Very good insider information- I keep forgetting that you guys up North have Thanksgiving a bit earlier than down here in America. With that said, I can very much see funding from some level of government for the Canadian GP, as the event has always had a strong place in Canada’s national sports culture from what I can see. I don’t know if such a development would get the event back in time for 2009, but I do strongly suspect it will happen in the near future.

The only downside to such a development is that it would make things much tougher for the promoters of any new attempt to re-launch the USGP. If the interested parties have enough cash to meet Bernie’s demands, fine, but if Canada can get government funding than Bernie will demand the same of any U.S. venue that can’t cough up the cash itself, eliminating any negotiating room for the interested Americans. I know when the event was in Indy that Tony George made a point of not asking for assitance from any level of government in paying the fee, and such an attutide may make it very tough to even open the door with Bernie for the forseeable future.

I am not sure that lots of folks in Canada are up for paying $$$ for having an F1 GP, however, Quebec (the French speaking part of Canada) is a very important political area for any government looking to take power, so the gov’t tends to spend more there than they might elsewhere. It would not surprise me at all to hear that the Canadian Government has stepped in to provide funding to get the F1 GP back in Canada.

Greg