RM On The IRL

[cache]

Just to be fair ,this is what Robin Miller said about the IRL in Autosport Magazine-


Entering its 12th year of business, the Indy Racing League remains a poor substitute for CART in its's heyday, an under-developed property that's thought to be a tax write-off for founder Tony George. Today, it's a spec series comprised of road racers and foreigners that's dominated by the men (Penske and Ganassi) that George openly despised in the mid-90s, It has no title sponsor, pathetic TV ratings and struggles to maintain grid sizes.

HOW MUCH MONEY HAS GEORGE INVESTED IN THE IRL? The conservative estimate, counting cars, engines, purses and marketing, is somewhere north of $300 million. Before Honda and Toyota arrived, George had to spend millions propping up several of his under-funded teams. In 2003, during a round of golf, he complained to one of the car owners that he'd spent $90m on purses alone. Another estimated $50m has been thrown at marketing companies trying to raise sponsorships. Last May, the IRL founder is believed to have helped finance 11 of the 33 starters in the Indianapolis 500.

WHAT IS HONDA GETTING OUT OF IT AS SOLE SUPPLIER? Not nearly what it expected when it left CART in 2002. Its very existence is mostly to compete against hated rival Toyota, but its dominance in 2004 and 2005 chased it away. And the low-revving, harnessed horsepower rules hardly challenge its technical skills. Supposedly, there is an escape clause in the contract with the IRL that says unless there is a competitor by 2008, Honda is free to leave.

WHAT ABOUT ALL THAT UNIFICATION TALK? There is no doubt that talks were making headway until they were outed by an American magazine. Now it appears there's little, if any, communication between the two sides. The bottom line? George doesn't trust what he perceives as shifty car owners and the Champ Car team bosses are wary of a rich kid they think has questionable business acumen.

[O&A Virus]

Fair enough.

Like his recent CC article, I see no fault in what he's writing in the article above. Do I like what he's saying? Of course not, but I'm not going to pretend that its not true just because I dislike what he's writing. This is something some CC fans are having a difficult time grasping. Cache, I think you know who I'm talking about.

Anyways, I enjoy watching the IRL, but I'm not going to put rose colored glasses and say everything is perfect. They aren't. Like him or not, RM has some pretty good sources.

[cache]

Do you think TG would 've fired RM if he was employed by IRL?

[tbyars]

Do you think TG would 've fired RM if he was employed by IRL?

TG has always been smart enough to NEVER put himself in that position. Those who work for the IRL work for the IRL, and not independent outlets.

It's the difference between running a business professionally and running it like you were running a campaign for college class president.

[cache]

TG has always been smart enough to NEVER put himself in that position. Those who work for the IRL work for the IRL, and not independent outlets.

It's the difference between running a business professionally and running it like you were running a campaign for college class president.

There is a rumor that TG pressured Indystar to fire RM.

[Davedigler2004]

^^^^

Got any proof or are you pulling that out of your a&s? Again, more speculation from a forum dweller with an obvious agenda.

I can do the same over in CC land. However, I'll leave that up to O&A and others. ;)

[Davedigler2004]

You're already spending a fair amount of time over there. Don't accuse others of what you're doing. That goes for both of you, by the way. We don't want to get back to where we have to rigidly enforce the split between the two forums.

Discuss the opinions and the news but DO NOT attack or insult other posters. There'll be a few "time outs" for people in BOTH forums otherwise.

I spend a lot time there but I don't start threads just to start an argument or to attack. Theres a difference.

[indycool]

FYI, cache, that is a rumor that Robin started himself. If you followed his grievance arbitration hearing through the union that was denied in keeping his job, you would know what he was released for. TG doesn't own the Indianapolis Star. Gannett Newspapers has followed the Pulliam family in owning it.

[ZzZzZz]

TG and KK (and, well, *everyone*) should read "Marketing Myopia" by Theodore Levitt.

Every business will eventually decline if they remain product oriented instead of customer oriented. Who are the customers in racing? Fans, sponsors, teams, etc.. Are their needs and wants being satisfied by AOWR? No! We know from the numbers how many fans left. (We also know that even at the best of times, things weren't run as well as they could be.)

