Much like NASCAR’s own France family, the IRL (and IMS)’s Hulman-George family is a racing dynasty that began two generations ago. Soon after World War II businessman Anton “Tony” Hulman bought the run down Indianapolis Motor Speedway and turned it back into the gem of American motorsports. Hulman’s daughter Mari Hulman George became the matriarch of the family after the death of her father in 1977 and her son Anton “Tony” Hulman George took over leadership of the speedway in 1990.
Tony George of course ”resigned” (or was ousted) from all of his leadership roles (by his sisters who make up the majority of the company board) late last month.
We received a question asking us why we haven’t commented on the fall of Tony George, so with NASCAR returning to the storied track this weekend I thought now was as good a time as any.
Tony George is perhaps most famous for the battle he waged throughout much of the 1990s and 2000s against CART. George eventually won the battle, and his Indy Racing League was unified with what had become Champ Car last year. This battle though was not without it’s costs. George used an estimated $500 million of the family fortune to destroy CART (Champ Car) and build the IRL.
While George successfully brought down CART, his objectives for the IRL of bringing more American drivers and more ovals into the series has fallen flat. Of the 18 drivers who have competed in the majority of events this season only six are Americans. Of those only Wisconsin-native born Danica Patrick is in the top-five in points. None have won a race this season. The lineups at both the sport’s powerhouse teams, Penske and Ganassi, are made up of foreign born drivers.
To his other objective of more oval racing, that too has been waning in recent years. This season nine of 17 races were ovals. The schedule for next year is due to be released at Kentucky in a couple of weeks, and from what I have heard ISC, the holder of three of the oval races, may not be happy with the IRL. If I were betting on the schedule for the next couple of seasons, I would bet on more road course racing (which I personally am a fan of with Indy Cars) and less oval racing.
It seems to me, it’s only a matter of time (in fact we may already be there) before what Tony George has is a second incarnation of CART. Was it worth $500 million? I’m guessing the entire Hulman-George clan is thinking it was not.
George himself has said in recent months if there was no improvement in the profitability of the IRL by 2013 there may not be an IRL. At this point without the Hulman fortune propping up the sport, that may turn to reality.
In recent years I have been less and less a fan of Tony George. He took some big risks and unfortunately it was the fans of the sport who suffered. I think the ouster of Tony George was probably a good move. That being said I have heard from people far more familiar with the situation than I that the present leadership of the IRL is less than spectacular.
On top of all this we learned this week IMS is losing their President and Chief Operating Officer Joie Chitwood to ISC (a coup for ISC) after the Brickyard. By all accounts Chitwood is about as good as they get. In him IMS loses a very competent and knowledgeable part of their team. I have doubts Jeff Belskus, the current CEO of IMS (and Hulman and Co.’s former CFO) can fill the void being left by Chitwood.
Whatever the case, it’s a shame for the Hulman-George’s and every IndyCar fan that we have reached this point. I can only hope that with time and leadership the sport can rise from where it is to become what it once was.
Related posts:
- The Sad Demise of American Open Wheel Racing
- Why Danica Patrick Is Not Coming To NASCAR
- I’m In A Daytona State of Mind
- The NASCAR Duopoly
- The State of TNI
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on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 3:29 am
Aren’t they the same “Hulman” baking powder people as well?
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 8:00 am
Journo-nice piece and I too agree w/ the road course preference. You covered many details and understandably could not devote too much to the actual formula of the IRL cars. IMHO therein lies a large chunk of the problem in IRL, and careful NASCAR cause it’s creeping into your stable as well. I am speaking of a spec car series.
While CART in its heyday had many chassis, engine and tire combos, IRL ultimately (& later CART as well) moved to single spec series. Pure racing enthusiasts get bored w/ that and tune out leaving only the casual viewer as a waning fan base. To see a early 90’s CART shootout in the hands of Nigel Mansell, Unsers, Andretti, Emmo , Montoya, Zanardi, Tracey, etc, etc sent shivers down your spine and truly rivaled F1. And trust me here that many of the current IRL drivers could not handle the fire breathing cars of that era. Ask Robby Gordon or Montoya and I would have loved to see Stewart wheel a Lola or March w/ turbo Cosworth power.
