Norris McDonald's Auto Racing Blog

Register NOW for Canadian GP tickets; Slack gets big racing job

Two items of interest today for racing fans to chew on:

1. Remember last Friday, when I wrote that you shouldn’t waste any time making hotel reservations in Montreal for next June’s returning Grand Prix of Canada because rooms would be snapped up quickly?

Well, forget the rooms. (I don’t mean you should forget them, it’s just that there are bigger fish to fry – such as tickets to the race.)

That’s correct. If you want a seat when you attend the Grand Prix next June, you’d better get your name in fast because although tickets aren’t exactly on sale as yet, organizers want people to express their interest as quickly as possible.

This is a paragraph included in an email I received from organizers Monday:

"Details regarding ticket sales for the 2010 Formula 1 Grand Prix du Canada to be held on June 11-13 will be released soon. However, as of today, all the Formula 1 fans intending to purchase tickets for this event should register on-line click here for the link or send a telefax to 514-350-0007. The ticket office attendants will contact them at a later date."

So don’t delay!

2. Roger Slack is back in the auto racing biz.

Roger Who?

The grandson of legendary southern Ontario Cayuga Speedway owner and promoter Bob Slack, that’s who.

Roger was Humpy Wheeler’s right-hand man at the Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte for many years. His duties included promoting modified, late model and sprint car shows at the Dirt Track @ Lowe’s plus just about everything else you could think of so far as the running of the big speedway was concerned. When Wheeler left following the 2008 Coca-Cola 600, Slack wasn’t far behind.

The World Racing Group, which includes the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series, the World of Outlaws Late Model Series and the Super DIRTcar Series, announced Monday that Slack, 35, will be the organization’s new Executive Vice-President of Events.

Slack, son of one of Ontario’s most famous late-model drivers, Randy Slack, has been involved in racing for most of his life. He cleaned toilets at Cayuga Speedway when he was a kid and his grandpa owned the place. His first promotion was a bicycle race when he was in elementary school.

He told me once – and I wrote it up in one of my columns – that DIRT Motorsports promoter Glenn Donnelly once saw him on top of his father’s hauler at Rolling Wheels Raceway in New York, pretending to be flagging the races. Donnelly decided to give the-then-14-year-old a shot at the real deal.

"Not long after, I flagged my first race at Rolling Wheels. Two years later, when I got my driver’s licence, I started to travel all over and I flagged all over. I flagged with the ASA (stock car series) and I flagged at kart races. I flagged big rigs and late models. I flag at the Chili Bowl midget races (indoors every January in Tulsa, Okla.) and I flag some World of Outlaws races."

A graduate of Hamilton’s McMaster University, Slack went south about 15 years ago to learn from the master, Wheeler. The training seems to have paid off.

Just one thing: will Slack the executive climb up on the flagstand now and again to flag the odd Outlaws race? Don't bet against it.

The day Mario Andretti crossed swords with Don Branson

When there’s no more racing to go to, or watch on TV, I spend my spare time reading about it.

I have magazines and books coming out of my ears.

And they’re all over the place: bookcases upstairs, bookcases downstairs and boxes and boxes of magazines. I never throw anything out, so there’s lots in the garage.

I should be more organized. My wife will see me going down to the basement, and up to my home office, and out to the garage and back in to do it all over again and she knows not to ask because she knows I’m looking for a book or an article to check a fact, recall an incident or find a quote because I know the damn thing is around the house somewhere.

I have three favourite motor racing journalists. Nigel Roebuck (isn’t he everybody’s favourite?), who writes about all things Formula One – the races, the racers and the politics. I bought Autosport magazine for years just for his column and articles. The CBC, back whenever, telecast a history of F1 that I was really lucky to tape and I found out later that he was the narrator. Now he’s editor of Motor Sport magazine. It is a pleasure – a pleasure – to read his stuff.

Then there is John G. Sawyer, an American educator who freelanced to the long-gone Open Wheel magazine a series of incredible profiles of old-time Indianapolis drivers who also raced midgets and sprint cars on dirt. He also wrote three books about those legends of the speedways.

I read his stuff again and again and again and never, ever, get tired of it. I know what the next sentence will be and I keep reading anyway.