[Jonesi]

FYI, cache, that is a rumor that Robin started himself. If you followed his grievance arbitration hearing through the union that was denied in keeping his job, you would know what he was released for. TG doesn't own the Indianapolis Star. Gannett Newspapers has followed the Pulliam family in owning it.

I'm trying to remember what it was that got RM fired. Best I can remember was it was something petty, like misuse of emails.

[sezix]

Once again I agree with what Miller was saying. He speaks from his heart and said facts. If IRL fans say that's bashing them they can think everything is rosey......

[gofastandwynn]

I'm trying to remember what it was that got RM fired. Best I can remember was it was something petty, like misuse of emails.

No, it was the classic porn on the work computer that got him ousted...

[gofastandwynn]

There is a rumor that TG pressured Indystar to fire RM.

Yea, and that may make sense to someone outside of Indianapolis, who knows nothing about the city or that the Pulliams would do nothing the Hulmans would ask them to do...

BTW, did you say that CC fans should stay in the CC form and vice versa?

[cache]

FYI, cache, that is a rumor that Robin started himself. If you followed his grievance arbitration hearing through the union that was denied in keeping his job, you would know what he was released for. TG doesn't own the Indianapolis Star. Gannett Newspapers has followed the Pulliam family in owning it.

Fair enough IC,thanks for the answer. What was the reason RM got fired from ESPN? Did he burn his bridges there too?

[Jonesi]

I'm trying to remember what it was that got RM fired. Best I can remember was it was something petty, like misuse of emails.

The answer to that was in RM's new column that went up today on SpeedTV web site.

[CCFan]

The answer to that was in RM's new column that went up today on SpeedTV web site.


Where Jonesi? The last article by Miller that I see at SPEEDTV is his one about Champcar.

[Alexamateo]

Looks like it was taken down, but someone posted it on another forum.


MILLER: Handling the Truth
Written by: Robin Miller
Indianapolis, Ind. – 3/2/2007




The title of this column could be “Career Suicide 101,” because I’ve become somewhat of an authority on the subject and hopefully it will enlighten some people on the consequences of trying to tell the truth.

And I want to thank my bosses at SPEEDTV.com in advance for indulging me and letting me explain why I can’t hold a job.

For 32 of my first 50 years I had the good fortune to be a reporter/columnist at The Indianapolis Star, which was somewhat of a miracle since I’d flunked out of that academic pillar at Ball State.

I covered my first Indy 500 for The Star in 1969 and by 1975 I was racing midgets in USAC and writing a racing column 52 weeks a year (mostly on USAC). By 1977, I’d become the lead racing writer for the only newspaper in the country that truly cared about motorsports.

From ’77 until 2000, my May ritual was write the daily lead, a column every other day and contribute to our Pit Pass notebook. When you threw in the Bob & Tom radio show every morning (I worked with the irreverent Jay Baker on Dick’s Picks from Gasoline Alley) and the trackside TV show I did every night, it was a long but fun day that I loved. And it got even better the Thursday before the race when I emceed The Last Row Party (an event that roasted the 31st, 32nd and 33rd starters).

All this background is necessary to illustrate what happened in 1996.

When Tony George divided open wheel racing with the formation of the Indy Racing League, changed the qualifying procedure (you surely remember 25/8) at Indy and replaced Andretti, Fittipaldi, Rahal, Sullivan and Unser with Bronco Brad Murphey and Racin’ Gardner, I went on the attack. In print, on local television and on my nightly radio show on WIBC, I railed against the IMS pres almost daily and he explored pulling my credential but was wisely talked out of it.

Now, I still covered Indy like always, writing the news and accomplishments of the day along with feel-good columns on Tony Stewart and Mark Dismore, but continued to pound T. George. I treated the competitors like any other May because they put on the show and it wasn’t their fault Indy had been forever damaged.

Of course the interesting thing was the rest of my local media brethren. They all knew this wasn’t the real Indy 500 but nary a disparaging word came out of their mouths. Just all that happy talk and gushing about Joe Gosek and those big crowds watching qualifying. It was see-no-evil on TV and hear-no-evil on radio for a solid month and I was the ONLY voice speaking out on the obvious emasculation of May.

