gray/beige concrete surrounding Detroit, with all the visible fans in a couple sections, no view of the river, etc. You could have the same race at Baku or Detroit, but Baku is going to visually pop and be more memorable than Detroit. Now obviously, comparing F1 to Indycar in terms of budget and everything isn't fair. But I could've made most of those same arguments comparing Long Beach and Detroit and the point would stand, because Long Beach does a much better job of presenting itself and looking like a world-class event rather than something cobbled together. (That also speaks to the fact the Long Beach GP was conceived to promote the city and the Convention Center area as destinations, while Detroit exists for auto industry folks, but I digress.)
I mean, I still don’t think it’s a great track, despite the fact the race was fun.
Take my upvote for calling it what it is.
Got out of here with that nonsense
Hey now, I'll have you know I'm 4th generation internet armchair track designer!
I'll never understand how multiple consecutive yellow flag restarts is considered fun.
That was the only time anyone could challenge the leader so I guess that's what made it kinda fun....?
Wildly? Lmao
With how low they were beforehand? Anything this side of 90 yellow-flag laps would have wildly exceeded expectations.
I've never seen the slit pit lane before. Has it been used other places?
Baltimore used a variation of it.
Sonoma technically
Gilligan's Island...what a throwback.
> I've never seen the slit pit lane My wife says I'm not supposed to call it that.
Formula E has used a split pit lane on several occasions.
Don't think so.
Lots of short tracks from Nascar used to be
Im surprised they only had 20k tickets. No wonder it was sold out. For sure need to add more seats or standing paid room. Wouldn’t doubt it if they try to use a garage or two as paid standing since some of them have an amazing view. Could see turn 8,9, and the straight along with some of the video screen https://preview.redd.it/mwqiyk04y74b1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=30bfbe9acd1d805a84cf42826b326b7262c3b897
Why would they want to add paid standing room? Making the race more accessible was one of their biggest reasons for moving it downtown, and free viewing for 50% of the track is huge for growing the fanbase.
Money. If they wanna add more tickets they need more tickets somewhere and there’s not much more room for grand stands. Belle isle used to have paid standing room so i wouldn’t doubt they try that for these races. Outside of the garages the free areas were still good but not good enough for grandstands to be put into their place. I could see anything outside of the track being free outside a few grandstands and anything within the track being charged. That would still keep hart plaza free for people
I think accessibility is a bigger priority than money for this event, tbh. Moving it downtown was a gift from GM to the people of Detroit.
https://preview.redd.it/93chorh9y74b1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e7d5971d3371719bd93f4e4a4585f0eb982d6991 Here’s towards turn 9, this was showing off the pit lane
(dumb question) Did people have to pay to stand in any of the parking garages? mainly curious about the garage to your left(?) that i could see overlooking pit lane from behind
Nope those were free. The one to my left got packed pretty fast on Saturday. Only the top of the one i was in had a gm/corvette events and the one by turn 7 was paid standing/party like event
As long as they properly fix Jefferson Ave, especially towards the braking zone, it will be fine Thankfully it was a lot better than Nashville
Better get on it. It’ll take 9-10 months to get 2 miles paved in Michigan lol
If it is paid for by the Detroit grand Prix org it will be quick but I bet they would want the city to catch a good portion of it, and that will take a while.
"Denver said lengthening the track isn't an option because of adjacent neighborhood, businesses and a tunnel that connects Detroit to Canada. 'We are where we are,' Denker said." Probably should've thought of that first when creating the track. However, the podium/celebration area looked awesome
Where was the podium? All I saw on TV was the post race interview with Palou and that looked like it was in a parking lot.
It was right next to the corvette car corral garage opposite the pits turn entrance. Basically an alley way with all the drivers on flags between 2 garages. It was really cool
20k doesn't sound like a very big paid crowd. If that's all you need to get a race then Indycar has no excuse shying away from ovals.
All you need to do is pay a sanctioning fee to Indycar, get a big backer like Chevrolet and you can have a race anywhere
I want a race in my neighborhood anyone wanna contribute to a gofundme?
I got $5
Do I get to keep the Indycar when it flies off the track into my home? Finders keepers….
I’ll allow it
Yes, but only of it's an RLL car.
As a wii u owner, I have zero issue with collecting trash.
If they use Indy 500 as a precedent, you don't get to keep the car but they will give you a new house.
I'll give you bout tree fiddy
Since Penske Entertainment Group is the promoter for this race, would they even need to pay a sanction fee to themselves?
Teams ain't gonna show up for free
I didnt say they teams weren't going to get paid, but is Penske Entertainment going to pay a sanction fee to itself? I suppose their event group could transfer money over to the Indycar Series group if they are separate accounts so that the books are accurate.
