Schumacher races goodbye in Brazil

It was a great finale to the season, with Felipe Massa winning in front of his home crowd -- the first Brazilian to do so since Ayrton Senna 13 years ago. Massa even raced in green and gold overalls rather than his usual Ferrari suit.

Fernando Alonso clinched consecutive world titles, for himself and Renault, with a marvellously mature drive, little more than 18.5 seconds behind Massa, before his switch to McLaren next season. It should not be overlooked that the Spaniard has won back-to-back titles at an earlier age than Schumacher.

Jenson Button took third place in Brazil for Honda, from 14th on the grid, but Australian Mark Webber's miserable two years with Williams ended on the first lap with a broken rear wing -- and his teammate, Nico Rosberg, went out behind him in a spectacular shunt.
Things surely can only get better for Webber at Red Bull next year.

FACTFILE
Name: Michael Schumacher
Date of bith: January 3, 1969
Birthplace: Kerpen, Germany
Height: 1.74m
Weight: 74kg
Wife: Corinna (married August 1995); children - Gina Maria (nine), Mick (seven)

Bernie wanted another year
F1 impressario Bernie Ecclestone would have liked Schumacher to stay on next year. "I wanted to see him at Ferrari with Kimi Räikkönen next season," Ecclestone says. "With his ability and his fitness he would have been capable of doing that for at least one year."

The diminutive 75-year-old Ecclestone also laments that Schumi "lacked opponents" in F1, saying: "If Villeneuve had stayed in a good car, or Mika (Hakkinen) had kept on going, who knows if he would have dominated like he did." Audi is reported to have already offered Schumacher US$12.5 million either to race in the German touring car championship or the Le Mans 24-hour sports car classic. He's unlikely to do either.

The Holden drivers who swapped places for the Sandown and Bathurst endurance classics, Todd Kelly and Garth Tander, won the first two races on the Gold Coast, back in their Holden Racing Team and HSV Toll colors respectively, while Rick Kelly took the third as Bathurst winner and championship leader Lowndes fumed, having copped two penalties throughout the weekend.

Todd Kelly amassed 313 points for the weekend, becoming the fifth driver to win the Gold Coast's V8 Supercar Challenge in as many years, while Ford Performance Racing's Mark Winterbottom earned 300 points and Rick Kelly 294, giving him 2571 in the championship to Lowndes' 2601. Winterbottom is third in the series on 2283.

No way to win a title
Sebastien Bourdais leaves the Gold Coast having clinched a third straight Champ Car title but he's been dubbed "a wanker" by Will Power for wrecking the Australian's chances of winning yesterday's race. After starting from pole position, Power was on the way to scoring what would have been the first victory by an Aussie in the race. "We were controlling it, saving fuel and the car was good enough," Power says.

Team Australia owner Craig Gore also made a stinging attack on Bourdais. "It just goes to show the French are arrogant and selfish," Gore says. "We had it all under control, Will was winning the race, no doubt about it and then Sebastian couldn't deal with it. He's not worthy of holding that championship trophy up."

Bourdais apologised, albeit dismissively, saying: "It's racing, it happens all the time when someone wants to pass another guy. That's how it goes."

Another Frenchman, Nelson Philippe, scored his maiden Champ Car victory, holding off the 2002 winner, Mexican Mario Dominguez, in the final laps, while Power's teammate, Canadian Alex Tagliani, was third. Philippe became the 16th different winner in 16 years and, at 20, the youngest winner in Champ Car history. Power wound up 12th and fellow Aussie Ryan Briscoe 11th in his debut with RuSPORT.

Seeing double at Team Aussie
Team Australia has visions of an all-Aussie team in 2007, with Briscoe joining Power. Derrick Walker, the American-based Scotsman who grew up in Western Australia and co-owns the team with Craig Gore, says: "This team is all about Australians and Australian drivers in my book. So there is one who is not in this team who should be in this team in my book, and that is Ryan Briscoe. I do not know if that will happen, but I would love it to happen. If we run a two-car team (in 2007) I am saying that it should be two Aussies drivers."

Walker would happily field three cars, but even then Team Australia would have to offload either Alex Tagliani, who it has had for two years, or Simon Pagenaud, who won the Formula Atlantic series for it this year and is virtually certain to be in Champ Car next season.

"There is Alex and Simon and Briscoe, but I am saying I would like to have Briscoe," Walker says. "We have talked on and off with him. If we could have had him in a third car this year I would have loved to have had him. I am all for three cars. If you have enough money and enough time it gives you more opportunity to win. Three cars, in my books, is not a scary thought."

Word from an impeccable F1 source is that as many as nine GPs are without naming rights sponsors for next year. Among them is the Australian race, which has lost Foster's.

Hyundai is reported to be planning to enter F1 in 2010, when Korea is due to host its first GP. However, a coy Hyundai executive in Europe, Gerry Dorizas, says: "I know only that we will start a new motorsport engagement in the rally field in 2008."

Haas that? Not all's fine
Carl Haas, who co-owns Newman Haas Racing with actor Paul Newman and is rarely seen without an unlit cigar in his mouth, was reprimanded by police at Indy for riding a scooter without a helmet, but Bathurst winner Jamie Whincup was fined for the same offence.

The bad blood between Brazilian Antonio Pizzonia and Aussie Mark Webber from their days as F1 teammates in 2003 persists. Webber branded Pizzonia a liar after burning him off at Jaguar Racing. On the Gold Coast at the weekend, Pizzonia -- now in Champ Car -- called Webber "two-faced" and "like an actor". "I didn't have a problem with him (Webber) but he was always trying to find a problem with me,'' Pizzonia says. "I respect Mark as a driver and he is very quick, but I don't respect him as a person."

Mario Andretti is to be awarded an Italian "knighthood" in New York today for his services to motor sport. The late Enzo Ferrari is the only other motor racing legend to receive the award.
Revamp for rally championship
The Australian Rally Championship has been revamped for 2007. There's a new round in NSW -- the Rally of the Great Lakes, near the holiday town of Forster on the central north coast, in mid-September, with a proposed Friday night ceremonial start in Newcastle. Queensland becomes the opening round with the first appearance of the new Super 2000 cars and a "super special" Saturday night stage at Nambour, ahead of WA's Forest Rally, then Canberra moving back to early June. Tasmania's Safari has gone, Rally of Melbourne pushes to November, and there is no tarmac event yet, although two other applications are said to have been received -- one of them for "an innovative event close to Sydney by a professional promoter" and the other "which could expand the horizons of the ARC outside Australia in the future".

Last blast in the west
Sixty cars are entered for WA's final Rally Australia this week -- the 14th round of the world championship and round seven of the production car world championship. It's the 19th WRC event to have been held in the West and comprises 26 stages and almost 350km of competition.

Australia's world rally star Chris Atkinson is making his third start in Rally Oz with Subaru. In 2004 he won Group N (for showroom class cars) and last year, in a WRC car, set the fastest time on nine stages and finished fourth, equaling Ross Dunkerton's 1993 record as the highest placed Australian finisher.

Ambrose fast but unlucky
Marcos Ambrose was unlucky to miss his fourth top 10 finish of his rookie season in the US in the latest pick-up truck series round at Martinsville Speedway in Virginia. Showing his best form yet on a short oval, Ambrose ran with the leaders after qualifying fourth but a puncture late in the race forced him to make an unscheduled pit stop and he finished two laps down.