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| STAT WRAP: French Grand Prix |
| by: Sean Kelly 06/22/2008 - 12:25 PM Nevers, France  Ferrari's crushing victory in France capped a historic weekend for the team. (LAT photo) We knew that Ferrari would almost certainly finish 1-2 on the basis of its Friday pace on the prime tires, but a mechanical drama meant that the order was reversed from qualifying, as Felipe Massa went to the top of the points table. Massa finished third in 2006 and second in 2007, so he was a logical winner on Sunday. He is also the first Brazilian driver to lead the World Championship since Ayrton Senna was there after the 1993 Monaco Grand Prix. He is the fourth different points leader in as many races, something which has never happened before in a single season. The only previous occurrence happened across the 1960-’61 seasons when Jack Brabham ended 1960 as champion, before Stirling Moss, Wolfgang von Trips and Phil Hill led the standings after the opening three races of 1961. Four changes of championship lead in as many races is rare enough in itself, not happening since 1986, when Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost and Nigel Mansell traded positions between the Canadian and British Grands Prix. The Ferraris picked up their third 1-2 of the season, extending their current point-scoring streak to 40 races. It came on the back of a front row lockout in qualifying, in which Kimi Raikkonen scored Ferrari’s 200th pole position in championship racing. It has only taken the Scuderia 111 races to go from 150-200 poles, meaning that the team has scored 45% of the pole positions available in the last six years, a phenomenal average – especially considering it only had one pole in the entire 2005 season. Raikkonen set the fastest lap for the fifth consecutive race, tied for the second-longest streak in history being Alberto Ascari’s 7 in a row betweenthe 1952 Belgian and 1953 Argentine Grands Prix. It was also Raikkonen’s 30th career fastest lap, leaving only Alain Prost (41) and Michael Schumacher (76) ahead of him on the all-time list. Ferraris’ best lap times were over half a second clear of anybody else, and in the opening stint they were averaging around 1.1sec a lap quicker than any other driver. While two Ferraris on the podium was entirely predictable, Jarno Trulli’s third for Toyota came as a welcome change for a team still mourning the loss of its founder and mentor Ove Andersson. Wearing a black band on both his arm and on the car, Trulli scored the team’s first podium finish since Australia 2006, and his first visit to the rostrum since the 2005 Spanish Grand Prix, a barren spell of 55 races, which was the longest active streak in F1. This was only Trulli’s 8th career podium finish in 189 starts (4.2%), so it was a rare day for the Italian, who infamously lost a podium result here in 2004 when he was passed by Rubens Barrichello, two corners from the end. He held off the dogged attentions of McLaren’s Heikki Kovalainen, which was irony in itself – Trulli punted Kovalainen into a spin on lap 1 last year, ruining both their races. For Kovalainen, it was his best result since finishing on the podium in Malaysia, and he crossed the line one place ahead of Canadian Grand Prix winner Robert Kubica. The Pole scored his worst result since the opening race of 2008 and lost the championship lead, but remains only 2 points adrift as we approach the halfway mark in the season. Ferrari are not the only team with a point streak in progress – BMW have now scored in 25 straight races. More quality work from Mark Webber saw Red Bull-Renault again beat the works team, as the Australian scored for the 6th time in 7 races. Blessed with reliable machinery, Webber is getting the job done – he retired 8 times in 2007 and 11 times in 2006, but is yet to suffer a mechanical failure in a race this year. Webber was 6th despite a mid-race wobble coming out of the final turn, and he spent much of the time holding off Fernando Alonso…..so it must have come as a surprise that it was the sister Renault of Nelson Piquet chasing him right at the end. For Piquet, this race relieved much of the pressure that was building on him after a very poor season so far – he was the only driver other than the Force India duo to have not scored a point in 2008 until Sunday, and passing teammate Fernando Alonso at the end was the icing on the cake. Alonso had a torrid afternoon, being passed by Lewis Hamilton twice in addition to Piquet right at the end, but he still picked up his 75th career points finish, and 500th point overall. Another Renault-powered driver was ninth, as David Coulthard came in just under 8 seconds behind Alonso. The Scot started 7th on the grid, which he had not done since the 2006 Monaco Grand Prix, a race in which he scored his last podium finish until Canada, two weeks ago. There was to be no repeat on Sunday, but RedBull continue to look strong. Lewis Hamilton knew he would have a