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Old 30 Jun 2013, 01:39 (Ref:3271747)   #51
BullMan
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These are ENDURANCE races. 6 hours is fine. I'm ****ed that ALMS shortened VIR, Road America AND Laguna this year. If I didn't live less than 2 hours from VIR I probably wouldn't have bothered with it.
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Old 30 Jun 2013, 06:40 (Ref:3271779)   #52
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The interesting thing for me here is the use of the word 'viewers' in the thread title. When I go to a race, I'm a spectator. So I presume this thread is intended at judging the best length of race for TV viewers, is it?
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Old 30 Jun 2013, 09:09 (Ref:3271804)   #53
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The interesting thing for me here is the use of the word 'viewers' in the thread title. When I go to a race, I'm a spectator. So I presume this thread is intended at judging the best length of race for TV viewers, is it?
I was thinking the same thing. At the Silverstone 6 Hours this year I just about had time to walk around the whole track during the race.

The difference between 24 hours at LM and 'sprint' races would be too big. I would favour a couple races between 6 and 24 hours in length. I have sentimental (albeit hazy, I was very young) memories of the Kyalami 9 Hours.
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Old 30 Jun 2013, 09:33 (Ref:3271812)   #54
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The interesting thing for me here is the use of the word 'viewers' in the thread title. When I go to a race, I'm a spectator. So I presume this thread is intended at judging the best length of race for TV viewers, is it?
Yes... in America they only give 30 minute highlights of the WEC. Worthless!
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Old 30 Jun 2013, 09:38 (Ref:3271818)   #55
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How about this.

7 Hours of Imola
11 Hours of Silverstone
8 Hours of Spa
24 Hours of Le Mans
10 Hours of Interlagos
6 Hours of COTA
5 Hours of Fuji
9 Hours of Shanghai
4 Hours of Bahrain
Not bad, but I was more thinking about the traditional endurance lengths such as 1000 km, 6 hours, 12, etc. I wouldn't mind Bahrain and Shanghai to be a good sprint race of 2 minutes, though.
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Old 30 Jun 2013, 09:44 (Ref:3271821)   #56
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Not bad, but I was more thinking about the traditional endurance lengths such as 1000 km, 6 hours, 12, etc. I wouldn't mind Bahrain and Shanghai to be a good sprint race of 2 minutes, though.
Yes, Bahrain and Shanghai are indeed snooze fests. And when Nico Rosberg complained of coughing and burning eyes because of the toxic atmospheric soup Shanghai is bathed in, I decided to pull the plug on Shanghai racing. As a big believer in green energy, the 6 Hours of Shanghai is hard to watch...

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Old 30 Jun 2013, 22:32 (Ref:3272139)   #57
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Yes, Bahrain and Shanghai are indeed snooze fests. And when Nico Rosberg complained of coughing and burning eyes because of the toxic atmospheric soup Shanghai is bathed in, I decided to pull the plug on Shanghai racing. As a big believer in green energy, the 6 Hours of Shanghai is hard to watch...

Interesting - China's a mix of environmental brutality and solid investment in more sustainable ways of doing things.

You only have to look at how much more pleasurable it is taking high speed rail around China than it is coping with the absurdities of domestic flights to see that they're very much going in the right direction.

In that light the WEC at Shanghai is a fantastic fit, and if Chinese industry, and one of the most exciting cities on the planet can get engaged by the WEC then so much the better.

That said, watching 6 hours or more around a dull track is a lot more of a challenge than one involving say a Spa, Imola, or Road Atlanta.

Others have raised golf and cycling as other long events that manage fine - it the WEC can manage to communicate the ebb and flow and underlying information that shows what's happening in a long distance sportscar race then I genuinely don't think having a product that's six hours long is going to be a problem at all.
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Old 1 Jul 2013, 01:40 (Ref:3272174)   #58
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Admittedly, it's harder now than in the past IMO to just tune out of a race for 4-5 hours. The racing is much more competitive/aggressive than in the old days where watching the start and first couple of hours and the end was all you really needed. 4 hour races were great for BPR, I'd like to see a couple 4 hour races, and maybe even a sort of fun race at the Norisring (1 hr, 45 minutes), mandatory full service stop. A little variety would help the series IMO.
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Old 1 Jul 2013, 06:38 (Ref:3272220)   #59
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Admittedly, it's harder now than in the past IMO to just tune out of a race for 4-5 hours. The racing is much more competitive/aggressive than in the old days where watching the start and first couple of hours and the end was all you really needed. 4 hour races were great for BPR, I'd like to see a couple 4 hour races, and maybe even a sort of fun race at the Norisring (1 hr, 45 minutes), mandatory full service stop. A little variety would help the series IMO.
Four hours sounds good for a bit of variety. Mandatory pit stops, on the other hand, make me mad.
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Old 1 Jul 2013, 06:42 (Ref:3272221)   #60
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chunder should be qualifying in the top 3 on the gridchunder should be qualifying in the top 3 on the gridchunder should be qualifying in the top 3 on the grid
Two races, a shorter srint type race where guys can go flat out all the time, and a longer race maybe 3 hours, to get a little of that long distance feel for teams and drivers.

