Population wise, from India to Japan and up to the top of Russia 2/3rds of the worlds population lives there and how many tracks do they have? A mere handful I expect.
I don't know about their middles classes, whatever they are, but seeing as most are so badly paid and the working conditions are atrocious I would not think they have much of a middle class in relation to population.
Laguna would be good, but I don't think it'll ever be back on the Motogp circuit.
Certainly you know what the Middle Classes are. Mechanics, shop owners, pastry chefs, factory owners, stock brokers, customs agents, real estate people, captains of industry.
The question is: how many tracks do the Japanese have capable of hosting a GP. Japan has three (to say nothing of many small local tracks that host club and national level bike racing equivalent to BSB. Suzuka, Sugo and Motegi. Sugo used to host GPs back in the day. Not sure - but I think Suzuka and Sugo could be made acceptable if there were the will to do so, but Honda is such a huge force there that nobody wants to risk spending the money to compete with them. Sugo to my recollection is a very tight track and probably would need major redesign to make it compatible with modern bikes. They do run superbike there as well as Super GT and Formula it is still a working track. I reckon there isn't enough of a population tho in Japan to make it viable for two GPs. Japan after all is a tiny place with dwindling population.
True that India's downtrodden masses make .... wages - but with a current population of 1,365,457,170 that still makes for a lot of comfortably well off blue collar types, merchant class and upper middle class who can afford stuff like tickets to a race, even if those people only account for the top 5%.
Problem is... India is a sad amalgam of corruption, incompetence and promises unkept - that it's very doubtful they will ever get their .... together to build a proper international circuit. Only reason they have subway systems there is because the Chinese and Japanese felt sorry for their ..... and built the subways in Calcutta and Delhi - which they will, like every other aspect of infrastructure there, run into the ground with carelessness and neglect. Pakistan - the same only worse. Truly a .........
Thailand with a pop of 69.04 million is a much smaller place and does well to have their one MotoGp race, and it's a great venue and very well attended.
Indonesia - too small.
Russia - .... Russia. Inept and corrupt with no concept of safety in any endeavor.
Turkey - does okay with their one race. With a population of 69,666,666 - that's about as many races as they can populate.
I could see Brunei doing one because they have unlimited bucks - but they're too close to Malaysia, like opening a Duncan Donuts next to a Starbucks
Bahrain has the money to do it just for kicks, if they did some serious infrastructure building.
The balance of Asian countries are either too small or two poor to even build the track with one exception. South Korea.
The Koreans could build a kick-... track if they had the will to do it. I've wondered for some time why they don't.
Really tho - the biggest obstacle to races in Asian and Arab countries is flying logistics for all the teams based out of Europe. Those 24 hour flights really are hard on everybody on the team and the costs are mind-blowing. The heat in Arab countries is so insane, that I think nobody wants another round in that region. Thailand and Malaysia are already two really hot places to race.
RE: Laguna - never say never baby!
