Long Beach race continues despite Champ Car

[Editor's Note: Reprint from a Long Beach Press Telegram article. Since Long Beach is Champ Car's biggest race, each article like this in the local newspapers helps to drive another nail in Champ Car's coffin. A reader who sent the article to us writes, – Dear AutoRacing1.com, I pray every day that the owners of Champ Car will sell the series to some major entity who can do what it takes to run the series right. As a long-time fan I am disheartened to see such a great product suffer from years of mismanagement and lack of enough investment to do it right. It's clear the current owners do not have enough money or wherewithal to run a major race series. I would much prefer that team owners do not also own the series. Please Kevin, Gerry, Dan and Paul, sell it to an independent entity who won't have any conflicts of interest. Just the fact that team owners also own the series has to make potential new team owners think twice. Dan Black]

The Long Beach Grand Prix feels more like Liechtenstein every day. The tiny principality is small in size only. It's an Old World city with a new world economy that appears disaffected by the tumult in that lands around it.

Such is the Grand Prix. The city fathers love the event. It draws six-digits worth of humanity annually to its weekend of racing, and the economic community considers it institutional stock.

Now if only it could get away from the tumult of Champ Car.

The racing series is once again beset by problems and gaffes, operated by directors who seemingly can't read a map, which is not a good thing if auto racing is your game. The people who run the Grand Prix look at this mess, shrug their shoulders yet again, and move on with its usual purpose.

The race isn't immune to these problems, but it has a stronger constitution than others.

"We can operate in a semi-autonomous vacuum," said Jim Michaelian, the CEO of the Grand Prix Association. "We like to think we have the greatest venue for the sport in North America, and we continually put on a good show.

"There's no doubt our task is more challenging than it was years ago, but it doesn't stop us from doing our thing to make the race a success and evolve." More at DailyBreeze.com