Marty's Version Of Events

Marty Roth, who has quit the IndyCar Series and is trying to sell his team, is clearly peeved at the IRL management. In an interview for www.wheels.ca, a website based in his hometown of Toronto, he confirms the rumor that the league essentially told him that they didn't want him driving anymore.

Here is a link to the article:

http://www.wheels.ca/Article%20Category/article/419845

I feel that a few comments are in order here. It is of course perfectly okay for the writer to be a fan of Roth and to paint him in the best light possible, but there are certian facts that he overlooked that I believe need mentioning here.

First of all, he claims that Marty finished with a higher championship points total than fifteen other participants. What he neglected to mention that all of them were running limited, part-time schedules - not the full season like Roth did (minus Watkins Glen): In fact, five of these fifteen only made one appearance in '08. Furthermore, there were two drivers with fewer race weekends under their belts for '08 who still managed to outscore him. 

Secondly, of the sixteen race weekends that Roth showed up for, he failed to keep the car in one peice long enough to even qualify for four of them, and he crashed out of six of the races that he did participate in.

In my opinion, while the IRL should have clearly stated that it was his driving skills - or lack thereof - that precipitated the attempt to "kick him upstairs", out of the cockpit & into the manager's chair, they were well within their right to ask him to do what they felt was best for his safety and that of the other drivers. Therefore, I feel the writer's assertion that the league owes Roth an apology to be without merit.