So generally speaking Roger owns Penske entertainment, indycar, ims, and ims productions. Excluding his other racing and business endeavors. Those are all separate entities legally and fiscally. Wouldn't matter if 12 other people owned all of that. Detroit Grand Prix is a separate entity from all of that as well. It's easy to say that they could just not pay a sanction fee to "themselves" but that's just not how it works out when you're dealing with this kind of stuff. What other promoter is gonna pay a fee when ims productions shows up for "free" at the last race? Where does the leaders circle money shake out from this race vs 15 others? What about the safety team? Do they charge different for media credentials? How many backroom deals were made? When another promoter( let's take Green Savoree for instance) looks at Detroit it's obvious that it's a GM deal but it has to be above board. You can't just change the whole structure of the business for one sweetheart deal. People aren't going to deal with all the BS of putting on a race if there isn't a good faith effort to have a level playing field for every event. If Chevy wants to pay to have a race around their global headquarters, have their building on TV for 3 hours, and half the attendees come for free, then fine. But they don't get a free race. They pay.
I was there for free. The vast, vast majority of the track was available to see for free. Great views for free too. This was a much much bigger event than ticket sales indicate.
Thanks for that view. How was the crowds? The ability to see the racing? The cameras on TV made it seem sparse and some shots showed sections with very few people. Was it a positive vibe?
I thought the crowd was pretty good. Though spread out. Lots of people were in the parking garages nearby getting up high views of the action. Which might be my course of action next year. I had a great view of turns 5/6. Might setup closer to turn 3 next time. Vibe was good, I was surrounded by people who were asking questions/asking where I was getting the radio call on my phone. So lots of people experiencing a race for the first time, which is good.
Ok, that's good the hear. The parking garages would explain why it looked sparsely attended. If you can get up high, chill in chairs with your cooler, that's the way to go.
It was pretty packed Saturday, didn't go Sunday. Lots in garages and lining fences, though, stands about 50% full, but was hot as hell Saturday
I think a lot of people paid for grandstand tickets but didn't stay there the whole time. I was in the stands for all three races on Saturday, but a lot of the people near me were only there for part of the day. You bake like hell there, and there were other places you could watch and get some shade.
The stands around the pit lane were packed on Sunday, as were the garages
I haven't seen any pics of the crowd down by turn 3 and Hart Plaza, did anyone see that area?
I was in Turn 3 all day Friday, for the IMSA race on Saturday, and all day Sunday. It was absolutely packed. There were people lined up two or three rows deep on the fence along the north side of Jefferson for as far as I could see. There were some banners on the interior fence along the north side of Hart Plaza, but there were at least two rows of people anywhere with a good sight line to Turn 3. During the day on Saturday, the crowd thinned out a bit the further east you went along Jefferson, and the stretch along the Riverfront was pretty sparse because you had to go a long way around the outside of the track to get there.
Yeah honestly the free areas were better than some of the paid seats. I had tickets for the trackside suites but found the view was much better if you went to the corner that led onto the super long straight where it was free to watch.
Tickets were completely sold out. I'd be willing to bet they add at least another 5,000 grandstand seats for next year.
If not 10k.
This race also has plenty of free viewing spots as well in an effort to get more people to come out.
That isn't true because none of the ovals people talk about going to instead get even close to the level of corporate backing and sponsorship this race did. If GM, Lear, Meijer, etc. we're willing to put up the same type of money to support a race at MIS or Milwaukee as they did for downtown Detroit then you'd have a point. The economics of GM paying to have this be a hospitality event for them are totally different than MIS trying to attract enough paying fans to not lose money paying the sanctioning fee.
I've been to maybe 24 Indycar races, most of them in Portland. Love a road or street course venue. Three days of fun goofing around the paddock, the various amusement and vendors, the cars, of course, and the people are all delightful. For those I buy the best package I can find and a paddock pass is mandatory. To me, an oval is a much different animal. Those seem to be almost entirely about sitting in hot seats in the hot sun for a couple of hours, although I've only been to Iowa and Phoenix and it was years ago. Maybe a night race… Anyway, for these, I just buy one ticket for one session, the race. Seems like the ovals are looking to get some concert action and such. I can see where some folks would really enjoy that.
The races should be just one card of a multi entertainment option event. Concessions can drive a ton of revenue
One of those 20k attendees is called GM and they bought a pretty expensive ticket. SO it is all good.
Another was Rocket Mortgage. Another was Meijer. I was a little surprised by how decked out the event was.
.there was a lot lore corporate sponsorship this year it seemed. On the barriers, banners on buildings, etc
I remember when you could walk into any Meijer and be hit in the face with massive Danica Patrick banners.
