Who Hates America? F1 does.

There are probably a lot of long faces in the city of Indianapolis today after the announcement that Formula One racing will not return to Indy or the US in 2008. The race had been held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the past eight years. The city of Indianapolis stands to lose 100 million dollars in revenue without the event taking place.

While F1 has gained popularity in the US it is still greatly overshadowed domestically by NASCAR. One of the sticking points in the negotiations between Bernie Ecclestone, president of Formula One Management and speedway chairman Tony George was the lack of domestic promotion of the event. While the US Grand Prix regularly attracts one of the larger crowds on the calendar, Ecclestone saw room for improvement.

Speculation is that there may emerge a rift between some teams and Formula One management over this decision. Ferrari, BMW, Toyota and Honda all rely on exposure from the race and participation in the series to elevate their brand perceptions. Ferrari may in fact have more support at the US race than it does at it’s home event in Italy. Formula One is as much about the iconic brands that race the cars as it is the actual racing. Separate championships are awarded for both the drivers and manufacturers.

This may also be unfortunate news for P Diddy. It was recently reported that he took interest in buying into an F1 team and was seen potentially courting the services of rookie superstar Lewis Hamilton. This could have answered another gripe of Ecclesone’s that there is currently no American F1 team.