Shuntorama

What a weekend for big accidents. We saw two entirely different yet highly disturbing crashes, both of which illustrated the potential danger of the sport, as well as the incredible ability of modern race cars to protect its occupant when things go wrong.

Here's exhibit A. Stephane Ortelli's LMP1 class prototype experienced some kind of mechanical failure during the Monza 1000km and veered abruptly to the right. At this point the aerodynamics, which are designed to prevent a car getting air (like the Mercedes CLRs at Le Mans in '99) took over because the car was sideways, and aero is not designed for sideways travel. The car launched into a massive barrel roll. As with most accidents of this type, they look far worse than they are - the gradual release of energy throughout the crash ensured that Ortelli never experienced life-threatening G-loading. The scariest thing about this one is how close the flying Oreca came to decapitating Allan McNish in the Audi:



Onto Exhibit B. In the Spanish Formula 1 Grand Prix, McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen also experienced a mechanical failure that forced the car to go somewhere it shouldn't. In his case, the car speared off the track and he made contact with the tyre wall at an angle of about 30 degrees whilst doing 137mph. Unlike Ortelli's crash, Kovalainen DID experience massive G-loads, perhaps equalling Robert Kubica's record-setting 75G load during his accident in Canada last year. It's worth noting that 100G is enough to kill most people. An additional aspect of this shunt that was scary was the fact that the car dived UNDER the tyre barrier, and no matter how low down the driver sits, his head is very much at risk in that kind of situation.


I'm not that surprised that Ortelli was relatively unharmed (save for a broken ankle) but the fact that Kovalainen survived with nothing more than concussion and some bumps and bruises is incredible. I have no doubt that the HANS device played a key role in his survival.

The gains in safety since the Imola '94 have been remarkable and it's weekends like this, where we could easily have been mourning the loss of one, perhaps even two, professional racing drivers, that are testament to the work put in by many on this critical issue.

Let the Danica post-mortem begin

I like to think of myself as a social liberal, generally nodding and agreeing with much of what I read on sites like Salon.com and hear on NPR. Social liberals are also generally required to be sypathetic to the principles of feminism, so sign me up there too.

However, a brief article in Salon's "Broadsheet", a column dedicated to women's issues, sparked a furious debate that to me seemed to trivialize Danica Patrick's historic win in the Indycar series on Saturday. Luckily my partner K was on hand to bring the discussion back on topic and she made some well-considered and salient points. Further evidence that I'm rather a lucky guy to have a partner who knows the name of one of the engineers on Citroen's World Rally team...

Anyway, there's a couple of things going on here:

• There will be some who will call the win a fluke. It is true she did not have the pace all day and was never able to get any closer to the front that fifth. However motorsport is not always about who's the fastest and I'm not sure even Danica would claim to have more natural talent than someone like Scott Dixon or Helio Castroneves. Sometimes winning takes balls and brains, which is what got the job done in this case. Her team came up with a great strategy and Danica executed it perfectly. In this regard she outdrove Castroneves, who was on the same strategy but overdrove early in his stint. When he started to second-guess his fuel reserves, Danica had the guts to risk going for the win. Good job Mrs. Hospenthal.
• It is probably true that had she been a guy, she would have been dropped by AGR after 2007 and would never have been in a position to fight for victory in this race. Her performances in the IRL have been rather inconsistent, with a second, a third and two fourths in the first three years of her IRL career. Once again though, there is a flip-side to this, and it's the acceptance that a driver's value to a team goes beyond pure results. Danica is PR GOLD, and the attention she brings makes AGR a sponsorship magnet compared with other IRL teams. AGR have four drivers - they don't need all of them to be championship-winners. Having a diverse line-up in which each driver has their own specialties and positive attributes is smart team management.
• Which brings me to point three. What has Danica done for women in motorsport? I just noted how her gender has probably kept her in the team when a guy might have been dropped. Is this good or bad? Is it better for a woman to be shown favoritism in this regard, or for her to never even break through to such a high level of motorsport? I think K put it perfectly when she alluded to how drivers will always leverage whatever they can to achieve success, her example being Tony Stewart's association with Subway. It may very well be considered "tacky" for Danica to show off her admittedly rather pleasing body in men's magazines, but I've seen male drivers do other equally tacky PR. I can see how feminists might be upset with her doing such things, but to be honest I think her racing career would be no different had she not - she's a media- and fan-friendly figure who attracts attention because of her gender, regardless of whether she's in a bikini or a racesuit. I don't believe women have to strip off to get ahead in racing, but an insistence on equal treatment as the guys get will not necessarily be the answer either. People want newsworthy stories and in Danica's case it's her gender that's the tagline. It's no different to Graham Rahal or Marco Andretti, who court similar (albeit less widespread) coverage because of their ages and family backgrounds. And dare we even mention the colour of Lewis Hamilton's skin?

