MOTORSPORT: It's Ford, Ford, Ford

Although Ford's top rally driver, Marcus Gronholm, crashed out of the Rally of Ireland on the first leg, handing the world championship lead -- and the chance for a fourth straight drivers' title -- back to Citroen's French superstar Sebastian Loeb, Gronholm's Finnish countryman and teammate Mikko Hirvonen's fourth place in Ireland sealed another manufacturers' title for the Blue Oval in the WRC, while Australia's Chris Atkinson was out early again in his factory Subaru.

This morning, Australian time, Matt Kenseth gave Ford another victory in the NASCAR finale at Homestead in Florida, although the title was a shootout between General Motors Chevrolet/Hendrick Motorsport teammates Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon -- with Johnson taking back-to-back crowns ahead of four-time champion Gordon.

Another achievement for Ford over the weekend has been dual Aussie V8 Supercar champion Marcos Ambrose's completing NASCAR's 35-race Busch series with another top 10 finish -- his sixth of the season in his first full year in the series -- and he wound up eighth in that championship.

However, the highlight by far for Ford's Australian fans has been its success at the Tasmanian round of the the V8 Supercar Championship after it seemed on Saturday evening that Holden's leading driver Garth Tander was set for further domination of the short Symmons Plains circuit near Launceston.

Tander had won the first of the weekend's first three 50-lap or 120km races at Symmons, where he had also won five of the six races the previous two years.

As he enjoyed dinner Saturday night Tander was sitting on a 31-point championship lead, but it all turned sour for him on Sunday, as a clutch problem in the second race restricted him to 10th as Ford's Jamie Whincup took the win -- and then, having worked his way up to third in the final race, Tander tried an over-ambitious pass on Steven Richards and damaged his steering, ultimately putting him out of the race in spectacular fashion as Whincup won again.

The Team Vodafone/Triple 8 youngster can hardly believe his luck, after squandering the championship lead he took to Bahrain two weeks earlier.

As the V8 show now heads to Victoria's Phillip Island for the 14th and final round, Whincup has his nose in front of Tander again by just seven points -- the same margin Rick Kelly took there last year before emerging so controversially as champion against Whincup's teammate Craig Lowndes.

"I had a shocker in Bahrain -- that was the lowest of lows, and this (the Symmons Plains success) is the highest of highs," Whincup said.

"I've led the championship before and thrown it all away.

"I don't think I knew how to lead a championship back then. I handled it quite poorly. But I've learnt a lot since.''

The scene is set for a classic showdown at the Island,

Tander, who wound up seventh at the Tasmanian round after Sunday's dramas, has said: "Seven or eight points is not insurmountable.

"I have been reminded that Rick led by seven points last year going into Phillip Island and yet it was all even after race one.

"So we just have to dig deeper and make up the gap and a bit more."

Lowndes is yet again in contention, just 14 points behind Tander and 21 in arrears of his teammate, Whincup.

And Kelly, whose engine blew at Symmons yesterday, is also still a mathematical chance, 48 points off the lead.

What the Tasmanian round, or at least Sunday, emphasised again -- as we highlighted here two weeks ago -- is how the pendulum has swung Ford's way in the second half of the season.

It has won eight of the past 11 races, including both the endurance races -- Sandown and Bathurst.

Holden won 19 of the first 23 races up to the Oran Park round in mid-August.

Team Vodafone/Triple 8 has the two Ford drivers in with a chance of the title, but Symmons Plains again emphasised how competitive Ford Performance Racing has become, with Steven Richards and Mark Winterbottom joining Whincup on the podium.

It has been a remarkable comeback by the Blue Oval.

It is a parity formula, but in a marketing sense it will be a crushing blow to Holden if its VE Commodore, which made such a dominant start to the season, does not carry Tander to the drivers' title against the older model Falcon, even if Toll-HSV wins the teams' championship.

Tander has won 12 of 34 races this season and, in many senses, is probably due a title.

However, Whincup has proven himself quite a remarkable V8 driver and has a head start as he prepares for Phillip Island.