It is hard to sell tickets for an enduro race I imagne judging by the amounts of people you see at them, but maybe that is just enduro racing isnt that popular except for one weekend a year? When it is infiltrated by people who are just wanting a good time!
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Old 1 Jul 2013, 07:42 (Ref:3272247)   #61
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Two races, a shorter srint type race where guys can go flat out all the time, and a longer race maybe 3 hours, to get a little of that long distance feel for teams and drivers.

It is hard to sell tickets for an enduro race I imagne judging by the amounts of people you see at them, but maybe that is just enduro racing isnt that popular except for one weekend a year? When it is infiltrated by people who are just wanting a good time!
I suspect it's a combination of relative obscurity, a more complicated proposition in racing terms (multi-class is always harder for people to get their heads around), and overall positioning.

Thinking back to the golden age, you could cram a decent crowd into the likes of Brands Hatch, but Monza never managed to get many people through the gates.

Is it however a question of selling tickets on the gate or attracting eyeballs? If it's the latter, and I suspect it is, one key area would be investing in the production of a solid highlights package - the current approach of taking the live footage and splicing together the start and the end simply doesn't work and won't serve to help the audience figure out what happened. I seem to remember when the LMS first started back in 2004 this wasn't such an issue - the Monza race that year coming across pretty well as a highlights package.
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Old 1 Jul 2013, 10:56 (Ref:3272322)   #62
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It is hard to sell tickets for an enduro race I imagne judging by the amounts of people you see at them, but maybe that is just enduro racing isnt that popular …

Well … how many serious endurance races can most fans see? It isn’t like a lot of areas have multiple top-tier endures in traveling distance. Maybe some folks in Europe, but even then, how many people can get to more than one WEC race?

As for being too long for people trackside, I cannot think of a day I went to a track for just a race. When I go to a race I am there as early as I can get there and want to see racing all day at least. I cannot imagine someone taking a trip to see a race and only spending four hours at the track after a four-hour flight or drive. (I guess some American oval-racing fans do that, but I can’t understand it.)

Further, it depends in which country the event is held. In Europe, not so sure how the economy has rebounded but reading about all the financial uncertainty makes me think maybe a long weekend at the track is not an option for some potential fans.

As for TV, I don’t know what kind of ratings the races get, but I understand the problem of devoting a six-hopur block of time to one event. TV-web combined coverage seems like a better option in this case.

As for “a shorter srint type race where guys can go flat out all the time,” that sounds like Le Mans and all the shorter events. What “endurance” races are run slowly any more, except one Middle Eastern event that uses a target lap time?

“…one key area would be investing in the production of a solid highlights package…

This. If you have to cut up a race, take a little time and tell a story. Since you know the outcome, you can choose which action to spend more time with and which to downplay.

Snippets of cars interspersed with snippets of passes and crashes leaves viewers not knowing if they watched one race or highlights from several. If the race isn’t live, take an extra couple hours and make the highlight show have a little continuity.

I’d say endurance racing is not a tremendously and widely popular sport, but it has a solid core of fans and the potential to grow with a little promotion.
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Old 2 Jul 2013, 00:41 (Ref:3272707)   #63
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For me, the longer the better. I know when Daytona, Sebring, LeMans & PLM are on the schedule and make sure to make no plans for that day/weekend. For any other race, I don't feel bad when If miss and tend to not watch a lot of them or will watch them on fastforward on the PVR. Really nothing special about a sprint race, unless the cars are really interesting to look at & hear.