It was a bizarre win, but a win nonetheless. It was a moment in history. It was something that women can be proud of, but I think that motorsport has even more reason to be proud. After all, there was never any doubt that a woman could do this, but there was doubt as to whether motorsport would ever let them. That doubt is now gone. Hooray for that.

Indycar - go to your room!

Imagine the scene: an angry teenager has a fight with his parents and storms out of the house with the obligatory "I HATE YOU!" The clock ticks by and the parents move on from anger and transition into the worried phase. They start calling around to the boy's friends' parents. Then they call local hospitals. Finally, as they get ready to call the police they hear the front door open. Furious but relieved, they send the boy to his room. Meanwhile they admit to themselves that the anger was temporary but the love they have for the child will always be there since all the want is the best for him.

January 23rd 2008 marked the 13th anniversary of the announcement of the IRL. It's officially a teen.

And Sunday's race at St. Petersburg was like having the teen come home. As mad as we all have been about the CART/IRL split, we're just relieved that we're back to how we were before. The talent level is suitably high, driver backgrounds diverse, sponsorship present (and growing), grids are full and on racetracks that go right as well as left, the former ChampCar teams will be competitive, making for interesting races.

Watching St. Petes was like a throwback to '95. I really enjoyed the race and in particular I loved seeing the ChampCar refugees take it to the IRL regulars. It was close racing with some great performances from a number of drivers. Various strategies unfolded, incidents shuffled the field, caution periods kept the pack together and the changing conditions provided the canvas upon which a very appealing picture was painted.

It only took 13 years for me to get excited again about US open wheel racing. Now go to your room Indycar! You're grounded! (and you look hungry - would you like a sandwich?)

Max Mosley - it is my OPINION that you are a piece of....

....shit.

This is disgusting

For a less inflammatory version, go here.

Okay, let's be perfectly clear, just so I don't have lawyers on my admirable-helping-underserved-youth-non-profit-job-salary-earning ass: in no way am I representing any of this post as FACT, but I personally FEEL that Max Mosley is a stinky dog turd of a human being. I would rather have my genitals slashed with broken glass than have him continue as the most powerful man in my favourite sport, although I wonder if something like that might actually get him off...

What people do in their own bedroom is their business. S&M doesn't freak me out, and I'll staunchly defend the rights of people to engage in sexual behavior of their choosing. However there's two additional issues here:

The first is that elements of what Mosley has been accused of doing, if proven to be true, constitute a serious criminal offence: it is alleged that he paid women for sex.

The second is that the scenario used in this particular mode of sexual expression is derogatory to a large group of people. Since Mosley is in charge of an INTERNATIONAL federation, he cannot be seen to insult any cultural group. If he does, it undermines his position and authority in a manner that would appear to make his continued work utterly untenable.

Up until now, I, like many, many others have vehemently disagreed with how he runs the FIA, but like it or not, it's his toy and he can play with it how he wants. Whether this sequence of events is true or not, the fact that he put himself in a situation that can produce such damning evidence, even it ultimately proves to be untrue (not sure how that can be, but anyway...) should be enough to make him step down. That would be the right and honourable course of action.

Although "right" and "honourable" don't seem to be concepts Max grasps very well, given his alleged behavior in that Chelsea dungeon.

One last thing: how sad is it that I had to spend significant time reading up on California defamation law before publishing this post? So one last time - I don't represent anything in this post as truth, it is all entirely my opinion.

Hey, even one more thing: all this goes down two days after Max's FIA predessor and one-time nemesis, Jean-Marie Balestre, dies. Weird. The ghost of JMB is already hard at work.

Max

I wrote a post earlier today about the story published in News of the World in which they alleged that Max Mosley was involved in a sordid S&M and Nazi-style roleplay session with prostitutes . I even published the post, stuffed full of as many disclaimers as I could think of.