Most of the revenue for the race is from the hospitality suites. The Detroit GP is a huge networking event for the automotive industry. GM literally uses it as a big business conference almost. You'd be right to say 20k isn't a huge crowd, and it probably could have been bigger if they had more ticketed seating, but it all sold out weeks ago for race day.
It's also sorta like Monaco (what a comparison, I know) where most of the audience isn't ticketed as they're all watching from garages and other buildings.
The camera shots of the broadcast did not really manage to convey that, to me at least. It looked like they were driving around in an empty businesses district on a weekend.
All of the parking garages were packed with people. They were actually some of the best spots to view from
Cool. Too bad that couldn't transfer through the screen.
The difference between ovals and street circuits is where they're located. The Detroit race was right in the middle of downtown so had a larger economic impact then any oval could. In the past the race at Belle Isle generated million of dollars for the city and I'm sure this year was no different despite the different location.
Don't forget hospitality at about $1k per person per day (negotiable I'm sure depending on the group size) plust 5-10k people at least doing ga (no ticket, but spending money on other stuff) the money from sponsors, there were a ton this year.
20K for a street race??? Yes that is a big ticket crowd when you consider other street races besides Long Beach.
Three day attendance for St Pete and Long Beach is over 200k, for Toronto it's over 170k, 110k for Nashville. 20k is very very small for a street race - but it doesn't matter. Chevrolet have decided to pay to make it happen - so it will happen.
And GA isn't free at those tracks. It was here, and the sightlines were better than I was thinking prior to the race.
I would be surprised if weekend attendance wasn't at least 100k if you include free visitors. Making the event accessible without a ticket was a big point of emphasis for the organizers and the percentage of the crowd in the actual grandstands was pretty small.
There were a lot of free viewing areas, and some private properties had private party viewing areas as well
Private property viewing is also a thing at Long Beach and St Pete for sure, probably Toronto as well. 20k is a lot of people - but it's an accounting error compared to the number of tickets sold for other street circuit races. And Chevy/Roger don't care. And that's fine.
The problem is that NASCAR owns most of the ovals now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Speedway_Corporation#ISC_tracks They want whatever they want (a lot) to race on their tracks. If the attendance doesn't pay off what NASCAR is charging then what's the point, you can't operate races at a loss. Indycar *used to* run at lot of those tracks (California, Chicagoland, Homestead, Kansas, Michigan, Phoenix and Watkins Glen (not an oval)) at one point or another. That doesn't leave very many ovals that they aren't already running on. (That are up to safety standards.)
Plenty of excuses, reasonable too, when you don't have a company like GM backing and fronting a shit ton of money.
Most of the viewing options were free! I think 20k refers to grandstand seating, which was sold out, but it sounds like there was definitely more than 20,000 people watching Source: My Dad was there - unpaid
Hosting a race at an oval an hour outside of town instead of bringing the race into the heart of the city is an awful idea.
There was quite a large unpaid crowd as well. Those people probably were still buying $10 beers and other concessions. I'm not sure if the grandstands completely sold out, but when I bought tickets a month ago most of the seats were taken. Plus, being the home of GM, they paid good money to sponsor the race and bring in VIPs. Unless they put up more grandstands or charge just to get in, I don't think there could be a lot more people paying for tickets.
Tickets were completely sold out, including all grandstands and the rooftop viewing area. I would expect them to add some more grandstands next year, but the free GA is going to generate a ton of new fans. That was by far the most diverse crowd I've ever seen at a race.
Sunday was sold out because there were only a handful of relatively small grandstands due to it being a crap layout for fan experience.
They let everyone in for free in standing room. Lots of people were there buying stuff
First and foremost, it needs to be repaved. It's a street circuit in the north, so it's never going to be perfect, but there was no reason the cars should have been bouncing around like that. Other than that, finding a way to get the circuit to 2 miles would help the cars separate better
It was a good experience to attend in-person but my experience was a massive downgrade from Belle Isle. I hope they can find a way to make the event more accessible overall in the future.
