MOTORSPORT: Aussies light up in US

The first night-time Formula 1 grand prix is only six months away in Singapore. The Malaysian F1 GP will be a night race next year.

F1 overlord Bernie Ecclestone wants the Chinese race and the new Korean race, probably from 2010, to be under lights too.

Shanghai is resisting at the minute, although not as unequivocally as Melbourne with which Ecclestone is now talking about a "divorce", but Korea won't have much option.

Today we learn that Qatar, which recently hosted the first night-time MotoGP, is to undergo a big upgrade so that it can host F1 racing and testing.

Night racing is not new.

We recall the Peter Brock Classic at Melbourne's Calder Park in the mid-1990s. Quite a night it was too, although our recollection was that in the wake of it there were complaints from sponsors that the livery on the touring cars did not come up well under lights.

Lighting a GP track will be a much bigger exercise than anything that Calder Park has had, either on its road course or the adjoining Thunderdome.

We remember that when the Thunderdome was lit for stock car racing by the American company Musco the circuit owner, Bob Jane, boasted that it had only cost $1 million.

We gather the lighting exercise in Qatar for the MotoGP was US$19 million.

The estimate for Singapore is, apparently, $15 million.

The US$15-20 million range would probably be the minimum for the 5.3km Albert Park street circuit, although we don't expect it ever to happen.

Amid all this fuss about racing under lights, two Aussies will be in action in the opening round of the new-look IndyCar series in the US this weekend -- a night race at the 2.4km Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Ryan Briscoe will be with the mighty Team Penske and Will Power with the KV Racing outfit.

Penske is a long-established, stable, iconic team and is a dream home for Briscoe, who now has a big shot at winning open-wheeler racing's biggest race, the Indianapolis 500 in May, after seeing his F1 hopes with Toyota scuttled four years ago.

KV Racing is owned by expatriate Aussie billionaire Kevin Kalkhoven and American ex-racer Jimmy Vasser, on whom Power will be leaning for advice about oval racing as he has had only one such race previously -- at Las Vegas in 2006.

KV Racing is getting some assistance from Chip Ganassi Racing, another iconic American team for which Briscoe once drove and which has Dan Wheldon, who is chasing a fourth straight Homestead-Miami victory this weekend, and experienced Aussie-born New Zealander Scott Dixon.

Craig Gore has taken his Aussie Vineyards sponsorship from what was Team Australia run by Derrick Walker in the now defunct (well, after the Long Beach race next month) Champ Car series to KV Racing in the unified IndyCar series.

Gore issued a long statement this week about the breakdown of his relationship with Walker, who has threatened to sue him for more than US$1 million.

In a nutshell, each is accusing the other of being the party in the wrong.

What was interesting was that Gore revealed that Walker had signed Power in mid-February on a deal which obviously lapsed when Walker found himself unable to proceed with a team in the IndyCar series as he'd hoped.

"Once this (deal) was disclosed to me I severed all ties with Derrick Walker," Gore said.

The financial squabble between Walker and Gore seemingly will end up in a court, but it's a pity to see Power embroiled in such a situation.

He's an impressive racer who is going to have his hands full in IndyCar after only four days of testing and with a team lacking the experience of those that have been in the Indy Racing League.

It's quite a contrast to what ought to be a smooth adaptation for Briscoe at Penske. Roger "The Captain" Penske is motorsport's -- and the automotive industry's -- ultimate professional.

Kalkhoven and Gore are wealthy men but have had more than their share of headaches in recent times, with News Ltd newspapers today highlighting that Gore's Wright Patton Shakespeare has frozen a $24.8 million mortgage fund, blaming a $3.275 million investment in troubled Gold Coast company City Pacific.

Let's hope that none of this becomes a distraction for Power and that he, and indeed Briscoe, come to terms with IndyCar racing quickly.

We gather the Homestead-Miami race will be on Fox pay-TV, via ESPN, at 11am Australian eastern time, Sunday.

It would be good to see a strong rebirth of American-style open-wheeler racing with 26 drivers in Dallara-Honda cars after 12 years of division.

Hopefully starting with a large dollop of Aussie success, if the lights shine the right way on our boys this weekend.

Formula Ford champ wins first-up in Britain
On the subject of Aussies racing overseas, great news this week that our reigning Formula Ford champion Tim Blanchard won the opening round of the British Formula Ford Championship.

Driving a French-made Mygale car, Blanchard was second and third in the two qualifying sessions at the Oulton Park circuit, second in the first two races and then won the third race in snow!

In France another Aussie, Daniel Ricciardo, won a Formula Renault race in the Western Europe Cup.