However, until the story develops further the post returns to unpublished status. I'd hate to be made an example of. How fucking sad. Freedom of speech and all that...

Formula 1, Top Gear-style

Rumours are flying in the UK that with the switch of F1 coverage from ITV to BBC next year, Top Gear's Richard Hammond is set to anchor the broadcasts. Furthermore, Jeremy Clarkson and James May, Hammond's co-presenters, may also wind up being involved.

I cannot decide how I feel about this idea. I love Top Gear. Despite all its chest-pumping, anti-American vitriol and Clarkson's brainless pontificating, it is a genuinely enjoyable TV show with rich content and extremely high production values. People complain about how TG emphasizes impractical, expensive cars and engages in childish stunts but if you took Top Gear and made it more "practical", less fancy, and with less cartoonish presenters, you'd have Fifth Gear. That show is still enjoyable but is nowhere near as compelling as Top Gear. Thinking about it though, it's the stories in TG that I find most compelling, not the personalities. In F1, we'd be subjected to more personality and less story, so it might get very irritating, very quickly. Even more worrying, despite winning an Emmy for "best unscripted documentary" or something, Top Gear is very tightly scripted, even the road tests, something that the F1 coverage won't be. How will they do without time to work out what they're going to say?

Still, it's an interesting idea. I'm curious to hear from those in the UK what they think of this...

The open-wheel spiderweb

Much has already been written about the "reunification" of American open wheel racing, and I'm not sure I can add much to the chatter. But one thing that has struck me is the sheer reach and knock-on effect of the situation.

When Tony George and Kevin Kalkhoven were trying to hash out a schedule, the first issue was the clash of dates between Long Beach and Motegi. So they went to Honda, who own the Japanese track and asked to move the date, which Honda agreed to. Now the FIA stepped in, since the rescheduled date was too close to the F1 Japanese Grand Prix, and TG and KK were forced back to the drawing board. They came up with a compromise that sees both races running on the same weekend with equal points available to competitors in both events. Attendees to the Californian event will be robbed of the opportunity to see the newly reunited series and all the top names, instead having to put up with a last gasp of ChampCar. Who knows how many cars will actually show up? Thank goodness that the ALMS is also part of the event.

What about the people? How many people are going to lose their jobs? What will these people be facing on a day-to-day basis? How many mortgage payments will be missed? This is truly the butterfly effect in action. One person who has already been laid off is Shrek-alike Paul Tracy, whose former team boss was one of the main shareholders in ChampCar. Perhaps the financial toll of propping up ChampCar for years has proved too much, and Gerry Forsythe simply can't face starting over.

The bulk of ChampCar races are gone for 2008. My local race, which had been scheduled at Laguna Seca for May will once again have to go ahead as a standalone Grand-Am event. The cancellation of the Houston race has forced that entire event to postpone until 2009, despite a promise a few weeks ago that it could run as an ALMS event. This is bad news for the Risi Competizione Ferrari ALMS team who are based in Houston and use that race as a major opportunity for entertaining team sponsors and guests. How many local merchants are losing major contracts? I feel bad for the trucking company contracted to move those big concrete walls, but even worse for the low-income local residents who work for Reliant Park as parking lot attendants and t-shirted security and who are only paid when there are events.

Over in Australia, the Surfer's Paradise event will be going through some changes. The weakening of the Indycar side of that weekend in recent years was good news in part for V8 Supercars, which lately had attracted more interest in the weekend than ChampCar. That is set to change, even though this year it's likely to be a non-points event for the IRL, due to contractual obligations to Chicagoland Speedway which has a lock on being the season-closer. A reschedule is not possible due to the V8 Supercars race, which can't move. Next year, organizers will be able to pick a date that ensures the race will have championship significance.

So whilst everyone is purely focused on car counts and the bringing together of two sets of drivers, it's worth considering that this thing means much, much more to many people and organizations.

IRL wins

Let's not beat around the bush: IRL wins, ChampCar loses.

