Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Red Bull U.S.GP: What Laguna thinks of the Grand Prix On the subject of the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix, the typical letter to the editor reads something like this: Dear Sir, My passenger and I last 10 pounds stewing inside our leathers and helmets and torturing the clutch on my Gixxer 1000 on the hour-long crawl from Highway 68 to the top of the hill at Laguna Seca. We waited in line an hour to buy a T-shirt only to be told they were sold out of large and extra-large. We waited in line 45 minutes for food and half that for the bathroom. But the racing was awesome. See you in '06! Sincerely, Kneepuck46@001.com one of that will come as a surprise to Gill Campbell. The Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca general manager was aware of the problems as they were happening, but by then it was too late. The roads were clogged, the T-shirts were sold out, the porta-potties were overflowing... Simply put, the track was overwhelmed. It won't happen again. That was the pledge from Campbell in her postrace assessment. The weekend was spent trying to put out fires, taking in the spectacle, wondering at the finish, and, most importantly, learning how to make it better in 2006. That's the goal, but even she admits it will be hard to beat the racing or weather. We caught up to the transplanted Briton as she was about to enter a meeting to discuss a number of issues, including the riders' requests for track changes for 2006. N The number-one complaint seems to be traffic. What's the solution? We certainly know that that's an issue that we need to address immediately, and we've already started work on that. Number one, we were certainly overwhelmed with the number of vehicles. One of the many ideas is to have one road dedicated to motorcycles. One of the things that happened is motorcycles were passing cars on the road coming in. Sitting in his car, actually one member of our executive committee counted 1000 motorcycles pass by. That's 1000 people ahead of you all of a sudden and you haven't moved. We need to have a road dedicated just to motorcycles. I think that will help relieve a lot of things. And getting offsite shuttle parking. I think all the problems are fixable. I think we have go through it once before we know issues so we can fix them. We were a victim of a first-time deal with this. We certainly underestimated the impact of traffic. Two things right there 34 "!Iv 2 7 2005 • eye. F NEWS which we can immediately fix which will have an enormous relief on traffic. We've put together a task force just to deal with traffic. It's our top priority. Was this the biggest crowd ever? Yes, it was. The previous largest was the [50,000) who saw the Pope in 19B7. This is the largest crowd ever for a racing event. There seemed to be long lines at both the concession stands and the restrooms. We had eight souvenir booths, but what we need is a souvenir store the size of the media center. We underanticipated the enthusiasm of this crowd. It was overwhelming. Again, it's something that's fixable. I dealt with the porta-potty order on Wednesday. We have to figure out where to put them so that they can be emptied on a regular basis. Put them in places where they can be pumped. We'll put out more concession booths. Our aim is to please the fans, and there's nothing more disappointing than not fulfilling every hope. The downside is that until you do something once, you don't know if you've screwed up. If I do it again, you can shoot me. When did you know you were overwhelmed? On Saturday. Unfortunately, there's not much you can do, there really is nothing much you can do. With the traffic, I was constantly on the phone with the Monterey sheriff's office and with the California Highway Patrol. We were all trying to do what we could to work with situation we had. Saturday, even though we still had long lines, Sunday just was even more congested and we worked as hard and as fast as we were able to within the limitations for this year. I understand that Valentino Rossi had problems getting in. I heard that story. He could have taken a helicopter. We even had helicopter congestion. We had a lot of helicopters, and they had to wait for the ones that landed to take off before another could come in. About the criticism of the track by the riders. After you were given a date, you were presented with a list of improvements by the FIM and the rider safety commission. Did you do everything that was requested? Absolutely. We fulfilled absolutely everything the FIM asked us to do and the riders' commission asked us to do. We were signed off on that. We were in compliance. Were you surprised at the criticism? Yes and no. I think a lot of these riders have never been to our faCility. This is a traditional road race facility, and these riders, a lot of these riders are used to new facilities that are purpose-built for motorcycle racing. It's different. That is a traditional racecourse. It has a different look, a different feel. Have you seen the list of changes the riders have requested for next year? I have seen the list and, in fact, I have people waiting for me to go into the initial meeting. Obviously, we don't own the property. The county owns the property. We have some hoops to go through to get to the point that we can g through it all. Many people are involved in this whole process. We'll address it as quickly as possible. When will you know what you can and can't do, whether financially or logistically? I don't know yet. I have no idea what we're looking at. I'm not an engineer so I have no idea what it's going to take. It would be too premature to say what it's going to take. I understand the track is scheduled to be resurfaced in 2007. It is scheduled for a resurface in 2007. That could possibly change. We could move the schedule up. It's premature to say what will happen. There are a lot of things to consider. Our track is rented out most every day of the year. We have to consider how long we would close down. There are a lot of issues before I can even address that. What is your overall assessment of the weekend? I'm thrilled. Ninety-nine point-nine percent of the fans who were here had an incredible time and let us know that. I think this was the best event we've ever had, and we had a lot of very, very happy fans. Seeing two Americans on the eN podium was more than I could have imagined.

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