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pressdog's Year-End Representation

Ah, 2006. A colorful year for both the Indy Racing League and the Champ Car World Series. Although they remain technically separate series, pressdog joins ESPN in sort of ignoring that technicality and presenting the one, the unified, Year End Representation:

Best Finishes -- The last-lap, turn-four pass of Marco Andretti by the freakishly charging Sam Hornish in the Indy 500. A real "No (rhymes with "trucking") Way!" moment. Over in Champ Car, give the nod to Sebastien Bourdais (rumor: "Bourdais" is French for "bitchslapper") chasing down Justin "World's Tallest Open-Wheel Driver" Wilson in the season finale in Mexico City.

Even though Wilson and Bourdais were about a day ahead of the rest of the field, the last 10 laps were about as exciting as you'll get on a street/road course as Bourdais slowly reeled in Wilson and hip-checked his way by on a final-lap pass. Adding to the excellentness was Wilson driving with a broken wrist, and his refusal to whine, cry to the refs and talk smack about Bourdais' final pass in the post-race interview. That's courage and class. Bourdais got the checkers, but Wilson was the winner.

Biggest Crashes -- Katherine Legge at The Kink at Road America. Dude, when you lose a rear wing, going about 180, that ain't good. Your car tends to drift a smidge. In Legge's case the car went butt first into the barrier at about 188, then belly-first into the catch-fence, end-over-end until all that was left was the cockpit and Katherine saying "get me out of this (bad word) car." Later she pops out of the medical center like she's stepping out for a ciggy. Couple bruises. No big deal. Commentators Derek Daly and Rick Benjamin were incredulous, as was everyone watching.

Ironically, CCWS probably wants her to take the fence again since walking way from the frightening crash got Katherine on about a billion major network morning shows and -- all by itself -- quadrupled Champ Car's press coverage for the year.

Biggest Ado About Nothing -- Marco and Eddie Cheever at Watkins Glen. It's, like, 53 degrees on the track and wet so the tires are basically discs of ice. Marco is taking a bunch of chances and gets whacked by Cheever who was coming out of the pits on ultra-icy tires. Marco gives Eddie a fist shake. Come on, Marco. Like you wanted to GO right there with Cheever. Dad and Grandpa jump to his emotional rescue. Cheever, they say, should be shot by a sniper for this outrage. Simmer-frigging-down.

Here's the thing, maybe Marco should have waited a bit to pass Cheever. No doubt he would have gotten around him within a lap. Going for it on that point on the track was a smidge reckless. I'd love to see the Young Future F1 Driver (Marco) racing against Paul "Outta My Way" Tracy.

Best Off-Track Action -- Gotta be Tracy vs. Tagliani at San Jose. The Slap Down in Silicon Valley. After Tracy suffered brain lock and drove over Tag's front end, Tag found Tracy in the pit and started with the shoving. Pretty soon we had a scuffle. Tagliani kept his helmet on, though. Tracy should have worked the body, I guess. Look for the Unification Fight -- Tracy vs. Cheever (or Marco).

For some odd reason, right as the major haymakers started in the pits, Champ Car cut away from the fight to show a routine pit stop. WTF? The director must be a pacifist or something. Even as it was, the fight caused a hundred-fold increase of air time for Champ Car on SportsCenter. Now if Katherine Legge could crash, not get hurt and start a brawl with Tracy in the pits Champ Car would be in coverage nirvana.

Best Glimmer of Hope -- Ryan Briscoe for giving Dreyer and Reinbold Racing (or Reyer and Deinbold as the IRL calls them) a thrill by driving to third place at Watkins Glen. DRR. Third. Dude, seriously. Team co-owners Dennis Reinbold and Robbie "Incredi" Buhl and the DRR posse probably did shots of Patron into the night.

Worst Race -- That would be Snore-noma for the IRL. Number of clean passes: zero. Number of cars taken out by Vitor Miera and Scott "The Iceman" Dixon during the race, about seven. Parade city. Then, at the end, when there was some drama about whether Young Marco would make it to the end on fuel, Bryan Herta spun bringing out the yellow and the last glimmer of interest in this race was snuffed. There's two hours none of us will get back. Z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z.

Over in Champ Car, the worst race was easily Milwaukee. Worst oval race I have ever watched in my entire life, and I have watched a lot of oval races. Bourdais LAPPED THE FIELD. Any time the leader (Bourdais, try to act shocked) can pit on a one-mile oval and come out of the pits still in the lead, that's a serious bitchslapping.

Add to that Champ Car's phantom "debris yellows" to clean the track of marbles and the fact that it was a timed oval race and you may have a cause for a class-action lawsuit by the people who were charged money to see such a farce. When a "big-league" open-wheel race makes you long for a 25-lap sprint car feature race, that's bad.

pressdog In Your Face Award: A.J. Allmendinger. Winless Allmendinger gets fired from RuSPORT after the debacle at Milwaukee, gets hired by Forsythe and wins about four straight. RuSPORT boss Carl Russo maintains his class, however, refusing to diss Humdinger and congratulating him in victory lane. \

pressdog Show Me the Money Award: Extremely close call, but we gotta go with Danica Patrick. Mid-season Danica's subtle-as-a-chain-saw father, T.J., visibly hob-knobs with some NASCAR teams. Rumors swirl that Danica is jumping ship to Fenderland. Eventually she changes IRL teams and goes to Andretti Green Racing for a ton of cash (by IRL standards. By NASCAR standards Danica got cab fare).

Not sure if Dancia seriously considered (or had offers for) NASCAR, but I am sure she wouldn't have enjoyed being mashed into the wall regularly by the good-old-boys who aren't about to be beaten by a 100-pound "little lady." Danica should get with Sarah Fisher who spent a brutal season in the NASCAR minors or Erin Crocker who got regularly ass-checked into the wall in the NASCAR minors.

Runner up is AJ Allmendinger who parlayed his five Champ Car wins into a ride with Red Bull Toyota in the NASCAR system next year. Ka-ching. See ya!

pressdog Makes Me Laugh Every Time Award: IRL or Champ Car officials claiming the league is "very competitive." BAAAA. That's a good one. Competitive if you are on a Ganassi or Penske team in the IRL or Bourdais, Justin Wilson and Forsythe in Champ Car. Rest of you guys and girls are driving for 5th. Masses of fans are praying the league will somehow address the lack of drama as to who will win next year.

Close second: The Little Baby Jesus prayer in the movie Taladega Nights. I laughed so hard I started crying.

pressdog Best Move for the Future of the Sport Award: Champ Car's development of the new Panoz DP01 chassis. A dramatically cheaper car to replace their aging Lolas, the DP01 may help to level the playing field a bit and encourage more teams to get into the league by reducing costs. If it takes less money to sponsor a competitive car, odds are you'll be more appealing to more sponsors. Duh.

pressdog Circus Music Moment of the Year Award: Lap 1, Turn 1, Champ Car World Series, Long Beach, April. Cars and carbon fiber everywhere. Four cars (nearly a quarter of the 18-car field) is toasted, including Sebastien Bourdais' chief competition. Rumor has it he drives one-handed the rest of the race and wins easily.

pressdog Worst Television Moment Award: ESPN/ABC repeats the intro video during their taped replay of the Motegi race and then doesn't air the first 17 laps of the race. Way to choke the video replay of a race. Good thing virtually nobody cares about or watches the Twin Ring snorefest each year.

pressdog Best Trackside Interview Award: Jamie Little! Get her in a CAR! Chasing down Dan Wheldon who was pissed after not winning at Texas and stalking angrily back to his trailer. Jamie grabbed Dan by the elbow to try and get him to slow down a bit and Dan ripped his arm away from Jamie like, "Don't touch me!" Jamie Little, pit warrior. Then she got assigned to work NASCAR next year. Money CJ leads the mourning for the loss of Jamie. To be fair, Danno bounced back pretty well and had some fun with the heated arm rip away the rest of the season.

pressdog Best Announcer Verbal Eclamation: Derek Daly: "Grandma's on the whiskey!" caused by AJ Allmendinger doing something fabulous during the San Jose race in July 30. For some reason Derek, advised that AJ's grandma was at the race, illustrated the race by telling us at various points what Grandma would think of AJ's driving. When he passed Cristiano da Matta Derek declared Grandma was on the whiskey. I've use that line often in my daily life since then.