He also would make a worthy 2007 champion -- as would Lowndes, but, unless things are massively shaken up again in the Saturday race at the Island, Lowndes' role now will be to assist the younger Whincup wrest the big trophy.

V8 Supercar Championship driver standings after 13 of 14 rounds -- Jamie Whincup (Ford) 569 points, Garth Tander (Holden) 562, Craig Lowndes (F) 548, Rick Kelly (H) 521, Mark Winterbottom (F) 381, Steven Richards (F) 366, Mark Skaife (H) 335, James Courtney (F) 331, Todd Kelly (H) 325, Will Davison (F) 315, Russell Ingall (F) 301, Steven Johnson (F) 294, Greg Murphy (H) 238, Jason Richards (H) 235, Lee Holdsworth (H) 189.

V8 Supercar round 13 points -- Jamie Whincup 68, Steven Richards 55, Mark Winterbottom 45, Mark Skaife 41, Craig Lowndes 38, Jason Richards 36, Garth Tander 32, Steven Johnson 29, Rick Kelly 25, James Courtney 22, Will Davison 18, Dean Canto 13, Jason Bright 9, Lee Holdsworth 9, Greg Murphy 8, Paul Morris 6, Marcus Marshall 6, Todd Kelly 5, Russell Ingall 4, Paul Dumbrell 4, Shane Van Gisbergen 2, Steve Owen 2.

V8 Supercars teams championship after 13 rounds -- Toll HSV 1083 points, Team Vodafone/Triple 8 1036, Ford Performance Racing 735, Holden Racing Team 700, Stone Brothers Racing 632, Jim Beam/Dick Johnson Racing 588, Tasman Motorsport 419, Garry Rogers Motorsport 299.

World rally championship driver standings after 15 of 16 rounds -- Sebastien Loeb (France) 110 points, Marcus Groenholm (Finland) 104, Mikko Hirvonen (Finland) 89, Daniel Sordo (Spain) 61, Petter Solberg (Norway) 42, Henning Solberg (Norway) 34, Jari-Matti Latvala (Finland) 30, Chris Atkinson (Australia) 29, Francois Duval (Belgium)   12, Manfred Stohl (Austria) 12.

World rally championship constructor standings -- BP-Ford WRT 194 points, Citroen Total WRT 173, Stobart M-Sport Ford WRT 80, Subaru WRT  79, OMV-Kronos Citroen 43, Munchi's Ford WRT 14.

NASCAR Busch series final standings after 35 rounds -- Carl Edwards 4805, David Reutimann 4187, Jason Leffler 3996, Kevin Harvick 3993, David Ragan 3739, Bobby Hamilton Junior 3667, Stephen Leicht 3603, Marcos Ambrose 3477, Greg Biffle 3466, Matt Kenseth 3451.

NASCAR Nextel series final standings after 35 rounds -- Jimmie Johnson 6572, Jeff Gordon 6486, Clint Bowyer 6331, Kyle Busch 6185, Tony Stewart 6169, Matt Kenseth 6103, Kevin Harvick 6093, Jeff Burton 6089, Carl Edwards 6067, Kurt Busch 6056.

"Performance wise, I'd probably give us a B-minus; for everything else, it's been an A-plus year," he said.

"The team believes in me and Ford supports me.

"We've struggled a bit... But we have a great future for next year.

"I'm driving the 59 car (again) next year.

"Busch Series again full-time for sure.

"There's rumors and stuff floating around about some (Nextel) Cup starts in the 21 (car) or maybe a second entry for JTG (his existing team, Wood Brothers/JTG Racing), but I haven't seen a contract across my desk.

"I'll wait until they give me the nod.

"Next year we've got to win (Busch) races if we want to call it a success.

"If we don't get race wins next year, I won't call it a success."

The Federation Internationale de 'Automobile's court of appeal ruled McLaren's appeal against the Williams-Toyota and BMW-Sauber inadmissible.

So why was McLaren ever allowed to lodge an appeal?

