Interviews with Steve Johnson and Kevin Kalkhoven
Here are transcripts of their conversations.
Interview with Steve Johnson:
STAR: You opened the season with three quick races (Las Vegas, Long Beach, Houston), then there was a six-week gap. There are several of those "gaps" before you end the season in Phoenix in early December. What are you going to do to compress your schedule next year?
JOHNSON: We’re working on tightening things up right now. It’s unfortunate what happened this year but we’re working now to avoid that in 2008. Right now, we’re in talks with about 14 different cities in several countries. Our intention is to close some of these gaps because (when we stop) we lose momentum, continuity and consistency.
But the type of racing we do – grand prix racing through city streets – creates problems. Sometimes you can’t race when you want to. For instance, this spring Las Vegas told us, "You either come race this weekend or you don’t race." Phoenix said, "Here’s the weekend you can race or you don’t race."
So you’re kind of handcuffed a little bit when you do our kind of racing. If we raced on permanent road courses and ovals, we could do 14 races in 14 weeks. But we don’t and we can’t.
STAR: So how, exactly, will you solve some of these scheduling problems?
JOHNSON: For next year, we could have 18 races. That doesn’t mean we’re going to have 18 races, but we could accommodate 18 races based on the economics of the teams and the series. Eventually, as teams get healthier and we move forward, I could see a 20-race schedule.
I can’t tell you the name, but I was in a city in recent days that I think would be ideal for our style of racing and it’s about the same size as Edmonton. Everybody laughed when we said we were going to Edmonton and it’s turned into one of our top five events. It’s a great city that’s supported us and the city I talked to this week would be the same kind of city.
STAR: Your TV ratings leave something to be desired. What are you going to do to boost those ratings? More at wheels.ca
Interview with Kevin Kalkhoven
STAR: Over the winter, car count for 2007 didn’t look good. Only at the last minute did it go up to 17. What are you going to do to stabilize things?
KALKHOVEN: We’ve got 17 and we will grow. I’ve pointed out for years that Formula One was stuck for a long time at 18 and now they’re up to 22 and will soon be to 24. We’ll get there. We’re well within the bounds of where we should be.
Do we want more? Of course. But what we’ve seen with the new car this year is great racing. And what’s interesting is that although Sebastien (Bourdais) has won, there have been great battles. It’s all been very entertaining.
STAR: You mention Bourdais who, after Tracy, is your biggest star. There’s talk he’s champing at the bit to go off to F1 . . .
KALKHOVEN: You know, I don’t know where all that talk comes from. He’s under a long-term contract to Carl Haas so I don’t know how he’s going to go racing in F1.
STAR: I asked Steve Johnson this question, and I’ll ask you: is unification talk as dead a subject as some people say it is?
KALKHOVEN: I really don’t want to talk about it. I will say this, however: in our case, we’re all in favor of doing it under the right circumstances. Our position hasn’t changed. We would be happy to meet, to do whatever. . . More at wheels.ca