MOTORSPORT: The good and bad out of Adelaide

V8 Supercars great, except where it matters most
What a wonderful weekend's motor racing -- for those who got to see it, and we'll come back to that in a moment.

Garth Tander and Holden Racing Team showed their determination to fight back in the V8 Supercar Championship after the horrors of the Middle East, winning both races at Adelaide's Clipsal 500.

A Ferrari quinella in the opening grand prix of the Formula One world championship in Bahrain overnight, and this morning Australia's Will Power won the first round of the Indy Racing League in Brazil -- in his first race since a serious back injury last year. More of all that later too.

Tough luck in Adelaide for V8 Supercar racing's No. 1 man Jamie Whincup and the Triple Eight outfit, but things are not always going to be perfect.

Some good signs for Ford, especially in the second race -- in which Falcons filled second, third, fourth and fifth places.

However, there is a big difference between finishing on the tail of the winning Holden Commodore in races distorted by safety car periods and overtaking the leading Holden in the closing laps to get to the chequered flag first.

James Courtney and Shane van Gisbergen are looking particularly good in Falcons at the minute, although Mark Winterbottom remains the leading Ford driver.

The Adelaide racing and the telecasts were excellent. The attendance was terrific too -- announced as 277,800 over the course of the event, the second best in the Clipsal's history and including 89,600 on Sunday

We've raised here before the abnormality in sport that crowd figures for motor racing are so often rounded off to the nearest thousand, and usually thought to be inflated, while those for the major ball sports have the hallmarks of accuracy.

Won't dwell on that matter today, and clearly the attendance in Adelaide was huge.

Apparently V8 Supercars Australia chairman feels that some media, particularly veteran Sydney motor sport correspondent Peter McKay and this author, are too pessimistic about V8 Supercar racing.

McKay is a respected contemporary but, to this author's mind, there is a point of difference between us: McKay, I believe, doesn't much like V8 Supercars, believing them to be outdated, even "dinosaurs"; while I like, indeed quite like, V8 Supercars, acknowledge that there is very sizeable body of people who follow them, but don't like the hype that comes with the show, especially from the series organiser, headed by Mr Cochrane.

Now if Cochrane wants to take a shot at McKay and I, he chose a bad weekend to do it.

Because, while the crowd and the racing in Adelaide were fantastic, the TV numbers for the Clipsal 500 were woeful for what V8 Supercars Australia boasts as its showcase event.

Readers may wonder why we concentrate so heavily here on TV figures. Well, there are two reasons:
i. By the time the races have been run and won, seen on TV and reported on in the mainstream media and dedicated motorsport websites, we see no point in simply repeating that, but rather look at a bigger picture.

ii. To this author the OzTAM TV figures are somewhat equivalent to the VFACTS car sales figures for car makers -- the barometer of how they are doing in the marketplace. Crowds are another measure, and in the main they are quite, indeed very, healthy for V8 Supercar racing -- although we have our doubts about the veracity of the numbers announced. The TV audience should be a factor several times that of the number of fans at tracks and, to this author's way of thinking, is a better indicator or interest in the sport.

Now what we see in the OzTAM figures for the weekend's Clipsal 500 was an average audience in the five mainland state capitals cities of 814,000 for the two days.

And we'll set out of the Clipsal two-day (Saturday and Sunday) numbers combined for those five capitals for the past five years.
2006 892,000
2007 1,250,000
2008 1,069,000
2009 1,128,000
2010 814,000

We'll save Cochrane the trouble of getting his calculator out, but the figure for the two days just gone is 34.8 per cent down on the 2007 Clipsal -- and 27.8 per cent down on last year.

We're not trying to be pessimistic here; just factual. And, for the record, the 814,000 for the weekend just gone comprised a five-capital average of 338,000 on Saturday and 476,000 on Sunday.

And those two daily totals were comprised of these audiences in the various cities:
Saturday
Sydney 63,000
Melbourne 73,000
Brisbane 73,000
Adelaide 93,000
Perth 36,000
Total 338,000

Sunday
Sydney 87,000
Melbourne 89,000
Brisbane 102,000
Adelaide 149,000
Perth 48,000
Total 476,000

A few points about these numbers:
>> More viewers again in Brisbane than either of Australia's two biggest cities, Sydney and Melbourne.