Joe Scalzo is my third favourite. His beautiful book, The American Dirt Track Racer: 1951-1971 (he’s written more than a dozen in total but this one stands out), contains outstanding writing like this:

"There were not one but two possible final destinations for the dirt-track warrior. One was the Indy 500, where everybody wanted to go. The other was the marble orchard, where nobody wanted to go."

I love a great line, and that one about the cemetery – the "marble orchard" – is right up there.

In any event, last week I was reading an article by Roebuck in the latest Motor Sport in which he interviewed Mario Andretti about the years when he was just starting out as a professional midget and sprint car racer.

In the Roebuck piece, Andretti talks at length about the late U.S. Auto Club sprint and champ car driver Don Branson, who didn’t taste success until he was nearly in his 40s – which was ancient for the times.

In the article, Andretti professes great affection for Branson and discussed a particular incident involving the two of them: he’d run into Branson and spun him out during a race at Williams Grove Speedway in Pennsylvania, following which he suggests he received some fatherly advice from the grizzled veteran.

"Couple of days later, in Indianapolis, I’m having breakfast and I see Don’s at another table and he calls me over – Jesus, I knew what was coming. ‘Mario,’ he says very quietly, ‘how much money did you make at the Grove the other night?’ Not much, I says. ‘I know, Mario,’ he says. ‘You made about as much as I didn’t make because you took me out. Now, listen,’ he says, ‘let’s cut out that sort of crap, and we’ll both get to eat much better, right?’

"He never raised his voice, but I was shaking. ‘Do you hear me, Mario?’ he says. And you’d better believe, I heard him!’ "

That’s a great little yarn, I thought to myself, and then my long-term memory kicked in:

Wait a minute. I’ve read that story before, somewhere. The version I read was similar, but if I recall, Branson wasn’t being nearly as charitable. In fact, he was giving Andretti a warning.

So away I went – upstairs, downstairs, out to the garage and so-on – and there, finally, in the July 1988 issue of Open Wheel magazine was a story entitled "Gramps," which was the first of a two-part series by Sawyer on the life and times of Branson – "a simple, unpretentious man with the Illinois heartland written all over his face."

So I started to read Sawyer’s piece – man, what a way he had with those words – and in a part in which he interviewed Branson’s long-time crew chief, Jud Phillips, I found these passages:

"There was one . . . altercation with a newcomer that nearly pushed Don to violence. Mario Andretti was that newcomer and I never saw Don more angry. . .

"I’ll kid you not, Don was furious. However, he smoldered in silence. But you knew he was really hot – about as close to throwing fists as he ever got. Still, he said nothing. 

"On the following Tuesday, Don and I were having breakfast at the Cove Restaurant in Indianapolis. In walks Mario with a couple of Clint Brawner’s people. And they sat right next to us.

"Now, ol’ Don hadn’t forgotten about all those slide-jobs from the previous weekend. He was still mad about it and upon seeing Mario, he turned bright red. ‘Uh-oh,’ I said to myself.

"Don just sat there, playin’ with his breakfast. Finally he spoke – and the tone was hardly friendly. ‘Hey, Mario,’ he says, ‘how much money did you make over at the Grove?’ Mario didn’t answer right away but eventually he said he hadn’t made very much. ‘Yeah, I know,’ ol’ Don growled. ‘About as much as I didn’t make when you spun us both out. So – let’s cut out that kind of crap and we’ll both eat better.’ Then he said:

" ‘Do you hear me, Mario? No more of that crap,’ and that closed the subject. But Don had made his point."

The incident is the same and the quotes are almost the same. But two versions of the same story paint an entirely different picture of what went on between Mario Andretti and Don Branson in an Indianapolis restaurant all those years ago.

As we go through the winter, waiting for the Daytona 24 and then the 500, we’ll visit with all three of these writers from time to time.

It’s a pleasure for me to write about them. I hope you’ll get the same pleasure reading about them and the people and races they wrote about.

TV didn't like me being positive about the Grand Prix

A TV reporter and a camerman came over to the Star today to talk to me about the return to Montreal of the Grand Prix of Canada next June and, after they left, I turned to one of the guys I work with and said: “Well, they won’t use any of that interview.”

“How come? he said.

“I was too cheerful,” I said. “I was too positive. I didn’t have anything bad to say.”

It’s true. I can’t see one thing to criticize about Formula One racing returning to Canada.

Not one thing.

