Rossi tries Merc racer

Mercedes motorsport chief Norbert Haug says: "His times were very good. He's a natural talent, obviously; an icon of the sports world. There is no background to this. He just wants to try out different cars. Who knows what the future brings?"

Rossi, who recently lost his MotoGP crown to American Nicky Hayden, was previously mooted for a switch to F1 with Ferrari, for whom he tested several times. Next week he is competing in Rally New Zealand, the penultimate round of the world rally championship, in a Subaru. "In the future I am sure that I will do car racing, but maybe not F1," Rossi says.

"We decided to take the financial penalty rather than push it too far and risk points as well," Lowndes says of the messy dispute over his track infringements and remarks at the Gold Coast Indy round. "We thought we had got a case to go further (to the stewards, who were scheduled to hear the matter today) but decided against it," he told a Ford breakfast in Launceston. "So we accept it and get on with it. Now I've got three more rounds to keep my mouth shut (because $5000 of the fine is suspended unless he offends again this season)."

While Lowndes has preserved his 30-point lead in the championship, he goes into the final three rounds -- with Bahrain and Phillip Island to come after Symmons Plains this weekend -- knowing he has won four rounds and his Holden rival Rick Kelly none.

Ford and Tasmanian veteran John Bowe told the breakfast he hasn't decided his future in the sport. Asked about next year, Bowe said:  "I'm not sure what I'm going to do -- whether to go for one more year or to retire. And, honestly, I'm still lying awake at nights thinking about it."

Aussies up for Mexico
Aussie openwheeler racers Will Power and Ryan Briscoe are looking to end the Champ Car series on a high in Mexico this weekend. Fresh from his first Champ Car pole position and leading the early laps at the Gold Coast recently before three-time champion Sebastien Bourdais wrecked his chances, Team Australia driver Power leads the rookie standings by 15 points over Dan Clarke.

Power has raced in Mexico before, finishing 10th last year. Briscoe made his Champ Car debut at the Gold Coast, starting and finishing 11th, and is in Mexico in the knowledge that the RuSPORT team he is with had Justin Wilson and A.J. Allmendinger finish first and second there last year.

Wilson missed this year's Gold Coast race with a broken wrist but is hopeful of starting this weekend. He needs 17 points to overtake Allmendinger, now sidelined from Champ Car after announcing his intention to switch to NASCAR, for second place in the series -- and an extra US$50,000 prizemoney (US$250,000 versus US$200,000). Wilson needs to finish seventh or better in Sunday's 66-lap race. Last year he led 65 of 70 laps from pole position.

The best finish by a Mexican driver in a Champ Car race in his own country was Mario Dominguez's third in 2003. Dominguez's best result this year was at the Gold Coast, where he finished second to Frenchman Nelson Philippe, who became the youngest driver to win a Champ Car race -- at 20 years, two months and 29 days, eclipsing the previous mark of New Zealander Scott Dixon by more than six months.

Three Mexican drivers have led their home Champ Car race -- Michel Jourdain junior in 2002, Adrian Fernandez in 2003 and Rodolfo Lavin in 2005.

Volatile Canadian Paul Tracy will be missing this through injury, while American Buddy Rice, the 2004 Indianapolis 500 winner, makes his Champ Car debut.

The Mexican circuit is a 4.4km road course named in honor of the famous Rodriguez brothers, Pedro and Ricardo -- who were both killed in races, the latter at this track, which is modeled on Italy's Monza. Built in 1962, the circuit has also hosted F1 GPs at various times. A new layout this year incorporates the fabled Peraltada -- an infamous 180-degree high-banked sweeping turn -- for the Champ Cars for the first time. It was at the Peraltada that Ricardo Rodriguez lost his life. The corner now is a tamer version of that where numerous F1 drivers, including Ayrton Senna, were involved in heavy crashes.

This is the third round of the second season of A1. There have been three different winners from four races, while Briscoe scored a podium at the opening round in Holland. South Africa and Germany scored a win each there at Zandvoort, while Malaysia's Alex Yoong two wins at Brno in the Czech Republic.

Germany leads the series with 20 points, Mexico has 19 and Malaysia 17. Australia is equal ninth with reigning champion France and China on eight points. There have been 15 lead changes in the four races so far and more than half the teams from 23 countries have scored points.

Champ Car refugee Ryan Hunter-Reay make his A1 debut Team USA in Beijing, while it's a special occasion for 22-year-old Chinese driver Congfu "Frankie" Cheng, who hails from Beijing but has never raced in his home town before as he moved to Britain in 2001 to further his racing career. He was runner-up in the Formula Renault winter series in the UK and the first Chinese driver to win a race in the category. He drove a lap of Brno in a McLaren F1 car in 2004.

Despite doubts about the future of the A1 series, which began with funding from Dubai which is now drying up, Australian team franchise holder Alan Jones reckons the series is gaining momentum. And A1GP chief operating officer David Clare points to A1 having two rounds in China, with the other in Shanghai in mid-April. "To hold two races in one of the fastest-growing economies in the world is a significant marketing and business tool for the series and its teams," Clare says.

The Australian round is at Sydney's Eastern Creek on February 2-4.

Williams wouldn't listen - Webber
Mark Webber has been out of circulation this week, but piece by piece the extent of the breakdown of his relationship with the Williams F1 team is emerging from interviews done before he set off on his adventure marathon in Tasmania.

Webber says one of the big problems at the once great team is that owners Sir Frank Williams and Patrick Head don't listen to drivers. In an interview with influential Swiss-German weekly publication Motorsport Aktuell, Webber says his previous teams Jaguar and Minardi took more heed of his input.