Here's to a fabulous 2007. Unification? Maybe. Maybe not. Can't we all get along? Here's to tons of sponsors and millions more fans tuning in to see American open-wheel racing of whatever flavor.

Thanks for reading the blog. My contract (with myself) was renewed for 2007, so come on back and visit. Also take a look at my IRL homeys' sites, So Damn Indy and My Name is IRL. Pressdog gets his own URL in 2007, and the whole deal is moving to www.pressdog.com. The protoblog is up there now, so rush over and eyeball it.

I plan to attend the IRL races in Kansas, Iowa and Chicago and the Champ Car race at Road America. Watch for Expanded Coverage. Me and Derek Daly? Parting? Hold on to your hollyhocks! pressdog is in the whiskey.

Johnson and Tracy to Form Golf Cart Stunt Team

Note: Most of this is made up, except the parts about Joie Chitwood.

NASCAR points champion Jimmie Johnson and Champ Car World Series veteran Paul Tracy will soon form a touring troupe that features stunt driving with golf carts, according to several sources.

The revelation came days after Johnson admitted he was ``horsing around'' on top of a moving golf cart when he fell off and broke his left wrist. Johnson's injury comes on the heels of Tracy's mysterious injury in Las Vegas on Nov. 4 which was initially reported as golf-cart related (later the story changed to ATV stunt driving). In early November, sources told pressdog that Tracy's accident was part of his preparations to jump the Snake River in a modified golf cart.

It now appears that Tracy and Johnson are preparing to launch a Joie Chitwood-style thrill show that would tour the lucrative county fair circuit throughout the United States and Canada. Chitwood, who died in 1988, drove in seven Indy 500s between 1940 and 1950, finishing as high as fifth. (Chitwood is shown at right in his 1950 Indy 500 entry.) Chitwood drove to fame as the operator of the Joie Chitwood Thrill Show, a stunt driving show that toured the U.S. for some 40 years.

Chitwood was the grandfather of Indianapolis Motor Speedway COO Joie Chitwood III (shown at left).

Witnesses to Johnson's accident injury said the 2006 NASCAR champion was sprawled out on top of the cart in a James Bond chase-scene-like fashion and was thrown several feet when the driver hit a berm. Rumors that the accident was caused by Johnson's cart driver bump drafting another cart could not be confirmed.

"I've learned that Johnson and Tracy are secretly preparing to form a golf cart thrill show," said one insider. "The person driving the cart was, in fact, Paul Tracy. He disguised himself as NASCAR fan by chewing tobacco, drinking Miller Lite and saying 'shake -- and bake, baby' a random times."

The insider said Johnson and Tracy feel there's an unmet demand for golf cart-based thrill driving, especially in the upper Midwestern U.S. and in various regions of Tracy's native Canada. The two are expected to go public with the PT Johnson Flying Golf Cart Circus in early 2007.

In other news, a rumor that EZ GO golf cart company is set to offer Johnson $5.4 million in sponsorship money for 2007 could not be confirmed.

Andretti Indy Run Appeals to "Older White Guy's With More Money than Sense"

Um, yep, much of this is made up.
Michael Andretti's desire to return to the Indy 500 is part of a marketing strategy designed to appeal to "middle-aged white guys with bails of cash," according to league insiders.

Others insisted that a thinning field of legitimate Indy 500 contenders were "starting to shift the odds in Michael's favor."

The speculation came days after the Indianapolis Star actually reported that Andretti (left) would like to return to the Indianapolis 500 for his 16th try.

After leading on lap 197 of the 2005 running before eventual race winner Sam Hornish Jr. blew by him en route to a dramatic final-lap pass for the win, Andretti once again has the bug.

League officials are eager to find a sponsor for Andretti, who turned 44 in 2006. "We think his running will appeal to all those 40-somethings out there with way more cash than sense," said one insider. "You know, guys who dream up stuff like 'Extreme Golf' play high-stakes fantasy football and will spend $9,844 on fishing boats mainly because they look really cool at Cabela's. The whole Clinging to Youth market is really an untapped gold mine as far as we're concerned."

Others contend with the dwindling IRL car count makes Andretti's chances to end his 0-15 streak at Indy better than ever.

"Couple things," said a league insider. "First, someone has to win. Second, who are we kidding? A solid 12 cars -- assuming we get to a full grid of 33 -- have zero chance to win the 500, even if God himself was driving. They'll be out by lap 50 with 'handling' problems. Plus, of the 20 or so with a remote shot, 10 of those will need a miracle to win. So that means Mike has to beat about eight, maybe nine cars to win it. If he comes back again in 2008 he may be top five by just showing up."

The insider said with four Andretti Green Racing teammates out there blocking for him, and if Sam Hornish and Dan Wheldon hit the wall or blow up, it might be Danica, Michael Andretti and Michael's son, Marco, fighting for the win.

AGR is expected to account for about 20% of the entire Indy Racing League field in 2007 by fielding cars for Marco, Danica, Tony Kanaan and Dario Franchitti. AGR said it still had to find a sponsor for Michael's Indy 500 effort, but they weren't concerned. "We'll put a couple of interns on it and let them call back the eight or so sponsors we didn't get around to calling back last week. Shouldn't be that big of a deal. Danica may have to pose with a few more products, but I'm sure we can figure it out. "

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The Iceman Proposeth

It's all TRUE. I swear.
Alerted by the ever-vigalent Jeff at My Name is IRL, Scott "The Iceman" Dixon cracks many smiles as he proposes to his Welsh girlfriend. The bride-to-be gets the all-important public thumbs up from Dixon's mum. Video here.

pressdog raises a pint of New Zealand's Steinlager and gives a howl of congratulations for the Iceman.

(Photo: Dana Garrett, Indy Racing League)

Jeff Olson Represents on Iowa-ness

Fellow Iowan Jeff Olson, now of Indy and RACER Mag, posted a most excellent Q&A on our beloved corn state. Jeff mentions the most excellent Iowa Speedway (right). His article is so good I wish I had written it. Damn you, Jeff Olson! It's just too good.

Check it: The IRL's Field of Dreams.

Grief Counselors Dispatched to Rahal Letterman Racing

Um, yeah, this is all made up.

A team of grief counselors descended on Rahal Letterman Racing in Hilliard, Ohio, Friday to help a team struggling to cope with the departure of Danica Patrick.

"It's just a very difficult time right now," said one teary PR operative. "It's like the phone service is on the blink or something. The phones just went dead at midnight Nov. 30."

As of Friday, IRL ultra-mega-superstar Danica Patrick left Rahal Letterman Racing and went to work for Andretti Green Racing. Late in the 2006 IRL season Andretti Green won a bidding war for Danica (pictured at right with her new AGR ride).

"It's strange," said an RLR insider, "In some places in the buidling you can still smell her perfume. Then suddenly comes the crashing realization -- Danica won't be here any more."

Grief counselors encouraged Rahal Letterman workers to share their feelings and memories of Danica with teammates, friends and loved ones. "Talking about it is always good therapy," said one counselor.

Rahal Letterman operatives also busied themselves with promoting their existing drivers. There was some confusion early Friday, however, when RLR driver Jeff Simmons was briefly mistaken for diet and exercise guru Richard Simmons (left) by some members of the company.

An e-mail sent out by one confused staffer asked "How are we supposed to market this little guy who wears short-shorts and glitter-encrusted tank tops all the time?" The e-mail was later recalled after an extensive study of photos of Jeff Simmons and Richard Simmons showed they were not the same person, and possibly not even biologically related.

"This was a lot easier when we had Danica to fixate on," sighed an RLR mechanic. "With her leaving and our other driver, Bobby (actually Buddy Rice), driving a Champ Car, it's been pretty confusing around here. And with this all coming during the holidays, it just make it hard."

Rahal insiders expected their ship to be righted in time for the 2007 season. "At least Danica is staying in the IRL," said a tire changer. "That way we can watch the ring of media around her from a distance and remember all the good times."
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Champ Car ESPN Deal Part of Covert Unification Drive

Note to the gullible: everything below is made up.

The multi-year agreement between the Champ Car World Series and ESPN is really part of a stealth unification scheme, according to multiple sources within both series.