I don’t see anything wrong with using public money to subsidize this race (a paltry amount, actually). We’re paying through the nose for the Olympics, aren’t we? How much of a subsidy does the Canadian Open golf tournament get? Don’t kid yourselves, every professional sport and athlete in this country is getting big-time tax breaks one way or another. At least with the Grand Prix, they’re up front about it.

So I didn’t get upset about the use of public money in the interview and when he tried to get me to talk about all the scandals surrounding F1 – the race-fixing, in particular – I essentially said it was old news and nobody cared about that stuff anymore because new drivers and new teams are coming into F1 and the last two world champions are on the same team now and won’t it be exciting to watch Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton battle it out in equal cars, and so-on and so-forth.

However, I guess this was the bit that really sealed the deal:

“The eyes of the world will be on Canada twice next year,” I said. “First for the Olympics in Whistler and then for the Grand Prix in Montreal. You can’t buy better publicity than that. There are three huge sports in the world – the Olympics, Formula One racing and World Cup soccer. We will have two of the three in Canada next year. People in 200 countries are going to watch us on TV. This is gonna be great.”

Now, if I’d said: “The Conservative government of Stephen Harper is squandering taxpayer dollars on a promotion that’s essentially for rich people and did you know food bank use in Canada doubled this year?” I guarantee I would have been the first story on the National.

Or, how about:

“Who would want to go to a sporting event in which the participants have been known to cheat and lie and the cars they drive pollute the environment and contribute to global warming?”

I betcha that one would have gotten me on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos.

But it’s easy to be negative. Dead easy. The media go crazy over headlines like:

OPPOSITION ATTACKS GOVERNMENT

Try being positive about anything these days. People will laugh at you.

And leave your comments on the cutting room floor.

Okay, now I’ll get serious.

We got off easy, folks.

The last time I really paid attention to what was going on so far as the negotiations to bring the race back to Canada were concerned, Bernie Ecclestone wanted $175 million for a five-year contract. Then, that sum dropped to $105 million over five years. After that, my eyes glazed over and I just waited for the press conference.

And this afternoon, when they said $75 million over five years, I really wondered if there’d been a mistake.

But no, it’s $6 million from the city of Montreal, $5 million per annum from the feds and $4 million a year from Quebec. And get this: the city, province and Ottawa will share in 30 per cent of the revenue from ticket sales, so money will be coming back. (Has anybody taken Bernie’s temperature lately?)

Yes, F1 has had its problems but a new day has dawned. Max Mosley is gone, as is Flavio Briatore and Nelson Piquet Jr. The manufacturers (Honda, Toyota, BMW) have been replaced by new teams and new blood – Lotus, Campos, USF1. Bruno Senna will be just one of the many new faces to race in Montreal next June. It will be an exciting time. (Cross fingers that all of this comes true . . . which the cynic deep in me still suggests might not happen . . .)

But make your hotel reservations fast. The rooms will go quickly.

And Crescent Street awaits.

 

BMW sells F1 team, Volkswagen considering F1 engine

There are two big pieces of Formula One news today, neither of which were covered by the major wire services (and just another example of how mainstream media continue to view the world of motorsport).

Item 1: BMW has sold its Formula One team back to former owner Peter Sauber after the deal with Qadbak Investment Ltd. fell through.

The sale, however, is conditional on the team having a spot on the F1 grid in 2010.

Sauber tried to buy the team back immediately after BMW announced its withdrawal from F1 in July but was rejected. Apparently, the company felt the offer from Qadbak (whoever and whatever they are has always been a mystery) was firm – and obviously was for a lot more money.

However, with the collapse of the Qadbak deal, Sauber’s offer became more appealing and the deal has been done.

No word on the fate of Dr. Mario Theissen, who has been the face of BMW-F1 since the German automaker got into the engine-supply business and then after it became a team owner in 2006.

Item 2: Although the BMW-Sauber deal is important, this next bit is more significant. Volkswagen, the world’s largest car manufacturer, is seriously considering going into the F1 engine business.

According to Hans Stuck (remember him in F1 in the 1970s? His father is a legend in Germany), Volkswagen is not interested in forming a team on its own or even making a deal with individual teams. No, it will go into the engine manufacturing business and the motors will be available to anyone who wants them.

As it stands, Cosworth is the only choice for a number of the new teams going into F1 next season, now that Ferrari, Mercedes and Renault are the only engine manufacturers remaining (and cross fingers about Renault, because their involvement is still very much up in the air).

