Marco saves America!
Feb 06, 2007
Nothing better than the annual exercise of Europeans analyzing what F1 needs to be successful in the US. Their latest panacea is a knight in shining armor named Marco Andretti. This grandprix.com article says:
It is clear that Andretti is exactly what F1 and indeed Honda, needs in America. F1 will never strike it big in the United States without a local hero winning races to get the locals excited. One needs only to look at the effect that Fernando Alonso’s success has had on F1 in Spain or think back to similar phenomena in Germany in the mid 1990s with Michael Schumacher and in Britain in the mid 1980s with Nigel Mansell.
Wow. If that is all F1 needs to be successful in the US Bernie would mortgage the farm to get it done. The fact is you can’t compare the Spanish and German racefans to American race fans. Why? Because most of the people who attend the USGP are foreign nationals living in the US who actually do care about F1. They attend the race because in other countries people are passionate about seeing their countrymen compete even if the event is boring (for further research on this topic go to Google and search the keyword soccer). Like it or not, Americans prefer the thrill of excitement and the agony of defeat, not the joy of just being there.
Formula 1, lets face it, isn’t the most spectator friendly sport in the world. Sure, there are people passionate about automotive technology and others who enjoy it because they can appreciate the history of F1, but in the real world of selling tickets to motorsports events in the US, cars going by one-by-one isn’t going to ever be a big deal to people who buy the bulk of American products. Don’t believe me? Go ask Kevin Kalkhoven.
Marco Andretti in an F1 car, regardless of how famous his Grandpa is, isn’t going to make one iota of a difference. That is, not until Americans learn to appreciate the beauty of follow-the-leader.
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