Next Level TV and Ashley Avis

at the

Honda/Indy Saint Petersburg Grand Prix

This past weekend we were fortunate enough to attend the SPGP sponsored by Honda. We had a blast thanks to the people at Red Bull including team owner Eddie Cheever.

The weekend started off a little bumpy as this is the first production Ashley and I have worked on together. There is a lot of work and preparation that goes on and it is a pretty big responsibility if you want to look like a seasoned professional. She is also the youngest woman to actually complete her assignment at 18. And as I have said all along, this job is not easy and for an 18 year old young woman to talk with world famous athletes without blinking an eye was pretty impressive. By the time the weekend was over we were working like a well oiled machine. It is amazing that such a young woman has so much poise.

This weekend actually started for me several weeks prior as things have to be planned and arrangements made for media credentials and pre-event press conferences. We had a chance to meet a few of the drivers including the eventual winner of the event Dan Wheldon.

And speaking of eventual winners for those of you who are not aware the cast of NLTV seems to be a good luck charm. We also attended the last SPGP which was sponsored by the CHAMP series and hooked up with Team Players who not only won that race but the series championship. Later that year we hooked up with Team Donzi Offshore Powerboat racing and they won a National Championship. This year we followed the home team of Andretti Green Racing and lo and behold, they win. Are we a good luck charm?

So we got a chance to wander the entire circuit once again and although I'm not happy at the restrictions Indy has on video taping the cars on the track they are first class all the way. The past experience that the city of Saint Petersburg had with the CHAMP race really paid off. The only way to know what you are facing when putting on an event of this magnitude is to have done it before. Each city has it's own hurdles and this one having been through this before put the lessons of the past to good use. There was ample parking and shuttles all to our picturesque waterfront.

Ashley also talked with Team A/G members current champion Tony Kannan and team member Dan Wheldon. She jumped right in and didn't stutter or make any huge stumbles. The interview you see is what we shot with just a couple edits because of things out of our control.

Then we got a chance to hook up with Red Bull/Cheever Racing. Now I have to say I'm pretty much like most guys that grew up in the Midwest, the Indy 500 is a very special race. Although some of the prestige has diminished since the CHAMP cars and Indy split ways it still holds the historic aura. Getting to meet Eddie Cheever let alone have him be so cool was quite a thrill. More people have gone into outer space than have won the Indy 500.

We attended the Red Bull party on Friday night at a downtown Saint Petersburg bar and it was really off the hook. Everywhere you walked you saw famous race drivers and team owners. Unfortunately these parties are private and not open to the public. Eventually they open the bar but by then most of the people you want to meet have left.

In my opinion Indy should put these parties on and allow the public to mingle with the drivers and owners to boost the popularity of the sport. There is the big monster of NASCAR looming over every racing series and part of what makes them so popular is that the drivers are so accessible to the fans.

Anyway, yep I ended up partying too hard and had a tough time getting up on Saturday. The day we did all the interviews.  We also went around and shot at several of the exhibits around the track.  There are samples of cars and simulators as well as the merchandise.

On Sunday we hung out track side at the Red Bull area and got to see the cars pass by so close you could flip a coin into the cockpit. We were positioned at the hard left turn coming off the long straight picturesque straightaway. Tony Kannan bump wheels more than once right in front of us, one time I caught on tape but I can't show it because of the agreement Indy has with major broadcasters.

Now that may not seem like that big of a deal to someone who is say a NASCAR fan because they bump one another all the time but in open wheeled cars that is a completely different story. If you bump you are almost always bumping spinning tires against something and the natural reaction is for that tire to climb the surface which launches the car into the air. Not fun going over 100 MPH.

Well, hope you enjoy the show and get an idea of what going to a race like this is like. For each city that has a race track or supports a street race it is like the circus coming to town. For the people who work in the industry it is like waking up and working in the circus every day.