The addition of Volkswagen will be most welcome.

To read an interview with Stuck, click here.

Ontario driver Steve Arpin hopes to race for Dale Jr. in 2010

So I was reading a story by Nate Ryan on the USA Today Internet site about Danica Patrick maybe driving for Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s team in the NASCAR Nationwide Series next year when I came across this paragraph:

"Earnhardt is (also) high on ARCA driver Steve Arpin, who finished seventh in ARCA points this season. A recent win by Arpin at a short track in Missouri impressed Cup driver Carl Edwards, who (told Earnhardt) that Arpin ‘jumped into a car that looked beat on and he made the rest of the guys look like they were tied to a tree.’ "

My goodness! Could this be the Steve Arpin of Fort Frances, Ont., which has a population of – what? – 8,000 and yet’s produced such famous people as politician Howard Hampton and hockey players Dave and Mike Allison and Neil and Tim Sheehy, among others?

The Steve Arpin, who’s been tearing up the speedways of northwestern Ontario, Manitoba and the American border states of Wisconsin and Minnesota and points south for – well – years?

Turns out it is – and it’s just possible that the little pulp-and-paper town of Fort Frances is on the brink of producing its first NASCAR Sprint Cup driver!

I had the pleasure a few days ago of chatting with the 26-year-old Arpin who’s now living in Cornelius, N.C., and working away on sponsorship for the 2010 racing season.

"We – my wife Trina and I – moved down here in February," said Arpin, who embarked on his first professional ARCA stock car season in ‘09 following 10 or so years of apprenticing in open wheel as well as closed-wheel cars in which he’s won just about everything he entered.

He was, in no particular order going back to 2001, USAC Silver Crown Series rookie-of-the-year, Minnesota Modified champion, Wissota Heartland champion, North Florida Nationals champion, IMCA Dakota Classic Modified Tour champion, Florida Speedweeks Nationals UMP Modified champion and on and on and on..

Oh, and he was track champion at his local Emo Speedway in 2001 and ‘02 as well as being Polaris Industries snowmobile champion the same two years.

It hasn’t been all smooth-sailing, though. Early in 2008, he suffered severe burns to his hands and thighs after a radiator hose blew and drenched him with boiling water. He was out of racing for two months but he bounced back and had returned to his winning ways by season’s end.

His resiliance and determination got him the ride in the ARCA series this season – where Sprint Cup and Nationwide drivers Scott Speed, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Justin Algaier were learning their trade just the year before – and he split the season between Eddie Sharp Racing and Venturini Motorsports.

Now he’s working hand-in-hand with the marketing people at Earnhardt’s company, JR Motorsports, to get the money necessary for a Nationwide Series ride next season.

"It was pretty cool (to read what Earnhardt and Edwards said about him in the USA Today article)," he said. "This is such a great team and organization to be connected with and I hope we can put a program together to do the Nationwide, because that would move me in the direction of the Sprint Cup series, which is where I want to be."

Although Nationwide or the Camping World Truck Series are his immediate goals, Arpin said there is a Plan B in place, if necessary, and that would entail running another season in ARCA with the Venturini team.

"But even if I go Nationwide," he said, "I’m still planning to run the ARCA races at Daytona and Talladega next year."

Arpin said sponsorship opportunities "are looking good but nothing’s signed yet. We’re also actively negotiating with a couple of Canadian companies and, hopefully, something will work out in that area."

Arpin said that to succeed in modern-day motorsport, a driver has to be a winner on the speedway and also have the ability to raise the money necessary to participate. The system is "really designed to weed out the weak," he said. "You have to be strong to survive at this game. Yes, times are tough but all that means is that I have to work harder."

Arpin is not solely dependent on race-driving for his income. A chip off the old block – his father, Chuck, owns and operates Pinewood Sports and Marine back home – he recently went into business for himself. He’s started Arpin Enterprises, in which he builds and sells dirt modified racing cars.

And although he talks a tough game about survival of the fittest, Arpin said he hopes somebody to own and operate his own Sprint Cup team so that he can give young drivers "who can’t afford it a chance at their dreams."

Good luck, Steve. There haven’t been all that many Canadians who’ve made it to the Sprint Cup level of NASCAR so we’ve got our fingers crossed for you.