The IRL has:

• A car count of 18, the majority of which look like solid, dependable entries
• A TV package on ESPN2 and ABC that it is not paying for out of pocket
• American drivers, some of whom have legitimate star power, like a young Andretti and a hot chick who doesn't win but brings in the crowds
• The Indy 500
• A pretty diverse calendar that includes five road courses and a trip to Japan
• Close racing
• Great teams such as Penske, Andretti-Green and Ganassi
  
• Most importantly of all, momentum

ChampCar has:

• Two truly marquee events at Long Beach and Surfers Paradise, both of which are upstaged by supposed "support" races (ALMS and V8 Supercars respectively)
• One powerhouse team, Newman-Haas-Lanigan
• Series owners with deep pockets
• Road-course credibility

There's no doubt that if ChampCar failed, some or most of its teams would move over to the IRL, as would the Long Beach Grand Prix (Surfers is looking at A1GP and may not be interested in IRL). Promoters of other ChampCar events would also be looking at the IRL and some would end up coming to a deal, probably increasing the proportion of road courses in the championship. Road America, Laguna Seca, Toronto and Cleveland would all be good candidates for an IRL event, whilst the European swing would fade away.

What would we be left with? An American open-wheel series featuring the Indy 500 and a 50/50 split of road courses and ovals, featuring some of the top US racing teams and a healthy mix of American and international drivers racing at well-attended events being broadcast via a decent TV package. Is it 1995 again?

So please, please, please, ChampCar, just fucking die already...

Mad as a brush

The antics of FIA boss Max Mosley continue to astound just about everyone. He's now gone off and sued Britain's Sunday Times over an article penned by F1 commentator Martin Brundle in September, critical of the whole McLaren spy affair.

I know it's been said many times before by many other people, but this man simply has to go. There's no doubt that his antics have harmed the sport in the past year and I'm sure will continue to do so. I remember back when Jean-Marie Balestre was ousted - the sense of relief in the racing world was palpable. When Mosley is finally given the chop you can expect the same.

But what others are tending to miss is the fact that Max is not just in charge of Formula 1 rule-making. He's responsible for ALL FIA-sanctioned motorsport, and perhaps more importantly the organization's automobile advocacy worldwide. What concerns me is that if he seems this nutty in regards to F1 rule-making, what kind of an effect is he having on road-safety efforts? What bizarre schemes is he dreaming up, and which other safety advocates is he suing for daring to question his decisions?

Fernando Alonso

Just decide already. You bore me...

Sad Indy 500 fact

I was just listening to Globecast 0157's NASCAR review show and their North American correspondent Declan Brennan revealed this very sad fact:

"Next year there will be more past Indy 500 champions racing at the Daytona 500 than at the Indy 500."

Despite this, NASCAR's TV ratings continue to fall, as do those of ChampCar and the IRL. About the only US motorsport gaining viewers is the ALMS, but how many Indy 500 champions will be in that next year, I wonder?

Live timing = more interesting

Shock horror: I watched an F1 race yesterday (Clive, you'd be so proud...)

Call me a fairweather F1 fan, you'd be right, but this race was rather important, and had the added bonus of not being at the bum-crack of dawn. When you watch live you can pull up the live timing and scoring from the Formula 1 website and I won't lie when I say that watching this was in some ways more interesting than watching the TV. I'm not trying to bash F1, but I say this to illustrate something that's critical for those involved in racing to realize:

Beyond the spectacle of cars or bikes moving fast, what draws people to racing is the competition, and a genre of racing that best highlights the competition is a genre that will be successful.

This is easy for some racing: World Superbike or British Touring Cars for example have constant action between leaders, and the battles are clear to see using nothing but TV as a communication medium. But in something like the American Le Mans Series, or even Formula 1, where large gaps open up between competitors, live timing and scoring can be a lifeline. As I watched the F1 race yesterday I was completely captivated by the scoring, letting out of whoops of joy every time a purple number showed up indicating a fastest sector time, or even seeing green numbers that showed a driver was putting in their personal best times. Such simple presentation made it much easier to follow how the race was unfolding, and instead of watching 90 minutes of cars that appeared to be one long unchanging train with large gaps, the subtleties of the drama became obvious.

Following the progress of young Lewis Hamilton as he clawed back from 18th place was much like what I'd been doing the day before, when I sat in the media centre at Laguna Seca watching the ALMS race. My focus was on the dramatic recovery of the Andretti-Green Acura which came from two laps down to just 30 seconds off the lead of the race in four hours. It was a picture best painted by timing and scoring, and the advantage of being in the media centre was that it was real-time, as opposed to the aggregated version that's online and is often delayed.

