THE MOTORSPORT YEAR: Ticks on the home front, crosses abroad

And lots of disappointment at the results of Australians on the big international stages.

The first year of V8 Supercar’s Car of the Future (CoTF: a generic chassis with 5-litre engines and bodyshells of four makes, with Nissan and AMG Erebus joining stalwarts Holden and Ford) produced 17 winners (including endurance race co-drivers) in 36 races.

The new-generation cars cost a whole lot more than they were supposed to but produced lots of terrific racing, primarily between the traditional brands out of the red and blue corners.

There were five new winners – Fabian Coulthard, Scott McLaughlin, Chaz Mostert, James Moffat and David Reynolds – in three makes.

And there were other surprises, especially the instant return of former Falcon driver Shane Van Gisbergen in a Holden after he was going to have a year off. Van Gisbergen promptly won one leg of the season-opening Clipsal 500 in Adelaide and finished with another victory at the Sydney 500.

Jonathon Webb’s Tekno Autosports, for which “The Giz” now races, wound up fourth in the teams championship and Brad Jones Racing did even better – one place higher after five wins by Coulthard (3) and Jason Bright (2).

Almost two-thirds of the championship’s races were won again by the two teams that dominated 2012 – Triple Eight Race Engineering and Ford Performance Racing.

FPR and its long-time driver Mark Winterbottom finally broke through for victory in the Bathurst 1000, with former FPR full-timer Steven Richards the co-driver (but he’s defected to Triple Eight for next year’s endurance season).

While that success at Mt Panorama was overdue and well-deserved, especially as Winterbottom held his nerve in the final hour, FPR could not wrest the championship from Triple Eight.

Just as it had consistently been with the older-generation V8 Supercars, Triple Eight proved the benchmark with CotF and its two drivers fought until the last day for the title. Jamie Whincup denied teammate Craig Lowndes a first series crown since 1999, in the process joining the late Ian ‘Pete’ Geoghegan, Dick Johnson and Mark Skaife as a five-time national champion.

The new makes weren’t frontrunners other than at Winton, where Moffat and Nissan teammate Michael Caruso finished first and second on the one occasion they were allowed to run E70 fuel rather than the usual E85.

The best finish by a Mercedes was Lee Holdsworth’s fourth with Craig Baird in the Sandown 500.

The top Nissan driver over the season, Rick Kelly, ended 13th in the championship while Holdsworth was best of the Merc men in 20th.

A school report to Nissan and Erebus would say they “must do better” in 2014, when Volvo also enters the fray. Ford and Holden ceasing production of Falcon and Commodore road cars in coming years won’t guarantee an easier ride for the newcomers to V8 Supercar racing in the immediate future.

International expansion, a buzz term in the category for several years, is at a standstill with the Texas round off the calendar after just one visit. V8 Supercars says it will revisit the USA in 2015. But V8 Supercars already has a lucrative new media deal beyond 2014 with pay TV and Ten that will reap it $196 million in cash over six years.

Elsewhere on the Australian landscape, the Bathurst 12-Hour gained some serious traction in 2013 with a strong international entry, although it was won by an Erebus Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 – albeit with three foreign drivers, led by consummate professional German Bernd Schneider.

Eli Evans and co-driver Glen Weston made a clean sweep of the Australian Rally Championship in a Honda Jazz, after which the manufacturer withdrew – leaving the series sadly floundering again.   

The last year of the 2.4-litre normally-aspirated V8s in F1 became a whitewash for Red Bull Racing after the mid-season break as it got to grips with Pirelli’s revised tyres after they had been so problematic in the first half of the season.

Sebastian Vettel was unbeatable in the last nine races, claiming his fourth straight world title along the way, although the biggest hero ought to be the man who creates his machinery, Adrian Newey.

Aussie veteran Mark Webber bowed out of F1 with dignity, without a win in his final season at Red Bull Racing - although he and his supporters would say he should at least have won in Malaysia, where Vettel tore up any notion of team orders.

Webber’s consolation was third in the world championship for a third time, behind the two finest drivers of the modern F1 era – Vettel and Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso.

Younger Aussie Daniel Ricciardo now takes Webber’s place as Vettel’s teammate after having been groomed by Red Bull through its Toro Rosso junior team.

