LMDh (DPi regulations version 2.0)

[BrentJackson]

Originally Posted by truebeliever

However, in a post Virus world, they may just have to re-think that business model.

Thanks to the coronavirus, there is no maybe now. And that's a problem for IMSA too, as they have to live with similar regulations, unless they want to abandon the connection with the ACO, as they will dragged kicking and screaming to the world of privateer-supported sports car racing.

The question is what that will be. Chiana's points about it ultimately being taken over by a vast collection of Oreca 07s with new badges do have some point to it, but I'm not entirely sure that will be what happens because the manufacturers will not always be there forever and having Ginetta and Dallara and Riley and Multimatic leaving isn't gonna be good for the ACO for a variety of reasons, and sooner or later that will start to get back to making the teams and their supporters unhappy, which then rapidly becomes a problem for the race itself.

Maybe motor racing on a smaller scale will work .... but given real estate costs, track maintenance, and the cost of media contracts (not sure TV will be a big force 20 years from now) I am not sure that motor racing, as it has been for the last century, will exist much any more.

It is a question of fan base, ultimately. There have to be enough fans for sponsors to be willing to fund teams, even privateers ... or enough billionaire enthusiasts willing to bankroll teams at a loss for the fun of it. Sponsors are the only sustainable cash source ... and as the fan base shrinks (how many 18-25-year-olds are excited by cars anymore?) sponsor value shrinks ....

I think part of this problem is the wide ways one can get entertainment these days for cheap. We've all seen what the internet can do, and television viewers for many of these series has been nearly non-existent, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Are there enough people with interest out there? I think there it is, but the price of admission is too high (as you mentioned, when a Trans-Am car can lap as fast as a GT3 car, there is clearly an issue there) and there isn't enough advertising and get-out-the-name out there. IMO, IMSA would be wise to make sure TV networks know that they will be streaming races online at the same time, so be prepared for people to do that (And yes, TV may be irrelevant twenty years from now, or it may have merged with the internet in a hybrid of the two styles), and directly also broadcast it onto games - and use trackers to know where the cars are on the track, so someone playing Gran Turismo or Forza Motorsport can race along with it, feeling like they are in the event. Once VR is commonplace in the world, have suitable cameras in the race cars so one can feel like they are riding shotgun in the race cars.

What says to me there is interest in the sport is the tens of millions of copies games like the aforementioned series manage to sell. Also, ideas like Nissan's GT Academy are absolute genius as well - how about it, IMSA? A competition in one of the games (or hell do both) where the best competitor gets a shot at racing in IMSA for real, perhaps in a GT4 car to prove their up for it, or have the best dozen or so come to test out real GT4 cars and get IMSA licenses, allowing them to legitimately seek out IMSA rides?

Young people have in recent times been hamstrung more than anything by money and distance. We are, when accounted for inflation, considerably poorer than our parents. That's never stopped me, but I can see why that would stop others. The coronavirus may have, in a perverse silver lining, changed that, as the demands for better pay and conditions for people who are still working are likely to keep fighting long after the virus is gone. If finances improve for the young generation, that's likely to see more of them go to racetracks, both now and in the future....

As far as the rich enthusiasts, people like James Glickenhaus, Lawrence Stroll, Ed Brown and Laurence Tomlinson prove those people are still out there. And there has been a lot written about the generation of app-made millionaires that have made Northern California an expensive place to live, and many of them having a love of cars. Maybe we need to get a lot of those people out to races at Laguna Seca for the whole experience - a ride in a DPi, a shot at driving a GT4 (or maybe even GT3) car, a helmet and driving suit, seeing the tech in an IMSA car, whatever works. Who knows, it might make them buy a GT car and get out there....

As far as sponsors for the series, the cost of competing in the series is half the issue, its also the return for their investment, which means lots of people watching great races. IMO, the best way to get that attention is big and diverse grids and constant action, with the ability to keep people watching all the time.

Fans used to pay for the tracks, but with real estate values rising, how many track owners are going to make enough money selling tickets to cover the cost of the tracks? How many will sell out to developers?

This is a problem for some, but not others. I can see it being issue at a track like Road Atlanta or Circuit of the Americas that is closer to a major city, but one result of the economic problems that exist now is going to a major drop in property prices, which will make selling out to a developer much less attractive. But that doesn't make your point of selling tickets less valid, but in the short term I wouldn't be too worried about that, even if in the medium-term its much more worthy of consideration.

I'd be happy to see a bunch of full-on two- and three-liter normally aspirated sports racers and GTs going at it .... a lot more affordable than all the "cutting-edge", change-every-season regulations we have now. But how many people will be happy watching cars going by slower than they used to?

HERE is the major problem. Think about this: One Riley Daytona Prototype owned by Chip Ganassi Racing raced for twelve years with Lexus, BMW and Ford power, and one of Dyson Racing's Riley and Scott Mark IIIs racked up over 45,000 racing miles, in four different race series - IMSA, USRRC, ALMS and Grand-Am. Were these cars slower at the end of their lives? Not really - hell, thanks to regulation changes, the Ganassi DP was undoubtedly much faster. Do the cars have to be replaced every four years, if that much? Would a 2014-vintage Acura ARX-03b not be impressive today? If somebody built a Riley or Coyote DP with C8 Corvette lights and detailing, or a Ganassi Riley with the detailing from the Ford GT, would that not still be incredibly fast? Would a previous-generation GTE or GT3 car still be quite a machine to see?

As was mentioned earlier, if a Trans-Am car can make the same pace as the GT3 car, or an older GT3 car runs at similar pace to the new one, why not let the old one race? What would be the problem with Trans-Am TA1 cars joining the field in IMSA? Grand-Am did that for years, and they were never a problem there.

What about letting the Oreca FLM09s back, but with Oreca 03R bodywork and a choice of production-based V8s of similar-displacement to the old engine that are readily available - Chevrolet LT2, Ford Voodoo, Chrysler 6.1 Hemi, Nissan VK56, Toyota 3UR, et cetera - and let them race once again? (This assumes you don't just let the LMP3s into IMSA, but I think the evolved-FLM09 with the roaring V8s is a cheaper - and allows more freedom - option.) And what about the current DPis not specifically having to change the bodywork, just the engines and electronics and gearboxes to go with them?

Before we go to a field of smaller-engine cars for IMSA - large engines are still quite common in North America, and will be for some time to come still - why not simply let the cars we have extend their lives? They don't have to last forever, of course, but making suitable race cars cheaper and more accessible is certainly not going to hurt IMSA. (And in all fairness, the DeltaWing showed that a two-liter-or-less race car can go quite fast indeed....)

Shoot, I would be fine with stock-block engines, given the degree of sophistication out there now .... just wrap them in light little bodies, insane power/weight ratios .... but how do you excite a new fan who doesn't own or ever want to own a car to begin with?

People who don't want cars won't be race fans, so they don't matter in the discussion. What matters are the fans to come. They do exist, otherwise nobody would bother making racing games for all kinds of platforms. The challenge IMO is getting them hooked early on. Games can help. Greater accessibility to the races on multiple platforms can also help.

Beyond that, what else? Advertise on college and university campuses, and get college and university engineering departments to partner up with race teams? Maybe a challenge to build a DeltaWing-style competitor that would be legal to race in IMSA?

The world has changed, yes. But priority number one needs to be getting more cars on the track to get greater action to get more people watching. That can be done, if IMSA has the will.