>> While Clipsal draws big crowds to the track, the biggest TV audience among the five cities is also in Adelaide -- 242,000 over the two days out of 814,000. That's almost 30 per cent of the TV audience for the event in its home city. A big number, but if these events -- especially downtown street races on temporary circuits -- are meant to be about generating exposure and economic benefit from outside the host city that almost 30 per cent (29.76 per cent to be more precise) is way too high. The audience needs to be much better in Sydney and Melbourne, in particular.

>> There will be a feeling among fans, and especially among competing teams and their sponsors, that starting the championship overseas, with two rounds in the Middle East this year, has harmed -- indeed perhaps "cannibalised" -- the Clipsal, meant to be the showcase event, even if historically/traditionally Bathurst is and remains the No. 1 event.
There could easily have been a feeling among potential viewers before the weekend that the Australian rounds of the championship were not starting on a level playing field because of the points imbalance quickly established in the Middle East and that Jamie Whincup was going to wipe the floor with his rivals.
And Ford fans may have been disheartened that Holden had won the first four races and they perhaps saw little hope of that dominance being ended in a hurry -- certainly in Adelaide (in which case they were right, albeit with HRT/Tander dominant instead of Triple Eight/Whincup).

>> We've reported in the past month on the TV numbers for those races in Abu Dhabi and Bahrain, and what we now notice is that there were more viewers in Sydney for the delayed telecast of the first Abu Dhabi race (65,000) than there were in Sydney for Saturday's first Clipsal race (63,000). And there were more viewers in Sydney for the second Abu Dhabi race (92,000), another delayed telecast, compared with the number in the country's biggest city for yesterday's live telecast of a great second leg of Clipsal (87,000).

>> Saturday's total for this year's Clipsal (338,000) was lower than for the Saturday of last year's Tasmanian (359,000), Darwin (369,000) and Townsville (402,000) rounds, as well as for Bathurst (obviously), the Gold Coast and the new Sydney/Homebush event.

>> The total for this year's Clipsal, 814,000, was only 33,000 more viewers than the 781,000 for last year's West Australian round at Barbagallo Raceway in Perth -- yet WA is now off the calendar, while Clipsal is meant to be the showcase. Sunday's Clipsal total of 476,000 was 11,000 less than the 487,000 for the Sunday of last year's Perth round, when admittedly there was considerable interest in the title fight -- on whether Will Davison could stay in touch with Jamie Whincup.

Please don't feel that we are trying to be deliberately pessimistic about V8 Supercar racing.

Instead, what we are trying to do is, after all the talk/hype in V8 Supercar racing circles, is complete the "circle" of information with a few perspectives that others are reluctant to provide -- or perhaps simply just don't want known.

V8 Supercar Championship standings after six of 6 of 26 races -- Jamie Whincup 771 (Holden), Mark Winterbottom (Ford) 714, James Courtney (Ford) 696, Shane Van Gisbergen (Ford) 630, Lee Holdsworth (Holden) 573, Craig Lowndes (Holden) 552, Rick Kelly (Holden) 530, Paul Dumbrell (Ford) 489, Michael Caruso (Holden) 462, Steven Johnson (Ford) 455.

V8 Supercar Championship team standings -- Team Vodafone 1323 points, Jim Beam Racing 1151, Fujitsu Racing/GRM 1050, FPR -- Orrcon Steel and Dunlop Super Dealer FPR 1005, Stone Brothers Racing -- Irwin and SP Tools 951, Toll Holden Racing Team 849, Jack Daniel's Racing 777, Team BOC and Trading Post Racing 681, Supercheap Auto Racing and Castrol Edge Racing 528, Rock Racing and Kelly Racing 504.

Dream start to F1 season for Alonso and Ferrari
Sebastian Vettel was going to win the first Formula One grand prix of the year in Bahrain, qualifying his Red Bull-Renault on pole position and leading convincingly until a cracked exhaust robbed him of power around two-thirds distance -- although he still salvaged fourth place.

Ferrari, after a horror 2009, began the new season with first and second places -- Spanish dual world champion Fernando Alonso winning on debut for the sport's greatest team, with Felipe Massa runner-up in a terrific return from the nasty eye injury that sidelined him for half of last year.