Typically, F1, Indy and sport car fans relate and latch onto the team even more so that the actual driver. While NASCAR fans, typically, follow the driver wherever he/she goes the Frances should be mindful that a spec series can breed boredom. I will admit that the spec COT is helping to pull NASCAR through these tough economic times, but Brian shouldn’t hedge the future on flat-line formula.
I want a car that, quite frankly, some drivers are just too scared to drive!
Oh yea Tony was the subject. I’ve always liked the Indy 500 and what it stood for, but honestly, being involved w/ that hallowed race and track doesn’t really automatically qualify Tony or anyone else to run a successful series.
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 8:36 am
I think you mention the France family owe a debt of gratitude to Tony George. Thanks to his power grab George turned the premier racing series in North America into a second rate side show. Thousands of those fans turned their attention to NASCAR and stayed while George struggled to squash CART.
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 9:52 am
Danica is an Illinois native, not Wisconsin, she was only born there.
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 10:19 am
It’s too bad that Tony George is such an arrogant, egotistical human being. His antics completely ruined what was a good open wheel series at the expense of the American racing public. I feel really sorry for the fine drivers that had to put up with him. Too bad the sisters did’nt do this much sooner. Who knows whether it can be saved now…
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Michael- Yes they are. Their company produces Clabber Girl.
on Jul 23rd, 2009 at 11:01 pm
Journo/TC – thanks for the post.
I will try not to break my record of longest post, but this is a topic near & dear to my heart. First, I grew up within earshot of THE Speedway. My friends & I would ride our bikes over after to school to catch Happy Hour. Then, I started working in the sport on the IndyCar side of the world. For a kid that hung on the fence to catch a glimpse of Al/Bobby Unser, Foyt & Mario; standing on the grid for “Back Home Again” is really special. I still get goose bumps when I drive through the tunnel.
Much like Neon (and similar to a lot of NASCAR fans), I liked the racing pre-spec series much better. The days of Granatelli’s turbine, V6’s with massive turbos, Wildcat & Eagle chassis, etc…. ahhh those were the days.
Now, I do not want to turn this into a controversial topic, but I will disagree with folks that TG “ruined” the sport or allowed NASCAR to become the dominant motorsport.
There were some pretty deep issues going back into the 1970/1980’s. Remember, CART was formed because Patrick, Penske & Haas did not like the way USAC was handling the sport in the late 1970’s. A time when many would say the sport & the 500 were doing quite well.
Patrick, Penske & the gang wanted control of the sport. So CART was run by committee. A committee that had power struggles for 20 years. There was the fiasco in the late 80’s where they fired Frasco & Caponigro for favoring certain “more powerful teams.” Then they hired Stokkan and Craig as CEO’s but would not let them actually make the changes CART needed. As Journo pointed out in another post, the dictatorship of the France family provides stability to NASCAR. While I think NASCAR takes the dictatorship too far, management by committee is worse.
While there were Cosworth engines and Chevy/Ilmor engines, when the Ilmor was THE engine to have, not any/all teams could get on the Chevy program. Haas decided when you got your Lola chassis delivered to you. If it was late in the offseason, you had little chance to test and learn before the season began. Then Haas/Ganassi has such close relationships with Lola/Reynard, if your team found an advantage and shared it with your Lola/Reynard engineer, it was certain Haas/Ganassi teams were going to know about it.
Another issue with CART (and a primary place NASCAR did so well) was that many of the sponsors were B2B deals. You had PPG, Amax Coal, Alumax, LCI, Oracle & MacKenzie. PPG really did not care about the consumer. PPG wanted owners of body shops, car dealers, etc… to buy PPG paint. Same with the other groups. They were there to entertain VIPs of the customers. Kmart/Target did nothing to promote its involvement in the series. They could care less. Their involvement was/is paid for by the vendors. About the only folks that were concerned with consumers was Marlboro, Bud & Miller. In NASCAR, you had Winston, Busch, Bud, Tide, Folgers, Miller, Texaco, Kellogg’s, Wrangler, etc..
