MOTORSPORT: One less V8 Supercar round

V8SA walks away from Queensland Raceway
The year is not yet 10 days old and already there is an upheaval in V8 Supercar land.

The Queensland Raceway round of the series scheduled from April 30 to May 2 is off, with V8 Supercars Australia and track operator John Tetley unable to agree a deal.

The round, which was to be the fifth of 15, appears unlikely to be replaced, leaving a four-week gap in the calendar between Hamilton, New Zealand, and Winton in Victoria, as well as the two-month mid-season break from Townsville in mid-July until the Phillip Island 500 in mid-September.

The Queensland Raceway round had only ever been provisional on the calendar, and the Barbagallo, WA, round is still only provisionally on the calendar until agreement is reached on the extent of a venue makeover there.

But back in Queensland there is now only 9½ months until the "SuperGP", or old Indy, round on October 21-24 and there's no indication of a new international open-wheeler category -- after A1 GP's infamous no-show last October and IndyCar not wanting to come to Australia at that time of year.

It's getting very late for the Gold Coast to be added to the calendar of any international series for this year.

Three months ago the Queensland government ordered two inquiries into the Gold Coast event. Management expert David Williams reported to the government more than a month ago, but that report has not been made public, while Attorney-General Glenn Poole's examination has no timeframe, at least publicly.

As time ticks by, high-profile businessmen John Singleton and Gerry Harvey are suggesting to the Queensland government it would be much better spending much of the almost $12 million it tips into "Indy" each year by helping make their Magic Millions activity on the Gold Coast the world's richest horse race.

Their lobbying hasn't gained any traction with the government -- yet.

The axing of Queensland Raceway at Ipswich from the V8 Supercar Championship raises one particularly interesting prospect: what if the Queensland-based V8 Supercar teams that use it as their test track now have trouble getting access to it for that testing?

The other Queensland tracks in the series, the Gold Coast and Townsville, are street circuits with no opportunities for testing.

And Sydney is a long way south -- and with a distinct shortage of circuits palatable to V8 Supercars Australia and available for testing.

V8SA chairman Tony Cochrane has said: "Maybe the time has come for us to work with the Queensland government and jointly build our own permanent facility to ensure the nearly 1000 jobs in our great industry are kept in south-east Queensland."

Yet it was little more than a decade ago that Queensland Raceway was built with a bundle of Queensland government money and, as we recall, V8 Supercar icon Dick Johnson as a consultant/ambassador for the venture.

Little more than 2½ months ago Cochrane was quoted in Brisbane's Sunday Mail saying he was committed to having what the article called "a permanent base in Ipswich".

"It (Queensland Raceway) is a vital cog in our whole infrastructure," Cochrane was quoted saying then.

"We are seeking some major improvements in the facilities at Ipswich.

"Our (racing) facilities are OK, but the fan facilities are terrible."

Yesterday Cochrane said that dealing with Queensland Raceway operator Tetley "turns into a greater nightmare for all of us in the championship every year" and V8SA had come to "this very frustrating point" (scrubbing the round).

Tetley said Queensland Raceway's business had become largely grassroots motorsport and he wanted to "dry hire" the track to V8SA.

"For three months we have tried to find common ground with the management of V8 Supercars, to no avail," Tetley said.

"We had agreed to accept their price, but it was their inability to accept the rights of the Queensland Raceway's passholders (virtual life members who contributed financially at the time of the track's birth) and to accept responsibility for damage to our track whilst they are running the event which became deal breakers.

"We already have a very full program at Ipswich and Lakeside (the old Brisbane circuit which Tetley also operates amongst new housing). There will be no lack of motorsport to enjoy and participate in because of this disappointment."

V8SA said it had been "totally prepared to become the promoter of the Ipswich event in May to keep the event alive, but unfortunately this is not possible due to a long list of unrealistic demands set by the Queensland Raceway operator".

"QR demanded a near record hire fee for the hire of the venue, despite its ageing facilities, and also insisted the venue would not be responsible for obtaining the very necessary CAMS licence that is required under the FIA (Federation Internationale de l'Automobile) sanctioning of V8 Supercars as an international series, amongst many other things," V8SA said.

"This, coupled with the fact that fans and corporates have dropped off from attending QR because of the lack of decent facilities, means that QR at Ipswich is no longer a viable venue for Australia's premier motorsport championship."

V8SA's acting CEO Shane Howard, apparently keeping that seat warm until Bahrain circuit manager Martin Whitaker is lured to Australia in the role permanently, said: "This (breakdown in the Queensland Raceway negotiations) is extremely disappointing for all our fans, but we had given QR a very reasonable offer and we have to be responsible to our teams when we hire venues and conduct events.

"The unrealistic hire fees and uncommercial terms demanded by QR, when compared with other permanent venues, are absurd given the standard of the QR infrastructure for fans and teams alike.

"QR's reluctance to be a CAMS-sanctioned venue further compounds a very difficult position for us as we are a fully-fledged FIA championship. Almost no money has been spent on fan facilities at QR in the last eight years, despite our ongoing requests, and it is now looking very tired from a fan and corporate point of view."

