Lexmark 300 future secure
“I cannot understand where all the current rumor and speculation has been circulated from and take offence to such accusations of instability in regards to Australia’s number one motorsport spectacular," said Lexmark Indy 300 Chairman Terry Mackenroth.
“The future of our current management structure, which has yielded countless major successes over the past decade, is in good hands.
“The Queensland Government and IMG have more recently exchanged letters of intent to continue our partnership and only some of the finer details of the agreement are still being worked through at the moment.
“Our current agreement will take us through to the 2008 event and we expect to cement a formal arrangement between the Queensland Government and our event partners IMG to take us through another five year contractual period up to and inclusive of the 2013 event."
Similarly Lexmark Indy 300 General Manager Greg Hooton was happy with the progress of ongoing discussions with the Queensland Government and expects IMG, in conjunction with the Gold Coast Motor Events Corporation, to continue to enhance the global reputation of one of Australia’s major events.
“The Queensland Government has been a fantastic partner in the Lexmark Indy 300 during a relationship with IMG for the past 10 years," said Hooton.
“Together we have netted countless milestones in respect to continually growing the event, which in turn has proven to be a major windfall in respect to boosting local economies and providing a boom tourism period for Queensland.
“We look forward to working together with the State Government well beyond 2008.
“Together we have worked tirelessly to make this event not only one of the most successful in Australia but more strategically one of the true iconic motorsports events in the world."
The 17th Lexmark Indy 300 will be staged on Queensland’s Gold Coast October 18-21.
[Editor's Note: It's interesting that the press release never made mention of Champ Car, just that the event would continue. Hmmm……given all the rumors of Champ Car's collapse one would have thought they would have gone out of their way to mention Champ Car at least once. The event is called the 'Indy' 300 so we suppose they could easily bring in the IRL IndyCar series and continue like nothing happened.]