Via the Indy Star…

A stormy eight-year relationship between Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Formula One ended today with the announcement the international racing series would not return in 2008.

IMS chairman Tony George and F-1 boss Bernie Ecclestone could not reach an agreement on a sanctioning fee to continue the U.S. Grand Prix. George had set today as a deadline for a new contract.

As long as the pompous Ecclestone is in charge of F1, that is fine by me.  I have never been to an F1 event as it just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me (parade “racing” and team “racing”) and I think a lot of Americans are in the same boat.  The main downside is that it will lose the city quite a bit of business for that week, but hey, we’re building a bigger and better convention center, right?   And next year the MotoGP comes to town, so that should help out and hopefully that will be a bit better than the GP car racing.

I must admit that the competitive eating circuit intrigues me a bit (and sort of disgusts me at the same time).

With that said, I am happy to see Major League Eater Joey Chestnut beat reigning champion Takeru Kobayashi AND set a new hot dog record (66 hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes) in the 2007 Nathan’s 4th of July Hot Dog Eating Contest. (Apparently Kobayashi had a “reversal of fortune” but was credited with 63 hot dogs.)

How gluttony became a sport AND entertainment is beyond me, but I must say that I’d prefer to watch that over any reality program.

[Photo courtesy of and copyright held by Chris Chin -- Thank you, thank you, thank you!]

The 2007 NBA Draft wasn’t that full of surprises…Greg Oden went #1 to the Portland Trail Blazers with Kevin Durant going #2 to the Seattle SuperSonics. The other two Indiana All-Stars, Mike Conley Jr. and Josh McRoberts, went #4 to the Memphis Grizzlies and #37 to the Portland Trail Blazers respectively.

The Indiana Pacers on the other hand pretended that they got into the draft this year, and I’m not going to join them on their journey into Neverland by pretending that I know what these goof-balls are up to. Something seriously needs to happen in the Pacers front office in order to make us a contender once again. Bad decision after bad decision has just hosed us to the point of only having one chip left to play, and that chip is a bit overinflated.

Who knows, maybe we can swing a deal with Portland to give Jermaine O’Neal back to them (along with the rest of the team) in exchange for Oden & McRoberts and then somehow steal Conley Jr. away from Memphis (maybe give them our “drafts” that are staying across the pond). Can you imagine the potential of having those three guys on the roster three or four seasons from now. And just the fact of having three “local boys” on the roster would sell out the Fieldhouse year-after-year.

But I digress as that will never happen for multiple reasons even if the other teams were willing. And I seriously wouldn’t be surprised to see Portland try to swing a deal to land Conley Jr. down the road provided the trio is healthy and have delivered on their expectations. Time will tell.

It’d been years since I had been out to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (I think the last time was 2001 when I went to the Indy 500), and even longer since I had been to the track on a weekday (I was in college the last time that happened). So, being self-employed this year provided an excellent opportunity to go to my first “Fast Friday” (with my dad, my brother-in-law & a friend), and I must say that there was quite a bit more track traffic than I had seen on any Carb Day I’d been to in the past.

The highlight of the day (besides watching the cars) had to be snapping over 1300 pictures of the cars, drivers, fans & “celebrities”. That alone is quite a feat and a quite daunting task to pick out the “best of”.

While down by the pits we saw Ryan Briscoe, Scott Sharp, Bobby Rahal, Johnny Rutherford and A.J. Foyt (telling the crew that he didn’t have all day to sit there…ugh, where are you going?). And we also saw Saliva in the pits, but opted out of the concert as we were a bit tired and hot. (If you don’t know who Saliva is, you’re not alone…I guess I’m starting to show my age a bit with my current music choices.)

For more photos, check out the Fast Friday 2007Photo Gallery.

…but not gone from the team?

**From the 1070 WIBC NewsCenter**

Pacers’ President of Basketball Operations Larry Bird says Head Coach Rick Carlisle will not return as head coach next season. Bird has invited Carlisle to move into the front office with the team.

Nothing against Rick, but what’s up with that? Maybe something in his contract?

Anyway, what coaches are available that would be along the lines of The General? I think that might be what we need for a few seasons around here to fix the mess left behind from the Isiah Thomas era. This off season should be interesting.