Zoning change would clear track for Niagara Falls World of Motorsport

The race to see who will be the first to build an auto racing facility in the Greater Niagara area shifts into high gear Wednesday when Toronto entrepreneur Lee Abrahamson formally requests a change to the Official Plan that will allow him to develop a property at the intersection of Sodom Rd. and the Queen Elizabeth Way in Niagara Falls.

In so doing, a second proposed race track – the Niagara Falls World of Motorsport, which has been rumoured for several years – will become reality.

News media, including the Star, have reported previously on a proposal to build the Canadian Motor Speedway, a one-mile oval and a 2.5-mile road course near the QEW in Fort Erie that would have seating for 65,000 people and cost in the neighbourhood of $200 million.

A formal announcement of that project a little more than a year ago identified the Kuwaiti company Bayt Al Mal Investments as the source of funding. The project, spearheaded by Niagara Falls businessman Jay Mason (his son Jesse, a racing driver of note, is also involved in the business), is being guided by Jim Thibert, who’s general manager of the Fort Erie Economic Development and Tourism Corp.

When I talked to Jay Mason about his idea several years ago, he suggested the proposed Fort Erie speedway could be up and running by 2009. That hasn’t happened, but projects of this size are often difficult to get off the ground.

To keep the interest alive, a new Canadian Motor Speedway Webletter was emailed in recent days spelling out the plans for the racing circuits, a research and development project involving McMaster University and retail and other commercial operations that would be built in the immediate vicinity of the race track.

All very impressive.

Now, for the last couple of years, there has also been scuttlebutt about a second project in the area, closer to Niagara Falls. Nothing official, of course, but speculation has been out there all the same.

Wednesday, the second proposed track will officially become public when Abrahamson formally requests the Official Plan change that, if approved, will allow him to go ahead with plans for the Niagara Falls World of Motorsport, which would be within the city limits of what’s still nicknamed the Honeymoon Capital of the World.

"It’s a perfect location," Abrahamson told me during a quick phone call Tuesday night.

"It’s 10 minutes from Buffalo-Fort Erie by car and seven minutes from the Falls, where there are 16,000 hotel rooms. If mom and the daughters don’t like car racing, they can see the sights and go shopping while dad and the sons go watch the races. Then they can all be back together again in time for dinner. Everybody will be happy."

Abrahamson’s plans are not as grandiose as the Fort Erie project and he says he’ll build his facility – projected to cost a total of $20 million – in three stages.

"We plan to build a 3.5-mile (5.6-kilometre) road course that will incorporate a 4,125-foot runway (already on the property), which will double as a drag strip," he said.

"The first phase will be the circuit – the berms and ponds and everything else. The second phase will be industrial and commercial development and the third phase will be Club Autodrome, which will be a country club for car enthusiasts."

Abrahamson, who I’ve known for years, is a talker. So I let him talk.

"What we’re eventually looking at - long term, I might add - is eight international-style racing weekends a year. We’ve worked very closely with the noise engineers on this project and we’ve developed a traffic plan to handle the anticipated crowds. We want to make this facility the crown jewel of Canadian motorsport.

" The big attraction – other than the motor sport, of course – is Niagara Falls, with all its attractions and facilities. It is an hour and a half drive from Toronto. Within a two-hour drive there are eight million people and within an eight-hour drive there are 150 million people. Those are the facts. I’m not saying they are all fans, but they are there.

"We will not allow any overnight camping. We want people to stay at the hotels or to park their motorhomes at campgrounds in and around the city and to take in all that the Falls has to offer. It will be just like in Montreal: you come and then leave and come again the next day."

I asked him about the major difference between the two projects: the cost.

"Building a Taj Mahal-type place, with a hotel, isn’t going to do anybody any good," he said. "I want to drive traffic to Niagara Falls because the happier the hotel operators and merchants are, the happier I’ll be.

"And you can get a return on an investment of $20 million. How do you get a return on $200 million? It’s impossible. It’s like dealing with Bernie and F1. How do you make any money? He makes the money, but nobody else does."

Abrahamson was vague about when he planned to break ground.

"One step at a time," he said. "I need a change to the Official Plan so that the location can be zoned for this project. We’ll go from there."

He was also vague about product – as in, what racing attractions he plans to bring to his new facility.