tough weekend before it even started, courtesy of a 10-position grid penalty for his pitlane collision in Montreal. It got even worse when he was penalized for passing Sebastian Vettel illegally on the first lap, and he never recovered from it, ending up a dismal 10th. BMW’s Nick Heidfeld had an extremely poor weekend. After qualifying in the top ten for 28 consecutive races leading into Monaco, Heidfeld has missed Q3 twice in the last three events, and never looked competitive at any point in Magny-Cours. It took his best time of the entire weekend just to get out of Q1 (and even then, on his final lap), and Kubica was so far ahead of him on Sunday that he was able to rejoin from his first pit stop still ahead of him – food for thought for the German. Magny-Cours saw 19 finishers, which tied Bahrain for the most in 2008. However, there was only 1 retirement in France as opposed to 3 in Bahrain (the difference occurring because of the demise of the Super Aguris), and the odd man out on Sunday was Jenson Button, capping a miserable weekend for Honda that saw them outpace only the Force India drivers in qualifying. This came only two weeks after Barrichello led the Canadian Grand Prix, and Honda were one of several teams reminded on Sunday that things change quickly in Formula 1. |
| Posted on 23 Jun 2008 by garysweb1 |
| NHRA: Kalitta Succumbs to Injuries Suffered in Qualifying Incident |
| Written by: NHRA Communications 06/21/2008 - 07:46 PM Englishtown, N.J.  Scott Kalitta: 1962-2008 (NHRA photo) Funny Car driver Scott Kalitta, 46, died Saturday from multiple injuries suffered after his car went out of control and crashed in a high-speed racing accident at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park during the fourth and final round of qualifying at the Lucas Oil NHRA SuperNationals. Kalitta was extracted from his car by NHRA emergency services officials and transported to Old Bridge Township Hospital, where he was later pronounced dead. Kalitta, a two-time NHRA POWERade Series Top Fuel champion and one of only 14 drivers in NHRA history to earn victories in both premier nitro categories, earned 18 victories during his career, his last coming in Chicago in 2005 in Top Fuel. Kalitta earned most of his racing success in Top Fuel, where he claimed back-to-backworld championship titles in 1994 and 1995. He retired from racing in 1997, sitting out most of two seasons before returning for a 10-race campaign in 1999. He sat out three more seasons following that brief stint and then returned again in 2003, joining cousin Doug as a second driver for the family's two Top Fuel dragsters. Kalitta started his pro career in Top Fuel in 1982, running limited events for four seasons before moving to Funny Car in 1986 for his first full-season of competition. He returned to that category fulltime in 2006. He posted a runner-up finish two weeks ago in Chicago, his 36th career NHRA final round appearance. Kalitta is survived by his father, legendary NHRA racer and team owner Connie Kalitta; wife, Kathy; and sons Corey, 14, and Colin, 8. |
| Posted on 22 Jun 2008 by garysweb1 |
| LE MANS: ALMS Drivers on Pole in GT Classes, Peugeot Retains Top Spot |
Written by: ALMS Communications 6/12/2008 - 06:43 PM Le Mans, France Penske Porsche driver and 2007 Le Mans GT2 winner Pat Long is on pole for the 2008 edition of the 24 hour classic. (Photo: Marshall Pruett) Corvette Racing’s record at the 24 Hours of Le Mans since 2001 is as impressive as any with five GT1 victories. Jan Magnussen gave America’s premier sports car team its first pole position in the world’s greatest race on Thursday. Magnussen turned a lap of 3:47.688 (133.911 mph) to better his time set Wednesday in the Corvette C6.R he will share with Johnny O’Connell and Ron Fellows. Magnussen and Patrick Long in GT2 gave the American Le Mans Series two drivers on class pole positions for the weekend’s 76th running of Le Mans. The two-day qualifying session continued the momentum the Corvette drivers established in the first half of the American Le Mans Series season. The trio in the No. 63 factory entry won the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, and Magnussen and O’Connell lead the GT1 championship with three victories in four races. Magnussen, O’Connell and Fellows have combined for 74 American Le Mans Series victories to go along with eight wins at Le Mans. Magnussen’s time was just 0.093 seconds ahead of Christophe Bouchut in the Larbre Competition Saleen S7R, the smallest of margins over an 8.468-mile circuit. Oliver Gavin in the other works Corvette qualified third at 3:48.539 (133.400 mph); Gavin will drive with Olivier Beretta and Max Papis. They did not finish last year’s race after the Corvette’s driveshaft failed in the first two hours. He was less than a half-second ahead of Aston Martin Racing’s David Brabham in the No. 009 Aston Martin DBR9. Long threw down a stunning lap of 3:58.152 (128.016 mph) in the IMSA Performance Porsche 911 