MotoGP timing is a model for many other racing series, especially in qualifying, where fast sector times are illustrated by coloured "helmets", and online users can check the progress of riders in real time, sector by sector.

Whatever the mechanism, any technology that more clearly communicates the competition is going to make for a more compelling product. It's an area I expect to see utilized ever more comprehensively. For any race series that wants to see the possibilities, NASCAR's system is perhaps the most highly developed, with GPS tracking in every car allowing for a computerized image to be presented, along with driver communications and timing that shows the progress of the driver in a plus or minus format over the current fastest time or leader. Fascinating stuff indeed, although perhaps edging into "information overload" territory. For now, Formula 1's simple yet effective system is for me the benchmark if for no other reason in that it made the race more enjoyable to watch. And that has to be the bottom line for any such system.

The day after yesterday, in racing blogs

After my unashamedly immature outburst on the McLaren spying issue yesterday (I'm not the only one either, Ian at Suitcase of Courage is similarly incensed), leave it up to Clive over at F1 Insight to come up with a coherent post about why this decision is so unjust. Check it out...

Do you know the way to San Jose?

Champ Car did, but doesn't want to anymore. The series announced today that they will not be returning to San Jose for a third time, discarding the track in a very large bin named "street circuits of the past" alongside defunct tracks like Birmingham (England), Caesar's Palace parking lot (Las Vegas), Miami and Vancouver.

The question is: will it be missed? The drivers for the most part hated it, with its tight confines, single passing zone, shortness and those VTA tram lines. Fans flocked to the race, but none can claim to have had a particularly good time with the poor sightlines, ridiculously crowded bridges and processional racing. The city of San Jose was indifferent, with the additional sales tax revenue offset by the cost of policing, road closures and cleanup much of which was not covered by the organizers. The political cost of displacing angry residents was also not insignificant.

There is a place in the grand pantheon of motorsport for street circuits. Staging a motor race slap-bang in the middle of a major city, whilst a logistical challenge, brings significant recognition to racing in general and the specific genre in particular. The Monaco Grand Prix is a perfect example of this. F1 puts up with all the extra BS and headache for one weekend in order to stage a remarkable event that serves as the "jewel in the crown" of the championship. Safety standards are "relaxed", teams suck it up and park and their transporters offsite, drivers accept that qualifying becomes the most important part of the weekend and fans eschew traditional spectating approaches simply for the pleasure of "being there".

But Monaco is unique on the F1 calendar. Yes, there are other street races such as Canada and Australia, but neither of those are to be found in the typically urban environment of a major downtown area. Champcar on the other hand has four races in just such a venue, and eight that can be classed as being on temporary courses. That leaves only six races at permanent, legitimate race tracks.

At some point, the advantages of street racing (exposure to new fans and sponsors) are outweighed by significant disadvantages. Too may street courses tend to undermine the credibility of a championship - "well if they're not racing on a track, surely it's not proper racing" being a thought process of a typical casual fan. It also means you don't get such committed, hard racing, as drivers spend much of their concentration avoiding walls instead of racing each other. Compare the terrific Mont-Tremblant race with such snoozefests as San Jose....

Next year Laguna Seca will take the place of San Jose. Consider this a victory for real racing, and not much of a loss for Champcar, which will still be able to showcase itself in the downtown parts of Toronto, Surfers Paradise and (probably) Las Vegas. Furthermore, it will probably still race close to Cleveland's downtown at the kooky (but good for racing) Burke-Lakefront Airport, right in the middle of the Southern California sprawl at one of the world's best street circuits, Long Beach, and within the conurbation of Houston at Reliant Park.

Formula 1 is exciting (except on track)

In what I can only describe as an "inspired" decision, I chose to not watch the Hungarian Grand Prix. Instead I had to "make do" with some terrifically engaging racing in the form of World Superbikes from Brands Hatch, the X Games rallycar super-special and AMA Superbike (and even though it's not racing, the fascinating skateboard vert competition from the X Games).

By all accounts the F1 race was as dull as I expected it to be. In a form of motorsport where passing is as rare a filthy race transporter, a track where passing is virtually impossible pretty much consigns the race to Dullsville from the get-go.

However, when I came to check the news this morning it appeared as though it was a weekend filled with drama, centered around the English tabloids' favourite sportsman, Lewis Hamilton.