And the way the court of appeal's decision was handled did no credit to a sport that claims it is the world's biggest, other than soccer.

Rather than announce the decision, application had to be made to obtain it -- all apparently intended to minimise the coverage of the outcome (and what a farce the whole thing was).

While the issue was sparked by an FIA technical officer finding the cars of Nico Rosberg (Williams) and Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld had fuel much cooler than it should have been , we note a couple of interesting paragraphs from America's speedtv.com's report on the appeal case.

"In the course of the ICA (international court of appeal) discussions BMW, Williams and even Ferrari presented data showing the respective teams' own readings of fuel tank and/or fuel rail temperatures recorded during the Brazilian race," wrote speedtv reporter Adam Cooper.

"McLaren was asked to supply the same data, but the team declined to do so, despite confirming that it took similar measurements.

"Sources suggest that this did not come across very well in the courtroom."

Despite that, it is hard to escape the conclusion now that McLaren always cops the rough end of the stick in anything to do with the FIA.

Once Kimi Raikkonen had claimed the world title with Ferrari, hardly anybody wanted to see that result overturned in favor of McLaren's Lewis Hamilton by excluding Rosberg, Kubica and Heidfeld from the Brazilian GP and promoting Hamilton from seventh in the race classifications.

Even McLaren made the point that its appeal was not about seeing Hamilton made champion but, quite legitimately, in the "interests of rule clarification and rule consistency".

The way the fuel row, and other arguments, have been handled by the FIA this year leave a lot to be desired -- and gives critics of motor sport good grounds for much of their cynicism.

RBR chief Christian Horner told Spanish radio station Onda Cero that Alonso will end up back at Renault.

"We are pleased to be linked to Alonso -- it shows the progress that we have made in the last two years -- but our drivers (Australian Mark Webber and Scotsman David Coulthard) are under contract in 2008," Horner said.

"Renault are the only team next to Toyota who have a free space and who have not announced their drivers for next season."

Even Toyota may not be closed off, with Jarno Trulli expected to stay and German Timo Glock set to take the vacancy created by Ralf Schumacher being ditched.

<<<Eddie Jordan lost a lot of credibility towards the end of his time in F1, but one thing can't be taken away from him.

"Only five teams in the last 25 years have won multiple GPs -- Ferrari, McLaren, Williams, Renault and Jordan," Jordan said.

"Toyota and Honda now spend billions and can't even get on the podium.

"Can they win a race? Not a chance."

Of his old team, which has since been Midland and Spyker and next year will be Force India, Jordan said: "We delivered."

<<<Amazing results -- after the first two -- from a survey F1 sponsor ING did of 8500 fans on the popularity of drivers.

The top eight in the survey were: Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher, Nelson Piquet, Nigel Mansell, Mika Hakkinen and Robert Kubica (equal fifth), Kimi Raikkonen, Alain Prost.

"Being there in Colin's place will be difficult," the former British rally champ and some-time WRC driver said.

"But hopefully, as Team Scotland, we can do him proud.

"I know it's meant to be a bit of end-of-year fun, so that's exactly what we intend to do.

"I just know that Colin wouldn't have wanted me sitting about dwelling on things."

The Race of Champions organisers are planning a tribute to McRae at the 80,000 sell-out event, which will also be seen on worldwide television, on December 16.

The annual event attracts a lot of talent from F1, the WRC, IndyCar, Champ Car and motorcycle racing.

Briscoe has recently been confirmed for Penske, driving in the Indy Racing League next year.

His driver's licence has been suspended for 15 years!

A jury convicted Walther, 59, after a two-day trial, of failing to comply with an order of a police officer in July.

Three months ago Walther was sentenced to two years and two months for failing to support his family and violating terms of an earlier sentence for stealing car parts.

Walther maintained his innocence throughout the latest case, saying he was not the man who fled from police that night because the car used was no longer in his possession.

"I still say I'm innocent, but they found me guilty and I'll do my time," Walther said.

Walther said he was caught up in child support payments but was not using drugs, despite having drug problems in the past, and is planning a book on his life and troubles.