GT3 RSR. America’s lone Porsche factory driver is going for a class repeat with Richard Lietz and Raymond Narac. Long, who drives a Porsche RS Spyder with Sascha Maassen for Penske Racing in the US, was just ahead of Wolf Henzler in the Team Felbermayr-Proton Porsche. Henzler drives for Flying Lizard Motorsports in the American Le Mans Series and leads the driver’s championship with Jörg Bergmeister. Driving with Alex Davison and Horst Felbermayr, Henzler’s qualifying time was 3:59.072 (127.523 mph) in his Le Mans debut. Speaking of Flying Lizard, the team elected to concentrate on race setup Thursday and did not improve on Bergmeister’s time of 4:00.106 (126.974 mph) he set Wednesday. He will drive with Johannes van Overbeek and Seth Neiman. Risi Competizione, the other American Le Mans Series representation in the class, saw its Ferrari F430 GTs qualify sixth and 11th in GT2. Sascha Maassen, Long’s teammate at Penske, qualified second in LMP2 in Team Essex’s Porsche RS Spyder. Maassen’s time from Wednesday of 3:33.441 (142.836 mph) held up Thursday and ended 1.14 seconds behind Jos Verstappen in the Van Merksteijn Motorsport Porsche. The top five positions didn’t change Thursday. Peugeot’s three diesel-powered Peugeot 908s were quickest with Stephane Sarrazin setting a Le Mans record with a lap of 3:18.513 (153.578 mph) on Wednesday. Allan McNish was the quickest of the nine Audi drivers with a 3:23.847 (149.559 mph) in the Audi R10 TDI that he will drive with Dindo Capello and Tom Kristensen. McNish’s time was third quickest overall Thursday behind a pair of Peugeots. The Team Cytosport/Charouz Racing System Lola-Judd of Greg Pickett, Klaus Graf and Jan Lammers finished qualifying 12th fastest overall and in LMP1 with Graf improving to at 3:31.135 (144.397 mph). Autocon Motorsports’ Creation-Judd of Michael Lewis, Chris McMurry and Bryan Willman made the biggest jump of the day by nearly nine seconds. Lewis’ time of 3:47.695 (133.895 mph) was the Creation’s best lap. The 76th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans runs from 9 a.m. ET (3 p.m. local time) Saturday, June 14 to 9 a.m. ET Sunday, June 15 from the Circuit de la Sarthe in Le Mans, France. Forty-four drivers will represent the American Le Mans Series, whose teams have captured seven overall victories and 22 class championships since 1999. SPEED will televise the event live, and Radio Le Mans will have flag-to-flag coverage of the race as well as practice and qualifying on June 11 and 12. The next round of the American Le Mans Series is the American Le Mans Northeast Grand Prix. The race is scheduled for 2 p.m. ET on Saturday, July 12 at Lime Rock Park. SPEED will televise the race from noon to 3 p.m. ET on Sunday, July 13. XM Satellite Radio will air the event live on XM Sports Nation Channel 144. Additional live coverage from American Le Mans Radio and IMSA's Live Timing & Scoring also will be available at americanlemans.com. |
| Posted on 13 Jun 2008 by garysweb1 |
| STAT WRAP: Canadian Grand Prix |
Written by: Sean Kelly 06/08/2008 - 05:44 PM Montreal, Canada. Hamilton's early advantage didn't last long. (LAT photo) We sort of expected it, but the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve again delivered the mayhem that has become a staple of the Canadian Grand Prix, with a bizarre pitlane collision, safety cars, multiple leaders and a historic result as Montreal delivered a first-time winner for the second consecutive season. BMW scored its first ever win as an engine supplier in Montreal back in 1982, when Nelson Piquet took victory in the Brabham, so it was fitting that Robert Kubica delivered their first ever victory as a constructor on Sunday at the same track. In doing so, Kubica propelled himself to the top of the world championship table, another first for a Sauber driver, and 12 months after his serious crash in Montreal. He isn’t leading this championship by chance – he has scored in six of the seven races in 2008, more than any other driver. Kubica was the seventh and final leader in this chaotic race, which is only one short of the all-time record, set at the 1971 Italian Grand Prix, which was the last true slipstreaming race at Monza before chicanes were added. He also kept up Montreal’s curious record of one-time winners of this event. Since 1989, only Michael Schumacher has won this race on more than one occasion (admittedly he did it a mammoth 7 times!). Nick Heidfeld followed his teammate home to complete a 1-2 finish, the first time a constructor has taken a 1-2 for its maiden victory since Damon Hill and Ralf Schumacher did it for Jordan at the 1998 Belgian Grand Prix. In that constant rivalry between BMW and Mercedes, it will please Munich no end that they’ve equaled the feat of Mercedes-Benz at the 1954 French GP, when Juan-Manuel Fangio and Karl Kling were 1-2 for the manufacturer’s first win. However, Heidfeld must be wondering what he has to do to get onto the top step of the podium.This was his 