Indianapolis still hopeful of F1's return

Indianapolis Motor Speedway President Joie Chitwood has reiterated his desire to see Formula One return to the hallowed speedway in the near future.

After Indy boss Tony George failed to agree a contract extension with F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, the United States Grand Prix left off the F1 calendar this season.

However, Chitwood reckons it could make its return in the not too distant future.

"I know that Tony has said it, I've said it: The door is open," he said. "We think that's a phenomenal racing series; we think it should be back in America.

"So the door is open. Maybe it can come back some day."

But while Indianapolis said goodbye to Formula One, it is welcoming MotoGP to the hallowed circuit this season.

However, in order to host the race the track had to be redesigned, although Chitwood claims all changes made were with an eye to seeing F1 return.

"One thing I want to make sure is clear, motorcycles didn't replace F1," he said.

"If you look at the way we scheduled our calendar, we had hoped that F1 would come back and it would have maintained that June date after the Montreal event, and that's why you saw the motorcycle event in September.

"One of the things that we did do with the design of this motorcycle course is that every change we made was also inspected and approved by the FIA so that should F1 come back.

"They can run this course, they can run it their same direction, they can run it the other direction, they can run the four-turn chicane in Turn One or not.

"We did not want to make any changes that would preclude us in the future from hosting F1."