Last Tuesday, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing announced a new driver for the 2009 season. Many fans reacted with horror and calls of ride buyer (which Mike Conway supposedly isn’t). Compounding their sorrows was the rumors that Mike Conway’s appointment to DRR would be the end of Buddy Rice’s tenure with the team, as his poorer skilled but richer funded teammate Milka Duno would be a more likely choice for the second car. It was a tragedy, as yet another American driver (one with a 500 win to boot) was forced to the background.
The key debate set off from Conway’s hiring was not about ride buyers and the like, but the increasingly smaller field of American drivers in IndyCar racing today. Is it really a problem, or is the problem something else?
Along with being a huge fan of racing, I happen to enjoy hockey. I bring up these sports because like open wheel racing, at the top levels they happen to be very international in their demographics. The National Hockey League has 83 percent of its teams in America, but only draws about one-fourth of its talent from the USA. More than half its players come from Canada, and the remaining from a smattering of Scandinavian and Eastern European nations. Fans still show up in spite of this lack of American born boys. Chicago, Pittsburgh, New York (the Rangers), Minnesota, San Jose, Philadelphia, Buffalo, Detroit, Washington, and Dallas all average at least 95 percent capacity.
I have never felt having a majority American lineup has been essential for IndyCar. It can be beneficial to have an international field to help grow the series fanbase, as unlike NASCAR there is a broader global appeal for open wheel racing. If a driver is really serious about having a career here in the States, should it matter?
I do have one concern. I want to use another sports league for an example of what I worry about. I also follow soccer heavily, in particular the English Premier League. The EPL is truly the most international sports league in the world, with stars from every continent with names, like Cristiano Ronaldo, and Fernando Torres. Some of the stars, however, have grown up on home soil. Guys like Wayne Rooney, Frank Lampard, and Rio Ferdinand are held in similar high regard as those born outside Britain. Certain folks might like the fact they had similar upbringings to themselves and kids dream about being the next one too.
What am I saying in all this? The international flavor of IndyCar works when there is a mixture of foreign and domestic talent, both in the entry sheet and the podium. Unfortunately, what has happened in the past few years is that the American talent at the top has withered to non-existent.
I have studied IndyCar results since 2000 to look at the receding results of American drivers. Take a look at the win percentage for American drivers in that period:
The amount of wins has dropped dramatically since 2001. For those of you who have not followed the sport for long, the drop coincides with the arrival of Penske (2002), Ganassi, and Andretti Green (both 2003) to the IRL. Each brought primarily foreign drivers with them (save for AGR’s Bryan Herta). This stat doesn’t necessarily tell the entire story since a dominant foreign driver or two could easily take the majority of wins (like 2007, when Dixon, Franchitti, and Kanaan won 13 of 17 races). Further proof of the drop-off can be seen in the amount of Yanks in the top 5 and top 10 (FYI, blue lines are Americans, red from other countries):
Eek. Not only has the amount of Americans in the top 10 tailed off, the majority of those that did make it to that point finished in the sixth-tenth range. Only once since the Ganassi/AGR move have two American made the top 5 (Hornish and Sharp in ’05), but for the first time in series history no American was in the top 5 last year. Danica Patrick was the highest ranked American at sixth, but she was a distant sixth to Ryan Briscoe.
The problem exists that there are only eight or nine cars every that can win every week, and only two spots are held by Americans: those being the AGR cars of Marco Andretti and Danica Patrick. Marco has not been able to put together a complete run to win despite some great promise last year, and Danica has not run in a “leading” position in a long time.
So what can be done to alter this situation? The hope is that Marco has a breakthrough year in ’09 and Newman/Haas/Lanigan can return to its old glory and thus bring Graham Rahal towards the top, but that is not enough. The push to grow American talent needs action, not prayer.