139th career Grand Prix, 92 of which have been for Sauber in all their forms, and his 50th career points finish, so despite his outward happiness for the team, he must be frustrated to be watching someone else take the acclaim while he is second for the fifth time in his career, now surpassing Stefan Johansson for the most second place finishes without ever winning. By the way, he’s also been second in Montreal for two consecutive years! At least he got to see Germany beat Poland 2-0 in Euro 2008, immediately afterwards…. On the bottom step of the podium was Red Bull’s David Coulthard, who scored his first top three finish since Monaco 2006. It means the Renault-powered Red Bull squad have scored more podium finishes in the last 18 months (2) than the works team (1), and brought Coulthard his first points of the year, on the same track where he scored his first career points way back in 1994. A podium comprising two BMWs and a Red Bull meant there was no McLaren or Ferrari up there for the first time since the 2006 Malaysian Grand Prix (Fisichella and Alonso were 1-2 for Renault, ahead of Honda’s Jenson Button). The Toyota drivers ran 1-2 at one point in the race, and Timo Glock ended the day in a career-best fourth place. Glock must want every race to be held on this circuit – his only previous F1 points finish was 7th place here for Jordan on his Grand Prix debut in 2004, and it was also the scene of his best career Champ Car finish (2nd) back in 2006! He resisted the attentions of Felipe Massa right at the end, who sandwiched the Toyota duo in fifth, giving Ferrari a vital 4 points that keep it ahead of BMW in the constructors’ championship. Had Massa passed Glock, he would now be second in the points behind Kubica, but that will have to wait for another day. Coming into Monaco, Rubens Barrichello hadn’t scored a point for 22 races, but on the back of his sixth-place finish in the Principality, the Brazilian finished a strong seventh on Sunday, and even led a Grand Prix for the first time since the ill-starred 2005 United States GP at Indianapolis. The last time the Honda team got both cars to the finish in Canada was back in 1992, way before either Honda or BAR ever came along, when the team still belonged to Ken Tyrrell. He won a big scrap with Sebastian Vettel, a man over 15 years his junior, but Vettel still managed to finish in the points yet again, despite starting from the pitlane. This was the fourth successive year that a driver starting last ended up in the points in the Canadian Grand Prix, if you count starting from pitlane as being “last place” in field. Contrast this statistic with the pole winner, who has only been in the points in two of the last four Montreal races! Neither McLaren was in the points on Sunday, ending a run of 31 consecutive races in the points for Ron Dennis’ team, the 4th-longest in history. Heikki Kovalainen finished just 0.3s behind Vettel for the final point, although his day was somewhat better than his teammate Lewis Hamilton, who crashed out in a pitlane misunderstanding with Kimi Raikkonen. /> There is a certain irony that Lewis Hamilton is still yet to retire from a race on the actual racetrack in his F1 career. His only two failures to finish have both happened in pitlane, the other one being when he slid into the gravel entering the pits in Shanghai last season. On Sunday, he creamed into the back of Raikkonen when his championship rival stopped at the red light at pit exit. Hamilton was presented with the option of hitting either Kubica or Raikkonen, as they were stopped alongside each other, keep to avoid the same black flag penalty that befell Giancarlo Fisichella and Felipe Massa in this race last season. As it was, Hamilton swerved out of Kubica’s way, but wasn’t able to avoid Kimi. Who knows what championship implications that may have at the end of the year, but certainly he was moved up BMW’s Christmas card list…. Lewis will start the Magny-Cours weekend with a 10-position penalty as a result of the collision, as will Williams’ Nico Rosberg, who in a chain reaction hit the back of Hamilton’s car. His penalty may be considered a little harsh, as he hit the back of a car that was effectively out of the race already, and Rosberg has still never scored points in Canada despite never qualifying lower than 7th on this circuit. |
| Posted on 13 Jun 2008 by garysweb1 |
| STAT WRAP: Monaco Grand Prix |
