Grand Prix Wknd..

[Lee STONE]

I just Got back from spending this Hot scorching Day downtown on Crescent....

What can I say but that I love living in Mtl..
We have the most beautiful women in the world here..
I didnt know where to turn next..I probably will have whiplash for the next couple of weeks..the women were fantastic..what cars..I didnt see any cars.

Was it the Heat, the cars, the excitement of Grand Prix..
I was overwhelmed today...just unbelievable..
cant wait untill tomorrow..

Montreal is the Best City to live in..especially during this wknd.. I just love it....I gotta go take a cold shower..

Lee STONE

 

[EagerBeaver]

The actual race is about to start and it is being televised nationally in the USA. Here it is called "Canadian Grand Prix", not Montreal Grand Prix.

I see that is it is 91 degrees Fahrenheit in Montreal with 84% humidity. It's even hotter than it is here!

 

[EagerBeaver]

Fischiella

Fischiella's car broke down and he stalked out of it like an unruly child. If there was a problem with his hydraulic system, well shit happens in car racing doesn't it?

 

[rarebird]

Hot time in Montreal

It was VERY hot at the circuit on Saturday and Sunday. The announcers compared it to Bahrain, but said with the humidity here it felt hotter. Several of the F1 cars brake rotors were glowing red, before they broke, or caught fire!

Do NOT buy General Admission tickets for the F1 race. If you can't afford a grandstand ticket, watch the race on TV under A/C. They severely restricted the areas for GA viewing, the greedy bastards. The few GA areas were jam packed and most people could not see anything. I've been to many other circuits in other series (Champ Car, etc) and you can still see the race with a GA ticket. Not in F1. The few GA areas were packed, and you rarely could see the big screen TVs from GA areas. They put black tarps all over the fences to prevent you from seeing the race from near the grandstand areas (where the big screen TVs are).

 

[Techman]

GA tickets

Years ago the ga tickets were great as they allowed you to pass right in front of the grandstands. In those days general admission to the track on the Friday was free. This was before they moved the start/finish line. The hairpin corner was completely ga as there were no grandstands there. When Labatts bailed out as the sponser things started to change as the event was getting more popular.
They built more grandstands and, I guess to ensure they sold out, they limited track access to the ga ticket holders. Like anything else the bottom line is how much money they make but today it seems that ga tickets are sold only to boost the attendance figures because you can't really see the race. It really is better to go watch the race in a bar on a big screen than to blow the bucks on ga tickets.

 

[HonestAbe]

Ridiculous Exit strategy at Grand Prix

I enjoyed Grand Prix but the lack of entrances/exits from the track was ridiculous. In addition to that the walkways were so jammed at times that we didn't move for a full 10 minutes. It took my friends and I nearly an hour just to get from grandstand 22 to the nearest exit on Saturday. Then to top things off on race day after it was all over we were told at the Casino (which took us an hour to get too) we had to either wait at the Casino for a bus (which we were told wouldn't leave til around 5PM) which would take us across the bridge to a cab stand or we could hump it several miles over the bridge to get to the cab stand.

We had dinner reservations at Queue De Cheval for 6PM and didn't want to screw that up so we walked across that bridge along with thousands upon thousands of other poor bastards who didn't want to or couldn't wait for the buses. Those of you who were there know how UNGODLY hot and humid it was that day, I was surprised that no one dropped dead from heatstroke, there actually was an ambulance waiting at the cab stand for precisely this possibility. One ****ing ambulance, for what, 10,000 people who walked over the bridge that day?

The city and the F1 planning committee must address this in a more effective manner. While it is true that 120,000 people attended the race and getting them all off an island is a formidable task I thought the very least they could have done was set up the cab stand on the other side of the bridge and/or started running those buses back and forth into the city immediately after the conclusion of the race rather than making thousands of people walk several miles in those conditions after spending the afternoon baking under the sun. I've attended Football games and concerts where 70,000 people had no problems exiting a stadium about the size of either far end of the Grand Prix racetrack and we were back on the highway an hour after the event. It took us 2 and a half hours to get back to our hotel that day. A pig is a pig no matter how much lipstick you put on it, and this evacuation plan is a real oinker.

 

[Techman]

Transportation

What about using the metro? I have been to the race many times, but not this year, and have never had any trouble getting downtown after. Sure there's a bit of a wait but they always put extra trains on the line and it has never taken me more than an hour including walking to the station and the wait in line at the metro.

 

[HonestAbe]

Metro

Maybe not taking the metro was a mistake if what you say is true Techman. I guess we all just assumed that the majority of the crowd would take the metro and the wait would be horrendous. We will definitely give it a shot next year. Thanks.