"The ESPN deal is just the tip of the iceberg," said one IRL insider. "Underneath the water line a bunch of us are working toward merging together one little thing at a time, when no one is looking. We plan to eventually tell (IRL chief) Tony Geroge (left) about it once everything is unified, maybe bring it up during a round of golf. Like, 'Hey, Tony, a bunch of us went ahead and got that unification thing out of the way.' "

ESPN announced November 16 that at least 11 Champ Car races in 2007 and the full series in 2008 will be aired on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC. ESPN and its sister stations currently broadcasts all the Indy Racing League's races. The announcement from ESPN means that the series will now have a unified broadcaster.

The IRL and Champ Car are the two major open-wheel series in the U.S. A large contingent of open-wheel fans have long called for the merger or "unification" of the two open-wheel series into one. Proponents claim unification would help ensure the survival of American major-league open-wheel racing by combining resources and creating a larger fan audience that would make sponsorship of the league more appealing.

According to insiders, people associated with both leagues have grown tired of waiting for George and Champ Car leader Kevin Kalkhoven to make a merger deal. The frustration has led to a plan to "just merge stuff and maybe just e-mail Tony and Kevin when it's done."

Beside having a common broadcaster, IRL and Champ Car insiders plan to use the same telephone carrier, switch to a common Web host and start using the same providers for "coffee cups and other disposable paperware."

"We also think we're getting close on having a unified lawn service and the same janitorial supply vendor," said a Champ Car source familiar with the covert plans.

"With The Grand Puppetmaster (ESPN) on board, we think the merger will happen sooner, rather than later," said a Champ Car insider. "Maybe we'll get the job done and tell Tony and Kevin when they come back from a long weekend. We're actually targeting having everything done so we can break it to the guys after Christmas break 2007."

Reports that Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network announcer Mike King has spent several hours practicing pronouncing "Bourdais," "Junqueira," and "Pizzonia" could not be confirmed.
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Open-wheel Racing Mulls Making all Hiring Decisions Based on Sponsorship

Come on. Do I have to? OK. Everything below is made up. Sheesh.

The jobs of engineers, pit crews, PR people, even transport hauler drivers in the Indy Racing League and Champ Car World Series may soon be determined by how much sponsorship the applicant can bring to the table.

Strapped for cash, the premier American open-wheel racing series are considering extending the practice of hiring drivers in part based on how much sponsorship they can generate to other positions within teams.

"We figure there may be some engineers out there who can bring some cash to the table. There may very well be some rich kids who want to be engineers in the IRL and wear the fancy team stuff home to show their friends," said an IRL insider. "All we're saying is that may become more of an element in hiring."

Many teams routinely make driver hiring decision based on how much sponsorship the driver can bring to the team. The practice, known derisively as "ride buying," is prevalent in both the IRL and CCWS.

Under the new program, ride buying would be a model for engineering buying, pit crew buying and even public relations representative buying. So, for example, a right front tire changer with $10,000 in his pocket could get the job over a changer with more skill but less cash. "From our point of view," said a Champ Car insider, "if it works for drivers, why not extend the model, so to speak?"

In other news, Champ Car leaders denied rumors that the remaining Lola chassis/Ford Cosworth engine Champ Cars may soon show up on eBay. Champ Car is going to its much-anticipated Panoz DP01 chassis with Cosworth engine (right) in 2007. Rumors that Panoz got the job designing the DP01 because it brought "significant sponsorship dollars to the table" could not be confirmed.

Notes from Champ Car World Series in Mexico City 2006

Notes taken during the SPEED broadcast of Champ Car World Series Grand Premio Telmex presented by Banmex, Mexico City on 11/12/06.

pressdog's muy frio beer of the race is race sponsor Tecate. Una cerveza muy excelente.

Sebastien Bourdais montage. First guy since 1948 to win three points championships in a row.

Welcome to Mexico City. 14th and final race. Wet weekend off and on. Rookie of the Year running down to Will Power and Speedy Dan Clarke. Power leads ROY by 15. $50,000 to the ROY. Noticeable cash.

Rick Benjamin and Derek Daly on camera. Talking about AJ Allmendinger bailing for NASCAR and Paul Tracy rolling his golf cart (or ATV or whatever) in Vegas. Both are out. So 2004 Indy 500 champion Buddy Rice (right) gets AJ's ride and David Martinez fills in for Evel Knievel Tracy. Buddy's ride is widely considered to be a tryout for a full season next year. Buddy got no sponsor love and therefore wasn't re-signed by the IRL's Rahal Letterman.

Speedy Dan and Power get air. ROY candidates. Power says has to finish to get it, so may be a bit cautious. Speedy Dan sucking on his water bottle says he's going for the win. Season-end video montage.

Wilson has a broken wrist. Wearing a carbon-fiber brace. Gets the pole. With Cameron Steele. Wilson is getting taped. Is fatigue an issue? Wilson -- Don't know. Give it our best shot going for the win if he can, if not he'll drive for second in the championship.

Nation's Cup -- France has clinched. England second. Surfers Paradise recall. Nelson wins. AJ Allmendinger pit fire and then taking the wall. Bourdais smacking Will Power out of the way.

Nelson goes to an orphanage in Mexico City. Giving away some race tickets. Video of the kids and Philippe. Nelson wipes a manly tear.

Mazda Power Play. Cooper Tires will be the official tires of the Atlantics.

Pace laps. Three sweet Mustangs out in front pacing.

Starting lineup: Justin Wilson, Sebastien Bourdais, Bruno Junqueira, Will Power, Ryan Briscoe, Speedy Dan Clarke, Oriol Servia, Alex Tagliani, David Martinez, Nelson Philippe, Mario Dominguez, Charles Zwolsman, Katherine Legge, Buddy Rice, Antonio Pizzonia, Andrew Ranger, Jan Heylen, Andreas Wirth.

Cameras onboard with the pace car, Justin Wilson, Mario Dominguez, Andrew Ranger. Ranger is also sporting the Visor Cam.

DD - race track is long and fast. Turns 14-15-16 are a first-gear chicane and then 200 mph down to turn 1. Have the circus music ready. We're going 66 laps, 185 miles. Two pit stops. Pit windows right around Lap 18 and 40.

Yo tango cerveza! Let's light this candle. We are green-green-green.

Holy sideways! Katherine Legge is sideways. She's into the inside wall even before the start finish. She's noseless. Replays. Katherine Legge moving to the right side, Dominguez already there (in back fo her) and they touched. Legge into the wall. This is all before the line. What Dominguez, who started two in front of Katherine was doing back there, I have no idea. Either he fell back or Katherine moved up, obviously. Briscoe in to the pits to get a flat replaced. May have hit debris. Dominguez in. Left front suspension is trashed.

Replay of Katherine going end-over-end into the kink at Road America. Video of her coming out of the infield medical center afterwards like it was no big thing.

Jan -- Briscoe -- tire had gone down. Checked the suspension. No damage found.

Mario into the pit. Damaged toe link on the left front. Busting out the wrenches. Looks like a long repair. Katherine coming around sans nose. Checking suspension. Getting the new nose out. New nose on. Legge out. Lost at least a lap.

Bruno interview. He wants to win this year. My viewing is enhanced.

Restart while at commercial! I should have been watching Race Director -- no commercials!

Bourdais has a major run on Wilson right off the green. He's got him on the inside. Bourdais leads. Wilson let him go because he's not an idiot.

DD says Boudais was mad at DD for blaming Bourdais for going mental at Surfers and taking out Will Power. Something about telemetry showing Bourdais' car bottomed out worse than it ever had before, blah blah blah. I guess the car and telemetry decided to try the pass at that point on the track all by itself as well. DD "With that bit of information, if I was wrong, I apologize."

DD calls Wilson "the one-handed wonder."

Video of Bourdais talking about Wilson -- Be hard if his hand cramps up. Wish we could battle fair and square.

Speedy Dan pits. May have issues.

Dominguez back out. Dan back on pit road. Engine issues. Listening in on Dan's radio. Can't undersand a word he's saying. Many hand gestures as he talks from the cockpit.

DD gives Martinez a shout out. Briscoe is moving up.

Jan with Jeremy Dale -- Team president for RuSPORT and Justin Wilson. -- Restarts are tough here. Long straight away. Bourdais got a tow on the restart and passed us. Wrist is fine. He's done an exceptional job. So proud of him. Can't say enough about him.

Wilson is 1.5 seconds back. If he finishes seventh or better he gets second in the points.

Lap 10 -- Bourdais, Wilson, Junk, Power, Tag, Nelson, Martinez, Pizzonia.

Onboard with Ranger. Briscoe is right up on Rice's ass. Holy Battle of former IRL drivers.

