Notes from the 2006 CCWS San Jose Grand Prix

Notes taken during the NBC broadcast of the San Jose Grand Prix presented by Taylor Woodrow on 7/30/06.

Intro montage: AJ Allmendinger has won three. Sebastien Bourdais has won four. Justin Wilson has won one. Who will win this week? Video of cars getting airborne over railroad tracks in the race course last year. Rick Benjamin -- It looked like a motocross course!

Derek Daly and Rick Benjamin on camera. Double D -- last year the track was just awful. Paul Tracy says this year's track is 200% better.

Jan Beekhuis with Bourdais. Brilliant qualifying. Bourdais -- the Mag-donalds car should be OK for the start.

Cameron Steele with the Forsythe boys. AJ qualified third and Tracy qualified second. Cameron wants to know if Tracy will take out Bourdais on lap 1 turn 1. Tracy says probably not.

Jan with Justin Wilson. Video of Justin going nose-first into the tire wall all by himself during qualifications. Justin - got to get through turn one and be patient. He thinks people will sit back and wait to see what shakes out. Wait to see what kind of pace Bourdais sets. Wilson is in row six on the start thanks to going nose-first into the tires.

Gimme Some Lovin' montage with Wilson video from Edmonton.

Michelle Beisner. Guns are out! Friday night was the unveiling of the new Panoz DP01 chassis. Built for more passing, faster speeds and less cost. Friday night VIP driver party when the car was unveiled was a tough ticket. Video of the unveiling. Paul Newman sitting in the car.

Derek -- New car rocks. More affordable. Good news for encouraging more competition. Don't need as big of a pile of cash for equipment.

AJ's hometown is not far from San Jose. DD -- he has his aunties and his uncles and grandma, granddad, neighbors, over here to support AJ.

Starting line up. Bourdais on the pole! Color me shocked. Tracy, AJ, Cristiano "What's" da Matta, Oriol Servia, Will Power, Bruno Junqueria, Andrew Ranger, Dan Clarke, Mario Dominguez, Nelson Philipe, Justin Wilson, Alex Tagliani, Charles Zwolsman, Katherine Legge, Jan Heylen, Nicky Pasterelli. Seventeen whole cars!

Let's light this candle.

Yellow yellow yellow. Total jail break at the start. Hey, we're all professionals here. Go around and try again.

Rick -- this was a mistake-filled weekend. Montage of drivers saying the word "mistake." DD -- One of the biggest mistakes is people brake too late.

Try again to start, this time single file. Cue the circus music. Tracy jumps the start. Turn 1. AJ gets his wing mashed when he drives into the back of Bourdais. Derek -- "Grandma didn't want to see that."

Yellow Yellow Yellow. Bruno and Oriol in turn 1 (lap 2 or 3). Replay shows Will power "drop kicking" Bruno and then Oriol is screwed. Will comes out the best of the three. Rick -- If you're Bruno, you just can't buy a break this year.

Replay of Will going sideways into the wall at about 150 mph in Edmonton where the CBS camera guy had to bail out.

Race control says Bourdais should be in front. Tracy jumped the restart. No penalty, just putting Tracy back in P2 and Bourdais in P1.

Lap 4 -- Pits are open.

We go green while at a commercial. Lap 7 -- Ranger 4th. DD likes the decision by race control to put Tracy in P2 rather than making him do a drive through for a penalty of something.

Speedy Dan is 5th.

Jan with Neil Micklewright of Forsythe. Neil didn't see the replay but thinks the penalty was a mistake.

Tracy .2 per lap slower than Bourdais.

DD -- "Dan Clarke we know he has the speed but he throws the thing into the bushes too many times. When he settles down he'll be a real contender."

Rick -- Will Power got a black flag and a drive through penalty for punting Bruno. He'll be in 14th.

Clarke is behind Ranger. Working on it. Bourdais turns a 51.3-second lap. Dan turns a 51.2-second lap. Keith Wiggins, co-owner of Dan's team. "It's easier to control a fast driver and try to slow him down the other way around. Learning to pace it but he's still aggressive, which is good."

Speedy Dan Montage. Carnage. Edmonton qualifying crash and then the car is on fire. DD - "that's just a barbecue." Dan punting Jan "Van" Heylen into the tires.

Cristiano montage. Nose first into the wall at Edmonton.

DD -- "The only thing in racing that doesn't lie is the stopwatch." Dan just set the fastest lap of the race.

Lap 20 -- Tracy back to 4th. Katherine Legge has a flat left front. Limping around to the pit.

Mario fifth. Bourdais sets fastest lap. Jan with Bruno -- Power bad exit based inside ... I cannot understand what Bruno is saying. Seriously. Not following it.

