{"id":271539,"date":"2026-04-16T22:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T22:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/271539\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T22:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T22:55:08","slug":"long-beach-motorsports-walk-of-fame-inducts-alexander-rossi-late-mayor-bob-foster-orange-county-register","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/271539\/","title":{"rendered":"Long Beach Motorsports Walk of Fame inducts Alexander Rossi, late mayor Bob Foster \u2013 Orange County Register"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>LONG BEACH \u2014 As a new father, Alexander Rossi says his induction into the Long Beach Motorsports Walk of Fame has a deeper meaning.<\/p>\n<p>The two-time winner of the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach took his place on the Walk on Thursday while the city also recognized the recent deaths of two of the event\u2019s biggest behind-the-scenes contributors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is something that\u2019s going to be here forever,\u201d said Rossi, who won in Long Beach in 2018 and 2019. \u201cI think when you\u2019re in your career you don\u2019t really get a chance to actually reflect on things you\u2019ve done, but I\u2019ve been fortunate to be a part of this race and accomplish so much.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rossi was inducted alongside former two-term Long Beach mayor Bob Foster, the city\u2019s first leader to experience a ride-along in a two-seat IndyCar.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBeing able to bring your family to honor a father\u2019s accomplishments, being a new dad, that resonates with me pretty closely,\u201d Rossi said. \u201cThese moments certainly remind you of that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Foster\u2019s son, Kenny, accepted the honor on behalf of his father, who <a href=\"http:\/\/presstelegram.com\/2025\/12\/01\/former-long-beach-mayor-bob-foster-dies-at-78\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">died Nov. 30 at the age of 78<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe loved everything about this weekend,\u201d Kenny Foster said. \u201cHe loved the cars and loved the speed. He wasn\u2019t a big fan of the noise, but he loved having IndyCar come to his city.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Both honorees recognized Jim Michaelian, one of the race\u2019s co-founders and the event\u2019s president and CEO from 2001 until <a href=\"https:\/\/www.presstelegram.com\/2026\/03\/21\/jim-michaelian-grand-prix-of-long-beachs-longtime-leader-has-died-at-83\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">his death March 21<\/a>\u00a0at the age of 83.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe was such an amazing supporter of every one of us as drivers,\u201d Rossi said. \u201cThe success of what this event is now wouldn\u2019t exist without him (and) how the entire city has always embraced this series and all of us.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBeing from California, this place is right up there (with Indianapolis) in terms of fondness and the memories that I have of being able to have success here and be a part of history on the series,\u201d Rossi said.<\/p>\n<p>Added Kenny Foster: \u201cThere\u2019s still a bunch of photos online of my dad and Jim laughing at different races over the years. They used to have so much fun. I think that\u2019s pretty cool.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Michaelian served on the Grand Prix Association\u2019s board of directors for 51 years, spearheading the event into becoming a worldwide racing destination.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen you look at what this race means, outside the Indianapolis 500, and this is the flagship event of IndyCar,\u201d Rossi. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to poll the paddock to know that the response will be that this is our favorite race (and) our favorite street circuit that we get the chance to compete on.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Michaelian was a sports car racer for more than 25 years, competing at Le Mans, Daytona, N\u00fcrburgring and Watkins Glen, among others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH \u2014 As a new father, Alexander Rossi says his induction into the Long Beach Motorsports Walk&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271540,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,28942,133,132,14396,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-271539","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-long-beach","8":"tag-long-beach","9":"tag-long-beach-grand-prix","10":"tag-long-beach-headlines","11":"tag-long-beach-news","12":"tag-motorsports","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271539","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271539"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271539\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}