So who could fill Franchitti’s seat at Ganassi?

By Nov 19, 2013, 5:00 PM EST
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With all the on-track action at Austin (Formula One) and Homestead (NASCAR) this weekend, the “let’s think and evaluate about potential Ganassi drivers” post went unwritten here on MotorSportsTalk.

Indeed the news Dario Franchitti had to retire due to his injuries sustained at Houston was the tip of the iceberg in terms of this story. The racing world reacted, then my MST colleague Chris Estrada and I offered our initial thoughts, then team principal Chip Ganassi outlined the game plan on a conference call last week about what might happen for the No. 10 Target Chevrolet.

Thoughts on potential candidates to fill the seat will follow. Though, as Ganassi astutely observed in that call, “Whoever fills that seat not only has obviously big shoes if not the biggest shoes to fill in the sport, but you’re also somebody that has to be a huge teammate and able to help Scott Dixon, as well, and Kanaan and Charlie (Kimball).  So it’s not just a single-faceted job to get in that car.  That car is part of a team that I think for years has run at the front of the pack, and everything that goes along with running at the front in terms of scoring points for championships and helping teammates win championships.”

  • Alex Tagliani. The veteran deputized admirably at Fontana until a late-race spin, and he has been listed for the team’s December 4 test at Sebring. Still, a full-time move to sports cars seems more likely for him at this point.
  • Ryan Briscoe. It could be “Ganassi 3.0” for the Australian if he slots in, after a rocky rookie year in 2005 and a one-off in a fourth car at this year’s Indianapolis 500. He hasn’t confirmed a deal – or a signed contract – elsewhere although reports have linked him to Panther Racing, where he ran a handful of 2013 races, for months.
  • Justin Wilson. Signed a contract extension with Dale Coyne earlier this year and will have a new engineer either way with Bill Pappas gone to Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing. Coyne is still very likely for him, but this would be the plum opportunity in a top ride Wilson has always deserved.
  • Tony Kanaan. Ganassi said TK was “not out of the question” for the 10 car although he is signed with the No. 8 NTT Data/TNT Energy Drink Chevrolet as it stands. Reading between the lines, I believe he’ll stay in the 8 if Ganassi signs a veteran, and could shift to the 10 if Ganassi takes a chance on an up-and-comer.
  • Paul di Resta. Has just said in an interview with The Guardian he has to consider IndyCar seriously if he gets dropped by Force India. Still an “if,” for now, though.
  • Conor Daly. Daly is known to be on the short list for the team, and as a young American who’s proved his versatility in various open-wheel series worldwide, would be a great addition full-time to the IndyCar field.
  • Sage Karam. This is the biggest wild-card I’m including on here, but it’s not impossible. Karam, the Indy Lights champion, has the same management team as Franchitti, has Mazda scholarship funding in hand and additional support from longtime backer Comfort Revolution.
  • A.N. Other. The “completely out of left field” choice a la Juan Pablo Montoya going to Penske. This option works if Ganassi manages to sign someone currently under contract to another team, or takes a flier on someone from Europe – perhaps di Resta as mentioned above – or someone else from the European junior categories.

Either way, the race to see who fills this seat is the most intense in IndyCar for the coming weeks.

Roger Penske vows new downtown Detroit GP will be bigger than the Super Bowl for city

By Jun 1, 2023, 2:00 PM EDT
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DETROIT – He helped spearhead bringing the town a Super Bowl 17 years ago, but Roger Penske believes the reimagined Chevrolet Detroit GP is his greatest gift to the Motor City.

“It’s bigger than the Super Bowl from an impact within the city,” Penske told NBC Sports. “Maybe not with the sponsors and TV, but for the city of Detroit, it’s bigger than the Super Bowl.

“We’ve got to give back individually and collectively, and I think we as a company in Michigan and in Detroit, it’s something we know how to do. It shows we’re committed. Someone needs to take that flag and run it down through town. And that’s what we’re trying to do as a company. We’re trying to give back to the city.”

