Del Mar Grand Prix Seeks Move to Downtown San Diego : Auto racing: Race promoter Chris Pook thinks his proposal is too attractive for the city to refuse. His plan would include a 10-turn, 1.56-mile course.

Chris Pook was in San Diego Thursday for the announcement that the Von’s grocery store chain was going to be the next sponsor of the Grand Prix of San Diego.

But of even more local impact was confirmation that Pook’s Del Mar Race Management team is seeking to move the increasingly popular event from its site on the Del Mar Fairgrounds to a downtown location that would feature the San Diego Convention Center as its centerpiece.

Pook has proposed a 10-turn, 1.56-mile layout that would not disrupt traffic at Seaport Village, the Marriott hotel, Embarcadero Park South, the shipyards or on the trolley lines.

And if that wasn’t enough to whet the city’s appetite, he isn’t asking for any up-front financial assistance. The major financial request: He wants the city to resurface Harbor Drive and bill the race over a five-year period.

Pook wants the 1993 race to go off Aug. 13-15, though that date conflicts with a Ford Motor Co. convention that has booked the Convention Center and more than 1,000 hotel rooms.

The race’s new five-year contract with the fairgrounds has a clause that allows Pook to move the race after its sixth running, which is Oct. 9-11. He is not dissatisfied with Del Mar, though.

“When one’s superiors (the boards of Del Mar Race Management and the Southern California Grand Prix Limited Partnership) tell you to look, you’ve got to look at it,” Pook said before departing for an International Motor Sports Assn. promoters’ meeting in Nashville, Tenn. “You’ve got to go through the process proper, you need to conform to policy, so that the event will have a positive economic impact; create jobs, especially in the minority area; be a viable marketing tool so that downtown businesses profit from it; and that the people of San Diego enjoy it and benefit.”

Bruce Herring, deputy city manager, sent a memo to Mayor Maureen O’Connor and city council members that stated: “Moving the Grand Prix to downtown San Diego is in keeping with the goals of the Economic Development Task Force’s recommendations to establish major annual events that have a strong economic impact on the community while providing festival, fund-raising and athletic opportunities for San Diegans.”

The race, which features GTP prototypes and GTO and GTU sedans, has attracted 334,500 in paid attendance in its five years at Del Mar, including last year’s record three-day total of 76,000. But the race must move downtown to attain the status of the Long Beach Grand Prix, which Pook founded and heads. More than 200,000 attended Long Beach in 1990-91.

Pook will have a chance to personally win over the movers and shakers Aug. 12 with a presentation before the Public Facilities and Recreation Committee.

“There has to be a conceptual buy-in of the project, then we can hammer out the details,” Pook said.

IMSA has a contract with NBC for an Aug. 22 telecast, meaning the proposed downtown race would be shown on a one-week tape delay.

The proposed course would use Harbor Drive between First and Eighth avenues, Fifth and Eighth avenues south of Harbor Drive and outside the parking lot to the south of the Convention Center.

“There are some national people excited about this: the sanctioning body (IMSA), sponsors, NBC, the buff (automobile) media,” Pook said. “This is going to be like a Grand National Steeplechase. Someone just dropped the flag and we haven’t gotten to the first fence yet.”