By all accounts, Lewis made an error in the final session of qualifying, when he ended up being first on track, against the wishes of the McLaren team. This messed up Fernando Alonso's strategy for the session, potentially bagging Lewis an extra lap (I'll admit I'm unclear on this point so hopefully someone more familiar with the story can fill me). During the final pitstop of the session, Alonso waited an extra few seconds in the pitbox, even though Lewis was waiting. Alonso was thus able to get one more flying lap, and Lewis was not. What followed was a delightfully colourful radio exchange between McLaren team boss Ron Dennis and his young protege that ended with Lewis telling Ron to "go fucking swivel." Nice.

Damage control was immediately in order and Ron rushed to the driver weigh-in, determined to alleviate the situation. Sadly for F1 pundits who live for this stuff the two drivers simply ignored each other. A dose of Senna/Irvine-style scrappage would have added to an already dramatic story.

Ron and Lewis apparently made up but Fernando refuses to talk to his team-mate. Stories are already circulating about how the Spaniard is talking to Renault about returning to them for 2008. It seems safe to say that in this war of egos, Lewis seems to be winning.

As a result of his pitlane activities, Alonso was docked five places and started the race from sixth. Unable to challenge for the win, he had to make do with watching his nemesis Hamilton take victory and extend his lead in the championship.

Once again, F1 proved to be truly compelling, a place where money, ego and technology are the three main driving forces. The racing thankfully took a backseat (again), which is good given that even when it is exciting, it is far less exciting than most of other forms of motorsport. I'm now convinced you can be a fan of the sport without ever watching a race, especially if you enjoy spy novels, boxing, CAD/CAM software and/or reality shows.

Indianapolis - goodbye F1, hello MotoGP

It's a funny old world sometimes, and the latest goings-on with Indianapolis Motor Speedway are no exception.

It seems like Tony George has once again shown himself to be a businessman at heart, choosing to not pursue a Formula 1 grand prix, and its $9 million fee, and instead host MotoGP, which will cost only 1/4 of that amount. There's little doubt that there will be just as many attendees for MotoGP as for Formula 1 - despite this nation's preoccupation with Hardly-Ablesons and other decrepit cruisers, the sportbike fans are widespread and loyal. In fact the sportbike industry is growing at a record pace whilst the cruiser market is actually shrinking. The percentage of people who ride sportbikes who also follow MotoGP is quite high, and the opportunity to see a MotoGP race for those riders closer to Indianapolis who cannot afford the time or money to get to Laguna Seca will surely be grabbed.

This is all good for MotoGP, their organizers Dorna, IMS, Tony George, US motorcycle racing fans and the US motorcycle industry. It's not so good for anyone in the US with an interest in Formula 1. The inability of all parties to retain a USGP in one place for an extended period of time is hard to figure out, and all the usual excuses just don't seem to wash with me.

Lack of interest from fans is often quoted as a big issue. I'll concede that interest in F1 in the US is much lower than in the rest of the world, but the bottom line is whether there are enough fans to allow the venue to make money and enough US TV viewers to justify the costs to networks (and their sponsors) to actually show the race. Since it has always been on network TV, I find it hard to believe that money is not being made by TV companies.

However, the staggering fee charged by Bernie Ecclestone to a venue may very well be the most significant issue in the failure of F1 in the US. For an event that costs $9million, and draws 120,000 - 150,000 spectators, each spectator would need to spend between $60 and $75 for the track to just break even on that one expense. Factor in the additional staffing costs (450 staff per day), supplies, accommodation, local fees for police, permits, taxes etc., and each fan is going to need to spend much more. I'll admit that additional income from sponsorship, merchandising, food and drink sales, luxury suites, parking and kickbacks from the City for the additional sales taxes the event generates all help. But the bottom line is that IMS can have just as much income from MotoGP, whilst spending $7million less for the privilage.

These venue fees are theoretically supposed to cover costs for the series. It costs money to transport an international racing series, especially via air on tight time schedules. I used to work for a freight forwarder that did just that, so I know the expenses involved. But the massive discrepancy between what MotoGP charges and what F1 charges indicate that the venue fee in F1 is a profit center, whilst in MotoGP it is a reimbursement of expenses. The sad thing for US fans is that Bernie can get that money from another venue in another country - the list of countries who want F1 is very long, and populated with a lot of heavily-funded plans. Bernie believes the US doesn't offer anything that he can't get from another country. Some of the top teams in his series might have a different opinion, especially Mercedes and BMW. It's this that could ultimately be the biggest fallout for F1 from the USGP issue.

