03/12/2009
FEATURE BY MIKE LAWRENCE
 |
The economy of Dubai is in trouble and it is expected that Abu Dhabi will prop up its neighbour. That's the theory, but on the afternoon of Wednesday, 2nd December, an urgent message was sent to many leading Historic racers: "Don't Come."
The message referred to the Abu Dhabi Classic next January. It was to have been the second motor race meeting to be held in that fly-blown patch of sand. Abu Dhabi has managed one motor race, it seems it cannot manage a second.
It was only on 14th October that the Yas Marina Circuit announced the Abu Dhabi Classic, organised in conjunction with Masters Historic Racing Ltd. It was to be a three-day extravaganza, January 21-23, 2010, with 'remarkable cars that have never before raced in the Gulf region.'
There was to have been no stinting, each grid would have three races, including one at night. It would have been the first time Historics had raced under floodlights and there was to be a track layout variant to the one used for the Grand Prize. There was to be another Tilke layout. Yippee!
In addition there were to be displays by manufacturers and classic car clubs and a Concours d'Elegance. It sounds like a cross between the Goodwood Festival and the Goodwood Revival, but it was planned to be 'a truly unique experience.'
'Unique' must never be qualified or embellished. Press releases should be written only by literate people. These days, it is a vain hope.
The race cars were due to be shipped out in the next couple of days. Then came the cancellation. No official reason has yet been given, but unless it admits the economic crisis, nobody is going to believe it.
The Classic would not have been as expensive to run as the GP, there would not have been the big bag of ackers going to Bernie and his petrolhead pals at CVC. The Classic was announced before the GP was run, so before the organisers could tot up their loss.
We were told that the recent race had a capacity crowd of 50,000. If we are told that, it must be true and therefore trick photography must have been used to show all the empty seats. I wonder if Bernie can recall the last time there was an unsold ticket at a British GP?
The cancellation came the day after a new £5 billion Dubai development was opened in Las Vegas. The unique selling points are that smoking, drinking and gambling are banned. Building a hotel without gambling in Las Vegas is like building a pub with no beer in the Australian Outback. It is a novel approach to business, and as likely to succeed.
One of the attractions of Las Vegas is the hint of naughtiness. There is the Mob past, the chance to gamble which began at a time when almost all the rest of the USA forbade it. Nevada even has legalised brothels, unlike most Middle Eastern countries where you have to take a chance with bottle-blondes from the former Soviet Bloc.
The Abu Dhabi GP is supposed to boost its tourist trade. There is not actually any good reason for being a tourist there, though I can understand the gaudy attraction of Las Vegas. Las Vegas is like a voluptuous woman with an interesting past, who you would never take home to meet your parents. Abu Dhabi and its neighbour, Dubai, are wannabe glam, like girls who cannot quite walk in four-inch heels.
Neither can overcome the fact that there are more pleasant places to watch Formula One, play golf, see exotic cars or spend a fortune on hotels. Neither place has history or culture on offer and both have to pay over the odds to import experienced hotel staff. They have to pay over the odds, and throw in accommodation and tax incentives, because Abu Dhabi and Dubai are not pleasant places to live.
Dubai is (was?) creating artificial archipelagoes in the Persian Gulf. A host of sports stars have been sold properties at huge discounts and some have been retained to promote the scheme. I reckon that you have to be unusually stupid if you take investment advice from someone who can kick a ball or wield a golf bat.
There is even a 25,000-seat cricket stadium. It opened this year, but a host of other planned venues have been cancelled.
Fans may flock to see top teams play cricket, for a week or so, and then they'll go home and the stadium will be unused. Many of the migrant workers who built the cricket stadium are passionate followers of the game, but they won't be able to afford the price of a ticket. I doubt whether the Middle East will breed cricketers.
Dubai is building Chav Heaven, and Abu Dhabi is following. It is gold medallion man's idea of paradise. The buzz was to sublet the property to other Chavs for their Chav holidays, a nice little earner, my son.
Dubai was intended to be a celebrity destination, in the full ghastliness of the word. If a TV show has 'celebrity' in the title, I will not watch it. I know someone who talks of attending a dinner with a celebrity guest. It was Desert Orchid, a horse. Imagine paying money to be in a room with dog meat, even celebrity dog meat.
