Norris McDonald's Auto Racing Blog

Here's how to get 'Mosport' back into Canadian Tire park's name

Ever since Mosport International Raceway became Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, there has been controversy about the name change.

Many people — me included — wondered why they couldn’t have kept “Mosport” as part of the new name.

Today, I am pleased to announce that my good friend Gary Morton has come up with the solution.

“When they were trying to invent a name for the place back in 1960-61,” he said, “is it not true that the name they agreed upon - ‘Mosport’ - is, in fact, a contraction of the words ‘motor’ and ‘sport?’ ”

(You can see where he’s going with this, can’t you . . .)

“So, because ‘motor’ and ‘sport’ became Mosport back then,” continued Mr. Morton, “why not do it again and call Canadian Tire Motorsport Park,  ‘Canadian Tire Mosport Park?’ ”

I think he’s got a point.

In fact, I think it’s brilliant.

Comments, please.

James Hinchcliffe of Oakville has been voted most popular driver in the IZOD IndyCar Series.

The HRT-Cosworth F1 team is on its last legs and unless some sucker — er, “investor” — has millions of dollars just lying around that he/she wants to flush down the toilet, it’s unlikely to be on the grid come 2013.

Things are so bad that when eight members of the team went to its Madrid headquarters Tuesday to pick up their final paycheques, a fight broke out. No details have been issued about what prompted the fisticuffs but a good guess would be that there were no paycheques there to be picked up.

The team’s owner, Thesan Capital SL, said on Nov. 12 that it was for sale.

Spanish police said the fight ended when officers arrived and no one was arrested.

Meantime, Williams F1 announced today that former F3 and GP3 champion Valtteri Bottas of Finland will join veteran Pastor Maldonado for the 2013 season.

This means Bruno Senna is out of a ride but he is not without options. Although Romain Grosjean is still listed as the second driver at Lotus beside Kimi Raikkonen, he hasn’t been confirmed and his crash-filled 2012 season, which included a one-race ban for careless driving, could work against him.

There is also a seat open at Force India beside Paul Di Resta and that team could use the $14 million that Senna has in sponsorship. Other possibilities are Caterham and Marussia, who both have only one driver (Charles Pic, Timo Glock) under contract for next year.

The 2012 Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals are taking place at the Kartodromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimao, Portugal, today through Friday and Canadians are looking good in at least four classes.

To follow all the action, and to keep track of Our Guys, go to ekartingnews.ca

Speaking of Mosport (we were up above, remember?) Reg Wesson, president of the Oakville Trafalgar Light Car Club for many years, died this week on Tuesday. Those of us who are older will remember that it was the Oakville club that ran the very first race meet at Mosport when it opened back in 1961.

On NASCAR, pit crews and the Petit Le Mans

The Delta Wing finished sixth at Road Atlanta

News and musings following a big weekend of auto racing:

Bruno Spengler, a French-born Canadian citizen from Saint-Hippolyte, Que., won the German Touring Car (DTM) Championship Sunday for BMW.

He won the title in grand style by racing to victory in the last DTM race of the season at the Hockenheimring.

It was Spengler’s first championship. He was the good soldier for Mercedes for years and years but was never able to close the deal. He moved to BMW this season when the marque returned to the DTM after a 20-year absence and stepped right up.

The other Canadian in the field, Robert Wickens of Guelph and Toronto, retired after 20 laps. His rookie reason in touring cars was not the success that he, and his fans, had hoped for.

For complete details, click here

NASCAR Canada held a reception on Saturday at the Hyatt-Regency Hotel on King St. W. to honour the 2012 Canadian Tire Series champion, D.J. Kennington of St. Thomas, the other drivers in the series, and the many officials and sponsors that make the National Championship the success that it is.

Dana Gladstone of major sponsor Canadian Tire said a few words, as did series director Brad Moran. The drinks were free and the hors d’ouvres were hot. It was very nice.

However (there’s always one or two of those, aren’t there?), when NASCAR purchased CASCAR from founder Tony Navotny in 2006, it was a big deal. Following the 2007 season, its first under the NASCAR banner, the Canadian Tire Series participants were treated to a lovely banquet at an east Toronto hotel. TSN’s Vic Rauter was the MC and all the drivers, wives, crew members and sponsors turned out for what was a really swell time.

Since then, everybody’s had to make do with an annual two-hour reception and, frankly, it’s not enough for a National Championship.

This should be a Big Deal – and it’s not.