The importance of that is; 1) exposure of the sport to the consumer and 2) longevity of the sponsorship.
As far as exposure, when you have team and series sponsor spending lots of $$ to put a picture/standup/display in the grocery store of their driver, that helps promote the sport. I know people that the first time they had heard of Ricky Rudd was from hi standup in the detergent aisle. How many people have heard of Ludwig Heimroth, Jr because of his MacKenzie sponsor?
As far as longevity, when the objective of the sponsorship is to entertain VIP’s you now have lots of competition for places to entertain VIPs. Once you have a sale/marketing executive that likes golf, sailing, whatever instead of racing; they will decide to entertain their customers via golf, sailing, etc… When you can prove consumers are buying lots of your product because you sponsor/promote through racing, it is difficult to do something else. Also, with more and more companies having very serious purchasing rules, you could not entertain much anyway. So, that model of sponsorship died/was substantially hurt and would have dried up for CART.
So, while on the outside IRL looks very similar to CART in the mid-90’s, there are some big differences.
I am actually sorry to see Tony go. He was the only family member that was involved on a regular basis at IMS (and IRL). He is the only family member that was passionate about racing and the track. The others are passionate about their dividend/distribution checks. I have not seen the actual numbers (I doubt many have) spent by TG over the last 15-16 years, but I have heard $500-$600MM. But I have heard that those numbers include capital expenditures at IMS, not just IRL. Some of that would include much needed improvements to the media center and race control. Some of it would have been to build the pit road suites that are revenue producing. So what the real draw on cash flow…who knows?
Yes, I am sure TG would go back and change some decisions if he could, but wouldn’t we all?
Remember, he was the guy that pushed hard to bring NASCAR to IMS. He brought F1 back to the US. He cannot be faulted for that vision.
I am also sad to see Joie go. As you said Journo, he is very talented. He was also very passionate about racing. ISC scored big there. Now IMS/IRL are led by bean-counters and attorneys.
I have heard lots of people begging for IMS/IRL to hire Humpy. Humpy is too much of a carnival promoter. He can sell tickets and blow up things during pre-race, but that is not what we need. We need great races, cool cars and innovation…very similar to NASCAR…not pre-race shows, concerts and family ticket deals for the chicken bone seats.
on Jul 24th, 2009 at 12:29 am
They sponsored Reeves several years back. Whenever He wrecked the broadcasters would call it “Clobber Girl!”
on Jul 24th, 2009 at 6:38 am
IMO, 2 things hurting the IRL (& NASCAR too) are going to a “spec” series & lousy TV coverage. Look @ Indy cars in the ’60′s for eample – dramatically different designs, from which came all kinds of technological developments. Also, nearly every new development on street cars came from racing – radial tires, disc brakes, overhead cams, fuel injection, etc. – heck, seat belts & rear-view mirrors were 1st used in race cars. I grew up in Indy & I enjoyed going to qualifying as much as the race – which design is going to work better? And you’d often see very different designs run about the same lap times. Just because it works on the drawing board (or computer model) doesn’t mean it’ll work on the track – you have to go try it. There was always something new being tried & it made for great competition.
As to the TV aspect, I don’t watch enough to justify the (high) cost of cable or satelite, so there are only a few races I can watch, unless I go in person & having moved to the South many years ago, the races are just too far away to attend in person. I’m certainly not going to pay to watch a spec series on TV – I did watch the IROC Series when it started & was a fun series, but they ruined it by cutting races back to a few ovals where NASCAR drivers had the clear advantage.
Face it IRL, racing is expensive & trying to limit costs by making everybody run the same chassis & leased engines just makes most races follow-the-leader boring. If you want to spark interest again, you’ll have to let different manufacturers come in with different designs & put all the races on broadcast TV so anyone can watch & people (including myself) will be interested in which team is trying what for the next race.