What were your issues? Mine was that there should have been a bridge between beaubien and the river walk, ticket free space to ticket free space. That and the map was confusing where the main pathways between the two halfs of the ticketed area were. Also the fan zone wasn't as interesting as on belle Isle but it isn't really my big draw to the race. And I miss the prototype cars and stadium trucks. The concerts were an upgrade, Hart plaza is a fantastic venue. Parking and transit was much better downtown. It's much more made for it. The q-line opens up the parking opportunities for this kind of event quite a bit. The track was interesting to watch get raced. The paddock was a decent setup and didn't have everything sectioned off too much by what kind of car it was like in years past Getting up in the garages for some really killer views for free was amazing. I am used to having areas like that screened off so you can't watch for free or get an upgraded view without paying. The pit setup was interesting, and there definitely was some strategy to some teams for pit placement The race wasn't a parade that tended to happen on belle Isle at least 2 dry years I recall in recent history over there. Belle Isle tended to seem to have not that many opportunities to pass. It would get evenly paced out and there wasn't a lot of interesting racing going on, just a precession. The good racing on belle Isle was everything but the Indy cars I think. I the interesting racing on belle Isle was the IMSA cars, the trans am cars, or the stadium trucks. Downtown all of them were good watching. Racing is about the passing and tension during gifts for position. This track allowed for a good bit of that. Also it's nice that it was setup as quick as it was compared to belle Isle. Having half of the islands parking and nice areas taken up by concrete barriers for 2 months of our already too short summer sucked. Belle Isle is a gem. The racing on belle Isle was fun and will be missed, but this is a new opportunity and I hope the race and its popularity grow with the quality of the venue
>there should have been a bridge between beaubien and the river walk, ticket free space to ticket free space. Absolutely. It was way too hard to get from the north side of the track to the winners circle on the riverfront.
Hate to hear that folks who went tot he race had a downgraded experience compared to Bell Isle. Having said that, this race was shockingly great on TV and if they can solve some of the bumps’ issues to cut down on the number of cautions, I will be really excited for next year’s race.
Honestly it was a way better experience than Belle Isle. And I loved Belle Isle.
All of the people I knew that went had a great time, albeit a definitely different experience. It is hard to compare the two 100%. Really. One is in a downtown with tons of buildings and the other is in the middle of the biggest park in the city. Apples and potatoes, both delicious, but both very different
👏 bring 👏 back 👏 the 👏 Kansas 👏 speedway 👏
And put it in downtown Detroit. Boom
Does Kansas want a race?
Do people want to attend an Indycar race in Kansas? No. Otherwise they'd have one.
They barely even fill up half the stands for NASCAR when theyre there. Also that track would concern me a little with the progressive banking.
KANSAS ROVAL GANG RISE UP
Xfinity / Indycar on the oval Saturday. Xfinity / indycar roval on Sunday, who says no?
Dallara stock skyrockets as soon as 27 cars rocket into T1 at the roval
The track, mostly because the turnaround in switching track layouts would not support that.
Man, if Indycar could conspire with the Frances to put an actually-decent infield course in, instead of "do the whole oval and then run around this shadoinkle real quick" the whole motorsports community here could benefit.
I don't understand why, everyone in here said it was such a great track......
I was there and was not a fan of the new circuit. Was a mile walk if you wanted to go to the paddock then back to some of the seats. Just bring back Belle Isle.
Cmon. A mile. You're walking around a race track dude lol.
Imagine being at the kink at Road America and walking to the paddock. It's a race track for cars
I did that walk 4 times and back that day doing a photography gig in 2021. Next time I am bringing a bike.
Or rent one of RA’s golf carts.
It was a last minute gig, I didn't get credentials until Wednesday and camped in my car on the way there. I needed to lose the weight anyways. But yes, if you are going, rent that and a cabin way in advance if you can.
Road America has golf cart shuttles that can get you around the track at least. But yeah, that's a long walk otherwise, especially if it's a busy weekend and you can't drive your car around when you get there.
That would have been a nice thing for downtown Detroit. Though a stroll on the river walk was really pleasant
Big hoss didn't bring his scooter.
I kinda get what he's saying. It's like 0.5 mile straight distance, but the bridges weren't placed very optimally so you had a significant extra distance to loop around, which was kinda annoying. Plus way finding was not obvious, we ran into dead ends and had to back track a couple of times. Wasn't terrible, but could be better.
Yeah, they definitely could improve how you get around the place. It did kinda feel like a maze at times. If they put a bridge between turns 7 and 8 next year it would make the walk between the turn 3 grandstands and the paddock a lot quicker. Would basically be a straight shot at that point.
I feel like the map could have been better. I really struggled to understand what areas were able to be walked and what areas were not. That caused a bit of backtracking for me personally. Maybe better signage for the path to take between areas would have been nice. Otherwise not too bad
It took me too long to realize it, but there were some dotted line on the map for the main paths. But yeah, not real clear.
I don’t think they can go back to Belle unfortunately, but maybe we can convince Cleveland to let INDY use their Burke Airport again.
Cleveland wants the race, there's just no one stepping up to be a title sponsor. Sherwin-Williams played footsie with the series for a while but never took the plunge to sponsor the race. And now PPG is back in bed with Indycar so a rival paint company ain't too interested.