Since I can't attend Mosport this year I thought of going to Lime rock but saw that it was a 3 hours race and decided that the 6h drive wasn't worth it. For a longer race , I might have!
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Old 2 Jul 2013, 04:14 (Ref:3272732)   #64
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Beryl should be qualifying in the top 5 on the gridBeryl should be qualifying in the top 5 on the grid
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I wouldn't mind having one (or more) 10-12 hour races in the WEC provided it would be at a proper circruit (no Bahrain etc).
The 12 hour Malaysia Merdeka Endurance at Sepang should probably be added to either the WEC or AsLMS schedule. Sepang is a great track and often provides great racing in F1 and Super GT, but it's also modern and fairly "safe". Would be a solid addition to either schedule.
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Old 13 Jul 2013, 15:46 (Ref:3277339)   #65
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Races should be either 24 hours, 12 hours or done by distance.

I find the 6 hour format actually harder to stomach than 3 hours.

At least three hours generally produces close racing in big fields (I'm a big fan of the Blancpain series), 6 hours seems long enough to string the field out but not long enough to allow a race to develop or push the endurance element. the Tilkedromes, and anorexic fields only serve to exacerbate the issue.
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Old 13 Jul 2013, 16:35 (Ref:3277348)   #66
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Sportscar racing has always been about the people who come to the track, not TV. Longer races give extra value to those who buy tickets, 3 hours is the minimum distance races should be.

The North American Endurance Championship rounds (Daytona, Sebring, Watkins Glen, Indy, Atlanta) should be a minimum of 6 hours.
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Old 14 Jul 2013, 10:18 (Ref:3277518)   #67
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Sportscar racing has always been about the people who come to the track, not TV. Longer races give extra value to those who buy tickets, 3 hours is the minimum distance races should be.

The North American Endurance Championship rounds (Daytona, Sebring, Watkins Glen, Indy, Atlanta) should be a minimum of 6 hours.
Put them in WEC as 4 Hour Races instead. Keep the original duration when racing in USCR.
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Old 14 Jul 2013, 13:04 (Ref:3277553)   #68
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"Sportscar racing has always been about the people who come to the track, not TV."

I disagree. Sports car racing when it started was about manufacturers showing off their cars, and rich people getting thrills. No one much cared about the fans.

Endurance racing even more so.

What sports car racing Used to be all about is not really relevant anyway. If sports car racing is going to survive in a changing world it might have to change.

Sports car racing didn't used to be on TV, for instance, and wasn't live on TV, and all that. Sports car racing used to be two short heats on Saturday and Sunday sometimes (look at the original Can Am) and mostly long races, and a whole bunch of things.

And sure, before it was televised, it made money from the people at the track, but do you think people picked 1000 km or 12 hours thinking of the track attendees? No, those distances/durations were picked to test the cars and teams. (Yeah, Mille Miglia was All about giving the fans a good show. )

Endurance Racing (as opposed to just Sports Car Racing) has always been six hours, 1000k, or longer, if we want to play the "tradition" card. But what about also considering the "financial health" card?

Financial health involves a few things: keeping factories involved, keeping long-time fans involved (you know the ones who already spend all day at the track even for a 3-hr race) and getting good TV coverage top draw in more sponsors.

I am all for long races. I understand that some series cannot afford long races all the time (e.g. ALMS/USCR) I understand that tradition is important, fan expectation is important, TV costs are important.

But it is also important that we keep the argument focused on fact.

Every time I have been to a sports car race, people showed up early and stayed late, whether it was a three- or a twelve-hour race. And That is the tradition.

I recall a picture form a race in the late '50s showing a couple with a blanket, a wicker picnic basket, bottle of wine ... set up on a knoll with the track wrapping around it. That was sports car racing---pack a lunch and spend all day in the sun. No timing and scoring on the smartphone---not even a track announcer on the PA, because the speakers were only on the front straight near the grandstands.

The question is, what is best for the health of the sport right now; what race length is most likely to keep viewers, maybe increase the nu8mber fo viewers, and attract more sponsors?

I am biased, so I will say, "Longer races keep the infrequent races on TV for a longer chunk of the day, creating more chances for channel-flippers to see the races and maybe get interested."

That's BS, but if we are going to make BS arguments ... why not.

[Sorry for the disorganized post, it is early and I am watching the Tour de France while typing---yeah a five-or six-hour stage where the fans (300,000 today) line the side of a mountain to watch the peloton pass in a few seconds. That is more the tradition of racing.]
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Old 14 Jul 2013, 14:37 (Ref:3277581)   #69
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Call that endurance? Froome crossed the line in less than six hours. Pah
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