MOTORSPORT: Hail new champ, goodbye old lady

Now for the icing on Whincup's cake
It's been a long while coming all this: Jamie Whincup's crowning as V8 Supercar champion; the goodbye to Oran Park, a grand old lady among Australia's race circuits; and Mark Skaife's send-off.

What more is there that can be said about Whincup? Probably not a lot until we see how he reacts and what he has to say when he finally clinches the title.

That could be Saturday afternoon. If not then, surely in either of Sunday's two races.

Our cousins at Auto Action magazine run what they call a "Box Score" in the lead-up to a V8 Supercar round.

It's pretty simple. It lists the round winners for the season, the drivers who have had pole position at each round, the number of races drivers have won for the season, and the championship standings for drivers and teams.

Nothing more than simple facts that anyone could put together, but they're there in a single column and they tell quite a story.

Here's the Race Winners list from that 2008 Box Score (on page 18 of Auto Action edition No 1319 if you need to know).

15 Jamie Whincup -- Team Vodafone, Ford
7 Mark Winterbottom -- Ford Performance Racing, Ford
7 Garth Tander, Toll Holden Racing Team, Holden
2 Will Davison, Jim Beam Racing, Ford
2 Craig Lowndes, Team Vodafone, Ford
1 Steven Richards, Ford Performance Racing, Ford
1 James Courtney, Stone Brothers Racing, Ford
1 Rick Kelly, HSV Dealer Team, Holden
1 Mark Skaife, Toll Holden Racing Team, Holden
1 Todd Kelly, Jack Daniels Racing, Holden

To us that nearly says it all about V8 Supercar season 2008.

Whincup has won more than twice the number of races as either of the drivers who have been his only serious rivals for the title.

He has last year's champion Tander beaten already.

Winterbottom is only a slight chance to overhaul him. It would take something extraordinary this weekend for that to happen -- something like at Hamilton, the new street race in New Zealand in April, where Whincup didn't even start a race, which can hardly happen at a round on Australian soil.

If any such thing were to happen by any act of fate it would be a grave injustice.

Winterbottom's turn may come in time, but -- as good a season as he's had -- he and FPR could not feel legitimate champions if somehow they stole the crown away from its rightful owner.

Of 38 races so far this season Ford has won 28. That leaves just 10, obviously, that have gone Holden's way. Almost a 3 to 1 ratio. Again it says a lot about the season.

Two wins each for Will Davison and Craig Lowndes. That tells us that those two guys have been better than most but nowhere near as good as the top trio, although Lowndes perhaps could have another one or two race victories.

One win for Steve Richards -- one seventh the number of his younger, consistently faster teammate!

One win for James Courtney. For all the hype just one win. (And next year, at Jim Beam/Dick Johnson Racing, and apparently on more money -- more than Whincup's improved package, supposedly, and perhaps on par with Lowndes -- what chance of more than the occasional victory?)

Rick Kelly one win. Yes, too good a driver not to win at least one a year.

Mark Skaife one win. Like Steve Richards, one seventh of the tally of his younger teammate. In this case with his younger teammate at Phillip Island. And it was a win in which Tander was very much the main man.

And Todd Kelly one win. Refreshing that. Like his younger brother, it wouldn't seem like a proper V8 Supercar season without this guy winning a race. (Lots of hard work ahead in future with the new Kelly family plan, and we recommend Auto Action editor-at-large Mark Fogarty's column on page 15 of this week's edition on how that has all come about).

What this Race Winners list and the Championship Standings emphasise is Tander as the only bright beacon of light for Holden this season.

Six Ford drivers have won races, only four in Holdens -- and Tander the only multiple Holden winner.

Seven of the top 10 drivers for the season are in Fords. Steven Johnson (Jim Beam Racing Ford) and Russell Ingall (Supercheap Auto Racing, Holden) are the only drivers to have forced their way into the top 10 without winning a race.

