It’s October, and that means it’s race week
at Surfers Paradise for the Champ Car World Series. Once
again it seems likely that Sebastien Bourdais will lock down
the Vanderbilt Cup signifying his third consecutive Champ
Car championship. Once that business is taken care of
Bourdais’ place in Champ Car history will be secure.
But there are a raft of
bigger questions before the court than that. What will the
team lineup look like in Champ Car next season? Which
drivers will stay, and who will move on? What venues if any
will join the schedule next September to fill a significant
gap?
And who will move up from
the Atlantics to Champ Car for 2007 besides Graham Rahal and
presumably $2 million dollar man Simon Pagenaud?
Don’t know for sure how
many of those questions will be answered this weekend Down
Under, but you can bet at least some of them will move
closer to a resolution. It appears likely Newman/Haas will
be able to retain Sebastien Bourdais next year, and all
indications are Graham Rahal will join him there. Whether
Bruno Junqueira, who’s quietly regaining his pre-Indy-injury
form, will also remain at N/H is uncertain. I for one would
love to see the ’04 Surfers winner stay on; it seems he’s
closer and closer to returning to Victory Lane for the
6-time Champ Car champion and in my mind, considering how
hard he’s fought to regain his health and abilities, it
would be the right thing to do.
At Forsythe Championship
Racing it seems certain that ’03 Champ and Bourdais
antagonist Paul Tracy will remain the team leader. PT has
put together some improved runs of late and I’m thinking
he’ll spend the winter months regaining his edge and
preparing the team’s new Panoz DP-01 chassis for an assault
on another title.
His stablemate AJ
Allmendinger hopefully will return as well. By now it’s
well known that Allmendinger has been Champ Car’s hottest
driver this summer since joining FCR and his stock has never
been higher. AJ has been impressive in a couple of NASCAR
Truck events for Bill Davis Racing, and with his longtime
backer Red Bull making a major Cup effort next season AJ’s
options seem as plentiful as his future is bright. Having a
young American driver as one of the series’ top stars is
clearly a major coup for Champ Car and will be a huge factor
in keeping the World Series on a nice growth curve.
RuSPORT has bounced back
nicely from the disaster of Cristiano da Matta’s testing
injury. While Cristiano continues to recuperate the
Colorado team has turned to Ryan Briscoe for the year’s last
two events and Briscoe I suspect will show well both this
weekend and in Mexico. While nothing is firm for 2007 I’d
suspect Briscoe is the front-runner to keep the seat in the
10 car at least until Cristiano’s future becomes clearer.
Briscoe is a proven open-wheel racer and will, once he gets
enough seat time with the team, be a major asset. It
appears Justin Wilson is gong to have to settle for another
top-three points finish this year but with his strong CDW
backing the Englishman will definitely be a contender next
year and beyond.
I’m really high on the
futures, too, of PKV, CTE-HVM, and Team Australia. All
three squads have shown brilliance at times this year and I
think their driver lineups will only get better as the weeks
roll by. Oriol Servia is already a terrific driver and
Katherine Legge, who may be ready to swap her “Lady
Katherine” tag for something along the lines of the Iron
Maiden, seems ready to break through.
The great improvements
made by Dan Clarke and Nelson Philippe this summer are
obvious. And I think Alex Tagliani is a very good mentor
for Will Power.
Rocketsports, with Antonio
Pizzonia now rejoining Mario Dominguez, should return to
form, and Mi-Jack Conquest will also continue to gather
strength as Andrew Ranger and Charles Zwolsman mature.
The new venues Champ Car
is moving into are also a sign of strength. I’m really
anticipating my first visit to Mt. Tremblant next summer;
everyone I’ve ever spoken with who’s run there or seen the
place raves about its beauty and its challenges. I think
street-course runs in Vegas and Phoenix will be big hits. A
Champ Car return to Europe will be a major asset. The
schedule event in China will make history. And returning to
Cleveland and Edmonton will further solidify Champ Car’s
footprint both in North America and around the world. It’s
a great mix of permanent circuits and street courses with
those two terrific airport tracks to give the tour plenty of
high-speed stadium-type excitement.
This weekend, I’d
anticipate Sebastien taking it mostly easy and locking up
his third championship. I expect Allmendinger, Tracy, and
Junqueira and Philippe to battle it out up front. As
always, especially with Bridgestone bringing an alternate
“red” tire, there are any number of others who could
surprise.
I don’t know who will
triumph this Saturday night, Eastern time, at Surfers. But
it will be a great show as always, full of high speed
action. We’ll have the coverage for you Sunday afternoon on
SPEED. Hope you can join us.
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