That summer I got gassed from my five-night-a-week radio gig at WIBC because management claimed the “ratings” were disappointing from 7-10 p.m. on AM radio. Yeah right. I got gassed because IMS officials told owner Jeff Smulyan that WIBC could become the official station of IMS but not until they got rid of me.

The Star had tried to become business partners with IMS since the mid-’90s but its marketing staff was told “never” as long as that $#&*%@ Miller was still writing for the paper. In January of 2001, the Gannett Nazis showed me the door because, drum roll please, I’d tainted the paper by helping Kenny Brack start his website, supposedly broke a racing story on CART’s website, borrowed money from Tom Sneva (after he quit driving) and used vulgar language in some emails (really, me?).

A week after I was escorted out of the building, The Star and IMS became partners. What a coincidence.

Channel 13, the local NBC affiliate that I’d worked for since ’95, kept me through 2001 before becoming “news gathering partners” with The Star, who demanded I get the boot and, naturally, I did in 2002.

Oh yeah, I wasn’t allowed on Bob & Tom anymore either, because I’d lambasted Tony once when those two radio jocks had suggested the “buzz” had returned to the Speedway.

But let’s fast forward to 2007. The Indy media is all a bunch suck-ups who either want to keep their pace car, free Indy tickets or jobs with the IMS network so they’ve never uttered a discouraging word about May during all these years despite the fact they privately acknowledge it’s lost its crowd, luster and pedigree.

And many of my old racing “friends” who turned on me and called me a Commie ******* for criticizing Tony have since admitted the obvious, Indy has been reduced to a one-day event and is never coming back like it was in 1995.

Owners, mechanics and drivers who praised Tony and cursed me in the late ’90s now take his name in vain because they’ve all been left behind as the IRL morphed into CART Lite, to quote A.J. Foyt.

I worked for ESPN from 2001-2004 before it stopped covering motorsports and went to work for SPEED while continuing to freelance for Autosport and Champ Car’s website. How can he be objective on open wheel racing if he gets money from Champ Car, was the question many IRL zealots asked.

When either series did something stupid and needed to be reminded, I wrote about it on SpeedTV.com and talked about it on SPEED Report or Wind Tunnel. Even though Champ Car agreed to let me be semi-critical a few times about schedules, venues and decisions, I’m sure SPEED would have preferred if I only wrote for them.

Well, now I’m all theirs.

After last Sunday’s critique of Champ Car’s state (which by the way was mild compared to some of the commentaries I’ve written about T. George over the years) on SpeedTV.com, I was informed my services were no longer required on Champ Car’s website. (For the record, I’d predicted my dismissal to a couple of friends on Sunday night).

So let’s recap. For reporting the demise of the Indy 500, I lost four jobs, lots of money, several friendships and to this day I’m persona non grata on every Indy radio and TV station except the ABC affiliate during May. Oh, and the Indy Star acts like I never existed on their pages for five decades.

For pointing out that Champ Car has a shortage of common sense, cars, leadership and good judgment on this web site, I lost a nice supplementary income.

Of course this is the big difference between myself and intelligent life. Obviously, I understood the potential consequences of my actions in 1996 and again this past weekend. Keep my mouth shut, toe the party line and collect my checks – facts and reality be damned.

But I can’t play that game of looking the other way when Champ Car tries to fire Tony Cotman or lying about how much drama there is on Bump Day at Indy nowadays.

My problem is that open wheel racing is my family, my job and my passion. Watching it be destroyed is maddening and frustrating. Nobody in this country has written more positive stories about Indy, Indy cars and open wheel than myself. And nobody has been as critical. A healthy faction of CART owners hated me in the late ’80s and early ’90s, and the IRL brain trust has felt that way most of the past 11 years. Now they both loathe me and that’s perfect – I must be doing my job.

Naturally, I understand a lot of people in my business maybe can’t always say what they feel because they’ve got families to feed and can’t afford to lose their job. Telling the truth in the media is usually risk vs. reward. You risk losing money, friends and stability for taking a stand while the reward is the conviction of your reporting.

Auto racing has always been driven by bitching, cheating, lying and stealing other’s peoples drivers and sponsors – it’s the nature of the beast. Indy car racing has always been mismanaged regardless of the call letters. NASCAR has always written its rule book in pencil. USAC has always been stuck in the 1950s. The AMA has always ripped off its riders. Sure there are some great people and stories in motorsports and telling them is the most enjoyable part of our jobs.

