MOTORSPORT: Big winners and big losers

Out of all the V8 carnage the class emerges on top
In the calm after the storm that was the Gold Coast 600 the upshot is that the cream has risen further to the top.

Even though Ford Performance Racing ended Triple Eight Race Engineering’s long winning streak on Sunday, Triple Eight Holden driver, Jamie Whincup, has gone further ahead in the V8 Supercar Championship. He’s now 218 points in front, with a maximum 900 remaining in the remaining seven races over three rounds.

The increasingly impressive Jonathon Webb and his German co-driver Marc Lieb made the podium after the chaotic, shortened first race at Surfers Paradise, but otherwise all the podium spots were filled again by Triple Eight and FPR drivers.

After 23 races these two teams have still provided the only four winners this season – Whincup, Will Davison, with Sunday’s his seventh of this championship after a five-month 'drought', and their respective teammates, Craig Lowndes and Mark Winterbottom.

Winterbottom jagged a pair of third places at the Gold Coast and Lowndes two sixths, the second without a clutch for much of the afternoon and they traded places in the standings.

Although there is skepticism and criticism of many of the visiting internationals, some of them were superb – most notably Frenchman Sebastien Bourdais and Finn Mika Salo. So too were the three expatriate Aussies – Will Power, Ryan Briscoe and David Brabham.

The images from the Gold Coast throughout the weekend were incredible, both for the beauty of the setting and the track action. The crashing of foreign drivers unfamiliar with standing starts and getting big heavy rear-wheel-drive V8s off the line made spectacular viewing – but at enormous cost to those having to foot the repair bills.

There was carnage too in the World Rally Championship’s penultimate round in Italy and NASCAR’s fifth last Sprint Cup race in Kansas, although better results for the Aussies in those events – rally driver Chris Atkinson sixth and Marcos Ambrose, after a mid-race tangle, 12th for his best result in the past seven rounds.

And BMW snatched the German touring car championship in its first year back in what is known as the DTM, with Canadian Bruno Spengler – driving one of the Schnitzer team’s M3s - pipping Mercedes’ British star Gary Paffett in the 10th and final race of the series at Hockenheim.

While Spengler and Schnitzer topped the driver and team standings, BMW ended the manufacturers’ championship on 346 points to Audi’s 335 and Mercedes’ 329.

Some big developments on the open-wheeler front in the US over the weekend too. Mario Andretti drove a Lotus 79 (the model in which he won his Formula One world title in 1978) to open the new Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, which is to host America’s first F1 grand prix in five years on November 18 – and V8 Supercars in mid-May next year.

The 72-year-old 'Super Mario' labeled the 5.44km course “absolutely fantastic”.

However, the other new American GP that was scheduled for next June at Port Imperial in New Jersey against a New York City backdrop has been postponed a year because of construction issues.

“We are going to be racing at Port Imperial, unfortunately just not as soon as we hoped and expected,” promoter Leo Hindery Junior said.

“We promised Governor Christie, the towns, the sport and its international fans the best possible experience, and unfortunately we need additional time to ensure that happens… We remain 100 per cent committed to the Grand Prix of America at Port Imperial, and the race could have no better partner and friend than the CEO of F1, Bernie Ecclestone. We benefit greatly from his experience and counsel and from his support,” the promoter said.

It also came to light over the weekend that Indy Racing League founder Tony George had tried recently to buy the series and fire its chief executive, Randy Bernard. George reputedly lost $500 million in little more than a decade running the IRL and was ousted from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway management by his mother and sisters but had been partially “rehabilitated” in the past year. Now he has to depart those circles again, although he remains a part-owner of the team that fields his stepson, Ed Carpenter.

In motorsport politics at home, the future of the Gold Coast 600 is more than ever in the lap of the Queensland government, and particularly new premier Campbell Newman – who chose to go to Goondiwindi at the weekend rather than the racing at Surfers Paradise.

The government’s contract to provide $6.5 million annually towards the event is up after next year’s event.

The state’s tourism and major events minister Jann Stuckey was at the Gold Coast at the weekend amid the mounting speculation that Newman’s cost-cutting axe may be poised.

Stuckey said the government “has a strong appetite for successful events and that isn’t going to change - this event will get a fair hearing as we reconsider and renegotiate.”

Outgoing V8 Supercar supremo Tony Cochrane said the event had become “an industry” on the Gold Coast, “has really got its mojo back” and was “on track to return to its halcyon days”.

Cochrane said it was “no drama whatsoever” that the premier had opted not to attend.

Although no longer of the magnitude of the Indy days, when the American open-wheelers raced at Surfers, V8SC claimed a three-day attendance of 182,255 compared with last year’s 181,486.

However, contrary to a report in Saturday’s Gold Coast Bulletin, the event was not broadcast “live to around 140 countries”. American pay network Speed is screening the event late next Sunday night.

