Article:Racing Roundup: 2/11/08 - Silly Season recap and early season action.



Believe it or not, Auto Racing is about to make its return for winter vacation. I'm also reviving the Racing Roundup articles I somewhat-regularly wrote towards the back half of last season with an intent on sticking to them.

This week's article is a bit of a special, since I will review some of the silly season shenanigans that went on as well as some of the racing action. Only a little bit of real action this week, as NASCAR has begun its Daytona proceedings, and drag racing makes its 2008, and as far as I know, its AGM article debut.

{| width="95%" cellpadding=5 align="center" |- | width="1000%" valign="top" | {| width="100%" style="background-color:#F5F7F4; border:1px #000000 solid; padding:3px;" |- | bgcolor="#33CCFF" align="center" |  NASCAR  |- | bgcolor="#FFFFFF" | The NASCAR season has officially debut this weekend, as they ran the Bud Shootout and began Daytona 500 qualifying. But even before the trailers took the cars to Florida, a few big developments emerged:


 * Open Wheel Emigration - the biggest personnel story from the perspective of the whole auto racing community has to be the move that many drivers have made this season to NASCAR from an open wheel background.  The last two Indy 500 and IndyCar champions are not racing in the IRL, but rather NASCAR this season, as Sam Hornish Jr. and Dario Franchitti switched series.  Also making the leap is Jacques Villeneuve, the 1997 World Champion now racing for Bill Davis and Patrick Carpentier, a five time winner in CART who ran two Busch races last year (including a pole in Montreal).  There are eight former open wheelers racing Sprint Cup this year, all but two having begun their stock car careers since 2006.


 * Dale Jr. + Hendrick = NASCAR's Wet Dream? - the biggest personnel story from the perspective of the "American" auto racing community is the arrival of Dale Earnhardt Jr. at Hendrick Motorsports.  Hendrick is now a dream team of sorts, with the series' most popular driver teaming up with its most successful drivers in the post-Petty era: Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson.


 * The end of Buschwhacking (for now) - Buschwackers, those drivers who used Busch Cup races as a testing tool, will be no more.  Beyond the renaming of NASCAR's second tier series as the Nationwide Series, this year the two series will be running different vehicles.  That's because the Car of Tomorrow is now the Car of Today in the Sprint Cup, while the Nationwide Series will remain with the old-style NASCARs.  It will be interesting to see if guys like Carl Edwards will continue to race without the prior excuse (let me just say here and now - any non-rookie who does is just trying to make some money).

Okay, on to this weekend. First up was the Bud Shootout, the exhibition race that begins each NASCAR season. The race is primarily made up of pole winners from the previous season and a few former champions sprinkled in. The race itself is not so interesting, since drivers don't want to screw up too much before Daytona. Dale Jr. won the race, with Tony Stewart second.

Sunday saw 53 cars begin qualify for the Daytona 500. Environmentalist might want to take offense at the silliness of the first day, since all these cars ran 5 miles so that a grand total of two cars can be set into the field and two others may qualify. Explaining exactly how drivers qualify for this race is rather complicated since it involves a billion scenarios, but here's a very brief tutorial: Only the front row is decided on the first day, while the rest of the field is determined in a pair of races that will occur on Valentine's Day.

Based on the qualifying session, it looks like Jimmie Johnson will starting 2008 the way he ended 2007. That's because he won the pole for 50th running of the Great American race. Joining Johnson on the front row will be two-time winner Michael Waltrip, who missed out on pole by .088 seconds. |}

{| width="95%" cellpadding=5 align="center" |- | width="1000%" valign="top" | {| width="100%" style="background-color:#F5F7F4; border:1px #000000 solid; padding:3px;" |- | bgcolor="#33CCFF" align="center" |  Formula One  |- | bgcolor="#FFFFFF" | If a television producer is smart, they'd created a series about Formula One. Sometimes, it seems more dramatic than Grey's Anatomy.

The fallout from the McLaren saga last year has some serious effect on the drivers roster this year. As the season progressed it became obvious that Lewis Hamilton was a fine driver, and was good enough to be a #1. Of course, it's damn near impossible to switch status when your other driver is the two-time defending World Champion that you just sign that very year. Since Alonso has to be #1 and Hamilton doesn't deserve to be relegated to second banana, status quo could not be maintained.