DD- Rice is having issues with his brakes. Not used to them. Way different than his IRL Dallara. Briscoe passes Rice for 10th. Briscoe now around Ranger. He's on the move.

Briscoe interview -- Run within the limits of what the car can do we may get on the podium. Get experience on full tanks. Do as well as he can.

Dan Clarke is out. BLOWN UP, Sir! Differential is junk. Dan gives out hugs in the pits.

Lap 12 -- Briscoe passes Pizzonia.

Cameron with Speedy Dan. Sucking on the water bottle again. Doesn't know what was up with the car. After all the yellow the engine started braking on down shifts. Radio disconnected. Couldn't hear. Carmeron: Thanks. Dan: Is that it? Cameron: That's it. Dan: Thought I'd get to gripe a bit.

Ranger locks his right side tires coming into the bus stop about every time. Major lock ups. Pizzonia also locks them up here and there. Pizzonia is slow through the esses.

Lap 14 - Rice pitting. Going the old "alternate pit strategy" route. Clean stop. He's out. Buddy's coverage during this one CCWS race has now exceeded the race coverage he got all season in the IRL. Buddy has to get onto the whole red sidewall thing.

Briscoe pits early. Briscoe is running about .6 of a second slower than the front runners.

Double D points out that Wilson has a busted wrist. Screw in one of his bones. Ballsy/risky move to drive.

Ranger pits on Lap 17.

Wilson looking inside Bourdais. DD points out that Wilson has been the fastest car all weekend. Not surprised to see him catching Bourdais. Rick says maybe Wilson let Bourdais pass for the lead and is saving himself for the late fight.

Bourdais Bold Moves Moment montage! Come from behind at Houston. Wins on an oval at Milwaukee. Ran in the rain at Montreal. Won the title at Surfers.

In car with Mario. Replay of lap 1 wreck.

Lap 23 -- Wilson passes Bourdais for the lead at the end of the front stretch. What the? Bourdais passed on the track! Media alerted. He may be having rear tire issues. Bridgestone red sidewalls may be going away.

Bruno in. Complained of understeer. Bourdais will be in soon for black sidewalls. Wilson stretching out on Bourdais. Bourdais pits. Two crew members are changing tires with food poisoning.

Wilson comes in after running an extra lap than Bourdais. Gets out in front of Bourdais. But Bourdais is right on him. Everybody is pitting for the harder Bridgestone blacks. Team Australia cars are 1-2 briefly with Power in the lead as others pit, but they're coming in soon.

Lap 24 -- Holy flying rubber! Briscoe has shredded his right front. It's stuck with a gaping hole showing at the top. He's still going around the track so no full-course yellow.

Wirth and Power almost collide on pit lane. Wirth has his head out and swerved right into an empty pit box to avoid Power. Props to him for the evasive action.

Lap 25 -- Tag leads and then pits.

Jan reports rain drops. Looks like we got rain starting. Wilson three seconds ahead of Bourdais. Briscoe replay. Rick says the blow out has to be from drebris or flat-spotting.

Andy Ranger helmet came shows how bad it's raining. DD - "This (rain) will put the cat among the pigeons." He has to have a stockpile of Dalyisms that he just pulls out whenever.

Down to Bridgestone's Al Speyer with Jan. I think they have Bourdais' rear red tires, the ones he had on when he got passed by Wilson. Jan -- what up? No wear bars left at all. These are shot. Al -- That's why we come here to race. Next year come back with a better tire. Briscoe flat spotted it and finally let go coming down the main straight. Jan predicts people will becoming in soon for rain tires.

Lap 28 -- Drivers say it's raining in the back straight. Teams start preparing to get the rain tires out. Tell drivers to come in when they think they need them.

DD - Rain. What will this do to Buddy Rice? Buddy Rice montage! Atlantics in 1999 and 2000. Won title in 2000.

Lap 31 -- Massive pitting for rain tires. Raining harder now. Lap 33 -- Wilson pits for rain tires, Bourdais stays out. He's a death cheater, that Bourdais! DD is incredulous. Bourdais will pit next lap and hope he can get back out in front of Justin. DD thinks Bourdais has lost time to Wilson. Wilson just flew by.

Video of Bruno. Racing to hold onto his ride, according to Rick. Raining like crazy now. Bruno montage. This season he's had a pole and four top fives.

Ranger helmet cam. Much spray.

Half way. Recap. Katherine Legge into the fence on the restart. Katherine and Mario both smacked. Ranger gets major air. Former ice racer. Used to the slick conditions. More Ranger Helmet cam.

Lap 40 -- Wilson is now six seconds in front of Bourdais. But, Bourdais was a full second faster on lap 40. Will Power short cuts a chicane in the esses.

Cristiano da Matta is back in Brazil. Now can drive his regular passenger car. Doing very well.

Tag may be auditioning for a job next season. Team Australia may field two Australian drivers. Briscoe (an Australian) may end up there. Nelson Philippe goes through the grass in the esses.

Lap 43, Buddy passed by Oriol. Rice gets out of the throttle enough to fall in about eight inches behind Oriol. DD -- all engines have pop-off valves. Since 1979 had pop-offs. New Champ Car engine has none. Electronics do the same job.

Andreas Wirth is holding up people. Not sure what his issue is. Champ Car trying to get him out of the way. Wirth gets the blue flag.

Tracy mini-montage. Nine top 10s this season.

Katherine Legge is putting down some serious times with the rain tires. Last lap was 1:39.5, about what the leaders are posting.

Helmet cam! Mario's left front changer guy wearing the helmet cam. Fablous.

Lap 46 -- Wirth gets black flagged for failing to yield to faster leaders. Has to do a drive-through.

Lap 47 -- Power is working on Bruno for 3rd. Got it. Passed Bruno for P3.

Wilson is now pulling away from Bourdais. Adding seconds.

Lap 53 -- Bourdais is 6.67 seconds behind Wilson. Legge puts up a 1:39.2. Driving like she's enraged. Justin Wilson pitting. Final stop. Clean. Bourdais stays out to try to stretch it out and come out of his stop at least close to Wilson.

11 laps to go. Bourdais tells his pit that his tires will last to the end. Bourdais is the one-word answer guy on the radio. Will the tires last? Bourdais -- "Yes." Derek says that means Bourdais will come in for a splash and go at the end giving him a better chance of catching Wilson. "This is good stoof here."

Graham Rahal gets air! Gonna drive with some Champ Car team next year, just not sure which. Big talk that it may be Newman Haas. Third car or bye-bye Bruno?

10 to go. Bourdais, Wilson, Will Power, Tag, Bruno, Nelson, Oriol, Andy Ranger, Buddy Rice, Martinez.

Lap 57 -- Bourdais will pit. Gonna be a fist fight. Bourdais in. Splash and go. No tires. Wilson blows passed the pits and takes the lead just as Bourdais is coming out on cold tires.

Derek is on the Power to Pass himself -- "This is going to be a straight fight now."

8 to go. Can Bourdais catch Wilson? Bourdais is 4.5 back but gaining. Derek -- This good stoof here. Rice is 7th but still has to pit.

Lap 58 -- Derek gives his ode to the circa 1970 pop-off valve on the Cosworths again. You can see it on the rear view of an in-car camera. Gone after today since the new engine doesn't have a pop-off valve. Derek is going to miss it.

Down to Jan with the perpetually optimistic Craig Hampson. Hampson says not changing tires at the end was a coin toss. Boudais made the call. Justin done heck of a job. Thinks it will end Wilson-Bourdais.

Lap 61 -- Bourdais is on it. He's cut Wilson's lead down to 2.7 seconds.

Lap 62 -- Ranger (a lap down) goes wide. Let's Bourdais pass. Class move.

DD is on fire. "It's a dog fight. It is a straight fight. The decks are clear, go at it boys. Go at it boys."

Now Bourdais is just .926 seconds back. You can almost hear DD breathing into a bag in the booth. The moment calls out for a "hold onto your hollyhocks" but Derek won't give it to us. He's teasing us. Refusing to give us what we want.

Coming out of the 1st-gear at the chicane before the front straight. Bourdais goes for a pass on the outside. What the? Mashing the power to pass. How do you say "massive balls" in French? Both cars get a little fishy coming out of the Peraltada. Not going to work though. Justin holds tight and fends off Bourdais.

Two to go. Both are on the power to pass down the straight. Wilson is now .74 seconds ahead.

