MOTORSPORT: Ambrose in frame for Sydney 500

The most likely entrant for the dual V8 Supercar champion is Ford Performance Racing.

An entry for Ambrose to race at the second street race at the Homebush Olympic precinct will need to be lodged by early September. A new wildcard regulation introduced by V8 Supercars Australia -- separate to that for wildcards in the endurance races -- allows high-profile drivers to contest "signature" events. They must be an additional entry for a team already participating, a $50,000 bond has to be paid, and the entry must be lodged three months before the race.

The Sydney 500 is on December 3-5.

Ambrose's participation may depend on him sorting his NASCAR future soon. He is quitting his Toyota drive with JTG Daugherty Racing in NASCAR's Sprint Cup at the end of this season and speculation is rife that he will join Richard Petty Motorsports to drive a Ford next season.

American reports suggest confirmation could come within two weeks.

Ambrose finished 15th in the weekend's 23rd Sprint Cup round at Michigan International Speedway. It was won by series leader Kevin Harvick in a Chevrolet, from Denny Hamlin in a Toyota, the Fords of Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth, and the Chevvies of Tony Stewart and Juan Pablo Montoya.

Ambrose started 37th and ran as high as fifth late in the 400-mile (640km) race.

JTG Daugherty gambled during a late race caution, giving Ambrose only two fresh tyres instead of four. But while the tactic initially worked, the Toyota faded towards the end, leaving Ambrose with the previous week's third place on the Watkins Glen road course as his only Cup podium of the year.

"We took a gamble with two tyres on the last stop -- it worked initially but the car dropped off towards the end," Ambrose said.

"We've been racing well on the ovals lately and next week we're back to one of my very favourite tracks at Bristol. It's a wild place, such a short oval -- you are so busy there in the night race. I finished third there last year and there's no reason why we can't finish better next weekend."

Ambrose won the 2003 and 2004 V8 Supercar titles for Gold Coast-based Stone Brothers Racing, remained with that team in 2005 and won his last start for it, at Victoria's Phillip Island, before starting his NASCAR career in America. There were moves to get him a start at the first Sydney 500 last December but the championship's rules at that time precluded such one-off starts.

Weekend reports suggest that Melbourne-based FPR is the favourite to enter Ambrose in Sydney rather than Stone Bros.

Since the announcement he would quit JTG Daugherty at the end of the NASCAR season Ambrose has said that he may return to Australia full-time if he did not secure another Sprint Cup drive. However, for now it seems the only Australian prospect is of him racing in Sydney in December.

"I am looking at it," Ambrose told Sydney's Sunday Telegraph newspaper.

"I am focusing on getting a new deal here [in the US] first, but if that is sewn up in the next couple of weeks then I will seriously look at coming to Homebush this year. It will be a great event and I am very keen to have a drive. I always love coming back to Australia and if you can get a race, well that's even better."

On his NASCAR future, Ambrose said: "I am talking to teams and the phone has been running hot, which is a relief because I just pulled the parachute [at JTG Daugherty] and hoped for the best. It has been a good couple of weeks for me and I feel confident about my future.

"It is a big risk. It has cost me a lot of money to get out and could cost me a lot more. There is no deal on the table, so I'm basically jumping off the cliff… I am trying to fast-forward what I am doing here in NASCAR.

"I am here [JTG Daugherty ] to win and I feel I need a change to make that happen. I need to find out if the weakness is me, the team or the people that work in the team. The only way to do that is to leave.

"There was a lot of security with the team and I owe my NASCAR career to them, but at the end of the day I am not happy to be running 15th to 20th. I want to be running first to fifth -- and this is what has to happen."

NASCAR Sprint Cup standings after 23 of 36 rounds -- Kevin Harvick (Chevrolet) 3400 points, Jeff Gordon (Chevrolet) 3107, Denny Hamlin (Toyota) 3047, Tony Stewart  (Chevrolet) 3020, Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet) 3014, Carl Edwards (Ford) 2986, Jeff Burton (Chevrolet) 2986, Kyle Busch (Toyota) 2975, Matt Kenseth (Ford) 2961, Kurt Busch (Dodge) 2935, Greg Biffle (Ford) 2913, Clint Bowyer (Chevrolet) 2755. Australia's Marcos Ambrose (Toyota) is 26th on 2173 points.

"The track has been reduced from 4.49km to 2.96km, which will allow fans to see more action more often," Reeves said.

"The build and dismantle time has been reduced by five weeks, which will ease the disruption on local businesses, traffic and Surfers Paradise and Main Beach residents.

"The track will retain the exciting chicane along Main Beach Parade, turning into Breaker St and travelling west, passing the great vantage point on the hill, before turning on to the Gold Coast Highway.

"The new circuit will turn into Surfers Paradise Boulevard, creating spectacular passing opportunities, before taking a hairpin turn back on to the beach side of Surfers Paradise."

The longer, 600km Gold Coast round on October 22-24 -- now classified as the third endurance round in the V8 Supercar Championship -- will have 18 international co-drivers, including several expatriate Australians, but not Marcos Ambrose, due to a clashing NASCAR round at Martinsville, Virginia.

The resumption of the V8 Supercar Championship is still four weeks away -- with the L&H 500 at Phillip Island on September 10-12. The Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 is on October 7-10.

After the Gold Coast there is the Falken Tasmania Challenge at Symmons Plains on November 12-14 and the Norton 360 Sandown Challenge in Melbourne on November 19-21 before the Sydney 500 finale.

Next year's calendar will be released a month later than normal -- in October rather than September.

New V8SA chief executive Martin Whitaker told BigPond Sport that the extra month would enable talks "integral to the future growth of the championship" to be finalised with CAMS (the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport) and the FIA (the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile).

While the V8SA board has discussed the calendar, which will retain the Middle Eastern rounds at the start of the season, the release of it is likely to be around Bathurst time.

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