As a result, Alonso was released from his contract with McLaren. With Ferrari and BMW-Sauber sure on keeping their lineups, next on the ladder was Alonso's old team, Renault with whom he won his championships. Already in a driver changing mood (out with Fisichella, in with Piquet), the team dumped Heikki Kovalainen for the former world champ. In a sweet twist, the young Finn got a new ride, with McLaren.

And speaking of CART refugees, you guys get Seabass (Bourdais). Wonder if he's any good against drivers who have rides because their good and not because they are rich. |}

{| width="95%" cellpadding=5 align="center" |- | width="1000%" valign="top" | {| width="100%" style="background-color:#F5F7F4; border:1px #000000 solid; padding:3px;" |- | bgcolor="#33CCFF" align="center" |  IndyChampCar, oops not so fast  |- | bgcolor="#FFFFFF" |When envisioning my preview of the IndyCar season, I was thinking about new rules, and how this is the year Danica must win to earn respect as a racer, but as this week went on, something dreamier occurred.

Robin Miller, one of the few name journalists in American open-wheel racing, released a story on Speedtv.com saying that the two open-wheel bodies in the US, IndyCar and Champ Car were thisclose to merging together. IndyCar owner Tony George was willing to give Champ Car teams that made move free cars and engines for this season. Along with it, IndyCar would add three Champ Car events: Long Beach, Edmonton, and Surfer's Paradise. One major glitch: Long Beach, the biggest gem of a race Champ Car has, has an unmovable date that is the same weekend IndyCar scheduled for its Motegi race. Honda who is Motegi's owner and IndyCar's sole engine supplier, agreed to move it back one week, but that was the week they were at Kansas. ISC, the NASCAR-owned company controlling Kansas Speedway, did not want to move its race either. They couldn't just take Motegi onto the back of the schedule either, since Chicagoland is contractually obligated to be the season finale, and Honda would not approve it as a non-points race. So it seems for now merger talks are off.

There will be one series next year. It has to happen. All the contract mumbojumbo preventing a merger will not matter. Champ Car is on its last legs. Most teams survive only by bringing in ride buyers with sponsorships. Some teams have not lined up drivers yet. Last year saw three races cancelled during the season.

I love what they've tried to do, but ultimately there's only room for one open-wheel series and IndyCar has what few assets American open-wheel has: an event race and drivers recognizable to the general public (yes, I know it's just Danica and Helio, but it's two more than Champ Car has). The ironic thing in the whole ordeal is that the series IndyCar has become was everything that Tony George was rebelling against when he broke off from CART back in 1996. |}

{| width="95%" cellpadding=5 align="center" |- | width="1000%" valign="top" | {| width="100%" style="background-color:#F5F7F4; border:1px #000000 solid; padding:3px;" |- | bgcolor="#33CCFF" align="center" |  NHRA  |- | bgcolor="#FFFFFF" |The new kids of my column are the only series to actually give out points this week, racing in Pomona, California. The two nitro classes (Top Fuel and Funny Car) both had a big-name racer move into their classes this season. In Top Fuel, former Pro Stock Motorcylce rider Antron Brown joined the racing every week crowd. Former Top Fuel driver Melanie Troxel switched to Funny Car, where she could possibly have to race against her husband, also a Funny Car driver. In that class, there are now three possible related to each other matchups, brothers, father-daughter, and husband-wife.

Both Brown and Troxel are quality drivers, and didn't need much time to adjust, as both qualified well in their debut races. Brown in fact was the top qualifier in his class, while Troxel qualified #3. Antron lost in the second round, while Melanie failed to advance from the first round of eliminations.

One thing I enjoyed about watching drag racing is that there are always dozens of stories, both happy and sad. John Force is a legend  in the sport, having won the season championship in Funny Car 14 times. However in September he was involved in a brutal crash that resulted in several broken bones. He spent up his recovery to make it to the semifinals. He is one-of-a-kind, not only a great driver but a great character as well, so it is great to see him doing well. |}

That's it for this week. Next week is the Daytona 500.