CoTA's 2014 F1 race scheduled for same Nov dates as TMS

[NickHolt]

Austin’s 2014 Formula One race scheduled for early November

 

By Dave Doolittle, American- Statesman staff

 

Austin, TX (December 4, 2013) - Next year’s Formula One race at Circuit of the Americas in Southeast Austin is scheduled for early November, about two weeks earlier than the previous two races.

 

The World Motor Sport Council, an arm of the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile – the sport’s governing body – today set the 19-race 2014 calendar.

 

Austin’s race for the past two years has been held in mid-November, when temperatures have been chilly in the morning but warm in the afternoons. The 2014 date has been set as Oct. 31 through Nov. 2, when conditions could be a bit warmer. It will be the third to last race on the calendar.

 

Officials have not announced when tickets will go on sale.

 

Next year’s race will not clash with Texas Longhorns football, which has a game at Texas Tech in Lubbock scheduled for that weekend. This year’s race fell on the same weekend as a home game against Oklahoma State, causing an even greater demand for hotel rooms.

 

However, the race is scheduled on the same date as a NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Texas Motor Speedway. That race is the second of the year at the Fort Worth oval and is part of the season-ending Chase for the Sprint Cup championship. Texas Motor Speedway will also host a NASCAR truck race on Oct. 31 and the Nationwide Series on Nov. 1.

 

TMS officials have recently announced changes that will reduce its overall capacity to 112,552.

 

Attendance at this year’s Austin Formula One race was announced as 113,162, which would make it the city’s second-largest sporting event behind last year’s inaugural F1 race. That one drew more than 117,000 and had a three-day attendance topping 265,000.

 

Circuit of the Americas Chairman Bobby Epstein said that overlaps between NASCAR and events at the Austin circuit are inevitable, in part because of the length of the NASCAR schedule. “However there are few similarities between a NASCAR race and the Formula 1 weekend we have developed,” Epstein said in a statement. “Ultimately, we see this as a great opportunity to draw sports fans from around the world to Texas and to proving again that Austin is the place to enjoy premium racing and entertainment.”

 

Texas Motor Speedway President Eddie Gossage, meanwhile, had strong words about the date.

 

“It’s a foolish move by Formula One,’’ Gossage said in a statement, according to Motor Racing Network. “Our two NASCAR Sprint Cup races draw the two largest crowds in Texas sports. It isn’t the smartest move to try to compete with that. I’m sure regardless of what they say publicly, the folks at the Austin track are pulling their hair out over this one. They don’t have any say over their date.’’

 

Hosting Formula One during Halloween could make for an interesting mix on Sixth Street, which every year is closed off to vehicles to make room for thousands of revelers, many dressed in costumes.

The Austin area has about 30,000 hotel rooms, with an estimated 4,000 more on the way.

Many hotels have charged higher rates during Formula One week because of increased demand.

On Wednesday morning, Expedia.com, Hotels.com and Hotwire.com were advertising rooms from Oct. 30 to Nov. 3 available for less than $100 to $400.

 

A race on the streets of two New Jersey cities with Manhattan as a backdrop is not on the 2014 calendar. That race, the Grand Prix of America, was announced in 2011 and originally scheduled for this year but was pushed back to 2014 because of financial setbacks. Race officials said Wednesday morning that they are working on “restructured financial agreements for a 2015 race.”

 

“Our entire management team and our supporters in New Jersey, New York and throughout the Formula One community obviously want to see the inaugural Grand Prix of America at Port Imperial take place as soon as possible,” race executive chairman and promoter Leo Hindery Jr. said in a statement. “Bringing a world-class race to the world’s largest media market is a huge undertaking that has required balancing construction of our road course, without tapping any public money, with the Sport’s own timing demands.”

 

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone also expressed confidence the race would go forward in 2015.

“There is great demand for a race in New Jersey and I have no doubt we’ll be racing at Port Imperial in 2015,” Ecclestone said. “New races can take many years to get started, but there is significant momentum and we are close to realizing a New York City F1 race.”

 

A race planned in Mexico City is also not on the 2014 calendar, nor is South Korea, which has hosted Formula One since 2010. All three races were on a draft calendar released in September.

 

The Mexico race would’ve been held at Mexico City’s Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, which last hosted Formula One in 1992 and would have to be refurbished. Tavo Hellmund, once a founding partner of Circuit of the Americas but who had a falling out with the financial backers well before the first race, is involved in the Mexico City project along with billionaire Carlos Slim Domit, son of the world’s richest man, and entertainment giant CIE.

 

The Korean race in Yeongam in the country’s far south has been poorly attended and has been losing money.

 

India’s race, which has been held in the fall since 2011, is also not on the calendar, though organizers have said they expect it to return in 2015 as a spring race.

 

Two new races have been added to the 2014 calendar: Austria will host Formula One for the first time since 2002 at the revamped Red Bull Ring in June. A Russian race at the Black Sea town Sochi, the site of February’s Olympic Games, is set for October.

 

2014 Formula One schedule

 

March 16: Australia

March 30: Malaysia

April 6: Bahrain

April 20: China

May 11: Spain

May 25: Monaco

June 8: Canada

June 22: Austria

July 6: Great Britain

July 20: Germany (Hockenheim)

July 27: Hungary

Aug. 24: Belgium

Sept. 7: Italy

Sept. 21: Singapore

Oct. 5: Japan

Oct. 12: Russia

Nov. 2: USA (Austin)

Nov. 9: Brazil

Nov. 23: Abu Dhabi

[AustinF1]

Epstein and some others seem to think the crossover on this is negligible. I disagree.

 

I think there's probably more crossover between NASCAR & F1 than most people on either side are willing to admit. Once you get past the F1 snobs & the NASCAR snobs, that's where you'll see the effect. The casual motorsport fan or the avid motorsport fan who can't get enough of every kind of racing...those are the fans who will be picking one race or the other.

 

At any rate, the USGP needs every fan it can attract, and going head-to-head with a TMS Cup weekend won't help at all. The Cup race at TMS has never had a problem drawing huge crowds. That place holds almost 200K people and the smallest crowd I know of there is about 150K.