And the Teams Championship table just confirms the Ford whitewash.
Team Vodafone   5491 points
Ford Performance Racing 5002
Jim Beam Racing   4224
Toll Holden Racing Team 4216
Stone Brothers Racing  3720

Four Ford teams in the top five. The first three all Ford teams, although HRT may yet regain a "podium" place.

But Jim Beam Racing is ahead of it on the strength of the consistency of Will Davison and Steve Johnson, while HRT is where it is because of Mark Skaife not picking up anywhere near the points expected of a driver in a front-running team (he's 14th in the drivers' championship), and certainly Holden's lead team.

The picture's crystal clear. Ford's season. Whincup's season. Team Vodafone's season. Oran Park should be just a matter of gift-wrapping it all.

Farewell to the dame - she's been a beauty
Now Oran Park ... this is a special weekend in the history of Australian motorsport.

It's not a crossroads. Not a milestone. Not a watershed. It's a sad fact of life for a motor racing fan. Downright bloody sad. Even a bit emotional.

Bathurst has a special, unique place in Australian motor racing. Phillip Island's pretty special too.

But among the circuits in the country's capital cities is there anything that compares with Oran Park for its layout, for the racing and spectacle it's produced, and for the atmosphere that generations of fans have enjoyed, indeed loved, for four decades?

Warwick Farm was something special. Amaroo Park was quaint. A little bit special in its own way.

In its own rather ordinary way -- perhaps blue-collar's the term - Oran Park is very, very special.

Mark Skaife's been racing there at the top level for more than two decades. Craig Lowndes for more than one decade.

Skaife has won there six times -- with the Nissan Godzilla in 1991 and '92, and four times straight for HRT in Commodores from 1999 to 2002.

He's had other things on his mind up to this point of the week (unwinding his final half-ownership of HRT by handing it over to settle a reported $3.6 million debt to co-owner Tom Walkinshaw, who now needs the approval of the V8 Supercar board to hold the team's two licences again in his own right) to be reflecting on his Oran Park memories.

But Lowndes told Auto Action what he thought made the place magic.

"It's an unusual circuit -- like that bridge, the dog-leg, it's bumpy, it's fast," he said. "I think it's that that makes it magic.

"Coming on to the straight you've got that concrete wall beside you, so there's elements of a street circuit. "You've got to be careful of the Turn One left-hander, where it's easy to lock up tyres, so it's actually very difficult to get right. It's going to be sad to see it go."

Indeed it is.

In another Auto Action feature this week, simply but brilliantly headlined "Oran Past", Luke West makes the point that Oran Park's history is not all about touring cars or what are now called V8 Supercars.

It had a very proud open-wheeler history, especially in the days of Formula 5000.

We have very fond memories of the '70s meeting when Lella Lombardi -- the late Italian who is the only woman to have finished in the points of a Formula 1 grand prix, although she got only half a point because the race was cut short -- raced there against a line-up of top F5000 bloke racers.

And it's been home to lots and lots of club racing.

West quotes Oran Park's chief official and historian Nev Beyers extensively.

Beyers is writing the history of the place that within a couple of years, apparently, will have 7540 new homes and 21,500 residents.

The suburb will be called Oran Park. It will be a proud address to have. And hopefully it will be haunted by races gone by.

Special exclusions for Homebush
This time next year, instead of trouping out to or tuning into Oran Park, we'll be focusing on the new Homebush street race -- certainly unless the NSW Labor government somehow gets turfed out in the near future.

The Sydney Morning Herald -- even more so than us, it seems -- smells a rat about this whole project and continues to scrutinise it.

It has reported that the Homebush Motor racing (Sydney 400) Bill will give V8 Supercars Australia immunity from parts of the state's National Parks and Wildlife Act and sections of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act.

SMH urban affairs reporter Sunanda Creagh wrote this week that the Bill "foreshadows future regulations to control the 'conduct ... and the exclusion or expulsion of persons from the declared racing area' and protects 'the Minister and the (Homebush Motor Racing) Authority from challenge or review before a court'."

