Friday, November 14, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

CART sets date for race in Vegas

But cash-strapped series is still looking for an event venue

By JEFF WOLF
REVIEW-JOURNAL

The financially troubled CART Champ Car Series released its 2004 schedule Thursday, and the 18-event slate includes a May 16 race in Las Vegas at a "venue to be confirmed."

"There will be a CART race in Vegas," said Merrill Cain, CART's director of public relations.

"We're working on a few (venue) options there. We hope to have an answer shortly. We wanted to make sure we got (Las Vegas) on the schedule so we could get a schedule out the door. Once we have the venue confirmed, we'll make an announcement on that."

CART also revealed Thursday that it is in default on some of its financial obligations, according to its filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Open Wheel Racing has proposed a buyout of CART. The group is led by CART team owners Paul Gentilozzi, Gerald Forsythe and Kevin Kalkhoven, who hold about 3.3 million shares, or 22.9 percent, of existing CART stock.

The next step is expected to be a vote by CART shareholders on whether to accept Open Wheel Racing's bid of 56 cents per share, a total of $7.4 million.

If the buyout does not go through, CART has said in previous SEC filings, the series probably would have to cease operations by mid-December.

Thursday's release is the second time in about six weeks that CART has teased the racing industry with a schedule. In early October, CART released a list of 2004 venues for its Indy-car style series, and among the stops was one at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

At the time, Gentilozzi said listing the speedway as the Las Vegas race venue was premature.

"In the rush to get a list out, I thought I was approving the list of cities," Gentilozzi said Oct. 2.

Gentilozzi could not be reached for comment Thursday. He said last month he had discussed renting the 1.5-mile oval at the speedway with officials of Speedway Motorsports Inc., which owns the Las Vegas speedway, but had not ruled out creating a street course that would not include existing thoroughfares.

Julian Dugas, manager of sports and sponsorship for the Las Vegas Convention Authority, said Thursday he thinks the speedway is the only local venue being courted for the Indy-car style race.

"There had been some talk about trying to create a street course, but that's extremely expensive," said Dugas, who added he was unaware of any LVCVA staff members who had talked with representatives from CART or Gentilozzi's group. Dugas did say the LVCVA has discussed a potential event with speedway officials.

"We look forward to being able to work with the folks at the speedway about developing another race stop in Las Vegas," he said.