Lap 22 -- Cristiano and Dan for second. Dan sponsored by CTE which stands for Cedric the Entertainer. Cedric is in the house with his entourage.

Cameron -- Ranger pits. Complains of being loose. Back on the black tires. Has done from 4th to 9th.

Video or Katherine Legge and Andy Ranger smacking each other. DD -- "Andrew Ranger mugged Katherine Legge."

Lap 25 -- Beisner. Drifting is very popular. Drifting is controlled sliding in a car. Exciting to watch.

Lap 31 -- Clarke takes da Matta in turn 1. DD -- "Hold onto your hollyhocks here and tighten down the belts because we are moving."

Derek says a laser-driven diamond grinder has been used on the streets to get the course more smooth this year.

Bourdais is running away.

DD -- "Did you see AJ almost give grandma a heart attack when he got it sideways there?"

Lap 44 -- Wilson working on Mario for seventh. Onboard with Wilson. Wilson has to stay calm in the back. NBC shows section times which are meaningless to viewers. He's faster in certain parts of the race track, but what are the parts? No context.

AJ goes around da Matta for sixth. DD --"Grandma's on the whiskey! We need to strap her down because AJ is making some brave moves out there."

Jan -- da Matta had trouble fueling in the pit. Fuel guy had to come back out and go back in because he failed to seat it. Trouble. Lost time.

Derek -- "Allmendinger is completely wrapped in red, white and blue."

Jan -- Tracy claiming that Dan Clarke is leaking something. DD -- he's leaking adrenalin. Rick says he sees smoke coming off of Dan's car. Cameron reports there was an oil leak earlier in Dan's car, but they thought they had it fixed. May be some residual oil left over from that leak.

Lap 49 -- Tracy up to third.

Lap 50 -- Speedy Dan is BLOWN up, SIR! in turn 1. Gear box is toast. Dan gets out and kicks the right rear. DD -- Love to see emotion like that. Dan, you're entitled to do that."

Tag suddenly his no front wing. He's been denosed by someone. Tacy! Replay shows Tracy goes into the run off turns around, comes barreling out and smucks Tags. DD -- "That has to be the dumbest, most dangerous thing I've seen Paul Tracy do in years. Better get down on your knees, Paul, and apologize for that."

Tag in the pits. Camera guy is following him. Tag still has his helmet on. DD -- "Uh oh. I think (Tag) is walking to Paul. He wants him! "

Tag catches up to Tracy. "I have no f*cking cars left!" F-bomb! You had to listen close. Tags is pushing on him. Tracy is trying to keep walking. More pushing.

Rick -- At least Tag was smart and kept his helmet on.

Back to the video. Tag is walking away in front of Tracy. Turns around. Comes back at Tracy. Pushing on Tracy. Tracy telling him to stop. It's GO TIME. Tracy throws a big punch at Tag who has a helmet on. Work the body, Paul. We cut away to the race.

Lap 55.

Walker team comes down to restrain Tag. Gotta wonder where the Champ Car officials are. Give Tracy credit for putting up with more shoving and grabbing from Tag than a lot of people would have. Sure, Tracy made an idiot move, but Tag needs to get a grip after a few minutes of yelling.

AJ will be penalized for a pit road violation. Came in when pits were closed. Might have wanted to get a better look at the fight.

DD -- PT's was one of the most astounding moves I have seen for many years.

Lap 59 -- Rick "We're getting ready to page Don King here on the public address system."

Mazda Recap -- Carnage. Turn one circus music. We got cars going up over other cars in a Tracy-over-Bourdais-like fashion. Graham Rahal into the tires on his own.

Back to the race. Restart craziness. Da Matta about gets driven over. Legge gets smacked. Legge is about seven laps down so she's moving over. Bourdais is behind Zwolsman who did not pit. Oriol did not pit either, so he leads. Zwolsman second. Bourdais can't get around him.

Jan with PT -- I had braking problems. Went into the run off. Spun it around. Thought I could get out in front of Tagliani. Pulled out and ran right into him. Pit fight -- Tag started grabbing me. I said I was sorry. Grabbing me some more. I said stop grabbing me. He kept grabbing and shaking and I had to defend myself.

Over to Cameron with Tag -- I have the guys keep repairing cars. Disappointed. Really unfortunate. Having the boys working this hard again. It's not like we have a bunch of spare (cars).

Replay of the pull out. DD is fully into it now. "He should STOP right here. STOP. STOP. Goes straight -- boom -- into Tagliani. "

Wilson is 5th.

Lap 65 -- Dust is clearing from the fracas. DD counsel's Bourdais not to make any brave moves behind Zwolsman because Zwolsman will have to pit soon.