It was Alonso's 22nd GP victory and his third in Bahrain. Having been shaded by Massa in qualifing and starting third on the grid, Alonso always had the upper hand on his teammate in the race, maintained pressure on Vettel and was perfectly positioned to snatch the lead when the time came.

Australia's Mark Webber was a disappointing eighth, after qualifying an equally disappointing sixth -- yet it looked at the first corner as though it could have been a whole lot worse with a massive plume of smoke from his Renault engine.

Michael Schumacher's return was no fairytale. He was outpaced by his Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg throughout practice, qualifying and the race.

Rosberg finished fifth, close behind Vettel, and Schumacher sixth. "That was as good as it could have been for me," Schumacher said.

We still have an uneasy feeling about this comeback, and wonder whether that's as good as it's going to get for the seven-time world champion.

Lewis Hamilton took third place for McLaren-Mercedes after Vettel struck trouble, while reigning world champion Jenson Button's debut as Hamilton's teammate was less than convincing as he finished just ahead of Webber.

Lotus was far and away the standout among the new teams, with both its cars -- driven by Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli -- getting to the finish.

Neither Virgin/Manor or Hispania Racing (nee Campos) car made it to anywhere near the finish.

The signs are good for the Australian GP in less than two weeks now, but for Australian fans Webber needs to lift his performance.

Qualifying up front would be a big boost for him -- and in boosting attention in a race that in many other ways might otherwise struggle to capture local interest.

Formula One drivers' world championship standings after 1 of 19 races -- Fernando Alonso (Spain, Ferrari) 25 points, Felipe Massa (Brazil, Ferrari) 18, Lewis Hamilton (Great Britain, McLaren-Mercedes) 15, Sebastian Vettel (Germany, Red Bull-Renault) 12, Nico Rosberg (Germany, Mercedes) 10, Michael Schumacher (Germany, Mercedes) 8, Jenson Button (Great Britain, McLaren-Mercedes) 6, Mark Webber (Australia, Red Bull-Renault) 4, Vitantonio Liuzzi (Italy, Force India) 2, Rubens Barrichello (Brazil, Williams-Cosworth) 1.

F1 constructors' standings -- Ferrari 43 points, McLaren-Mercedes 21, Mercedes 18, Red Bull-Renault 16, Force India-Mercedes 2, Williams-Cosworth 1.

Power overcomes all the odds in Indy opener
Will Power won a wet, chaotic and shortened IndyCar Sao Paulo 300 this morning for Team Penske while fellow Aussie Ryan Briscoe crashed late in the race.

Power outlasted American Ryan Hunter-Reay to finish 1.4 seconds ahead in the Indy Racing League's new season opener on a street course that was not fit to stage qualifying on the scheduled day -- it had to be held on race morning.

Drivers were trying to stretch fuel when fellow Ryan Briscoe crashed, bringing out a full-course caution that set the stage for a full-speed sprint to the flag.

"It was a great day," Power said. "Everything was thrown at you but we got it done."

Brazilians Vitor Meira and Raphael Matos were third and fourth, followed by England's Dan Wheldon, New Zealand's Scott Dixon and Scottish pole sitter Dario Franchitti, the defending series champion.

Eight of the 24 starters failed to finish the race, which was stopped by rain at one point and plagued by puddles.

Marco Andretti escaped injury in a scary accident at the start.

Brazilian Mario Moraes crashed on the back of Andretti as they approached the first chicane. The bottom of Moraes' car appeared to be touching Andretti's helmet.

It took more than five minutes for officials to remove Moraes' car so the medical team could get to Andretti, who eventually walked clear.

He taken to the medical centre and then released.

Indy Racing League standings after first race -- Will Power (Australia, Team Penske) 50 points, Ryan Hunter-Reay (US, Andretti Autosport) 40, Vitor Meira (Brazil, A.J. Foyt Enterprises) 35, Raphael Matos (Brazil, de Ferran Luczo Dragon Racing) 32, Dan Wheldon (Great Britain, Panther Racing) 30, Dario Franchitti (Great Britain, Target Chip Ganassi Racing) 29, Scott Dixon (New Zealand, Target Chip Ganassi Racing) 28, Mike Conway (Great Britain, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing) 24, Helio Castroneves (Brazil, Team Penske) 22, Tony Kanaan (Brazil, Andretti Autosport) 20. Ryan Briscoe (Australia, Penske) is 14th on 16 points.

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