Formula 1 coming to Austin, Baby!

The city and state NEVER should have gotten involved. It's like nobody in politics at any level has any amount of brain power.

Way to go City of Austin looking like the blind leading the blind. You could see this coming 50 miles away!
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Bernie's not the problem here, & he's not raising the rights fee as much as he's just not going to give the CoTA investors the friends & family rate he was giving to Hellmund.

Look guys, I know it's easy to make kneejerk reactions like "Bernie is evil and is screwing the U.S. out of a race", or "Susan Combs is lying", or "Tavo H. doesn't know what he's doing", but I really don't believe any of that is true. If you look at the big picture, it appears that these three parties, and Dorna, are working in concert to bring this situation to a resolution.

Look at Combs' move. There's more to it than most people think there is. She's been fine with this deal for 18 months, but she suddenly made her move in the same week that Bernie made his moves, and COTA stops construction, and Dorna says MotoGP is in doubt if there's no F1 race here. Coincidence? I don't think so This move hurts the investors in this deal...REALLY puts them behind the 8-ball.

Bernie can do whatever he likes with the rights to the race, esp when he's supposed to have been paid 5 months ago.

Tavo's influence lies in his ties with Bernie, his political contacts, his knowledge of racing and the racing business, and his racing ties worldwide. As far as I can discern, the guy is on a speed-dial basis with damn-near every significant motorsport figure the world over. He also still has the MotoGP rights with Kevin Schwantz, and the Aussie V8s rights.

The investors have the checkbook (that appears now to not be as big as advertised).

COTA investors screwed this thing up when they began cutting Tavo out of the deal and weren't willing to pay him a fair price to transfer the rights to CoTA. Then they miscalculated on their end-around to Bernie when they withheld payment that was due 7/31, forcing Bernie to cancel Tavo's rights contract. Through some MASSIVE leap of fantasy, they seemed to think they could get the same $25M deal from Bernie even after disrespecting Tavo (essentially Bernie's family) and ****ing all over the deal Bernie and Tavo had set up.

See where I'm going?

The investors thought they'd be clever by getting rid of Tavo & playing hardball with Bernie. Instead, they got a massive lesson in what hardball really is.

They underestimated Tavo, Combs, and Bernie (and maybe Dorna as well). COLOSSAL misstep.

Think about it.

They HAD the "family" price already through Tavo. They just didn't pay it...despite repeated warnings and extensions. As a result Tavo's rights belong to Bernie again and they apparently have to pay a more typical fee if they want the rights. Now COTA is dealing with Bernie (and a pissed off one at that), not Tavo. No friends & family discount. Additionally, Combs is saying "You're no longer getting the reimbursement before the race because your deal has now fallen out of those parameters, AND further dealings with you will be more heavily scrutinized because you effed this up". The MOST they'll get from the METF now will be $25M. If they pay Bernie now, they won't get reimbursed until early 2013, EVEN IF there's a 2012 race...and the price has likely gone up. They'll have to make up the difference between the METF funding and Bernie's price, every year. That difference over 10 years will likely add up to $100M or more. Had they paid up back in July, they'd be getting set for full reimbursement in a month or so.

Now Dorna's saying their race may be in doubt if there's no F1.

So in a nutshell everyone is bringing pressure to bear on the investors, saying "No Tavo? No discounted F1 rights fee" or, "No Tavo? No advance payment", or "No Tavo? No MotoGP".

Now we see who blinks first. My guess is it won't be Bernie, or Tavo, or Combs...
 
I think the announcement of the F1 race in New Jersey has also caused a lot of heartburn. The quotes from Susan Combs make it sound like she was surprised by this news. From her official statement:
In reply to:
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I love F1 racing, but I don't think doing business with Bernie Ecclestone is a good idea for anyone. He is known for shafting the countries that spend huge amounts of money for these events, in favor of something that gives him a little bit more money, or is a little bit newer, whatever. Not too happy with F1 now, and I don't know if I will keep following the sport. This is a real debacle.
 
Bernie is an *******, but everyone knows it. Hellmund is a greedy promoter who was playing outside of his skill set and overplayed his hand badly. COTA are fools for trying to think they could ever gain any leverage on Bernie, and just plain stupid for even attempting to include any State money in a deal.

In order to pull this off COTA is going to have to eat a big dose of crow, and I don't see their egos' letting that happen.
 
Last minute deal worked out, money wired to London, and the Austin race stays on the F1 calendar.
This should bring the local haters out of the woodwork.
Hopefully, the site will be ready and the logistics worked out.
This is a big tourist attraction for Austin, and should bring in a lot of tourist dollars.
 
Sounds like Epstein and McCombs learned what negotiating with a dictator is like. However all is good with the best being the State is not involved.
 
The state still will pay the $25 million each year, no? They will just wait until the event actually happens instead of fronting the money, like they originally agreed.
 
To little to late on the roads. The perimeter roads need to be at least three lanes in each direction to allow for proper circulation.

The international press is going to have a field day with this, but hopefuly by the second race signifianct improvements will have been gained.
 
Too late, but this should have been settled long ago. There was plenty of time to get this expansion of Elroy Road done. Instead, the investors dropped the ball yet again in yet another quibble over money that will likely end up costing them much more down the road, at least in terms of headaches and egg on their faces if not in actual money.

These guys just can't seem to get out of their own way. They really blew it when they cut Hellmund out of the deal. Now they're like a rudderless ship.
 
Thank you once again for those and any updates you do. I am somewhat afraid of clicking on this thread any more due to the antics that have been going on with it. This was a payoff.
 
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