Ricciardo’s elevation coincides with the introduction of turbocharged 1.6-litre V6 engines in 2014 and other changes that hopefully will see a return to the quality of racing enjoyed for several seasons before the Red Bull rout of late 2013.

Best cars of 2013
Red Bull RB9 – A record-equalling 13 Grand Prix wins in a season, including the last nine straight, all by Sebastian Vettel as he became F1’s youngest four-time world champion at just 26 tells the story. Mercedes, Lotus and Ferrari matched it at times early in the season but Red Bull then asserted its now traditional dominance. Others suspected that was due to clever mapping of its Renault engine but Red Bull technical director Adrian Newey insisted there was “no single magic component or magic bullet to our upturn in performance”. More on Mr Newey below...

Mercedes F1 W04 – The German manufacturer’s team was a big improver in its fourth season, winning three GPs and jumping to runner-up in the constructors’ world championship from fifth in 2012. Initially hard on tyres, the W04 strung together four straight pole positions early in the season and tallied eight for the year. Nico Rosberg delivered two of its victories and Lewis Hamilton, recruited from McLaren to replace Michael Schumacher, the other. Finishing ahead of Ferrari was a major box ticked.

Volkswagen Polo R WRC – Ten victories in VW’s first season in the WRC (nine of them by its new French world champion Sebastien Ogier, the other by Finn Jari-Matti Latvala) made a perfect debut as it trounced long-dominant Citroen, which had nine-time world champion Sebastien Loeb for only four events, and it collected the manufacturers’ championship equally or more important to it. VW ended the season first and second in the final two rallies. Ominous for Citroen, Ford M-Sport and returning Hyundai in 2014.

Audi R18 e-tron Quattro – This hybrid delivered Audi’s 12th win in 13 years at the Le Mans 24-Hour ahead of challenger Toyota’s TS030 hybrid in a turbulent race run in constantly changing weather conditions. It also marked another record ninth win for Danish driver Tom Kristensen, a third for Scotsman Allan McNish and a first for flying Frenchman Loïc Duval. Audi also ended up with another World Endurance Championship.

Best race team
Long the top team in V8 Supercars, Roland Dane’s Triple Eight Race Engineering has proven itself truly world-class in winning the team and driver championships yet again and for a first time in Red Bull guise.

To have done it for Holden in the first year of the field-levelling CoTF after such prolonged success with the previous-generation Holden Commodores and Ford Falcons was a huge achievement. Its arch-rival Ford Performance Racing pipped it in the Bathurst 1000 yet its drivers Jamie Whincup and Craig Lowndes finished first and second for the season – Whincup for the fifth time in six years.

While a fourth title and first since 1999 eluded Lowndes, he overtook Mark Skaife with the most race wins in Australian touring car racing (94 to 90 now, with Whincup now third on 75) and was the only driver to score points in all 36 races. A superb effort on both sides of the Triple Eight garage.

Williams scored one world championship point in the first 10 GPs of 2013 and added only four more to finish ninth of 11 teams in the constructors’ world championship. McLaren failed to score a podium for the first time since 1980 and finished an embarrassing fifth in the constructors’ championship. It has one more season with Mercedes engines before reuniting with Honda - and perhaps luring back Fernando Alonso from Ferrari.

On the national scene the Holden Racing Team had three race wins in 2013 after none the year before but remains a huge disappointment as the V8 Supercar team with the strongest factory backing.

Triple Eight Race Engineering delivers massive results for Holden and HRT’s direct rival Ford Performance Racing is consistently Triple Eight’s main challenger and won the all-important Bathurst 1000 at last. To have Brad Jones Racing and Tekno Autosports end the season ahead of HRT and their drivers Shane Van Gisbergen (Tekno) and Fabian Coulthard and Jason Bright (both BJR) behind the Triple Eight and FPR pairings and ahead of HRT’s Garth Tander was an embarrassment. 

There was a lot less to celebrate than usual from Australia’s top drivers on the international scene.

Mark Webber’s last season in F1 was winless and his points tally was barely half that of Red Bull Racing teammate Sebastian Vettel. Even a reversal of the controversial Malaysian GP finishing order would have made little difference.