White flag. Boudais is on Wilson's ass, big time. Bourdais is out of power to pass.

Holy slide job! Bourdais tosses his car inside, bounces onto the curb and the ass gets squirrely hip checking Wilson out of the way. Body check city. Bourdais leads. DD -- "Looked like a bit of a Paul-Tracy-like move." Wilson locks up the brakes through the bus stop a few seconds later. He's toast.

Derek declares it a legit pass. Borderline. Replay. Banzai! Dirt-track slide job. Up over the curb, the ass of Bourdais' car slides out, hip checks Wilson out of the way. Stewards may take a look. Don't hold your breath on them taking a victory away on such a close call.

Finish -- Bourdais, Wilson, Power, Junk, Tag, Servia, Nelson, Andy Ranger, Martinez and Rice.

Bourdais is a 7-time winner. Batting .500 for the year (7 wins out of 14 races). Props to Wilson the One-Hand Wonder for putting up a major battle with AJ gone to NASCAR and Tracy recovering from his stunt driving.

Cameron with Hampson after the victory. Hampson says he doesn't think Bourdais has enough to win it (kidding). Really says he thinks Wilson was struggling at the end. Maybe the wrist. He was off the pace a bit.

Will Power is third. First-ever podium for him. Recalling Power going ass-first into the barrier at Edmonton and almost killing a camera guy (who, by the way, hung in there to get the video before finally bailing out at the last second. Major cajones on the camera guy).

Justin (pictured left) -- I was just hanging on the last 10 to 12 laps. Just couldn't hang on for the last lap. Wasn't surprised that Bourdais went for the pass. Quite a bit of contact. "I didn't think it was completely on, but, you know, I'll give it to him." Steering wheel snapped around a bit. (Wilson declines to call it a wanker move. Says it was right on the line between legit and punk-like. Doesn't seem pissy about it at all. Huge shout out for his post-race interview conduct.)

Jan with Bourdais. Says hi to wife Claire who is back home expecting a child. Bourdais -- That was a tought deal. But I didn't want to take Wilson out. Went side-by-side, touched a little. Pretty sure wheel-to-sidepod should be all right. I made up for a big mistake I made trying to catch him earier in the race (a spin-o-rama that TV didn't catch). When it started raining he started catching him.

Bourdais motage. Wins half the races on the year. Season's over. Tune in to see the DP01 make its big debut in April 8, 2007 at Viva Las Vegas. As a special race weekend event, Paul Tracy will jump some haulers with a golf cart! (Kidding.)

Tracy Mulls Snake River Cannon Jump

It's seem silly to have to say this, but 99% of everything below is made up.

Champ Car World Series veteran Paul Tracy is preparing to jump the Snake River Cannon in a golf cart, according to sources close to the driver.

Speculation has swirled since the weekend of Nov. 4 when Tracy (show at right modeling a possible jumping costume) broke his shoulder blade in an accident in his home town of Las Vegas.

Initial reports had Tracy getting hammered and trying to jump a golf cart over sand dunes. Later Tracy said he was "playing around with an ATV that I own and it just got a little out of hand; I flipped it over and it landed on top of me."

The injury will cause Tracy to miss the Champ Car season finale Nov. 12 in Mexico City.

Sources close to Tracy said the golf cart story is closer to the truth. For months Tracy has been working with super-modified golf carts in an effort to match the glory of Tracy's idol, Evel Knievel. Friends of Tracy who asked not to be named said the Forsythe driving star was testing out some JATO (jet-assisted take-off) tubes recently mounted on his golf cart.

"He was all right coming off the first dune, but then I think he might have hit a bird or something and the cart just drifted on him," said one witness to the accident. "Landed kind of on the front corner. Could have been a lot worse. Thank God it was sand. When we ran over to him he was saying something about 'goddamn bad aero package.' He was pretty delirious."

Knievel launched his mega-stunt bus-jumping career on New Year's Day 1968 by crashing in an attempt to clear the fountains at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. On Sept. 8, 1974 Knievel tried to jump the Snake River Canyon in Idaho in a specially constructed rocket powered "Skycycle" that looked a lot like a plain old rocket. Even though he cleared the quarter mile wide chasm, strong winds blew the malfunctioning parachute back into the canyon, landing just a few feet from the angry Snake River.

Tracy apparently is on a mission to avenge Knievel's Snake River failure, but in a super modified rocket-powered golf cart. Insiders said Tracy got the idea for his second career after his brief experience in the stunt-focused, high-showmanship world of NASCAR.

Another story that Tracy was injured when he tried to prevent someone from passing him during a golf cart/ATV race could not be confirmed. The theory seemed to lose plausibility when sources confirmed that Tracy nemesis Sebastien Bourdais was miles from Las Vegas at the time of the crash.

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pressdog Lauches Free Danica! Campaign

Photo: Shawn Payne and Indy Racing League
Reacting angrily to rumors of oppressive sponsor behavior, pressdog today formally launched a "Free Danica!" campaign.

"It's just wrong man," said obscure racing blogger pressdog. "Danica wants to run the Daytona test so she should be able to run the Daytona test. I mean, why is everyone getting so knotted up about it? You know what that is? It's The Man, bringing her down. We gotta stick it to the man."

Reaction came after IRL sponsor darling Danica Patrick had to drop out of a test of a Daytona prototype car for the 24 hours of Daytona. Danica had been slated to participate along with Champ Car rookie Katherine Legge and Rolex series regular Milka Dumo. The prospect of having three fast women on the track at once had put the blogosphere into a brief-but-intense frenzy.

When the all-knowing IRL insider kings from www.tracksideonline.com said in a podcast that Danica's inability to participate was probably a "sponsor conflict," the blogosphere reacted. (Open your iTunes and sign up for the free tracksideonline pod cast right now and then go briskly to www.tracksideoline.com and sign up for their news service. Do it now.)

Sponsors often times put pressure on their high-profile drivers/celebrities to not participate in something when they thinking it may make a competing company look good. Speculation in Danica's case focused on her sponsor, Honda, which participates in the American Le Mans Series, having a cow when it heard that Danica was going to participate in something that would draw attention to a rival league.

"Dude, Danica has to live her life, OK?," pressdog said. "Maybe all the sponsors should chill. Pretty soon the woman can't even make a phone call unless it's on a Motorola phone or something goofy like that. FREE DANICA NOW."

pressdog insiders said they had heard Danica was "totally pumped" to do the test and then The Man came down on her.

"It's just not right. Drive and let drive, I say," pressdog said. Plans include sending tersely worded notes to her sponsors, thinking positive thoughts about Danica and buying a Jay Z album in her honor.

Sponsors reached for comment on the Free Danica! movement said, "press-who? Never heard of him, or it, or whatever."
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Jeff of IRL Lays Down Some ROI Smack

Our boy Jeff at My Name is IRL is laying down some smack about the Indy Racing League's apparent indifference to the incredibly negative ROI that comes from sponsoring many of its teams. The lack of real steps to help reduce the cost of competing (competing for the win, not just showing up to finish behind Ganassi and Penske) makes us wonder if everyone at IRL HQ is drinking cheap Scotch all day or what.

Check Jeff immediately. Go on Jeff, you tell 'em. Get down with your bad self.

The Iceman Spaketh

The blogosphere cried out for a few, measured words from Scott Dixon (left), who responded by talking about Honda power, Kiwi beer and his stoic demeanor. Mega props to Ganassi PR Czarina Pat for getting these 100%, swear-to-God real answers from the freakishly fast New Zealander who won the 2003 Indy Racing League points championship.

pressdog: You seem eerily calm before, during and after the race. What's up with that? Do you go back to the trailer and scream and yell and fist pump when nobody is looking or is the calm guy just the Real Scott Dixon?

Dixon: That's just me. I don't take life too seriously... we don't get out of it alive.

pressdog: Are you aware that your nickname among the blog freaks is "the Iceman?" How do you feel about the name?

Iceman: Cool.

pressdog: After winning the title, how tough was it to be on the Toyota Slow Train in 2005? How great was it to be back up to speed in 2006?