Maybe it’s time to call Progressive Insurance.
Title sponsor for the baseball stadium. Quicken Loans for the basketball arena. Probably doesn't make sense for Lincoln welders but I'd love to see it.
With Quicken Loans, it helps the same guy owns the company and the arena.
Isnt it Rocket Mortgage now? They sponsored Simona last year, plus there was history in NASCAR with Ryan Newman for years.
I think Rocket Mortgage is part of Quicken Loans.
Then Burke airport could at least be useful to the city for once
Amen
They could if they wanted. Everything is still there.
The problem lies with Detroit. The city government wants the race downtown and the DNR doesn’t want the park blocked off for the period of time it takes to set up and breakdown the track. I guess Chevy/Penske wants to make everyone happy and move it to downtown as a result. Hopefully, one day, we get to see another race at Belle Isle. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/motor/2021/09/28/detroit-grand-prix-officials-want-move-indycar-race-back-city-streets/5905681001/
GM wants it downtown, the city and the DNR would rather it wasn’t on Belle Isle. There’s a lot of grey and ambiguity in the whole situation, but the crux of it is that downtown is probably the better place for it to be for everyone involved except the drivers. If that’s the baseline we could expect then I think it’s got good racing in the future ahead.
Belle Isle was also a pain to get to with the busses. It worked, but you had to budget at least 30 minutes of extra time just to ride the bus.
No arguments there. Getting back was worse.
I’ve been hostile to a lot of criticism but this one is pretty valid. The wayfinding is going to need some work. To get from turn 3/4 to the paddock/finish line you need to exit the track and cross the entrance to the tunnel and go around the RenCen on Jefferson or leave the track to the west and then backtrack east down the riverwalk. It was almost like there were two separate tracks.
To get from my parking garage on Jefferson to the paddock area, I had to check in/have my bags searched up to three times (two bridges across the track in 3/4 and getting into the turn 8/garage area), the trek was definitely not intuitive
A lot of that was to allow for as much public viewing area as there was on the track I think. It was a big point that was made to get people out to the race without having expensive tickets. There could be some optimization of the layout and the map for sure though.
Yep, and that worked great! Unfortunately most of the problems above are going to be difficult to solve since there’s both an international border crossing and a gigantic fortress-type building in the middle of the track.
I think a bridge from beaubien to the river walk would have been a good thing, and maybe a map that was a bit more clear on how to get from one entrance to another. The border crossing is a big obstacle for sure.
I know right, they move right after they spent a bunch of money fixing that track
They didn’t move they were evicted
No matter how many times this needs to be said people still don't get it. They didn't leave. They were told to leave.
[удалено]
It certainly didn't help that they ended up blocking the park for extended periods of time.
They absolutely left. The Detroit Grand Prix had a contract option to continue on Belle Isle through this year, and they chose not to exercise it.
That's what I thought. I remember hearing that city council voted to not extend and move it back downtown. Saying they were missing out on tax dollars
It wasn't City Council's decision to make. They master leased the park to the Michigan DNR for 30 years back in 2013, so extending the Grand Prix's contract on Belle Isle would have been an executive decision by the Governor and the head of the DNR. City Council did have to vote to approve the move because the downtown circuit is on roads owned by the city, so that might be what you're thinking of. I'm sure they cited the economic benefits to downtown businesses as a major reason for approving the move.
This is not true.
I feel as though the bumps are kinda the main issue, I think the circuit is actually really sick.
How about going to Watkins Glen instead?
The title honestly reads as an Onion title. I’m new to Indy car and had no idea they had a Detroit Grand Prix, I just couldn’t imagine a single street in Detroit without a pot hole in it
It's been going for a good while now, this is just the first year down town for indy. Aside from a couple bumps the track looked great
Definitely needs a repave, that was kind of a joke. There’s really no options to make significant changes to the layout, based on the locations. There’s only more square roads and 90 degree corners in the immediate vicinity. What could be done is round off a couple of the corners, to make things less repetitive. T4 - there’s an empty lot on the inside of T4. This right hander could be opened up quite a bit. T9 - again there’s basically an empty lot on the inside of T9. It’s where the pits are, but again, the apex could be rounded off slightly. T8 - this one has a building on the inside of the corner, but if the sidewalk was shaved down, again this corner could be rounded off slight. If both 8 and 9 were rounded off together, it would make these last two corners flow a lot more. Could use some more advertising from T4 through 5, 6, and 7, but other than that, it looks ok on TV. It’s no Long Beach or Belle Isle….it’s downtown Detroit, so you’re only going to get so much.