"That was not the case at Williams," Webber says. "You had to let the team do its work and be satisfied to simply drive the car. My opinion was not important. It was more relaxing for me, but also pretty frustrating because we didn't get the results we wanted. Frank and Patrick are very successful people, so I had no argument to give them about why to listen to me." Sad to see a "marriage" that promised so much disintegrate as it obviously did.

"And hopefully we can provide Mark with the environment to bring the best out of him. He has got undoubted speed as he has demonstrated in his career to date and hopefully he can realise his potential. With David (Coulthard), he's led the team very well during the last couple of years and hopefully we'll be able to capitalise on the hard work he's put in."

Bernie talks race swaps
The British and French GPs may alternate in future, according to F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, who has given a strong hint of an Indian GP by 2010. Ecclestone says talks with Indian organisers are "far down the line", although he wouldn't name the venue in an interview with Bloomberg financial service on the backseat of a Porsche Cayenne taking him to his private jet in Madrid. "We had to make sure we found the right place in India and we have," Ecclestone says. "India is a country that is probably going to grow quicker than China."

Ecclestone announced a month ago an agreement for a GP in South Korea from  2010. He says organisers of the French GP at Magny Cours are happy to have a race on alternate years, but of the British Racing Drivers' Club, who own Silverstone and have a contract to run the British GP until 2009, he says: "I don't know what they want and I'm not sure they do."

Germany and Italy have each lost one of their two races next season and Hockenheim and Nurburgring will now alternate the German GP.

Ecclestone says his role hasn't changed since London-based private equity company CVC Capital Partners bought a controlling stake in F1 a year ago. CVC "hasn't touched anything, not a thing", he says. "I'm still CEO and chief executive and I've got a completely free hand."

"For me, one of the biggest names in motorsport was (Ayrton) Senna, because the public wanted him," Ecclestone says. "Alonso lacks that connection with the people." However, the F1 chief admits Alonso, who moves to McLaren in 2007 after winning his titles with Renault, is best placed to become F1's flagbearer following Michael Schumacher's retirement.

"It was terrible when the press said that everyone was bored with Michael Schumacher winning all the time," he says. "Now that he has gone, however, the door is open for everyone, although Alonso has the greatest chance of success."

Mid-year swap story "nonsense'
Renault has branded "nonsensical" a report in Britain's Autosport magazine that it considered allowing Fernando Alonso to join McLaren-Mercedes midway through the recently-completed season in what would have been a swap with Kimi Raikkonen.

Autosport cited "sources extremely close to the negotiations" claiming Alonso's relationship with Renault team boss Flavio Briatore was bad mid-year, that he wanted to be released early, and that the parties "came within hours of agreeing".

"However, overtaking is just one of numerous factors that make F1 thrilling. In 2006, the battles for the title, and -- when it comes to our team -- positions in the constructors' championship, turned out to be extremely close. There was no reason to complain about a lack of excitement."

F1 theme parks are to be built around the world after the developers of the stuning but under-utilised race track in Dubai won exclusive rights from the Ecclestone empire to develop them. The first theme park, at a cost of US$360 million, will be built in Dubai and open in early 2009. The development, by Union Properties, will be part of the unique MotorCity in the United Arab Emirates.

Kimi Raikkonen, Michael Schumacher's replacement at Ferrari and runner-up in last year's F1 world championship for McLaren, and world rally ace Marcus Gronholm, who has won five times this year, have been beaten in a poll for Finland's motorsport's man of the year by motorcycle rider Mika Kallio, runner-up in the 125cc class for the past two seasons and moving up to 250cc next year. Kallio got 33.1 percent of the public vote in a poll organised by a television station and national motorsport annual.

Scuderia Toro Rosso, the second Red Bull F1 team that was formerly Minardi and is now headed by Gerhard Berger, plans to build a new factory, either in its Italian hometown, Faenza, or in nearby Forli, a bigger city with an airport. Berger says it is important for the team to maintain an Italian image, even though it is now run by Austrians -- after an Australian, Paul Stoddart, owned it for five years. The existing Minardi factory is tiny by F1 standards and is next to an industrial winery.

Dutch financial company ING, which was announced recently as the new sponsor of the Australian Grand Prix, is also expected to take up a three-year naming rights deal for the Belgium GP at Spa -- the race closest to its headquarters in Holland. Belgium did not have a GP this year after Spa's previous promoter, DDGP, went bust with debts of US$11.75 million.

Indy 500 champ tries NASCAR
Reigning Indianapolis 500 champion, Sam Hornish junior, makes his stock car racing debut this weekend in the Busch Series at Phoenix, Arizona. Another former Indy 500 victor, Juan Pablo Montoya, will have his third Busch outing there. Montoya's best finish so far was 11th on debut at Memphis. Hornish, who drives for Roger Pensie, still plans to compete full-time in the Indy Racing League next season. He will also attempt the Busch season finale at Homestead in Florida, where Montoya may make his debut in NASCAR's premier category, the Nextel Cup.

Ambrose changing banks
Australian Marcos Ambrose will make his 21st start in NASCAR's pick-up truck series at Phoenix, where the track features different banking in each of the turns as well as a "dog leg" in the middle of the back straight. Ambrose has had four top 10 finishes, most recently in Texas last weekend, in his debut season in the US, including third at Kansas in early July and then third again at Nashville a month later. He has qualified in the top 10 eight times and is 19th in the series points and third in the rookie standings. He has earned US$233,888 in prizemoney.