Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Happened to see the end of the New Hampshire NASCAR race yesterday and was shocked by the number of empty seats. Can't all be watching the World Cup? It occurred to me on my drive over that if NASCAR is removing seats as they have on the back stretch at Daytona, not covering them up, then they cannot believe that this is a short term problem. If they do not have confidence in their product then where is it headed. OK, there will always be a large audience for NASCAR, but it seems the growth has gone, another fad. Always seemed to me that it was a mistake forgetting their base fan and go chasing New York yuppies. Must be a worry for future TV negotiations.

Very busy day ahead. Great meeting with architects yesterday to discuss the theme for the club, and looked at a similar clubhouse we can base ours on, 20,000 sq ft with restaurant, gym and spa, and pro shop. Meeting other race clubs and potential partners today.

You've got to love Mark Webber, has a huge crash and says "let's just bloody get on with it." New car being built for Silverstone, and he sees the season as only half over, so he is still going for it. What else would you expect from and Aussie?

His boss, Christian Horner, is complaining that they are down on power and Renault should be allowed to upgrade it. Yeh right, and give you another second a lap, and I do not notice that Kubica is running too shabby either. Nice try Christian.

Lots of concern and negative comments on the movable rear wing, so suggestions that it may not fly, so to speak. Martin Whitaker of McLaren and FOTA says that if it does not work it is easy to take it off! It's only money.

Do not forget Tour de France starts Saturday, now that's some real tough men. Used to kill me riding my bike to school over a railway overpass, let alone the Alps!

Putting in the fee proposal for the track in Saudi Arabia, so we'll see how serious they are.

How did you like the beer bottle on the track at Valencia? Promoter said he did not think anyone threw it or it would have broken, now there's a nice image! So it rolled out there through the wall? Or was one of the marshals drinking it? "It could happen anywhere" he said. Well I have been watching GP's a long time and I've never seen it. When I have run races I made sure there were no bottles on the site and most times try and stop cans. Sell sodas and beer in cups, harder for the people to get drunk that way anyway, and stops the potential for some idiot to throw it. I annoyed the beverage sellers of course, but Oh Well, that 's just me. It seems they are more concerned about the track not providing much in the way of overtaking, as they should be. It will be interesting to see what their proposed solutions are.

The fallout from the weekends race continues, with the Spanish press beating up the story about Alonso's and Hamilton's comments. They really do not like Lewis do they? Lewis should not be beating their favorite son. I lived there for a year and never felt that there was a racist element, but after what happened at Barcelona a couple of years ago, and the continuing jibes from the press you have to wonder. Ferrari should look at the Rosberg incident at Singapore the first year where of my memory is correct he crossed the blend line on the pit out and had to do a drive through, but like Lewis he had a few laps to build up a cushion and did it without losing a place and finished well up.

FOTA is working with an environmental audit group called Trucost to reduce the carbon footprint in F1. No surprise to me but the actual racing is a very small component and while they are looking at more efficient engines for 2013, the main thrust is in how they work as a whole. The target that they have at the moment is 12% reduction by 2012. Maybe that will keep the greenies happy, but I doubt it. The nice thing was that, as I have been saying, Trucost acknowledged that racing is already about efficiency and the teams are already doing well.

Interesting that Melbourne F1 GP has announced a bigger presence for the V8Supercars at next years GP, with three races totaling 500K. Maybe they have just worked out that Adelaide is pulling a bigger crowd for the V8's than they are getting for the GP?

Talking of Australia, it seems my mate Wayne Gardner has spoken up about the state of GP racing and current riders. http://www.waynegardnerapproved.com.au./wr14.htm. Stirred up some comments, like he should keep quiet he's too old to know! I for one totally agree as you will know from reading this blog. When Wayne speaks people should listen.

Phil Hall has also been conversing with me about new tracks being built in the US, and "rich men's playgrounds." It is an unfortunate fact of life that the spectator event driven business model for tracks no longer works. The sanctioning fees and cost of staging races is higher than the potential spectator draw for those events. The model that does work is to build a facility for members, yes rich guys, who want to drive fast and not necessarily race, and can pay for the privilege. Now, once you have the facility, then you can look to accommodate clubs to come and race, renting the track and enjoying the nice facilities a country club offers. Some tracks here like New Jersey or Virginia Raceway also stage spectator events, but that is not what is driving them, if you excuse the pun. At the moment it is a US phenomenon, but there are a couple in Spain, and it will spread. The only two spectator tracks built here recently are Miller Park and Barber Motorsports park, both built by rich guys, who then put their name on it, what does that tell you. Other than that you need a Government to pay for it, shades of Eastern Creek.

That is why we are building a Country Club here in Arizona. Had a great meeting last evening with the local Corvette Owners Club and everything we do confirms that the location and the type of facility are correct, and the demand is there.

To finish off today, why is it that there is so little news on a daily basis other than for F1? Where are the series promoters? How can you expect the public to know when events are happening if you only promote the week before, and lose interest between events, especially for a series like ALMS that has not had a race for two months! When will they learn that you have to work at this 365 days a year, put out stories and information. I know I harp on Adelaide and PI, but they were great models of how to do this stuff, not just because of my involvement but because of the other great staff. Terry Plane at the Adelaide event had a story in the daily paper every day for a year. Did not appreciate him at the time but what he did was amazing.