"To use a technical term, I think we're screwed," says CoTA chairman
Wednesday 11 November 2015 14:25, UK
The future of the United States GP at the Circuit of the Americas is in doubt after the race reportedly lost 20 per cent of their state backing.
The Austin American-Statesman reports that the governor's office will reduce their support payment from around $25m to $19.5m, based on a different formula of calculating how much economic activity the race generates for Texas.
"To use a technical term, I think we're screwed," CoTA chairman Bobby Epstein told the publication.
"The state clearly made promises. I think we made a deal, and we lived up to our end of the deal," he said of the recalculation.
"It's like if you go to a restaurant and order a dinner, and then after you've eaten the meal, they change the price."
This year's race in Austin was affected by heavy rain which saw fans locked out of the circuit for final practice which turned out to be the only running on Saturday after qualifying was rained off.
The venue was then flooded a week later by further torrential rain and Epstein admits the weather has been "financially devastating".
F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone is keen to grow the sport in America and is known to be looking at staging a second race in the United States.
However, when asked about the reduction of the Texas state subsidy, Ecclestone was pessimistic about the future of the USA's first purpose-built F1 venue.
"If it's changed, it's going to be difficult to continue the race in Austin," Ecclestone said.
Overall crowd numbers were down at the 2015 race and that was attributed in part to the return of neighbouring Mexico to the calendar after a 23-year absence. The race day crowd in Mexico City was 135,000.
"The big question now is: 'Is the race coming back?'," Epstein told the newspaper.
If not, losing CoTA from the calendar would prove another devastating blow to F1's hopes of establishing itself in the USA.
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