The originally planned blog was laying out the perfect lineup for AGR next season. That got trumped by the developments at IMS today. Mari, the sisters and the lawyers made it official. Anton is out. The sterile tone of the press release made the entire affair sound sordid.
Predictable cackling has resulted ever since, particularly from the incredibly childish Tony George haters, most of whom have never understood Indy Car or IMS. Besides, after fifteen years of the some of the most vile poor sportsmanship in history, should the sub-humans not have their little moment?
What we really want to know is who is Jeffrey G. Belskus? What do we know about the incoming CEO? Does he have a passion for the sport and the dedication to maintain and improve the Speedway in the Hulman tradition, or is he a bean counter intended to allow the funneling of cash cow proceeds into the purses of the sisters? His background suggests company bean counter. Is that bad? Time will tell. The other guy is a lawyer. Both are company lifers and the company does not share its financial data.
Contrary to what various idiots may assume, Tony George leaving is not necessarily a bad thing, nor is change in general. I just do not want the greatest race course on earth turned into an ISC-like generic entity used only to milk cash for greedy spenders without much consistent synaptic activity. I also never want fenders on Indy Cars.
The other story will be what happens to the Indy Car Series. The future leadership of that entity seems up in the air. Maintaining a healthy Indy Car Series is vital. Most important, however, is IMS. Tony was a remarkable caretaker and took it to spectacular heights. The IRL? Not up to its potential. The one thing recent history has taught is that it is all about Indy, and Indy fans are hoping for the best in this transition.
Defender of IndyCar 
I can always come here to get a good laugh by reading your biased one-sided rants and this particular one is no exception.
How much longer can you continue to support one Tony George? As far as American Open Wheel racing is concerned he is a catastrophic failure and he has essentially ran the sport into the ground.
He took a thriving sport that was loaded with sponsorship, excellent ratings, high car counts, and multiple suppliers…..and divided it, thus angering and confusing the fans. Ultimately it drove a large percentage of those fans away for good. The sport is now on life support and is a joke compared to what it used to be.
You always ramble on in your blogs about people that can’t get over 1996 and how it’s not 1996 anymore and here we are today with the IRL on the brink of collapse. Years from now the year people remember might be 2009 or 2010.
The only thing I can ask you and Tony is:
Was it all worth it?
Tony was only one of many characters in what was going on in the early 90’s. I don’t see the split had as much to do with the issues of ratings and such as did the scorched earth policies carried out by those in the CART camp. But it does not matter now.
I don’t think the sport is on the “brink of callapse”. The Hulmans are ready to move forward with the sport. Those who want to see it die and want to think it’s dying seem to only want to punctuate their hate for Tony George.
I feel bad for Tony George; it was his vision and ultimate goal for the Indy Car Series to succeed. Ask yourself this question, had CART and the IRL not split, what would AWOR be like now? I wonder with this economy. I think everyone needs to take a “chill pill” and lets see where sponsorship in Brazil, races in Brazil and more road and street courses take us. I still think another chassis design(er) is needed. Maybe Panoz? Roger Penske and Chip Ganassi could offer alot of insight on how to make a profit in a bad economy. We shall see.
Greg L. (Owings Mills, Maryland)