And chairman Cochrane chimed in with: "We do question how a venue which was built with significant state government funds and is leased on Ipswich Council land can manipulate groups such as ours with ridiculous hire figures, and non-compliance with the government-recognised sanctioning body has surely got to be questioned."

The Ipswich Council is another stakeholder that may yet have a card to play in this mess, but it looks as though the Queensland Raceway round is gone for this year, at least.

Surely there's another venue that could host the round and keep the continuity/momentum in the championship that the calendar seemed intended to establish.

The 2010 V8 Supercar Championship calendar:

February 18-20 - Yas Marina Circuit, Abu Dhabi
February 25-27 - Desert 400, Bahrain International Circuit, Bahrain
March 11-14 - Clipsal 500, Adelaide
April 16-18 - ITM Hamilton 400, Hamilton, New Zealand
May 14-16 - Winton, Victoria
June 4-6 - BigPond 300, Barbagallo, WA (provisional)
June 18-20 -- Skycity Triple Crown, Hidden Valley, Darwin
July 9-11 - Dunlop Townsville 400, Townsville
September 10-12 - L&H 500, Phillip Island
October 7-10 - Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000, Mt Panorama
October 21-24 - SuperGP, Surfers Paradise
Nov 5-7 Falken Tasmania Challenge, Symmons Plains
November 19-21 - Norton 360 Sandown Challenge, Sandown
December 3-5 - Sydney Telstra 500, Homebush

(The March 26-28 races at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne are not part of the championship)

Peterhansel in big Dakar fightback
Six stages of the Dakar Rally in South America completed now, five different winners in the car sections, and three makes of car with stage wins.

Volkswagen Touaregs stand one, two, three overall approaching the halfway mark of this most gruelling event, but France's Stephane Peterhansel has won two stages now in his BMW X3 -- although he lost the lead on Wednesday because of transmission problems that cost him two hours and dropped him 10 places in the outright classifications. He's now back up to eighth, but still more than two hours off the lead.

Spanish World Rally Championship legend Carlos Sainz now heads the rally raid outright -- without winning a stage.

Americans Robby Gordon and Mark Miller have each won a stage since we last reported -- Gordon in his Hummer and Miller in a VW.

Last year's winner of the first Dakar held in Argentina and Chile, South African Giniel de Villiers, is only 16th in one of the five factory VW entries after he hit engine trouble.

Peterhansel's victory on the sixth stage overnight was his 20th in the car class in the history of the famed event, previously run in Europe and Africa. Peterhansel passed 11 cars on the 418km stage in Chile from Pedro de Valdivia to Iquique. It was a record 53rd stage win for the Frenchman -- the first 33 coming on motocycles.

The other stage winners in the car section this year have been Spaniard Joan "Nani" Roma in a BMW on the opening stage and Qatari Nasser Al-Attiyah in a Volkswagen.

Australia's Bruce Garland and his co-driver Harry Suzuki are now out of the event in their Isuzu D-MAX ute after earlier having been inside the top 20.

Garland said after Wednesday's 483km stage through Chile's Atacama Desert, the second longest of the event: "I now know what hell looks like because I've just driven through it. Not a blade of grass the whole way. Just mountains, rocks, and heaps of bulldust (fesh-fesh). It's just so fine it gets into everything and it's murder to drive through."

But since then Garland has been forced out of the event after the Isuzu's spare wheel dislodged from its rear tub mounting on the rough trackless wastes of the sixth stage after he hastily refitted it once he had used it as a safety auxiliary stand while doing some minor underbody repairs.

The wheel bounced forward, hitting and cracking the rear-mounted radiator and causing the engine to overheat.

Garland then had to depart the rally route and limp to the end of the stage via the highway and stewards ruled him out of the event.

In the motorcycle section Australians Rob Pollard and Christophe Barriere Varju are 43rd and 58th respectively on KTMs, while Garry Connell, on a Husaberg, is listed as dropping out on the third stage.

Dakar Rally car standings after six of 14 stages -- 1. Carlos Sainz (Spain, Volkswagen) 20 hours 35 minutes 33 seconds; 2. Nasser Al-Attiyah (Qatar, VW) +15 minutes 24 seconds; 3. Mark Miller (US, VW) +17m47s;  4. Carlos Sousa (Portugal, Mitsubishi) +1h34m04s; 5. Krzysztof Holowczyc (Poland, Nissan) +1h43m40s; 6. Robby Gordon (US, Hummer) +1h48m25s; 7. Guerlain Chicherit (France, BMW) +1h51m42s; 8. Stephane Peterhansel (France, BMW) +2h04m02s; 9. Guilherme Spinelli (Brazil, Mitsubishi) +2h12m18s; 10. Leonid Novitskiy (Russia, BMW) +3h10m18s.

FIA insists Briatore, Symonds bans stand
A Paris court, the Tribunal de Grand Instance, this week deemed that there were "irregularities" in the way former Renault Formula One team boss Flavio Briatore was banned for life and engineering director Pat Symonds for five years.