Save Olympic Park campaigner Robert Goodwill is quoted saying: "You have a private company (V8SA) writing their own contractual terms into NSW law ... on top of a commercial contract that we haven't seen".

V8SA chairman Tony Cochrane said the organization did not lobby for any exemptions from environmental laws.

"We will go out of our way to make sure we protect the environment," Cochrane said.

"I hear about supposed thousands of people protesting. Well, we wrote to more than 8000 residents in a 6km radius and got about two responses of concern back."

Calm before the real storm that, we suspect.

A recent report in Lismore's Northern Star newspaper began: "Locals have been kept in the dark about the proposed route of the Repco Rally, due to take place in Kyogle and Tweed Heads (shires) next September.

"The event, which is part of the FIA World Rally Championship, will see competitors from around the world thrashing it out on roads through the Border Ranges National Park and in both shires.

"However, the exact route has been kept a secret."

One objector, Lesley-Anne Jacobsen, complained that, apart from cars racing along roads, "the road kill will be horrendous, there will be massive disturbances to koalas and nocturnal animals, and it will be a waste of petrol".

There have been public meetings since at Murwillumbah and Kyogle at which rally organising committee chairman Garry Connelly has tried to sooth the critics.

The rally course, or at least a lot of it, is up for discussion today (Friday, December 5) by the Kyogle shire council.

Connelly told the Northern Star he felt the rally had 95 per cent public support but that the final routes for some stages are not yet finalised, although "we believe we can adequately address the concerns".

Strangely, though, Kyogle council general manager Arthur Piggott, who little more than three months ago was quoted by the Northern Star saying "we (the council) are very enthusiastic about the (rally) proposal" is now reported in the same paper to be stressing that the event is not a done deal yet.

"Council hasn't actually approved the rally going ahead," Piggott said.

The Northern Star reported that the previous council had given "in-principle" support and that the new council would have to endorse that view at a meeting later this month.

"Rally organisers would then have to submit development applications to Tweed and Kyogle councils by February or March next year," the report said.

Now this event is on the WRC calendar for September.

We'd have thought things would be a lot firmer at this stage than they appear to be. Perhaps they are firmer than seems, and perhaps the rally organisers have solid grounds to believe all will be approved.

If not this could all get a bit messy.

A change at the helm of Rallycorp
Australian rallying has a new leader, or at least Rallycorp, the commercial rights holder to the Australian Rally Championship, has a new chairman -- Adelaide businessman Ben Rainsford.

He's a long-time members of CAMS' Australian Rally Commission and has been a Rallycorp board member since January.

In succeeding Victorian Steve Ashton as Rallycorp chief Rainsford said the ARC had "enormous opportunities" with an extended, eight-event calendar next year, "new categories and a strong level of interest from potential new teams".

Ashton called it "a period of reinvention for the ARC".

"We have a new ARC structure, including categories for a two-wheel-drive championship and a showroom category, and the Australian Rally Commission is investigating opportunities for carbon offsets and a category for alternative fuels.

"This year for the first time we have had a tarmac round of the championship (in Tasmania, and next year's ARC will start on tarmac in Tassie in February).

"We are very optimistic that we will have some new manufacturers competing in 2009."

Ashton will remain on the Rallycorp board "for a short transition process". Queenslander Errol Bailey also remains on the board.

Rainsford is entitled to a "honeymoon" in his new role, but beyond that there will be pressure to see some serious results.

One rally Seb Loeb hasn't won
The final round of the 2008 WRC this weekend in Wales -- and amazingly it's a rally five-time world champion Sebastien Loeb has never won.

And the great Frenchman has made it clear that, as much as he would like to change that, his top priority is to ensure that his manufacturers' championship-leading Citroen wraps up that title and denies Ford a hat-trick.

Citroen's lead is 11 points going into this 15th round.

Mosley plays hard on WRC calendar
FIA president Max Mosley has strongly defended the concept of a rotating WRC calendar that keeps the season to 12 events and any country only getting a round every two years.