Will Power slipped from runner-up three years in a row in the IndyCar Championship to fourth, but had three wins – two late in the season, the last his first major success on an oval track. Power’s Penske team was dunced again by rival Ganassi Racing, with New Zealander Scott Dixon champion for the third time after Penske’s Brazilian Helio Castroneves led most of the season.

Aussie Ryan Briscoe had only spasmodic Indy outings, also languishing in American sports car racing, but will be back full-time in IndyCar in 2014 as one of four Ganassi drivers.

Marcos Ambrose had a miserable year in NASCAR with Richard Petty Motorsport, finishing only 22nd in the Sprint Cup. Another year like that and it will be all over for him in the USA.

(Bright spots among Aussie overseas were Daniel Ricciardo outshining his Toro Rosso teammate Jean-Eric Vergne in F1 and earning a promotion to Red Bull Racing in place of Webber, some of John Martin’s sports car performances again with expatriate Australian team operator Alan Docking, and Brendan Reeves winning the two-wheel-drive section of the American Rally Championship in a Ford Fiesta).

Newey has been responsible for cars that have won 10 drivers’ world championships and 10 constructors’ world championships – both records.

It has been said that Newey can see air. His genius with aerodynamics and how gases should flow in exhaust systems are priceless assets.

F1’s new-for-2014 turbocharged 1.6-litre V6 engines and other rules changes will present new challenges, but Newey’s continued presence surely will keep Red Bull Racing at the pointy end of the field.

While Newey and Vettel stand at the top of our tree for 2013, high commendations go to American Jimmie Johnson, winner of a sixth Sprint Cup title, new world rally champion Sebastien Ogier and Jamie Whincup, now up among the greats of Australian touring car racing.

Supported by the Australian Motor Sport Foundation (AMSF) and the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) Women in Motorsport Commission (WMC), Taylor is now hoping to tackle the full two-wheel-drive category in the 2014 European Rally Championship. As every other year, we lament there aren’t more women achieving such success in motor sport, at home and abroad.

Nissan Motorsport’s whingeing about V8 Supercar’s method of aerodynamically testing its Altima has been tiresome and we can’t recall it protesting about it until it became clear it was way off the pace unless running on E70 fuel rather than E85.

But the big gripes arrived late, with the FIA ridiculously introducing double points for next year’s final Grand Prix in Abu Dhabi and evidence of a return to the days of a previous V8 Supercar regime’s outlandish statements.

There have been some plusses in V8 Supercar racing in 2013 and James Warburton made a generally favourable impression after becoming its chief executive. But for Warburton to say: “Our sport has never been in better shape after another record year” is a nonsense.

Lots of race winners, yes, but not record crowds (not even properly counted attendances), some improvement in TV audience figures but not a record year, and certainly not record dividends from V8 headquarters to teams. Indeed, no dividend at all.

And the likelihood of less cars on the grid next year – at least a couple less, if not a few.

History has shown that the bulldust once so familiar from V8 Central does not fool all the people all the time.

But hats off to Warburton for the much more lucrative media deal he ’s already done beyond next year, provided it doesn’t short-change the sport’s fans in any way.

Expect Vettel to keep doing a lot more winning and to be very much the main man, but on the day(s) anything goes amiss for him, Ricciardo ought to be in line to pick up a GP win. That will be a day worth waiting for – and paying to see.

As always, we crave an Aussie driver winning America’s major races - the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500, or Marcos Ambrose winning any oval race in NASCAR’s Sprint Cup.

And now that he’s finished with F1, Mark Webber returns to Le Mans with Porsche aiming to win the world’s great sports car and endurance race. Nothing will compensate for him not winning an F1 world title, but a victory in the French classic would be a wonderful consolation and go nicely with his nine GP wins.

It also would be especially sweet because it was Le Mans that so easily could have claimed Webber’s life when his Mercedes flipped there a couple of times in the late 1990s. (In 2013 it did claim Allan Simonsen, a Dane who had raced a lot in Australia).

And, as much as we admire Jamie Whincup’s brilliance in consistently upstaging Craig Lowndes and Mark Winterbottom in the V8 Supercar Championship, it’s time a serious new threat emerged to him.

Some of the new boys have shown promise in 2013. Let’s hope we see a whole lot more of that in 2014.

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