MOTORSPORT: Where's the V8 oomph?

Thursday motorsport reportAugust 16, 2007

You probably need to be a pretty avid reader of Auto Action magazine to know that already, because there's precious little evidence around of excitement about the season entering its second half.

The next board meeting of the V8 Supercar organisers ought to decide on an appropriate thank-you gift to the Auto Action staff for publishing the results of its recent poll of drivers and team owners.

That poll made some news itself for identifying the sport's good and bad guys and sparked some reaction from within the V8 ranks that went a little way to filling the vacuum that otherwise seems to be the V8 scene at the minute.

The V8 Supercar community -- drivers, team owners, marketing and PR people -- were given a rev-up at the Darwin round of the championship by one of the ringleaders of the circus, Wayne Cattach.

They were told to be more controversial for the purposes of making some headlines.

However, things seem to have got worse instead of better since then, compounded by the apparent gag on Supercar head honcho Tony Cochrane after his remarks a couple of months back about not wanting the V8s on Channel 10 when they return to the Grand Prix in Melbourne next March.

Going into the round after Darwin the upshot of the "rev-up" was a driver bucketing of Queensland Raceway.

There seems to be some forlorn hope that contrived controversies are going to deliver some kind of salvation to a show that, in a media sense, seems to have pretty much stalled this year.

Without the recent Auto Action poll -- which we stayed away from once we could see it getting a bit of traction in the traditional media, and which we note was "in the works" before the famous Darwin rev-up -- there has been precious little to interest or excite fans in recent times.

There's been the announcement of a "restructuring" at Dick Johnson Racing, with the departure of general manager Steve Chalker, sporting director Adrian Burgess taking on more responsibility and Dick Johnson vowing to get more hands-on again.

And there's talk of Russell Ingall switching back to Holden next year with the Paul Morris team, to be replaced at the Stone Brothers Ford team by Paul Dumbrell.

Ingall isn't everyone's favorite person, but it must be said that V8 Supercars would have been a lot poorer without him the past decade.

And there's a good interview with him in this week's Auto Action.

Forgive us if we are living in the past a little, but we note with interest Ingall saying in that interview that he would love to have raced against Allan Moffat and Allan Grice.

"They were great personalities. That's what we're lacking (nowadays)," Ingall says.

Indeed, "Enforcer" Ingall sees himself as something of a modern-day Moffat.

"I'm probably the Moffat of the bunch," he says.

"And Moffat, like Gricey, probably wore the black hat -- the ones the fans loved to hate."

Ingall's admiration for Craig Lowndes comes through clearly in the interview, as he calls his younger Ford rival "the closest thing we've got to Brock, not just in status but as a personality too".

And there is begrudging respect for Mark Skaife, with whom Ingall has had more than his share of encounters on and off the track.

"Skaife, despite what I think of him and say about him, has some pretty impressive results," Ingall says.

He vows not to retire before Skaife -- and then even suggests they should eventually get together at Bathurst.

"How good would that be? I don't know if it will ever come off, and we'd probably be punching each other up about who gets to start, but it would be great," Ingall says.

But back to Oran Park this weekend.

Todd Kelly will become the youngest driver to have raced in 100 rounds of the championship, so well done to him.

And we're particularly keen to see how New Zealand teenager Shane Van Gisbergen goes in his V8 Supercar debut with the returning Team Kiwi, now aligned to Stone Bros after its split with Ford Performance Racing.

However dull the lead-up has been to this round, the consolation hopefully will be a great weekend's racing at an iconic Australian racetrack.

It seems it's the second last time the V8s will get to race at Oran Park because of the spread of housing in south-west Sydney.

Although circuit owner Tony Perich has talked of wanting to recreate the track further out, it will be a sad day when this place at which so many motorsport fans have had so much entertainment finally goes.

So it's a bit sad to see the skirmish that has developed over the permanent memorial planned for Brocky at the place with which he is synonymous -- Bathurst.

The Bathurst council had artists submit entries for the Brock memorial, but the entries most preferred by the council have not found favor with the Peter Brock Foundation.

Brocky's brother Lewis says the council's two favored entries are too impressionist and that a traditional bronze, life-like statue would be better.

Hopefully agreement will be reached by the time of this year's Bathurst, although the memorial now won't be in place until next year.

A pity, but hopefully it will be a case of all's well that ends well.

Long time before Reed crosses over
Supercross superstar Chad Reed had that scheduled serious V8 Supercar test with Team Vodafone/Triple 8 at Queensland Raceway early this week and from all reports it went well -- although any move into V8s by the 25-year-old two-wheel ace is still a long way off.

The supercross scene in the US that has already made Reed a very rich man inevitably remains his priority.

"I loved it (the V8 test), but I don't know what's next," Reed says.

"I was missing a few gear shifts early on -- I was a bit nervous."

Triple 8 boss Roland Dane says Reed showed "the right mentality".

Dane was pleased not only with Reed but also Formula Ford youngsters Tim Blanchard and James Moffat, who also trialled with the team.

Old Salt for Brickyard of another kind
David "Salt" Walther raced in the Indianapolis 500 seven times and survived a fiery crash in 1973, but these days he's under heat of a different kind.

Walther, 59, has been sentenced this week to 26 months' jail for failing to financially support his children -- and not complying with an earlier order to do so.

Walther is reportedly more than US$20,000 behind on child support but will get eight months' "credit" on his sentence for time he's already served.

Two F1 teams in financial strife
Life's always tough for teams at the back of the Formula 1 field, so the financial difficulties of the Spyker (formerly Midland and originally Jordan) and Super Aguri teams are no surprise.

Spyker's parent company, the stock exchange-listed Dutch exotic sports car maker of the same name, has been in strife for some months and the two entities may now be separated totally, with Michiel Mol taking complete charge of the F1 outfit.

Its woes have been exacerbated by lower than expected revenues from television rights and sponsors this season.

Super Aguri is aligned with Honda but is reportedly in talks with Spanish interests about taking a substantial shareholding.

Moves for peace in McLaren camp
The three-week break in the F1 season may produce a "ceasefire" between McLaren teammates and world championship rivals Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.

The teammates are believed to have spoken on the phone a couple of times since the tensions that surfaced at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Rookie sensation Hamilton has been relaxing on a luxury yacht owned by McLaren's Saudi Arabian part-owner Mansour Ojeh and there is talk of dual world champion Alonso joining him on that yacht in the Mediterranean to clear the air before the championship resumes next week in Turkey.

Meanwhile, McLaren says it will appeal the decision to preclude it from constructors' championship points at the Hungarian race.