But it’s a cut-throat business that demands more honest analysis and usually settles for saccharine shows on TV complete with cheerleading or insulting features about Michael Waltrip’s pain over the cheating on his team.

Thankfully, there are old rippers like Ben Blake, Ed Hinton, Monte Dutton, Gordon Kirby and Brock Yates who are never afraid to hold people’s feet to the fire. Thankfully, SPEED provides me a national forum and doesn’t tell me what to say or write.

In the movie A Few Good Men, Jack Nicholson’s character said: “You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth.”

And the truth is, not many racing people can.

[Jonesi]

Thanks for posting it. As of now it's still there/back again in the Commentary section as "MILLER: Fired Again".

[ZzZzZz]

No, it was the classic porn on the work computer that got him ousted...

Classic? I heard it was hot walrus on walrus action. I don't think that's classic.

Actually, he says <shock!> that he "used vulgar language in some emails."

[Hoss Ghoul]

On topic. I agree with Miller's assesment of the IRL.

Of course, what the IRL has going for it, like any succesfull series is consistency within its teams, driver lineup, and schedule.

I don't give a damn about the "vision" or "the road to indy". I just want to see consistent driver lineups, and a mix of challenging circuits. The IRL has become MUCH more appealing the last 2-4 years.

Before Penske, and then Toyota, Honda, and all the other big teams came over, I wathced CART, and Indy. Since that change, and with the subsequent diversification of the schedule, solid driver/team lineup, etc. It's become much easier to follow and care about the IRL.....case in point: I wanted Hornish and Panther to whoop Penske(with Castroneves and DeFarren) ass when they came over.

The IRL is far from perfect, but its schedule gets better every year, IMO. If they can hang on to Wheldon, Hornish, etc(seems unlikely) they may keep my attention. If they cannot, they will become as irrelevant as Champ Car, the Craftsman Truck Series, and other NASCAR/F1 feeder series. Leagues that are worth watching on a given weekend/track/etc, but you know are nowhere near the top of the hill, and are thus greatly diminished.

[Indy500'79]

TG has always been smart enough to NEVER put himself in that position. Those who work for the IRL work for the IRL, and not independent outlets.

It's the difference between running a business professionally and running it like you were running a campaign for college class president.

well said

[Roninho]

Maybe i'm missing something, but imho the numbers Miller is mentioning don't add up.

George complaining about paying up to $90 million on purses for the irl up to 2003? Looking @ the driver earnings page on indyracing.com, the irl payed somewhere around $140.000.000,- - $150.000.000,- on earnings up to 2003, and $120.000.000,- - $130.000.000,- up to 2002. So that nr. seems of base.

Also, and imho more importantly, talking about the money spend on purses and marketing is only one side of the story. What about indy-attendance, the tv-deal, chevy, toyota & honda's-fee's, sanction fees, etc.?

I have no idea if and how much money the irl has lost, but simply quoting "$90 million on purses and $50 million on marketing" and implying these are losses seems a bit one-sided to me.

[Mark in Oshawa]

I have no idea of knowing what Tony makes or doesn't make, but I must say Robin likely has a good source. That is what a good journalist does. He uses reputable sources to assimilate the story, and in the case of columnists such as Hinton or Miller, they can pretty much say what they want and back it up based on what they have been able to put together. People whine, but last time I looked, Miller was never charged with defmation of character, or slander.

Robin's take on the IRL is pretty much as damning as his opinion of Champ Car. Why would he do that? Simple, he loves the sport but he wont stand by while idiots blow it up.

It is why he lost his job at the Star, it is why he lost his spot with ESPN, it is why he lost his position writing PR pieces for Champ Car. Robin tells as it is. People don't like it. People try to shoot the messenger. I think Robin's track message, on both the IRL and CCWS has been proven that he is right more often than not.

His take is, and God knows I wouldn't want to say I am 100% sure on this, but is that OW has been mismanaged and screwed up by both Tony and the folks at CCWS. Robin is a Hoosier boy, grew up on the Indy 500 and the history of that great race, but he also gets that there is more to racing than the glorification of the 500 at the expense of any other race. He said in 1996 that TG was going to screw up the 500 and OW racing and he is now saying the people running Champ Car are making it a mess.

