CART wants 'two or three' European dates

Pook continued: "At the end of the day, we're a marketing company. We have to provide a delivery mechanism to our sponsors. If they invest in our sport, they need a return on their investment. We have to deliver big, big markets - the NAFTA markets, the EC, the Pacific Rim. If you look at us as a marketing vehicle delivering these consumer centres to sponsors, we start to shape up as a fairly interesting proposition."

Next year the Rockingham 500 will move from September to the first (bank holiday) weekend in May, and a second European race is tentatively scheduled for the last weekend of April. The venue is yet to be determined, but looks unlikely to be the Eurospeedway Lausitz in Germany, even when its current insolvency is resolved. Pook said: "Southern Europe is where we'll probably end up on the other weekend - somewhere sunny. Spain would be very good, but we have to be very careful and respect where F1 is. I want to be a feeder series for F1, not feed off F1.

"If F1 races every two weeks and we go back-to-back, [one weekend] we're going to get whacked. And we basically have to go back-to-back because of logistics and costs."