"This series is here for the longterm. I'm not a believer in highly-subsidized racing as we've seen either in the past or in other series." -- Kevin Kalkhoven source: ESPN - John Oreovicz Observers of the American open-wheel racing scene have been fixated on the short field of cars that came out for the first two open tests of the new 2007 Panoz Champ Car and the fact that just a a little more than a month before the scheduled start of the season, fewer than 10 drivers have been confirmed. "I promise I will never go and speak to penguins for two months in winter ever again," explained adventurous series co-principal Kevin Kalkhoven, who spent much of the offseason in Antarctica. "I disappeared for a couple of months and it wasn't necessarily the smartest thing to do without letting everyone know what I was doing. It caused a whole bunch of speculation." That speculation reached a fever pitch recently, which prompted Kalkhoven to discuss Champ Car's future with a small group of reporters on an international teleconference. However, firm answers about what kind of field to expect for the April 8 series opener in downtown Las Vegas won't be revealed until March 8, when Champ Car stages a media day at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca in California. "There has obviously been a quiet period over the winter offseason and that may have been taken by some people negatively and some people positively," Kalkhoven said. "But we had always planned to make a number of major announcements at Monterey next week. Significant sponsorships have come in and the series will continue to develop. I think you'll find there are a number of fully-funded teams and it's going to be one hell of a season. "I want to reiterate that the owners, particularly Jerry [Forsythe] and myself, are committed to both the fundamentals and the practice of Champ Car -- not just in the past and now, but solidly in the future."
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