They Want Indy Cars Off Roads and on Ovals

Will there be two Indy car series in 1996?

It appears that way as the fledgling Indy Racing League continues to schedule races, obtain tracks and talk about a revival of oval track racing, even while the existing CART IndyCar series moves toward another successful season.

The IRL, which has Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the Indianapolis 500 as its linchpin, has announced plans to open an inaugural season Jan. 27 with the Walt Disney World Indy 200 at Orlando, Fla. Other races are expected to be scheduled on a new track in Las Vegas, the existing Phoenix International Raceway and perhaps New Hampshire Raceway.

All of the IRL races will be on ovals.

“One of our objectives is to put into place the mechanics to get American oval racers an opportunity to get to the Indy 500,” said Jack Long, executive director of IRL. “We need a development system that will produce young drivers with experience at oval racing.”

This year’s 17-race PPG Cup Indy car schedule opened two weeks ago with a street race in Miami that attracted a sellout crowd of about 90,000 that watched Canada’s Jacques Villeneuve win. The schedule includes 11 street or road courses and only six ovals, including Indianapolis.

Of the 26 cars entered in Sunday’s street race in Surfers Paradise, Australia, 16 will have foreign drivers.

There is an existing Indy car development series, Indy Lights, but like its big brother, it runs mostly on road circuits and has been dominated by foreign drivers.

“Ovals have been the heart of Indy car racing, and we feel the current administration is heading in the wrong direction with almost twice as many road races as ovals,” Long said. “And we need to reduce speeds. The cars may be going 240 (m.p.h.) this year at Michigan, and that’s too fast.”

The IRL first announced plans for a smaller engine size and chassis modifications from those in this year’s series, but when it appeared that it might be difficult to have enough cars ready for its Disney World race, the IRL announced that it will follow the current regulations, for next year at least.

“We regard this as a logical and sensible decision by the Indy Racing League,” said Andrew Craig, IndyCar president. “While we want to make it clear that this is a unilateral IRL decision about IRL rules, we believe that this is generally in the best interest of the sport and many of the smaller teams in particular.”

There is also a possibility that the two groups will merge, although Long and Tony George, Speedway president and IRL founder, insist that IRL will conduct its own oval races. The two sides, however, have been meeting in hopes of establishing a single set of rules, eliminating schedule conflicts and working together in safety and technical areas.

Car owners Carl Haas, Carl Hogan and Chip Ganassi, plus Craig, have represented the older group, with George, Long, John Cooper and Dick King, president of the U.S. Auto Club, representing the IRL.

“The focus (of the meetings) has been on blend, rather than conflict,” Long said. “We need to slow the cars, which was the aim of our original rules, but it put an undue hardship on racing teams to have new cars ready by next January.”

The IRL would have downsized the current 2.65-liter V-8 engines to 2.2 liters and required chassis aerodynamic and ground effects modifications.

Motor Racing Notes

OFF ROAD--Larry Ragland drove a Chevrolet to victory in the Trophy-Truck class of the Tecate SCORE San Felipe 250 last week. The Phoenix veteran beat Indy car driver Robby Gordon’s Ford by 10 minutes. Gordon left immediately for Australia, where he will race Sunday. Defending champion Ivan Stewart finished sixth in a Toyota. Ed and Tim Herbst of Las Vegas teamed in a Mike Smith Porsche to win overall among the other classes. When Diablo Dry Lake filled with water during last weekend’s storm, only about half of the 250 starters finished the race. . . . Off-road vehicles will race Sunday in the McKenzie’s Performance Products series at Glen Helen Park in San Bernardino.

DRAG RACING--The 36th anniversary of the legendary March Meet will be celebrated Saturday and Sunday at Bakersfield Raceway, site of the original event in Famoso. The Goodguys Vintage Drag Racing Assn. will hold races for pre-1973 vehicles of all classes.

MISCELLANY--The Sprint Car Racing Assn. will return to action Saturday night at Manzanita Speedway in Phoenix. . . . The International Hot Boat Assn. will open its drag boat season this weekend with the Mission Foods Winternationals at Firebird Raceway, near Phoenix. . . . After suffering head injuries in a sprint car accident last Sept. 25 in Ohio, Page Jones, the 23-year-old son of 1963 Indianapolis 500 winner Parnelli Jones, is showing slow but steady improvement at Daniel Freeman Hospital.