Dixon: Funny story. My first test with a Honda engine was at Phoenix. I hit the throttle coming out of the pits and my first impression about the engine was "This is like cheating!" They asked Dan Wheldon his impressions. (pressdog note: Dan won in 2005 with a super-tweaked, factory team Honda so he was use to mega power. But the 2006 Honda was distributed to all teams and therefore had toned down power compared to Wheldon's ultra-tuned 2005 engine. So when Wheldon tested the 2006 version of the Honda) ... he was like "There must be something wrong with the engine. This is no where near the power I had last year." The fact that I thought the 2006 Honda was almost illegally fast and Dan thought it was slow gives you an idea of how different the 2005 Toyota and 2005 Honda engines were.

pressdog: What do you think of the IRL schedule for 2007? The perception out here is that you prefer road races over ovals. True or false?

Dixon: True. LOVE street courses. I find them a great challenge over keeping your foot flat around an oval. That can get old.

pressdog: Speaking as a bit of an introvert myself, is it challenging to be teammates with Super Extrovert Dan Wheldon?

Dixon: He’s out there all right. I just sit back and watch him go. At the very least, it is entertaining.

pressdog: Do you read the blogs? Is it true that pressdog is your fav blog?

Dixon: Doesn’t everyone?

pressdog: What's the race scene like in New Zealand ? Dirt tracks? Ovals? Mostly street/road races? Give us a flavah.

Dixon: Pretty cool really. My parents were both dirt trackers. Road tracks mostly. That’s how I got my start. There are even photos out there of me winning my first karting race with a few pillows tied to my arse because I couldn’t reach the pedals! Always a good time.

pressdog: What' the most popular beer in New Zealand?

Dixon: Steinlager probably. Then Speights Gold Medal Ale, Tui, New Zealand Lager, Kiwi Draught. The first beer brewed in New Zealand was made by the order of English explorer Captain Cook in the 18th Century, who believed the nutritional values of beer would help fight scurvy, a disease common to sailors of the time. But then again… do we really need an excuse for beer? (pressdog says: Amen, my Kiwi brother.)

pressdog: I've pounded beers (ok, one beer) with Ganassi IRL PR queen Pat Caporali. She seems cool. What's the real scoop on Pat?

Dixon: Pat drinks beer? Really?!

pressdog: What would be the first thing you would do with your first free moment after winning the Indy 500? (After the milk and the winner circle stuff and the photos.)

Dixon: Probably take a piss. I don’t pee in my firesuit like some others. (pressdog says: Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.)

pressdog: How do you feel abut F1? Dig it? Want a shot at it? Take it or leave it?

Dixon: Had a chance to test a Williams BMW a few times. I’d take it but not just to go in circles. I’d want to be competitive.

pressdog: Unifying the IRL and Champ Car. Good idea? Bad idea? What's your view?

Dixon: Has to happen. The sooner the better for everyone concerned.

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Sarah Fisher Wins Kart Endurance Race

Note: Everything below is true. Info courtesy of Sarah Fisher's PR peeps:

Indy Racing League driver and three-time World Karting Association Grand National Champion Sarah Fisher scared up a P1 finish at a 100-mile Halloween Grand Prix karting event in Norway, Ill. Saturday.

Fisher, teaming with her fiancé, Andy O'Gara, took first place in the 30-kart Yamaha Supercan division. The victory comes two weeks after Sarah teamed with Champ Car World Series rookie Katherine Legge at NewCastle MotorSports Park for a go-kart endurance race. Fisher and Legge finished 31st in that race after a broken chain forced extensive repairs.

“I had so much fun this weekend as I partnered with my fiancé, Andy, to compete in the 100 mile endurance race in Norway,” said Fisher. “The speedway really has a great facility and it is a really nice place to race at. It’s a really fast track yet is very technical which I love! You can go through the corners with momentum and you really have to utilize your skills to hang onto it. I’ve been entering as many races during the off-season as I can to get experience on the road courses to prepare myself for 2007. Go-karts really teach and hone your skills as they have a lot of the elements the big cars use. I definitely want to take my brother-in-law, Kyle, there and run him to get some additional experience. It’s a great place to teach someone about the line.”

Fisher has said her off-season will include a trip to Skip Barber school to continue to develop her road racing skills.

IRL Stunned to Learn of the Existence of Dreyer & Reinbold Racing

Note: Below is satire. Fiction.

Indy Racing League officials were stunned Sunday to learn that Dreyer & Reinbold Racing has been a racing in the league for years.

"We were having one of our three-a-daily meetings with Andretti Green Racing -- you know, to make sure they had enough sponsorship money and Danica was happy -- and they kept mentioning this 'Dreyer and Reinbold Racing' team," said an IRL official who declined to be named. "At first we thought it was an American LeMans Series team or something."

When news stories surfaced last week that DRR was considering moving to Champ Car in 2007, league officials apparently put two and two together.

"When the media called us for comment about one of 'our' teams moving to Champ Car, at first we were stunned," the IRL official said. "Then we checked into it a little bit and come to find out we do have a team known as Dreyer and Reinbold. Go figure."

Now that the league has discovered DRR, it was unclear how it would react.

"We're not sure, frankly," the official said. "We're not even sure where these DRR people are located. We'll have to get with Ganassi, AGR and Penske to see if DRR going to Champ Car would adversely effect them."

When contacted for comment, DRR officials said the league last talked to team leaders "sometime in mid-2004." As DRR officials recalled it, "it was a good meeting, once we got them to stop calling us Reyer and Deinbold."

Indy Racing League Embraces "Niche Strategy" for 2007

Note to the humorless. Everything below is satire. Stuff made up in order to express an opinion.

The Indy Racing League officials Tuesday confirmed they are abandoning their quest for mass appeal and instead "going after targeted, incredibly tiny and potentially somewhat profitable" audiences.

"We've tried filling barns like Texas Motor Speedway and who are we kidding?" said an Indy Racing League official who asked not to be named. "No matter how many posters of Danica we put up around town we're not going to fill that place. So we decided to do some very target marketing."

For example, an internal IRL memo obtained by pressdog cites research indicating "97% of all American race fans would rather undergo unmedicated dental surgery than watch a street/road race."

"Where others would see a negative -- street/road races are wildly unpopular with a huge majority of American fans -- we saw opportunity," said an IRL insider. "Those three percent who would choose watching a road race over unmedicated dental surgery, they represent tens of hundreds of dollars in disposable income that we hope will be spent on the sponsors who pay millions to be on our cars."

Internal IRL memos also indicate that the league has launched "Operation Key Audiences," the code name for offering races that appeal to key audiences who support the league.

"We got St. Petersburg for the Andrettis, Belle Isle for Roger Penske and Mid-Ohio for Honda," said a league source. "We're in preliminary discussions to race around Chip Ganassi's private residence, perhaps on one of his children's birthdays, but that probably won't happen until 2008."

League officials justified Operation Key Audiences by saying "Andretti, Penske, Honda -- those three groups make up about 76% of the non-George Family revenue for the IRL right now, so it's a good move to keep them happy."

League officials were unconcerned that huge sections of the IRL's already dwindling fan base would rather "hit themselves in the foot repeatedly with a hammer" rather than watch more road racing.

In a related move, the league indicated they were working toward a marketing approach that seems to work for public lotteries. Such a model would ask fans to watch every race on the extremely remote chance that their favorite driver might actually win.

"OK, sure, if you're a fan of a driver like, say, Buddy Rice, you're probably going to get hit by lightning before he wins," said yet another insider. "But what if he does win and you're not watching? You'd totally be kicking yourself. Look at last year. By the third race it was apparent Penske and Ganassi were going to win virtually every race. But suckers still tuned in every time to see if by some fluke chance someone else might win. We figure we can do that for at least another year before everyone gets sick of watching the same guys win all the time."

Elsewhere in open-wheel racing, the Champ Car World Series announced that, thanks to its aggressive cost-cutting measures including the new Panoz DP01 chassis, sponsors for their series will now see a return on investment of negative 40%, which is up dramatically from the negative 60% ROI of recent years.

Don't miss the pressdog! Sign up to be notified when this blog is updated (usually once or twice a week). Go to the home page and use the form at the top right. The pressdog mailing list is double secret and won't be sold, leased, loaned or even spoken of in public.

Notes from the TV broadcast of the Champ Car World Series in Surfers Paradise, Australia

Notes taken during the international broadcast of the Champ Car World Series Lexmark Indy 300 in Surfers Paradise, Queensland, Australia.

(Note: grabbed the replay of the race off Champ Car's most excellent "Race Director" -- go to www.champcar.ws and sign up for it right now! -- and it was the international broadcast version. No Derek Daly and Rick Benjamin! Some dudes named Jeremy Shaw and Jamie Hinchliffe. So no Dalyisms this time! Bummer.)

pressdog beer of the race has to be a Foster's because it's "Awstrawlyun for beeah."