I am aware of the fact that IMS was hoping to host both events, but the more favorable deal from MotoGP surely helped put things in perspective during negotiations with Formula 1. Had MotoGP not been on the table, I don't think the F1 deal would have seemed as stinky as it turned out to be.

Open cockpits - a risk worth taking?

Motorsport is so safe these days. Or so we're led to believe. I believe we may very well be in the same place as we were prior to the tragic weekend at Imola in 1994 in which both Roland Ratzenberger and Ayrton Senna were killed. Prior to their accidents, Formula had had no race weekend fatalities for twelve years, and everyone involved with the sport felt that safety was at a high enough level that there would never again be a death in the sport. Sound familiar? Ask anyone in Formula 1 for example if any major changes could be made to improve safety and you will probably get an answer that goes something like this: "no"...

The accidents of Robert Kubica in Canada and Ernesto Viso in Magny-Cours (and come to think of it, Katherine Legge's Champcar crash at Road America last year) were as much examples of how luck plays a part as how strong the cars are these days. I have little doubt that improvements in safety cell technology saved all three drivers' lives, but there remains one huge risk factor to open-wheel drivers, and that is a situation where the top of the head makes a direct, high-speed impact with something immovable. Viso's crash showed this most visibly: once the car was airborne and upside-down it landed on the top of a concrete wall. Had it made the impact six inches further forward, it would have been his head that took the brunt of the force as opposed to the roll hoop and surrounding safety cell structure.

The collision between Alex Wurz and David Coulthard at the Australian Grand Prix this year is another example of how objects are still able to get into the cockpit and make contact with the driver. The vectors of that impact were such the Wurz was uninjured, but the fact remains that cars without roofs introduce an additional safety risk factor that is not present on those with roofs.

Open wheel motorsport is not the only place where this is an issue. The plans of the ACO, organizers of the Le Mans 24 Hours, call for the elimination of open-topped cars in their top class by 2010. Whilst their reasons for doing so are varied and include responding to the majority opinion of fans who prefer the aesthetics of closed-top prototypes, the safety benefit is worth noting.

There are numerous ways to address this safety issue. Concrete walls played a major role in the crashes of Kubica, Viso and Legge, and repositioning, redesigning or simply removing such walls would be a good start. The addition of a lateral roll hoop to these cars would be a major step forward in risk alleviation, but would be an aesthetic challenge that would no doubt incense fans of F1, Champcar, GP2, IRL or anyone else who might implement the idea.

So I'm not going to advocate for any changes right here. Instead, I'm simply going to suggest that sanctioning bodies are ignoring a major safety concern in just the same way that things were ignored prior to Imola 1994, and that discussion of this topic by the powers-that-be should be happening right now. The clock is ticking before we have another fatality.

Hamilton breaks more records

I was all set to write a post about World Superbike after another gripping pair of races, but it's going to be Formula 1 instead. I watched my friend Jeff marry his lovely partner Becky yesterday and he told me he'd be relying on my blog to keep him posted on the Spanish Grand Prix since the hotel they were staying at didn't have Speed Channel. Funnily enough, Jeff is a motorcycle guy, being the proud new owner of a Ducati 1098S Tricolore, but apparently he was more concerned with F1. Not a bad idea on his part, given the relative lack of performance of the Ducatis in World Superbike this year. So with apologies to my fellow bloggers who do a better job of covering F1, here goes....

I didn't watch the F1 race (so far this year I've only watched the Australian Grand Prix), but the most significant aspect of the race didn't need watching: Lewis Hamilton now leads the Formula 1 World Championship, with 30 points and is the youngest driver ever to do so. He's also the only F1 rookie to take podiums in his first four races.

Alonso guaranteed he wouldn't win after an optimistic first corner move on Massa, and now trails his team-mate by two points, one point ahead of the only man to win two races so far, the afore-mentioned Massa. Kimi Raikkonen sits in fourth with 22 points.

It's clear that one of these four men is going to win the championship, but the question is, which one? Alonso and Raikkonen are probably the fastest men out there, but Hamilton has shown remarkable pace and, even more impressively for an F1 newcomer, consistency. The thing that has to be scariest to his rivals is that he is only going to get better. That fact alone has me thinking that he'll be the first ever F1 driver to become world champion in his rookie year. It's a bold prediction, perhaps, but I don't think Formula 1 could ask for anything better. It's always been a form of motorsport that needs personalities, stories and heroes. Hamilton is already all three.