There has been intense lobbying for a "spine" of classic events -- like Monte Carlo, Finland, Rally of Great Britain and the Acropolis in Greece -- to be run annually, with others rotating every two years, as Australia and New Zealand are set to do.

But Mosley is quoted in this week's Auto Action by international rallying writer international Jerry Williams saying: "We need 24 rallies because the WRC should be expanded to encompass countries where there is a very big market for cars but no WRC event.

"Obvious examples are Russia and India, and I should like to see a WRC round back in China.

"If we have annual rallies we will have endless arguing and lobbying."

Williams then reported that Paul Hembrey, motorsport director of Pirelli, which paid US$21 million for its three-year contract to supply tyres to the WRC, scorned Mosley's stance.

Hembery said the classic rallies were the sport's "calling cards".

"We need them -- they are the WRC's foundations," he said. "I put my job on the line to secure the WRC investment. I have to deliver on that investment.

"In terms of TV feedback we've had a successful year, but if you ask me if I am happy with the WRC the answer is no. The WRC has to raise its game and regain the direction and support it had.

"I watched the super special (stage) in Japan and, frankly, was bored after five cars.

"Tail-out, gob-smacking entertainment out in the wilds is what rallying is all about."

Big cutback in Audi motorsport program
A little manufacturer motorsport news from abroad...

Audi has announced it will not race in the European-based Le Mans Series next year.

And -- Andrew Cotton reports in Auto Action -- its American Le Mans Series program hangs in the balance.

And its DTM -- or German Touring Car Championship -- commitment will be reduced.

Audi, according to Cotton's report, will build a new sportscar for next year, the R15 featuring a lighter, more-efficient diesel engine, believed to be a 3.7-litre V8.

But it has confirmed only that it will race at Sebring in the US and at Le Mans in France.

"The decision whether or not to race in ALMS will be purely financial and is not expected to be taken this year," Cotton wrote.

That leaves the futures of drivers Allan McNish, Rinaldo Capello, Marco Werner and Lucas Luhr in doubt.

Audi motorsport director Wolfgang Ulrich was not happy about ending the Le Mans Series program after just one year but said: "The world has changed -- and we have to adapt."

Audi will cut its DTM program from 10 cars to nine.

NASCAR's half-billion-dollar man
From the US this week a report that Jimmie Johnson's third consecutive NASCAR Cup title that equaled Cale Yarborough's feat generated an estimated US$510 million in American TV exposure for his sponsors.

A report by media tracking organization Joyce Julius & Associates said Johnson got nearly 60 hours of direct airtime this year.

It said 62 brands on Johnson's Chevrolet and his overalls were highlighted, with 316 verbal mentions.

Hardware store chain Lowe's, which is the major sponsor of Johnson, reportedly got US$200 million worth of exposure -- representing almost 40 per cent of the total.

Chevrolet got almost US$68 million worth -- and it needs every bit it can get.

These reports are invariably inflated, we suspect, but no doubt Johnson won the exposure "race" over the course of the long NASCAR season, despite the triumphs of Kyle Busch and the popularity of Dale Earnhardt Junior.

Johnson's one of our favourites here for his consistency, his sportsmanship and his style.

For a snapshot of his season, there's more in an article from SceneDaily.com here

Still on NASCAR, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway is intent on redemption after the tyre debacle at this year's Brickyard 400. More here

Veteran US open-wheeler correspondent Lewis Franck has a bleak outlook for the Indy Racing League, particularly with its races -- or at least many of them -- going to the Versus channel. Hear Franck's point of view here

It's past tense for Marcos Ambrose now, but we mentioned often over the past year or so that he had to move on from the once-great Wood Brothers team if he was to seriously get anywhere in NASCAR.

He's done that, and in '09 his drive is a Toyota prepared by Michael Waltrip Racing with the sponsorship put in place by the JTG Daugherty Racing that has been so supportive of his American campaign.

Just for the record, an article on Wood Brothers, headlined "Venerable team looks vulnerable", is here

Image: jamiewhincup.com.au

To comment on this article click here