Some of you may like this, some of you may disagree, but the way I see it, it is pretty hard to say he is wrong. The results ( and that is what really counts, not what we all wish for) are OW has less ratings, less prospersity, and less interest than it did a decade and a half ago. What is more, NASCAR has pretty much doubled in impact and size, and this has all been fortold by Robin's columns over the years.

IN short, if more people paid attention to these guys like Miller who wont just suck up to the governing bodies (ever see a NASCAR story that is real critical of their screw ups lately? ), maybe the fans and the sport would be better served.

[djparky]

I read that article in Autosport a few weeks ago (the one about the IRL)- and agreed with every word of it- I saw his spleen venting about the state of CCWS and agreed with every word of that as well- this is a man who has an opinion and likes to air it- and good on him- much better than being a "brown nose creep arse"- a phrase a colleague of mine came up with a few months ago

he is passionate about OW racing in the USA and I can understand his frustration at watching "Indy Car" racing ripped apart with the IRL-CART/CCWS war- in the last 10 years Indy racing has gone from one thriving series to two virtually irrelevant series- all thanks to ego's, mismanagement and money- not to mention the turncoat team owners, manufacturers and drivers who stabbed the series they made their living off in the back a few years ago

it's all done as far as OW racing in the US is concerned- it's totally irrelevant outside the Indy 500- if both sides realised that then perhaps they could put it together again- 17-18 cars for CCWS and about the same for IRL- wow both sides are doing brilliantly aren't they?

[cache]

Maybe i'm missing something, but imho the numbers Miller is mentioning don't add up.

George complaining about paying up to $90 million on purses for the irl up to 2003? Looking @ the driver earnings page on indyracing.com, the irl payed somewhere around $140.000.000,- - $150.000.000,- on earnings up to 2003, and $120.000.000,- - $130.000.000,- up to 2002. So that nr. seems of base.

Also, and imho more importantly, talking about the money spend on purses and marketing is only one side of the story. What about indy-attendance, the tv-deal, chevy, toyota & honda's-fee's, sanction fees, etc.?

I have no idea if and how much money the irl has lost, but simply quoting "$90 million on purses and $50 million on marketing" and implying these are losses seems a bit one-sided to me.

I agree ,nobody knows the financials of the IRL. But if you talk about what IMS generates in income, you also have to realize that IMS costs money to operate.A simplistic way of looking at it is, not only does TG and Co. run a track business, they also run a league. He has 2 businesses that need to make a profit. On top of that, the 500 is an IMS race, so they are responsible for that too.Sanction fees can be ate up by purses. TV deals can cover the cost of running day to day and race events at IMS.TG pays F1 and Nascar sanction fees too. Not to mention the extra teams and cars needed to fill the grid at Indy.

No doubt ,IMS makes money to support the IRL, but we wonder how IMS satisfies its profit margin if they use it to keep the IRL afloat? Maybe someone here knows more about it than I do.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Cache, it is simple. TG and his family don't sell shares on the open market. They don't have to disclose their profit or loss margin to anyone but the IRS. IF they choose to take their considerable profits from the IMS and plough it into the IRL, it is their choice and their money. It is that simple. It is why Tony wont let go of the IRL and his desire to control OW racing, and it is why he thought he could do it in 1995 in the first place.

This has always been about a guy who thought he had the biggest draw in the sport being able to steer the sport, and the team owners who thought they had the answers. At some point, the team owners hired idiots and let their own selfish interests get in the way of their sport, while a selfish and often naive track owner with a lot of money on the other side went to war.

It has been a fiasco by any definition, and there are lots of villians on both sides of the equation trust me....

[Easy Drifter]

And the fact he wants a Moto GP indicates he may need more $

[Jonesi]

And the fact he wants a Moto GP indicates he may need more $

Also why would he have sold IMS' half of the Chicago track to partner ISC if he hadn't needed money?

[gofastandwynn]

And the fact he wants a Moto GP indicates he may need more $

If he needed money he would ne be paying millions to reconfigure the course for the bike, and it would easier to just drop Formula 1 and the loss that the the Speedway take on it.