Feeling CH-IRLish

Here’s a updated braindump on the possible acquisition of Champ Car by the IRL (call it unification if you must, but when one party buys the other it’s not a merger). Please be sure to read all the way to the end.

If the merger happens, there are only three tracks on the Champ Car 2008 schedule that the IRL would be interesting in adding tot their current 16 event calendar. They are Long Beach, Edmonton (Canada) and Surfer's Paradise (Australia) -- all temporary circuits. - Motorsport

The Long Beach street race date is not flexible because a contract is in place to close the roads for the event only on that specific weekend, so Motegi would have to be rescheduled. - Autosport

"As long as Honda won't move Motegi, there won't be a merger," Champ Car co-owner Kevin Kalkhoven told The Associated Press on Friday. "It's certainly a major hurdle, but not the only one." - MLive

The Motegi organisers were agreeable to moving back one week, which is currently the date for the IRL race at Kansas City. The ISC-owned facility reportedly declined the request because it's already a sell-out for the NASCAR/IRL package. - Auto123

Some issues are just plain difficult. Many contractual commitments have been made with suppliers and service companies based on two open-wheel organizations moving forward separately in 2008. Each of those contracts will have impacts that could have significant ramifications for sanctioning bodies, promoters, tracks, sponsors, teams and others. - Inside Indiana Business

BTW, one scenario we'd heard has the CCWS running Long Beach with their cars in 2008 - as kind of a wrap up party. This would require some point adjustments, or other consideration for CCWS teams moving to the full ICS schedule, but there are ways to make this happen. We believe that the CCWS needs to run Long Beach or they might lose the right to promote the event in the future, or be forced to change the contract terms to something less than favorable.

Who knows - it's all up in the air right now! - TSO

Here are some blogger reactions.

I'll wait for details before I do any kind of big report, but what makes Robin's report look good is that it has quotes from the big players and owners all acknowledging that some kind of deal has been agreed to and is being hammered out... - Furious Wedge

Although if this cancels Elkhart Lake I'm out $40 for a non-refundable hotel room. I'm not complaining. Even if it's not 100% accurate and buttoned up, it's difficult to argue Robin's story doesn't serve readers well. - pressdog

To hell with the presumptive press conference; the lot of them can bring a dead horse to the dais, stick a Champ Car hat on its head for symbolism and have Robin Miller or John Oreovicz punch it to show that, like Champ Car, it’s not coming back to life. I wouldn’t even believe that. And yes, I know that this is a gross exaggeration, thank you.

But such is the skepticism I have right now. I don’t want to have it, but history has taught me that in this messed-up realm of motorsport, if it’s too good to be true, it probably is. - Indy Racing Revolution

And lastly, a love letter from from Kevin Kalkhoven to Robin.

"Once again, as has happened previously in the past four years, somebody has leaked a story to the press, and the press has turned it into a tornado," he said. "Now it has everyone running around in a circle. It's almost malicious, and it disappoints and infuriates me.” - IndyStar

Which has brought us to this late breaking story.

Officials from the Indy Racing League and Champ Car World Series confirmed Friday morning that negotiations have recently taken place geared toward folding elements of the Champ Car World Series into the IRL IndyCar Series.

However, the ongoing saga of American open-wheel racing unification took another turn shortly after lunch when Champ Car issued a statement claiming that those talks have stalled. - ESPN.com

So don't get too up or down just yet. Tony George AND former Honda honcho Robert Clarke are reportedly off to Japan to see if they can sort things out over the next few days. In other words, hurry up and wait.