John Martin, who has been Australia's representative in the A1 GP World Cup of Motorsport the past four rounds, had a tough debut with Raikkonen Robertson Racing (yes, part-owned by F1 world champion Kimi Raikkonen) in the British Formula 3 Championship.

A first-lap incident dropped Martin to the back of the field but he set the fastest lap of the race in fighting his way back to 11th, but he didn't finish the other race in the round.

Atkinson not confident about Argentina
Chris Atkinson has been Australia's star on the international scene to date this year, with second place in the Rally of Mexico and third in the Monte Carlo Rally.

The fourth round of the world rally championship is about to start in Argentina, and Atkinson has admitted it is one of his least favourite events and that he finds its variable conditions very tough.

It is his fourth time there and his best placing previously was sixth in 2006. He is targeting a top five finish this time in his factory Subaru Impreza.

"I think we could be even more susceptible to punctures here than in Mexico, so that will be an important factor," Atkinson said on the eve of the event, which has been brought forward six weeks from the normal May.

The rally comprises 21 stages over 352 competitive kilometres through the Punilla Valley to the north of Cordoba, Santa Rosa de Calamuchita to the south and Traslasierra to the west.

Four-time world champion Sebastien Loeb's Citroen will have some new sponsorship in Argentina -- from Red Bull, even though the energy drink is apparently still banned in France, home of  Citroen, Loeb and his co-driver Daniel Sordo.

It will be driven by British champion Guy Wilks and his co-driver Phil Pugh in the Rally of Canberra on May 10-11 and Rally of Melbourne on October 18-19.

The front-wheel drive Civic -- prepared by JAS Motorsport, which has been Honda's partner in the British Touring Car Championship since 1998 -- is powered by a 260bhp engine built by Mugen, Honda's renowned tuning partner, and will run on Pirelli tyres.

Wilks and Pugh, who drive for Mitsubishi in Britain, will also be in the Honda at the world championship round in Finland, an International Rally Challenge round in Russia and another international event still to be named.

Targa Tasmania gets OK for Hobart stage
The Hobart stage in Targa Tasmania has been given the green light by the state capital's city council.

Hobart's Mercury newspaper reports that the approval came "after a bitter yelling match" at a council meeting on Wednesday night.

"The council said it would also push for Targa to verify its carbon offset scheme and to use the occasion to promote driver education," the paper said.

"Aldermen voted 7-3 to approve the stage at the bushy northern end of the Domain (close to the city centre) following angry debate about whether the event encouraged hooning and dangerous driving."

Targa organisers wanted a night stage but it will be in the afternoon on Sunday, April 20.

Last year's Targa did not include a Domain stage after three spectators were injured when cars ploughed into them during the morning stage in 2006.

Most of this year's stages will be in Tasmania's north and north-west.

The national audience is reported to have been close to 1.3 million viewers of the Channel 10 telecast.

In Melbourne it drew 627,000 viewers to be the top program on TV that day, while the "Race Review" had 591,000 watching in the city of the race.

Can't say we recall that review; only a hasty wind-up after the chequered flag and a switch to normal programming without even seeing the usual interview with the top three finishers that we get from all overseas races.

Nationally, the Albert Park race was the 11th most watched program of that week -- with 199,000 viewers in Sydney, 195,000 in Adelaide, 173,000 in Brisbane, and 79,000 in Perth.

Interest will now turn to overseas numbers, especially because of the 90-minute later start this year -- and the question marks over the Oz GP's future.

Numbers in Britain -- one of the very key markets for F1, and with four drivers representing it in the race, including the wonderboy winner in Melbourne, Lewis Hamilton -- are due within days.

We're hearing early indications that the telecast, which started at 4.30am London time, did not make it into the top 30 programs in Britain and that the audience was less than 1.2 million -- and perhaps less than a million.

Adam Sherwin, media correspondent for The Times, has reported in an article on the deal that will see F1 revert to the BBC from ITV in Britain next year that "early morning starts for races outside Europe mean that some GPs play to a few hundred thousand fans".

A good audience in Britain for a European race is above 3 million, while last season's three-way title-deciding Brazilian GP reportedly attracted more than 10 million in prime time and was the most watched F1 race this decade.

Malaysian company WCT Engineering, which built the Sepang circuit in Kuala Lumpur and Bahrain's track for the first GP in the Middle East, announced this week it had won an extra US$252 million contract for work on the Abu Dhabi track.

WCT executive Director Loh Siew Choh said the project would now be completed in June next year, which will obviously mean the race running in the second half of the season -- and no doubt at night.

Images by Shawn Payne - IndyCar.com