The Fort Erie project learned that lesson the hard way. After the official announcement of that project a year ago, media reports suggested NASCAR races would be among the attractions offered.

That resulted in a curt statement issued by NASCAR (which was even sent to governments identified as being interested in the project), to the effect that the sanctioning body had no plans to be involved with the new speedway, that it did not intend to add any more races to the schedules of its three series (with the possible exception of New York City for a Sprint Cup race) and that it was NASCAR’s belief that Fort Erie race fans were already well served by NASCAR-affiliated speedways in Watkins Glen, N.Y., and Jackson, Mich.

Ouch.

No wonder Abrahamson’s playing his cards close to his vest.

　

　

The ‘new’ Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame faces its first test

The co-founders of the original Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame, Gary Magwood and Lee Abrahamson, have raised objections to plans by the board of directors of the new Hall of Fame to induct American racing legend Carroll Shelby.

(It’s too long and complicated to go into the background of why there is an "old" hall and a "new" hall but you can find everything out in a column I wrote a few weeks ago by clicking here.)

In any event, the objection – first raised last week in an email sent out by Abrahamson – is primarily over the decision to induct someone who isn’t Canadian, although some critics are also questioning the choice of Shelby

Since then, my mailbox has been inundated with emails from people from one end of the country to the other who either, a) agree with Abrahamson or, b) disagree but wonder what Shelby ever did for Canadian motorsport to deserve such an honour.

With respect (and I have to be careful what I say here because most of the people involved on both sides of this issue are my friends), I wish the criticism would stop. What wrecked the hall the first time around was the involvement of too many well-meaning people who had too many differing ideas of what the hall should be about. In the end, the hall was going nowhere because just about all everybody did was sit around and argue.

That the hall is being rescued at all should be a cause for celebration rather than condemnation.

When Magwood and Abrahamson started the original hall back in 1993 (with lots of help from the late Len Coates, by the way), they did a fabulous job. The idea, as set out by Magwood, was to induct as many as 10 outstanding competitors or contributors each year for the first five years to honour those who had done the country proud to that point – the Gilles Villeneuves, the Peter Ryans, the Billy Fosters, the Chuck Rathgebs and the Imperial Tobaccos.

But then the number of inductees was supposed to drop off, according to Magwood, because the number of individuals or corporations sufficiently qualified for induction would naturally diminish. At the end of that initial five-year period, perhaps only one or two inductees a year – if any – would be worthy of the honour.

However, as more and more people became involved with the all-volunteer hall, and the numbers of ideas proliferated, the original ideals became blurred. Very blurred. As a result, some of the decisions made were perhaps not in the best interests of Canadian motorsport and/or the hall of fame.

But all that’s in the past – or should be.

Before moving forward, the new board has some unfinished business to attend to – specifically the induction of 10 people chosen by the old board of directors who were never formally inducted – bringing, incidentally, the number of Honourable Members to more than 150, which – guaranteed – is not what Magwood and Abrahamson had in mind back in 1993.

But after that, the new board’s vision is very much like the original: one or two outstanding Canadians a year will be honoured. Where they part company, apparently, is the decision to create a category called "International" so that people like Shelby can be inducted (there already are categories for road racing, oval racing, motorcycle racing, and so-on).

In a statement, Tom Riley, the current chairman, seeks to assure one and all that recognizing the accomplishments of Canadians will remain the preeminent focus of the Hall of Fame induction process. But then he says:

"With respect to creating an International category, this arose from a view that significant contributions to motorsport in Canada have also been made by persons of other than Canadian birth and nationality and a belief that it would be appropriate to also recognize such international fugures."

He goes on to say:

– That Carroll Shelby has Canadian connections with the Comstock Racing Team of the 1960s and the career of Eppie Wietzes. He also notes that Honourable Member George Eaton raced a Shelby Cobra;

– That Shelby is coming to Canada for the Toronto International Auto Show, where the Ford Motor Co. plans a display of historic Shelby automobiles;

– That this provides a "unique opportunity" for the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame to so honour him.

I could go on with this, quoting from other emails and telephone calls, but I’m sure you get the picture.

My take:

The Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame is on a sound financial footing for, probably, the first time in its history. The people in charge today have either been significantly involved, or are currently involved, at the highest levels of Canadian motorsport and have nothing – just like Abrahamson and Magwood – but the best interests of the hall at heart.