Ten years ago, I was a celebrity, briefly. Chris Balfe arranged to give some copies of my biography of Ron Tauranac as prizes in a competition. We met at Silverstone for me to sign the books. Since I was signing, I had to be a celebrity and a small crowd gathered so I was soon signing programmes. I could see some people look puzzled when they examined their prize. 'Mike Lawrence? Didn't he used to drive a Lotus?' They did not notice Stirling Moss walk by, unmolested.
All the building sites in the Emirates have been served by migrant workers, mostly from the Indian sub-continent. They have been exploited, they work in appalling conditions, and are mainly stripped of their civil rights. Their crime is to try to send money to their families. Many are now stranded because they cannot afford the fare home. Many have not been paid for months.
The oil sheikhs appear not to give a damn about the slave labour they employ. Bernie does not care either, or we would not have Abu Dhabi on the calendar. People in the West beat themselves up about carbon footprints, fairtrade goods and sweatshops. It comes to Formula One and the BBC tells us how wonderful a new circuit is. This would be the same BBC which has run hard-hitting investigations into what is virtually slave labour.
Abu Dhabi has a GP and no motor racing culture. When Silverstone started, the track was laid out with straw bales and oil drums and the race control/commentary point was a double-decker bus. All three prewar circuits were closed and a new tradition was born.
Here is a lesson from history, The Italian maker, Cisitalia, was a branch of a sports equipment empire and, just after WWII, had the idea of making, and selling, racing cars as though they were racing bicycles. The Cisitalia D46 was a pretty monoposto which used Fiat 1100 running gear. It was a Formula Junior car years ahead of its time.
In 1947, with financial backing from Switzerland, Cisitalia formed a 'circus' of 15 cars. The theory went that they would be transported to a major race and top drivers would each draw a car and engage in a one-make curtain raiser to the main event. It was a wonderful idea. Most of the star drivers at the time were Italian (Germans were barred from International racing until 1950) and they all signed up.
Now comes the point about culture and tradition. To get the formula under way, a series of races was organised in, of all places, Egypt. I have nothing but fond memories of the years of my childhood spent in Egypt, but motor racing in Egypt is about as daft as camel racing in Idaho. There was one race, near Cairo, and it lost so much money that the series was abandoned and the cars sold on.
The series operated to market forces, it did not have a government supporting it. In Egypt, it did not have a culture and tradition of motor racing and could not attract a crowd even though Cairo was a cosmopolitan city.
The UAE has been like a newcomer to the automotive industry which has built a massive factory and announced that it is offering a better product, just like DeLorean. I rest my case.
The number of spectators at Indianapolis for Formula One was more than three times the capacity crowd at Abu Dhabi, had that been achieved, but Americans have been denied their race. One of the things that FOTA is unhappy about was the absence of F1 from North America. Bernie has bowed to pressure and Montreal will be back in 2010.
Bernie should buy an atlas and find out how far Montreal is from, say, Los Angeles. Formula One is supposed to be international and in 2009 we had one race in the Americas, North and South, and none in Africa. In 1966, there were more F1 races in Southern Africa than there were in the World Championship.
Abu Dhabi is going to discover that it takes more than pretty lights and a crap circuit to build a tourist industry. Dubai has already discovered the folly of building for Chavs.
The property bubble has burst and there is no repair kit for a burst bubble. You can only attract the serious wealthy if you are perceived to be successful. Dubai is now a building site and Abu Dhabi is conjoined at the hip. It is has been claimed that the 'success' of the first Abu Dhabi GP, and its capacity crowd, minus the empty seats, will kick a programme of expansion which will take capacity to 75,000, which will mean more empty seats.
We are told by PR people that Abu Dhabi was a success, but we all know that the circuit is rubbish, as was the racing and there was not a capacity crowd. In fact, the Yas Marina circuit is another disaster.
Except, according to its PR, Abu Dhabi was an amazing success. That is the official line, believed by nobody. Its attempt to stage a second meeting, a 'truly unique experience' was cancelled hours before cars were due to be shipped there.
It had two international meetings planned in 12 months and one has been cancelled. Spare a thought for all the Historic racers who will not see the pretty lights change colour.
I suggest that we relax and enjoy the experience of watching PR people under pressure. We know that Abu Dhabi's ambitions are useless therefore, unless we were booked to compete in the Classic, we can at least enjoy the excuses.
Mike Lawrence
mike@pitpass.com
To check out previous features from Mike, click here