Written by: Sean Kelly 05/25/2008 - 12:49 PM Charlotte, N.C. Hamilton had to be both lucky and good to win in Monaco. (LAT photo) History told us coming into Sunday’s Monaco Grand Prix that a little rainfall would guarantee action and drama, and the elements did not disappoint as the race ran to the two-hour limit for the first time since 1997. Lewis Hamilton smacked the barrier at Tabac on lap 6, puncturing his rear tire, but the early pit stop ended up working in his favor, and his pace as the track dried made him the first English winner of this race since Graham Hill took the last of his 5 Monaco GP victories (and his last F1 win overall), in 1969. It gave Hamilton his first win from lower than pole position, and he was the first winner in Monte Carlo from below pole since Juan-Pablo Montoya won the 2003 edition. McLaren took its record-extending 15th victory on the streets of the Principality, 7 more than second-placed Ferrari on that table, and it gave Hamilton the championship lead once more. BMW’s Robert Kubica led 9 laps early in the race, the most laps that a Sauber driver has ever led in any Grand Prix, and in tying his career best finish (achieved earlier this year in Sepang), he put a Peter Sauber car on the podium in Monaco for the first time Johnny Herbert was third (and the last man to finish!) in the chaotic 1996 wet/dry race. He had already given Saubertheir first ever top 6 start in Monaco, so it was a good weekend overall for the Polish driver. Third-placed Felipe Massa took Ferrari’s first pole position on this track since Michael Schumacher in 2000, but no Ferrari driver has won from pole here since Jody Scheckter’s victory in 1979 – Michael never did it, despite his five Monaco wins, although he did achieve a “grand slam” with Benetton in 1994. In fourth place, Red Bull’s Mark Webber has scored in 5 straight races for the first time in his career, and he has scored all of his teams points so far in 2008. The joy within the Red Bull family will be further augmented by Sebastian Vettel’s terrific drive from the last row of the grid to finish 5th, on the debut of the new Toro Rosso STR3 chassis. After failing to finish the first four races of the year, and then receiving a five-place gearbox change penalty simply because he did finish in Istanbul (!), it was just desserts for the talented German. Ironically, Webber and Vettel’s respective teammates were both eliminated in identical accidents at the same corner, and on the same lap! Both David Coulthard and Sebastien Bourdais crashed out at Massenet after 6 laps, as the rain fell more heavily. One man who will be wearing a huge smile is Honda’s Rubens Barrichello, who in addition to celebrating his 36th birthday on Friday, finished sixth in the race to end a pointless streak that has lasted since the 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix, easily the longest barren spell of his career. He beat out Kazuki Nakajima, who scored for the third time in 6 races this year and is now only one point behind teammate Nico Rosberg. The final point went to Heikki Kovalainen, who rebounded well from stalling on the formation lap and starting from the pit lane. At the end of the race he was just 0.4s ahead of Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, who was the villain of the race to most neutral observers for taking Adrian Sutil out with only 9 laps remaining. Sutil, who has been consistently outpaced by Giancarlo Fisichella this year, drove the race of his life as Force India made all the right strategy calls to lie fourth at the final restart. It would have been this team’s best finish since Tiago Monteiro was on the podium at the notorious 2005 U.S. Grand Prix, when the team was known as Jordan. Sadly, he was removed from the race forcibly by Raikkonen, and was spotted in the garage understandably distraught afterwards. The minor positions were filled with drivers who were involved in collisions. Starting from eighth place down, Kovalainen, Raikkonen, Alonso, Button, Glock, Trulli and Heidfeld all had visits to either the sceneryor each other, but there were still 14 cars running at the finish – more than Barcelona (13) and Australia (8) this season. In the retirement column, Nico Rosberg will be bitterly disappointed not to have taken more advantage of his obvious pace this weekend – he was second quickest overall in the Q2 session, and was the quickest man on the track early in the race…but only after he bumped into the back of Fernando Alonso on lap 1, breaking the first of three front wings on the day. The third one broke, along with the rest of the car, when he stuffed it into the barriers at the entry to the swimming pool complex, bringing out the final Safety Car. Renault’s Nelson Piquet had nothing to lose by starting on the extreme wet tires, and he was doing his best to keep his nose clean until he ran out of talent at Ste. Devote. He was criticized for failing to get out of Q1, but in reality he was only 0.287sec slower than Alonso in that session, showing that he doesn’t lack pace so much as the ability to produce it at the right moment. Giancarlo Fisichella’s 200th Grand Prix was mostly spent in midfield while teammate Sutil was the star of the race. Both Force India drivers ended their day in the pits, but sympathy has to be with Sutil, who might never get that close to a top four finish again in his F1 career. However, a few more drives like Sunday, and his reputation will be renewed. |
| Posted on 29 May 2008 by garysweb1 |
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