The selection of Carroll Shelby and, undoubtedly in future, people like Roger Penske, Jackie Stewart and the Andretti family can do nothing but good so far as raising the profile, both nationally and internationally, of this hall.

I say let’s get behind the new board and give this thing a chance. Otherwise, the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame will die – and nobody wants that.

Chad Knaus is the power behind Jimmie Johnson's throne

Jimmie Johnson might have become the first driver in NASCAR history to win four consecutive Cup championships when he finished fifth in Sunday’s Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, which was won by Denny Hamlin, but he sure didn’t do it alone.

His crew chief, Chad Knaus, has also got to get much of the credit. Maybe not equal credit but a whole lot of it just the same.

For the uninitiated, the crew chief is the guy in charge of the race team. He reports to the team manager, but the crew chief is pretty much the main man. During the race, he makes the calls for chassis adjustments to the car, fuel and tire stops and overall race strategy.

Yes, the driver – Johnson, in this case – actually has to race the car and to put up with the rock ‘n’ roll out on the track. But the direction of the effort is at the discretion of the crew chief – in this case, Knaus – and the team’s success or failure is very often directly attributable to his decisions and actions.

Knaus – like most people involved in racing – was drawn to the sport by his father John, who once upon a time was a dirt-track racer of note in the U.S. Midwest. Papa John was seven-time modified champion at Rockford Speedway, in Rockford, Ill., where Chad Knaus was born.

When Chad turned 14 (he's 38 now), he became his father’s crew chief and other championships – the NASCAR Great North Series, for example – followed.

An ambitious kid, Knaus "went south" after graduating from high school to try to find work in the big leagues. It didn’t happen right away – he had to go to Alabama to get a paid racing job – but, in 1993, a whole bunch of things came together to start him down the road to where he is today.

The first was that Rick Hendrick – who’d been involved in Cup racing since 1984 – expanded his team to make room for Jeff Gordon, a young sprint car driver who’d turned heads while driving stock cars in the Busch Series. The second was that Hendrick hired a young crew chief named Ray Evernham to run Gordon’s operation. The third was that a young Chad Knaus applied for a job with the new team and Evernham liked what he heard.

"He told me that one day he wanted my job," Evernham once told a reporter, "and I like guys who talk like that."

They worked together for four years but Knaus was a young guy in a hurry to be a crew chief so he left the Hendrick operation and went off to run teams for – among others – Steve Park, Darrell Waltrip and Stacey Compton.

Evernham kept his eye on Knaus, though, and in 2003 – when Hendrick and Gordon decided, as partners, to enter a car in the Cup series for a rookie named Jimmie Johnson – he suggested that Hendrick get in touch with Knaus.

The rest, as they say, is history. Johnson and Knaus have been a team since and, beginning in 2006, unbeatable.

There have been some dark moments, however. In a sport in which cheating is rampant, Knaus has been caught and suspended twice for breaking rules.

The first time was at the Daytona 500 in 2006 when Johnson’s car was deemed illegal following time trials because Knaus had rigged the rear window so that when the driver was travelling at full speed ahead it went up, putting more air over the spoiler. When the driver slowed down, the window dropped back into position.

NASCAR fined Knaus $25,000 and sent him home for four races. Johnson won the Daytona 500 anyway.

In 2007, the shape of the fenders on Johnson’s new Car of Tomorrow were found to be not quite right and Knaus was fined $100,000 and suspended for six races.

Both times, Knaus took the suspensions in stride and justified them to reporter Steven Cole Smith, writing for Dick Berggren’s Speedway Illustrated, this way:

"We’re always trying to get a leg up – that’s our job. What’s what we do. NASCAR’s job is trying to maintain a level playing field. It’s tough, you know. We have to make sure we don’t take the element of creativity out of our sport because we don’t want an IROC race. . .

"My desire to win will never go away. As long as you have that desire, you’re going to have those creative juices flowing. Man, if I ever lose that, I’ll quit. . . If you’re not out there looking for an advantage, you’re not going to have the desire to win."

After reading that, I think it’s safe to assume that Knaus is still looking for loopholes, or other ways to bend the rules. If NASCAR doesn’t catch him, chances are Johnson will win a fifth straight championship because whatever Knaus is doing right (or wrong, depending on how you want to define your terms), it’s putting Johnson head and shoulders above everybody else.

