IRL, Champ Car schedules indicate anti-merger
Remember the talk this summer that the merger was all but complete? One newspaper even ran a bold headline that it was a done deal. Yeah, and Dewey defeated Truman, too.
The 2007 schedules are out for both series, and there are no hints at unification. There is even a hint at a backward step.
Both sides had indicated that Champ Car would leave much of May open so that its drivers could take part in qualifying for the Indianapolis 500.
Instead, Champ Car scheduled a race in China on May 20, the second weekend of qualifying for Indy. Champ Car drivers could qualify on the first weekend (May 12-13) but it would make for an awfully busy travel schedule, from Indy to China to Indy.
During a teleconference promoting an interesting 15-race schedule, Champ Car president Steve Johnson was asked about the difficulty of putting together a schedule with the possibility of a merger with the IRL.
Johnson indicated the unification was never a factor in finalizing the Champ schedule.
"I am running the business of Champ Car," Johnson said. "I am not running the business of trying to put a merger together. I took to our board what I felt was the best schedule that I have seen Champ Car have in many years.
"From a merger standpoint, my focus is and continues to be running the business of the Champ Car World Series, and if anything were to happen with a merger we'll see how that fits in down the road." Houston Chronicle
[Editor's Note: With all the new races added by both sides, those contracts will be an additional barrier to unification. It will cost the sanctioning body money to break those agreements. The only way to merge then might be our two divisions with a playoff system (under one governing body) just like we proposed in April of 2005. We still think that might be the best possible scenario for the short-term as it allows both sides to control something – i.e. their division.]