Bourdais and AJ are the only two with a shot at the points title. Bourdais says he may play it conservative especially on Surfers infamous, car-eating first corner. AJ says he's going for the win. Has to win and get a Bourdais DNF to have a shot.

Video of AJ's mashed car as a result of finding the wall in practice. Video of Bourdais getting the left half of his car ripped off when hitting a barrier.

Will Power of Team Australia is on the pole. Extreme excitement. He thanks Derrick Walker and the posse. Hopes to get through turn 1 on race day.

Starting lineup: Will Power (!), Sebastien Bourdais, Paul Tracy, Bruno Junqueira, Nelson Philippe (!), Oriol Servia, AJ "The Truck Driver" Allmendinger, Speedy Dan Clarke, Alex Tagliani, Mario Dominguez, Ryan Briscoe, Andy Ranger, Antonio Pizzonia, Jan "Van" Heylen, Charles "Chuck" Zwolsman, Katherine Legge, Adreas Wirth. 17 cars on a nearly THREE MILE track. I hope the audience brought a book to read during the vast expanses of nothingness going on in front of them. Wait a second, they all have lots of beer. Problem solved.

Justin Wilson is out with a broken wrist. Busted it in practice when he hit a tire wall and the steering wheel snapped around. Ryan Briscoe is in the 10 car. That was last driven by Cristianio "What's" da Matta until he hit a deer at Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin in early August. I still can't get over it being a DEER he hit. WTF? A deer on the track? Nutty. da Matta is back in Brazil recovering. This is the first race with a sub in his car. Briscoe is from Australia and most recently raced in the Indy Racing League (holy cross-over driver!).

Last year 316,000 people attended over three days of the event in Surfers Paradise. Weather today cooler than usual. Wind has switched entirely around.

Let's light this candle. Throw another Foster's on the ice bucket because we are green-green-green.

WTF? We are yellow yellow yellow. The first 7 cars were in tight two-wide formation but then there was about a one-hundred-yard gap back to the next group so the starter waved it off. We'll go around (which under yellow at Surfers takes about five minutes) and try again.

Restart coming. Single file? WTF? Bogus restart. Champ Car wimps out and starts them single-file to prevent carnage in turn 1. Nice. I guess we're not all professionals here. Jan Beekhuis is deployed and said Champ Car made the call to go single file to avoid having carbon fiber all over the place.

If Bourdais gets 9th or better today he wins the title. If three or more cars fall out of the race he wins the title. Jan predicts if three cars drop out Bourdais will start charging.

Lap 3 -- Power leads. Lap 19 is the first pit window and then lap 38. We're going 59 laps unless there are too many yellows and Champ Car gets the stop watch out. Surfers has had 15 different winners in 15 years of events. Bourdais, Bruno and Tracy have all won at Surfers Paradise previously.

Lap 6 -- AJ working on Oriol. Heading toward the front. Gotta win to have any chance.

Andy Ranger Helmet Cam deployed. Not us useless as usual. Usually you can't see squat from Helmet Cam, but they have it aimed a lot better this time.

Lap 7 -- Nelson is pressuring Bruno. Welcome to the Block Party! Bruno puts his ass out to block Nelson. Much reaction in the booth.

Lap 8 -- AJ around Oriol. Oriol gives him room and doesn't Bruno (block) him. Jan reports that Oriol said his car was "harsh" so far this weekend. Very stiff.

Lap 9 -- Katherine spin-o-ramma! Stalls it. Turn 8. Local yellow. Benefit of having a massive track and 17 cars is you can have local yellows because you probably have time to drink a beer before the next car comes by. Crew is scurrying to pull Katherine back to where they can get her restarted.

Speedy Dan working on Oriol. Oriol not having a fab day so far.

Replay of K. Legge's spin. Goes into the corner too wide, hits the breaks, gets it stopped but stalls it.

Lap 10 -- AJ closing on Bruno. AJ vs. Bruno. Block Party II! Bruno makes himself wide again. Much lamenting in the booth.

Lap 12-ish. Chuck Zwolsman pits. He's on a Freaky Deaky Dutch Pit Strategy, apparently.

AJ gets past Bruno. Much speculating that Bruno let him go to avoid getting barked at by race control for blocking.

Lap 13 -- AJ closing in on Nelson. Front three (Power, Bourdais, Tracy) are out front, then about five seconds back to Nelson in 4th.

Holy Crap. Nacho Tracy goes around Bourdais on the outside (right side) going into a left-hand turn. Too easy! Maybe Bourdais screwed up or thought better of taking on Tracy with the championship to win. Many replays.

Lap 14 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Speedy Dan into the wall. Full course yellow. Dan is done. He was 8th at the time.

Many aerial replays of the Tracy pass on Bourdais. Might have been a bit of contact.

Pits are open. Here comes the bum rush. Everyone is pitting.

Tracy hip checks Power coming out of his pit stall. WE GOT FIRE. AJ takes off with the fuel hose in his car and touches off a methanol fire. Wild water throwing everywhere. Cue the circus music.

Replays -- Tracy comes about straight sideways out of his pit and smacks into Power who was in the fast lane. Nice. Then Tracy almost nails Bourdais on the rebound. Dude, always keep an eye on Tracy. I think they just tell the drivers that in the drivers' meeting. "And, of course, everyone should always be aware of where Paul is and keep an eye on him."

Video of AJ going around the track with the fuel hose dangling off his car.

AJ back in to get the hose taken off. Long stop. Casual. AJ stalls it. Got waved out and stalled it.

More pit replays. Briscoe may have darted Mario a bit as well. Reports that AJ's fueler was on fire. It was quickly extinguished, however. Thank heaven for Nomex.

Lap 16 -- Van Heylen and Zwolsman are 1-2 because they did not pit. Then it's Powers, Bourdais, Tracy, Nelson, Oriol, Tagliani, Briscoe, Ranger, Mario.

Tracy pits again so he'll drop back in the field.

Lap 16 -- green. Briscoe and Legge spin and are stalled. Not sure if the spins were related. May be turn 8 again for Katherine. Local yellow again. Props to the crews for getting out the local yellows and not going full course all the damn time.

Lap 20 -- Speaking of, full-course yellow yellow yellow. AJ is into the wall. Just came in to a corner too hot and smucked the wall.

With AJ and Wilson out, Bourdais wins the championship. Holy Anti Climax. Bourdais first racer in 60 years to win three in a row.

Video of AJ going around Bruno before sliding it into the wall. AJ has five wins in 8 starts with Forsythe. Not too shabby. That makes him one of the hotter prospects in NASCAR's feeder system (all of open-wheel racing).

Lap 23 -- GREEN. Zwolsman slows WAY up and then puts the hammer down to get a jump on everyone on the restart.

Jan says with the championship in the bag, look for Bourdais to get after it. Also, Tracy's darting of Power in the pit busted off the Power's car's tire flugelhorn. Downforce affected.

Many minutes of Ranger's helmet cam.

Lap 26 -- report that AJ's fueler is fine. Video of what I think as Katherine Legge and Ryan Briscoe diving under Van Heylen for the pass.

Jan with Bourdais manager Craig Hampson. Hampson sounds happy. Rare. Doesn't claim the team may be screwed. Said they plan to race harder now that the title is locked up.

Lap 28 -- Bourdais making a run on Power. Inside and into some oil dry on the track. Locks up the tires. He's not going to make the turn and slides in front of Power clipping Power's front end before Bourdais goes off into the run off. WTF? Nice place to pass, Sebastien. Bourdais keeps it running and whips it around and gets back out on the track. Power looks damaged but manages to get it going again too.

Power is now stuck. Against the wall. Sucks to be him. Safety guys get him back under way and Power limps around to the pits. Crew Chief Helmet Cam as they work on Power. Send him back out. Have to have him come back in to get a piece on the front end replaced.

Jan with Derrick Walker -- Sebastien tried to make the pass. Bit of a bone-head move to overtake there. Ruin the whole bloody day for us and him.

Lap 31 -- green next lap.

Oriol, Nelson, Tag, Ranger, Paul Tracy, Wirth, Mario, Chuck, Bourdais.

Lap 32 -- green. Zwolsman clips wall. Keeps going. No yellow.