NOTES:

– Hamlin finished first in the race, which was largely uneventful except for the race-long scrap between Juan Pablo Montoya and Tony Stewart. Jeff Burton was second and Kevin Harvick third. Martin, who wound up second in the championship, finished 12^th; third-place in the points standings, Jeff Gordon, finished sixth in the race. For a full report, click here.

– The Montoya-Stewart pissing match started in earnest on lap 115 when they banged into each other on the backstretch. Stewart was apparently unhappy that Montoya hit him in the back earlier. Both had to pit for repairs.

Stewart got back onto the speedway fairly quickly but Montoya was out of the race for 27 or 28 laps. When he did return, he promptly ran into Stewart who went into the wall. Montoya was black-flagged at this point and told that if he hit anybody else he’d be out of the race. He behaved himself from then on, as did Stewart, who also eventually got back on track.

– You have to wonder how long it’s going to be before the fans start to boo Johnson. The problem is, he’s too nice a guy to boo.

He’s polite to the fans and the media; he’s a clean racer; he doesn’t retaliate or settle scores; he fulfills all of his contractual duties so far as sponsor commitments are concerned; he’s been married to the same woman for ages. In short, he’s a clean cut, clean living, all-American boy.

– Broadcaster (and former racer) Andy Petree was saying on the telecast before the race that even if he didn’t win, runner-up Mark Martin would go home after the race, reflect on his season, and be "a happy man."

Is he crazy? Maybe that’s why Petree’s a broadcaster and not a racer any more.

I guarantee you that Mark Martin is cheesed right off that he didn’t win because the only reason he’s still racing is to win that championship. Second sucks, Andy, particularly when you’re over 50 and you know there won’t be too many more chances like the one that was handed to you this year.

'Rocket' Richard wins fourth Canadian Rally Championship

Pat (Rocket) Richard of Squamish, B.C., won his fourth Canadian Rally Championship when he captured the annual Rally of the Tall Pines held at Bancroft, Ont., at the weekend.

Richard and co-driver Alan Ockwell of Toronto finished the Tall Pines in one hour, 53 minutes and 48 seconds in a Subaru. Second-place finishers Andrew Comrie-Picard of Toronto and Jeremy Wimpey of State College, Pa., were about three minutes behind in one hour and 56:44 seconds in a Mitsubishi while third-place finishers Frank and Dan Sprongle of Georgetown, Ont., did the rally in 1:57:07 in a Subaru.

Two-time national champions Antoine L’Estage and Nathalie Richard of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que., were winning when clutch problems on their Mitsubishi prevented them from starting the final stage on time.

They eventually finished the rally in fifth place but suffered a double whammy by losing both the Canadian championship to Richard as well as the North American Rally Cup to Comrie-Picard.

Said L’Estage: "It’s been said that the highs in this sport are really high but that it can also be cruel. We definitely felt that today."

Richard previously won the national championship in 2002 and 2004 as well as last year.

The stories keep changing with Raikkonen, Button

You know, the ink is barely dry on the paper on which the news is printed when the stories start changing.

Curiosity No. 1.

Kimi Raikkonen holds a press conference to say that he doesn’t have a deal with anybody for 2010 and will be taking a year off. “Maybe I’ll never be back in Formula 1,” he says.

So that’s the story that goes out on the wire services and is heard on radio and TV and on web sites and in the newspapers.

A little while later, Raikkonen runs into a reporter on the street who wasn’t at the press conference.

“So I hear you’re taking a sabbatical,” the reporter says to the driver who had just told the world he wasn’t going to drive for anybody in F1 in 2010.

“Well,’ says Raikkonen, “we’re actually still talking to a few people. You never know. I might hear a good offer.”

And his manager, in the meantime, is telling anybody who will listen that if Mercedes were to make an offer for Kimi to drive for Brawn GP next year (or Mercedes GP, whatever), well – hell – he’d sure have to consider it, right?

So is he in for oh-ten, or out?

Curiosity No. 2.

Jenson Button said that when Brawn GP rose from the ashes of Honda, there wasn’t a lot of money around so he took a pay cut to stay with the team.

Now he says he took a pay cut to sign with McLaren.

He sure doesn’t seem to place much value on himself, does he?

And remember when he said he was keen to continue with Brawn?

And then he couldn’t wait to get out?

What’s that all about?