Teams like second US race idea

Formula 1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone has hinted that a race could be staged in New York, but a return to Long Beach, engineered by former CART boss Chris Pook, is considered a more viable alternative.

"I think we have got to look at how we get better penetration into America per se," said BAR boss David Richards. "Someone was telling a story at lunchtime about how little awareness there was of F1 despite the fact that we are here this weekend and were in Montreal last weekend.

"As far as extra events are concerned, I have a slightly different view on this. I would rather do extra events and far less testing. I think extra events actually drive revenue and increase the value to everyone and testing does absolutely none of that."

McLaren boss Ron Dennis shares Richards' enthusiasm for F1's US expansion but is more concerned that the calendar will become too large.

"We are all feeling the strain of what is going to be an 18-race series this year," said Dennis. "I think we'd all support it, providing it didn't increase the calendar size.

"A west coast race would be very beneficial to the commercial interests of all of our teams and probably F1 as a whole. It obviously gives us the ability to attract some American investment into our sport, and we wouldn't want to see these races move off the calendar."

Fellow team boss Eddie Jordan believes that improving the show is as vital as increasing exposure however. "I remember not very long ago going to Barcelona to a handful of people, going to Canada to a handful of people, and they have turned out to be probably two of the best supported events on our calendar.

"We have to get our act together. We do realize in an American context we are not close enough to the people. We must make sure that we think carefully about this."