Okay Lewis, you've convinced me - I'll watch the next race. How huge would it be for him to win in two weeks time? The win itself would be remarkable, even if it would be expected fulfillment of potential. But the fact it would be at the spectacular Monaco circuit would make it the stuff of legends. That would be too good to miss.

Stefan Bellof

A question was raised on the Ten-Tenths sportscar forum the other day about people's favourite Porsche sportscar teams. This got me thinking about all those great Group C teams of the 1980s, like Kremer, Brun, Joest and Obermaier who ably backed up the factory team from 1983 onwards. So I hopped over to the RacingSportsCars.com site that has a fantastic archive of photos and entry lists from sportscar races, and started browsing through their Group C archives.

So many great cars and evocative liveries and so many great names. One driver in particular stood out as I looked over the entry lists, the late Stefan Bellof. There are very few drivers in the world who would be more deserving of the unfortunate title of "greatest talent lost before his time".

There was no doubt that he was one of the fastest drivers of his generation, winning the German FF1600 title and nearly winning German F3 despite only competing for half a season. He had a tremendously competitive year in Formula 2 before being drafted into the Tyrrell Formula 1 team. Even though the car was perhaps the slowest in the entire field, the young German managed to give Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost and Nigel Mansell a run for their money when the rain fell at Monaco in 1984 and levelled the playing field. He even scored two points finishes in 1985, grabbing a staggering 4th place at the US Grand Prix. It was widely believed that he had signed for Ferrari for the 1986 season, and I personally feel that that would have been the catapult to stardom for him. It's quite possible that he could have ended up alongside Senna or Prost in the McLaren team in '88 or '89. Who would have owned the title of "most successful German F1 driver of the 20th century" had Bellof lived?

His sportscar career was equally spectacular. Although he failed to finish during both his outings at Le Mans, he clinched the 1984 World Endurance Championship ahead of illustrious factory Porsche team-mates such as Derek Bell, Jacky Ickx and Jochen Mass. He won numerous races and showed that raw natural talent that team managers dream about.

In 1985 the factory Porsche team replaced him with Hans-Joachim Stuck, perhaps knowing that his Formula 1 commitments would make it more difficult to focus on his sportscar career. He had a number of outings for the privateer Brun outfit and it was in a Brun Porsche that he lost his life at Spa-Francorchamps on September 1st, 1985. His car was slower than the factory machines, but his sheer speed found him dicing for position with Jacky Ickx's Rothmans Porsche 962. Impatience got the better of him, and he collided with the other car at the brutally fast Eau Rouge corner, taking both cars into the armco where they caught fire. He was pronounced dead one hour later.

I tend to think of the loss of Bellof in the same way as I think of Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin or Jim Morrison. All had huge talent, and all had so much more to give to the world.

All were 27, too.

**LAST MINUTE EDIT**: I forgot to mention when I posted this yesterday that Stefan Bellof holds the record for the fastest EVER lap around the Nurburgring's Nordschleife circuit, set in a Porsche 956 in 1984. The fact that the 23-year old record still stands today is incredible...

Champcar - didn't suck

I watched my first Champcar race in a couple of years on Sunday, with the start of the new season and the debut of the Las Vegas street circuit. I'll be honest - I wasn't expecting much, with only 17 cars, virtually all of them piloted by pay-to-play drivers, and everyone in brand-new, potentially unreliable cars.

Things didn't start well, as the field struggled to achieve a single green flag lap. Graham Rahal got spooked by an aggressive move by Dan Clarke and crashed as a result. He obviously complained about Clarke's maneouver, but it seemed to me that it was a rookie mistake.

Once things got going, it was clear that a number of drivers were pretty competitive. Everyone was expecting good things from experienced Champcar drivers Seb Bourdais and Paul Tracy, but I was pleased to see Robert Doornbos, Will Power, Neel Jani and others on or near the pace of the quick guys. This bodes well for a reasonably interesting season.

I'm driving 500 miles to go to the Long Beach GP this weekend to report on the ALMS race for The-Paddock.net, and hadn't planned on sticking around for the Champcars. I may have changed my mind...