Lap 67 -- reminded that Z was the Atlantics champion last year. This boy knows how to drive (DD).

Shifter cam onboard with AJ. Lap 72 -- DD -- Grandma is half way through the bottle of whiskey and AJ is still not in the top 10. At this point, with all that whiskey in her, I doubt grandma cares.

Discussion of how the new Panoz car will rock with a paddle shifter on the wheel so drivers don't have to take their hands off the wheel to shift.

Serbia is about seven seconds ahead. Bourdais around Zwolsman! Video of Bourdais going around the outside of Zwolsman for a pass.

Lap 77 -- onboard with AJ who misses the turn in on about three turns in a row. DD - "Gotta be careful here, AJ, grandma is in the grandstand watching you."

Lap 80 -- Many flat spots in practice and qualifying here. People brake late and then lock them up.

Lap 82 -- Servia in. No tires and just a splash.

Yellow Yellow Yellow. Ranger is into the wall. Him and Katherine got together in turn one. Legge inside and Ranger outside. Derek didn't see Katherine do anything wrong. Rick mentions that Katherine was 7 laps down and Ranger was on the lead lap. Derek says then maybe she should have let him go. Legge had been warned not to challenge faster cars since she was so far back.

Ranger gives her the gesture as she comes by the wreck scene. Katherine better watch out because Ranger might chase her down like Tag chased down Tracy. Go time with Katherine! She's British and seems to have some rage issues recently, so I'd think twice, Andy.

Beisner. Guns out again. Second annual Cabana Gala to benefit the Canary Fund. Not sure if anyone told me what the Canary Fund is. Some kind of charity, of course, but what kind? At this gala people got to come down and look at hot and exotic sports cars.

12 to go. Can AJ get a top 5. Mike Cannon doesn't think so. Claims race control said pits were open before they came down.

Will da Matta make it easy for teammate Wilson? Wilson is third, da Matta is second. Wilson is in the points championship hunt. Da Matta is not.

Restart. Green Green Green.

Lap 87 -- Jan with Carl Russo of RuSPORT which is the team for both da Matta and Wilson. Please, no talk about kissing Paul Newman on the mouth. Jan -- any team orders? Carl -- No. We're committed to not having team orders. Don't think CDW wants to go to the front that way and neither do we.

Carl is the master of the sponsor mention. That was art. DD and Rick both give shout outs to RuSPORT for no team orders.

10 to go. Nelson is trying to make a move on Wilson for third.

9 to go. Power to pass graphic. Unreadable. Seriously. I even got up close to the TV. Nothing.

8 to go. AJ loose off turn 6.

7 to go. Bourdais is driving with his knees right now. Rick gives Nicky and Rocketsports a shout out for their impending top 10. Doing a better job week by week.

6 to go. Bourdais is 3.5 seconds ahead. Da Matta faster than Wilson.

5 to go. Onboard with Zwolsman.

4 to go. Boudais turns a 49.7, fastest of the race. Rick says Bourdais has said "see-ya."

Street fight between Philipe, Dominguez, Wilson and AJ.

Shout outs to the race track again.

2 to go. Nelson is 4th. Settling for it.

AJ working on Will Power.

White flag -- Bourdais has about 9 second on everyone. He's going to win barring an air strike.

Bourdais wins. 7.6 ahead of da Matta. Power holds off AJ. Doughnuts coming from Bourdais. Derek is the doughnut judge now. Gives Bourdais low marks. Claims its more like a French croissant. Bourdais goes for another set of doughnuts. Derek gives these high marks. The Lolas are way better at doughnuts than the Dallaras. Wonder if they will test the new Panoz for doughnutability.

Final -- Bourdais, da Matta, Wilson, Nelson, Dominguez, Power, AJ, Oriol, Zwolsman, Pasterelli.

Crash montage including Tags and PT going at it.

Bourdais with Jan. Bourdais -- really, really, really happy for the Mag-donald's team. Jan -- what about that move on Justin Wilson. Bourdais looks confused -- Only move I made was to pass Zwolsman. Proved to be useless because he pitted soon after. So that one was just for fun. Good to put on a show for the fans. Jan -- what about the restart with Tracy jumping and getting put back? (Are you sure it was Tracy, Jan? Kidding.) Bourdais thought that was good. It wasn't a fair start.

Bourdais leads the points. Wilson is 31 back. AJ is 45 back.

Many interviews with many drivers here who say the same stuff. Interview with Legge. Sporting some large-yet-feminine shades. Katherine says everyone was driving insane out there. She got smacked many times. Says Ranger drove into her. Seems pissed.

Tune in to SPEED at 3:30 eastern Aug. 13 for the Denver Street Fight.