Lap 34 -- Bourdais gets a penalty for "avoidable contact." Will have to drive through the pits soon. PT is all over Tag.

Jan reports that Craig Hampson was OK with the penalty.

Nelson around Oriol. Oriol locks up the breaks and smacks Nelson. No damage to either car, apparently. Nelson immediately checks out. He's GONE. Now Tag is around Oriol. Then Tracy is around Oriol. Replay. Tracy puts a dirt-track-esque "slide job" on Oriol. Puts his car under Oriol and then slides it about sideways to maintain the position and get around the corner.

Lap 38 -- Bourdais pits after setting fastest lap. Nelson is way out in front.

Jan with AJ. AJ says congrats to Bourdais. Not sure what happened in the pits. The fire burned out all the sensors in the car. Eventually the rear locked up and put him into the wall.

Lap 39 and 40. Much pitting. Zwolsman stalls it in the pits.

Lap 41 -- Tracy leads. Tracy sets fastest lap. Tracy is stretching it out in front of P2 Nelson. Tracy pits. Gets out in front of Nelson.

Lap 44 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Van Heylen into the tire barrier on turn 12. Oriol is out of the race. Black flagged for spraying something.

Nelson is in front of Tracy. ??? When did that happen? Nobody seems to know.

Lap 47 -- Now Katherine is into the wall gain. Third time today. Nose is toast. This one is terminal. Not sure if it happened at the same time as Heylen or under yellow.

Pizzonia leads but he still must pit. Then Nelson and then Tracy.

Carl Haas with the bratwurst-diameter cigar gets air.

Race control is eyeballing whether or not Tracy passed Mario under the yellow. Yep, he did. Tracy must let Mario pass before we go back to green.

Lap 49 -- green.

Mario takes a look inside Nelson. They get about an inch apart but no contact. Video of PT shortcutting the chicanes. Didn't gain a position on Mario so maybe no harm no foul. Now race control is telling PT he has to give up a position. WTF? Tagliani was about four seconds behind Tracy. Sha. Later Tracy claimed it was a fix to get a Team Australia car on the podium. Naaaaaaa. Stuff like that would never go on in auto racing.

Lap 52 -- Pizzonia pits. Gives up the lead to Nelson Philippe with 7 to go. Nelson is shitting toothpicks.

6 to go. 5 to go. Mario all up in Nelson's business. 4 to go. Mario has one shot of Power to Pass and Nelson has zero. Helmet cam with Ranger. Why go to Helmet Cam now when we have a race for the lead? No idea. They just love helmet cam, I guess.

3 to go. 2 to go. White flag. Mario can't get him. Went for it, got squirrellly and had to back off. Game over.

Nelson wins. Becomes the youngest winner in Champ Car history. Does donuts in about every corner of the race. Sets record for most donuts in most places on a single race track.

Bourdais goes off into a run off during the cool down laps. ???

Bourdais out of his car. AJ comes over to congratulate him. Bourdais says something like he wished they could have settled it on the track (rather than have AJ crash.) Class on both sides of that exchange. Very happy. Says this was the worst day of his career in Champ Car but glad to win the title. Irony.

Nelson (on the podium with the the Champ Car Australia Grid Girl queen, left) out of his car. Amazing. Fabulous. Great pit stops. Kept it off the wall. Absolutely fabulous.

Grab some Cerveza Tecate and tune in to the next race: Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez - Mexico City, Mexico. 3 p.m. eastern on SPEED.

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Sarah Fisher Gives Her PR Guy and Katherine Legge Props

Sarah Fisher PR Czar Klint Briney poses with his boss at a go-kart track during a team outing. Rumor has it soon after this picture was taken Sarah gave Klint a serious smackdown on the track.

Open-wheel driver and three-time World Karting Association Grand National Champion Sarah Fisher today refused to confirm rumors that she gave her PR Czar Klint Briney a serious spanking on the track during a recent team outing.

"Klint is as cool as a pr/marketing guy can get," said Sarah in a quote I am not making up. "He isn't afraid to try his hand at some karting even if he knows he won't be the quickest. We had a ton of fun for sure and that is what its all about."

With Sarah refusing to go on record as to how bad she lapped our boy Klint (shown in full Pit Stallion Mode at right) -- and instead giving him a shout out -- we fired in five more questions about the budding friendship across party lines between Sarah and Champ Car rookie Katherine Legge. Shout out to Klint for getting these 100% genuine answers from Sarah.

1) Have you met and hung out with Katherine and are you tight now?

Sarah: "I hadn't spent much time with Katherine before this past weekend (Oct. 14 and 15 during a karting endurance race) other then occasional appearances that overlapped. She is a really cool person and really down to earth. I would look forward to doing other events with her in the future."

2) Any truth to the rumor that you two are calling your team "team pressdog?"

Sarah: "No, I think it was Team MKPGP." (pressdog gets faced!)

3) Anything you can do to get this whole unification thing going between IndyCar ChampCar?

Sarah: "Not as one person. It's a solution that only the big guys can come up with. Of course, I would certainly volunteer to help because I love open-wheel racing and want to see it succeed."

4) Will you hit up Katherine for any tips and advice on big-car road racing?

Sarah: "Drivers will always share experiences and if something pops in my head that I want to ask, certainly I will."

5) How do you think Katherine would do on a dirt track? Maybe you two could hang at Knoxville in 2007 for the grand nationals. Bring Erin Crocker along or Danica?

Sarah (pictured to the right in a sprint car circa 1998): "I think a good race car driver can drive anything with the right teaching on technique and time. So, if it is enjoyable and you like it then you will study harder to find the right technique. She would definitely have fun in a sprint car! We'll see, schedules for 2007 are packed and I want to do a collection of racing besides what I might get to do in the IRL. Certainly if I am not in a car, I would go cheer her on at one of her races!"

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Team pressdog Hits the Road, Team Officials Fume

Team pressdog (Katherine Legge, left, and Sarah Fisher) hit the road this week after finishing 31st in a 56-kart, 200-mile endurance go-kart endurance race last week in New Castle, Ind.

A broken chain forced the KatFish kart into the pits for extensive repairs and led to the P31 showing. Team pressdog officials were reportedly hot over the dissing of Champ Car's Legge in the photo gallery on the Indy Racing League's official site.

"Yeah, they got some photos of Sarah and Katherine up there and Katherine is always in her helmet. WTF? Like she's some kind of unknown Karting Power Ranger or something," said a team official who declined to be named. "What is that? Can't have a photo of a driver from the 'Dark Side' on the IRL site?"

After the race, which was one by some highly fortunate NASCAR guy, team pressdog hit the road. Fisher, who won national championships in road course go-karting, spent years on dirt ovals before heading to the IRL. With five road courses on the IRL schedule next year, Sarah needs practice turning right.

"I'm going to do some Skip Barber off-season training to prepare for road course racing," Fisher said in nonfictional quote. "I have been helping (future brother-in-law) Kyle O'Gara with some karting races as well. We're going to go run an endurance race in Norway, which I'm looking forward to. On top of all this, I'm also going to school so all of this is keeping me plenty busy."

There was no word on whether Sarah picked up some street/road tips from Legge, who had her season-best drive going at Sept. 24 at Road America until her car went belly first and end-over-end into the wall. The wreck caused much consternation and tense moments on the SPEED broadcast of the race. Legge walked way with only a bruised knee.

"There were no lingering after-effects when I got back into the cockpit at Sebring the other week - if anything, I was more worried that I wasn't worried!" Legge said in her most-excellent journal on her site, www.katherinelegge.com. "I wondered if I should have been scared by it, but I really wasn't. It was just one of those things, and it was component failure (part of the rear wing came off which caused the accident), which is important. I know I was lucky, and I have a healthy respect for the dangers of what I do, but I just got back into the car, a bit like getting back on a horse." Read the entire journal entry here.

Legge said on her site that she still doesn't know what she'll be doing next year, although she hops to carry on with PKV, a team owned by Champ Car honcho Kevin Kalkhoven. Fisher hopes to be back in the IRL. On Thursday, the team Fisher finished 2006 with, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, announced the addition of EurUp! Energy Drink as a sponsor. Rush to www.eurupenergy.com to check it out.

In other news, SPEED commentator Robin Miller served as a judge for the Champ Car Babe Contest at this weekend's race venue, Surfers Paradise, Australia. Sordid details here. There was no word if Robin was able to make bail after the event.