The pair were awarded minimal damages, mere fractions of what they sought, and the decision was reported as overturning the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) bans, imposed for Briatore and Symonds' supposed roles in Nelson Piquet Junior crashing at the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix to help teammate Fernando Alonso win the race.

But the FIA does not accept that the bans are overturned and is certain to appeal the court's ruling.

While former FIA president Max Mosley claims to be "very much retired", he says the matter is "very far from over".

"The court did not find that Briatore was not guility," Mosley said.

"They just didn't like the procedure we used.

"But it's a very preliminary judgement. I think the FIA should appeal the judgement because I think it is seriously flawed in a number of areas.

"Aspects of it are just extraordinary. Symonds actually admitted in writing that he was guilty and yet they found in his favour. But that's only because they are not looking at the substance -- they are just looking at the procedure."

Jean Todt, the former Ferrari team boss who has succeeded Mosley as FIA president, said: "The court's decision is not enforceable until the FIA's appeal options have been exhausted. Until then the World Motor Sport Council's decision continues to apply."

The court said Briatore had not been given the right to properly defend himself during the FIA's inquiry and that his lawyer had not been allowed to question the witness, Piquet.

Briatore's lawyer, Philippe Ouakrat, who ironically acted for Mosley during his sex scandal/defamation case two years ago, said "some justice was reinstated" by the Paris court's decision.

Briatore said it "restores to me the dignity and freedom that certain people had arbitrarily attempted to deprive me of".

"The court recognised that all the criticisms I had formulated against the decision of the World Council were founded, by finding that the FIA had rendered a decision that it was not competent to pronounce, infringed its own articles of association, totally failed to respect my right to a fair defence, and, finally, entrusted the tasks of investigation, prosecution and judgment to a principle player known by all to be hostile to me.

"I believe that justice has been done."

On the question of returning to F1, Briatore said: "Let me take a little time to enjoy this moment of happiness after this difficult period. As concerns my possible return to F1, there is plenty of time to talk about this."

Media reports immediately saw Briatore as free to return to F1 team management -- although Renault now has a new team principal, Eric Boullier, an engineer well known to the team's new major investor, Genii Capital -- and to managing drivers, including Australia's Mark Webber and Spain's dual world champion Alonso, now at Ferrari.

But Mosley told The Times: "If we (the FIA) can't sanction somebody for doing what Briatore and Symonds did, then the whole purpose and basis of the FIA would be in question, because it goes to the heart of safety, of fairness and to all the fundamental points of our activity. You cannot envisage a more serious example of cheating than what happened in Singapore. Not only was it dishonest from the cheating point of view, it put lives in danger."

F1 commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone, a long-time ally of both Mosley and Briatore even though that pair are seemingly arch-enemies, has said that the colourful 59-year-old Italian would be welcome back in the GP paddock.

"I said at the time (of the banning) that even murderers don't get life sentences these days -- and the court seems to agree," Ecclestone said.

"He (Briatore) was a great character in F1, but I'm not sure if that (a return to the paddock) is what he wants to do now."

Briatore acknowledges that there may yet be a long legal fight, or fights, ahead.

For him, it seems, that firstly may involve suing Piquet Junior and his father, one of Brazil's triple world champions.

In this author's opinion, he would be best to accept something less than the life ban and be done with it.

Kiwi veteran in race for history
In New Zealand this weekend 67-year-old Ken Smith, a veteran of 52 seasons of top-level motor racing, is out to equal Graham McRae's record of winning the country's most famous motorsport trophy, the Lady Wigram Trophy, four times.

Smith will be driving a Lola T430 in the 15-lap trophy race -- now part of the Formula 5000 Tasman Cup Revival Series -- at Christchurch's Ruapana Park circuit.

He first won the trophy in 1976 in a Lola T332, the second time in 1991 in a Swift Formula Pacific car, and last year in the Lola T430.

Other three-time winners have been Peter Whitehead, the legendary Scotsman Jim Clark, and Craig Baird (who, incidentally, is set to replace Cameron McConville as Network Ten's F1 commentator this year).

Coming up in NZ are tribute meetings to the country's great constructor Bruce McLaren, who died almost 40 years ago testing one of his sports cars at Goodwood in Britain.

The McLaren tributes will be at the new Hampton Downs circuit in north Waikato on January 22-24 and at Pukekohe on January 29-31.

Eight out of 10 for sprintcar king Schatz
American Donny Schatz won this week's Scott Darley sprintcar feature race with $50,000 first prize that concluded Sydney's four-night holiday season at Parramatta City Raceway.

It was the four-time US World of Outlaws champion's eighth win in the Sydney speedway classic in the past decade.

Driving for Aussie speedway legend Garry Rush, Schatz won the main race on two of the four nights over the festive season.

NASCAR superstar Tony Stewart, Schatz's team boss in the US, finished 19th of 24 in the Scott Darley but the two-time Winston Cup champion, winner of 37 Cup races and former IndyCar series champion had a ball and is looking forward to returning next summer.

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