After 30 years of being run on Belle Isle, the race course has been moved to a new nine-turn, 1.7-mile downtown layout that will be the centerpiece of an event weekend that is designed to promote a festival and community atmosphere.

There will be concerts in the adjacent Hart Plaza. Local businesses from Detroit’s seven districts have been invited to hawk their wares to new clientele. Boys and Girls Clubs from the city have designed murals that will line the track’s walls with images of diversity, inclusion and what Detroit means through the eyes of youth.

And in the biggest show of altruism, more than half the circuit will be open for free admission. The track is building 4-foot viewing platforms that can hold 150 people for watching the long Jefferson Avenue straightaway and other sections of the track.

Detroit GP chairman Bud Denker, a longtime key lieutenant across Penske’s various companies, has overseen more than $20 million invested in infrastructure.

The race is essentially Penske’s love letter to the city where he made much of his fame as one of Detroit’s most famous automotive icons, both as a captain of industry with a global dealership network and as a racing magnate (who just won his record 19th Indy 500 with Josef Newgarden breaking through for his first victory on the Brickyard oval).

During six decades in racing, Penske, 86, also has run many racetracks (most notably Indianapolis Motor Speedway but also speedways in Michigan, California and Pennsylvania), and much of that expertise has been applied in Detroit.

“And then the ability for us to reach out to our sponsor base, and then the business community, which Bud is tied in with the key executives in the city of Detroit, bringing them all together,” Penske said. “It makes a big difference.

“The Super Bowl is really about the people that fly in for the Super Bowl. It’s a big corporate event, and the tickets are expensive. And the TV is obviously the best in the world. What we’ve done is taken that same playbook but made it important to everyone in Detroit. Anyone that wants to can come to the race for free, can stand on a platform or they can buy a ticket and sit in the grandstands or be in a suite. It’s really multiple choice, but it is giving it to the city of Detroit. I think it’s important when you think of these big cities across the country today that are having a lot of these issues.”

Denker said the Detroit Grand Prix is hoping for “an amazingly attended event” but is unsure of crowd estimates with much of the track offering free viewing. The race easily could handle a crowd of at least 50,000 daily (which is what the Movement Music Festival draws in Hart Plaza) and probably tens of thousands more in a sprawling track footprint along the city’s riverwalk.

Penske is hoping for a larger crowd than Belle Isle, which was limited to about 30,000 fans daily because of off-site parking and restricted fan access at a track that was located in a public park.

The downtown course will have some unique features, including a “split” pit lane on an all-new concrete (part of $15 million spent on resurfaced roads, new barriers and catchfencing … as well as 252 manhole covers that were welded down).

A $5 million, 80,000-square-foot hospitality chalet will be located adjacent to the paddock and pit area. The two-story structure, which was imported from the 16th hole of the Waste Management Open in Phoenix, will offer 70 chalets (up from 23 suites at Belle Isle last year). It was built by InProduction, the same company that installed the popular HyVee-branded grandstands and suites at Iowa Speedway last year.

Penske said the state, city, county and General Motors each owned parts of the track, and their cooperation was needed to move streetlights and in changing apexes of corners. Denker has spent the past 18 months meeting with city council members who represent Detroit’s seven districts, along with Mayor Mike Duggan. Penske said the local support could include an appearance by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Witmer.

Denker and Detroit GP  president Michael Montri were inspired to move the Detroit course downtown after attending the inaugural Music City Grand Prix in Nashville, Tennessee.

“We saw what an impact it made on that city in August of 2021 and we came back from there and said boy could it ever work to bring it downtown in Detroit again,” Denker said. “We’ve really involved the whole community of Detroit, and the idea of bringing our city together is what the mayor and city council and our governor are so excited about. The dream we have is now coming to fruition.

“When you see the infrastructure downtown and the bridges over the roads we’ve built and the graphics, and everything is centered around the Renaissance Center as your backdrop, it’s just amazing.”