Saturday’s average audience in Australia’s five major capital cities was less than 400,000 viewers (with Sunday’s numbers unsighted yet).

While the Newman government will be scrutinising the pros and cons of the event over coming months, V8 Supercars (even with Cochrane stepping back from executive duties) has some leverage in querying what better alternative there is to draw attention, and potentially tourists, to the Gold Coast.

While the Surfers Paradise street carnival fights for its survival, today’s Sprint Cup race at Kansas Speedway was described by NASCAR’s wire service as “the latest episode of Survivor”.

Ford driver Matt Kenseth won the war of attrition that had 14 caution periods – the most this season and a record at the Kansas track – ahead of Martin Truex Junion’s Toyota and the Chevrolets of Paul Menard, Kasey Kakne and Tony Stewart, who fought back from 33rd for his best finish of the six races so far in The Chase for the title.

The top two drivers in the championship standings, Brad Keselowski (Dodge) and Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet), were eighth and ninth respectively.

Ford’s victory was its sixth this season, including Australian Marcos Ambrose’s on the road course at Watkins Glen.

Ambrose’s team owner Richard Petty has had his Ford contract renewed at last and an extension of the dual V8 Supercar champion’s contract is now imminent with Petty.

Chris Atkinson may have enhanced his prospects of another WRC deal next year – after MINI’s works withdrawal – following his battle with French sensation Sebastien Ogier for fifth in Rally d’Italia in Sardinia.

Ogier’s performance in a Super 2000 Skoda, while he awaits his VW Polo for next year, was described as “remarkable” by Autosport, although Atkinson lost time on the final stage with a puncture and had to settle for sixth behind Ogier.

Finn Mikko Hirvonven’s 15th win in the WRC was his first with Citroen and, after his disqualification in Portugal, his first since last year’s Rally Australia at Coffs Harbour when he was with Ford.

Russian Evgeny Novikov was second in Italy, 80 seconds behind, and young Estonian Ott Tanak third – both of them in privateer Fords – after Citroen’s nine-time world champion Sebastien Loeb and Ford factory drivers Petter Solberg and Jari-Matti Latvala crashed on the first leg.
Latvala had two crashes on the same stage!

Norwegian Mats Ostberg had a diff failure but returned to claim a string of stage wins, while Solberg and Latvala also returned, finished first and second in the concluding power stage, and were classified ninth and 12th for the event.

What a crazy weekend of motorsport.

V8 Supercar Championship standings after 23 of 30 races: 1. Jamie Whincup (Holden) 3060 points; 2. Mark Winterbottom (Ford) 2842; 3. Craig Lowndes (Holden) 2815; 4. Will Davison 2503; 5. Shane van Gisbergen (Ford) 2182; 6 Tim Slade (Ford) 2085; 7. Garth Tander (Holden) 2030; 8. David Reynolds (Ford) 1746; 9 James Courtney (Holden) 1725; 10. Lee Holdsworth (Ford) 1719.

World Rally Championship driver standings after 12 of 13 rounds: 1. Sebastien Loeb (France, Citroen) 244 points; 2. Mikko Hirvonen (Finland, Citroen) 198; 3. Mads Ostberg (Norway, Ford) 137; 4. Jari-Matti Latvala (Finland, Ford) 133; 5. Petter Solberg (Norway, Ford) 124; 6. Evgeny Novikov (Russia, Ford) 87; 7. Thierry Neuville (Belgium, Citroen) 53; 8. Ott Taenak (Estonia, Ford) 52; 9. Martin Prokop (Czech Republic, Ford) 46; 10. Sebastien Ogier (France, Skoda) 41; 11. Daniel Sordo (Spain, MINI) 31; 12. Nasser Al-Attiyah (Qatar, Citroen) 28; 13. Chris Atkinson (Australia, MINI) 22.

WRC team standings: 1. Citroen Total World Rally Team  413 points; 2. Ford World Rally Team 281; 3. M-Sport Ford World Rally Team 170; 4. Citroen Junior World Rally Team 72; 5. Qatar World Rally Team 71; 6. Adapta World Rally Team 71; 7. MINI WRC Team 26; 8. Brazil World Rally Team 20.

NASCAR Sprint Cup standings after 32 of 36 races: 1. Brad Keselowski (Dodge) 2250 points; 2. Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet) 2243; 3. Denny Hamlin (Toyota) 2230; 4. Clint Bowyer (Toyota) 2225; 5. Kasey Kahne (Chevrolet) 2220; 6. Martin Truex Junior (Toyota) 2207; 7. Tony Stewart (Chevrolet) 2203; 8. Jeff Gordon (Chevrolet) 2199; 9. Matt Kenseth (Ford) 2195; 10. Kevin Harvick (Chevrolet) 2191; 11. Greg Biffle (Ford) 2188; Dale Earnhardt Junior (Chevrolet) 12.    2128. Australia’s Marcos Ambrose (Ford) is 17th on 860 points.