One other thing. If I went to Florida as a representative of the media of Canada and mispronounced the names of – say – some of NASCAR’s favourite sons ("I’d like to say thanks to Bill FRANK and the FRANK family . . .") I think I’d be run out of town on a rail.

This is the fourth or fifth year that I’ve had to listen to some NASCAR executive fly up to Toronto and mangle the name of the patron saint of Canadian motorsport, Gilles Villeneuve, while mispronouncing the name of the race track in Montreal that’s named after him.

Memo to NASCAR: It’s Sir-quee Jeel Veel-noov, NOT sir-cut gil vilnuff.

You would think someone would have had the good manners to ask how to say it corrrectly by now, wouldn’t you?

Okay, enough of that.

Jim and Joel Robinson, who produce the Canadian Tire racing TV programs for TSN, were singled out for praise and they do a great job. Here’s a link to a video that’s representative of their work.

Now, the reception was rife with rumour that NASCAR is on the verge of making an announcement about either a truck series race or a Nationwide Series race at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park next season.

One fellow "in the know" said it was a lock that the Camping World Series trucks would be the headliner at the track next May 24 long weekend.

But with the Nationwide cars out of Montreal for 2013, I still say the possibility of that race being moved to Old Mosport is very real. And the fact that a Nationwide car was practising out there in the last two weeks just adds to the intrigue.

We should know in the next week or two at the most whether one or more of NASCAR’s touring series will be at CTMP next year. Cross fingers.

Just before I wrap up the "Canadiana" portion of this column, I must say that poor James Hinchcliffe must rue the day he agreed to travel to Australia to participate in a V8 Supercar race on the Gold Coast Down Under.

They ran two races at the weekend and he didn’t finish either one of them.

Click here for a link to a video showing how his first race went. And the second one wasn't much better.

Okay, moving right along, the Daytona Beach city council has approved an application filed by International Speedway Corp. to develop some land it owns adjacent to the storied speedway as well as an application from the Daytona Speedway itself for redevelopment.

Want to take a guess what that all means?

Hint: look all around downtown Toronto and what do you see?

Condominiums.

Actually, I’m surprised they’ve waited this long. And I’m puzzled why they haven’t started down that road at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, too.

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship ran its sixth Chase for the Championship race at Kansas Speedway Sunday and it was won by Matt Kenseth. For complete details, click here.

Question: Kenseth has won two of the six races in the Chase to date. Why is he in NINTH place in the standings.

Why don’t the drivers who make it into the Chase start off even, as is the case in most other sports when the playoffs start?

Why aren’t the Chase drivers scored differently in the playoffs, with winning being the only thing?

It is wrong that Brad Keselowski and Kenseth have each won two races in the six that have been run since the Chase started (Clint Bowyer and Denny Hamlin won the others) and yet Keselowski is in first place in the standings and Kenseth is in ninth.

Nuts.

The North American sports car season is finito. Saturday at Road Atlanta, the American Le Mans Series ran its Petit Le Mans 10-hour race and the winners were (this can get complicated):

- Neel Jani, Nicolas Prost and Andrea Belicchi finished first overall and first in Prototype 1 driving a Lola-Toyota.

- Scott Tucker, Christophe Bouchut and Luis Diaz were second overall and first in P2 in an HPD ARX-Honda.

- Alex Popow, Ryan Dalziel and Toronto’s Mark Wilkins won the Prototyep Challenge class in an Oreca-Chevrolet. They were seventh overall.

-Scott Sharp, Toni Vilander and Johannes van Overbeek were first in GT in a Ferrari Italia.

- Henrique Cisneros, Mario Farnbacher and Jakub Giermaziak won the GT Challenge class in a Porsche 911 GT3.

Muscle Milk Picket Racing won the team and drivers’ championship in the glamour-puss P1 class. Lucas Luhr and Klaus Graf fought back from early-race adversity to wrap up both titles.

Now, an incident at Kansas Speedway and another at Road Atlanta illustrated perfectly this weekend why auto racing is the most complex and exciting team sport there is.

At Kansas, Jimmy Johnson’s pit crew kept him on the lead lap while doing repairs to his car after he backed it into the outside wall early in the race. He recovered to finish ninth and to score enough points to stay just seven behind Chase leader Keselowski, who finished eighth.

It took the Muscle Milk crew a little longer – an hour, actually – to repair the damage after Luhr tangled with a GT Challenge car early in the Petit Le Mans. But their expertise and effort was unparalleled on this day and they got the car back on track for the drivers to score sufficient points to wrap up the championship.

Great stuff !

And one last thing: Don Panoz’s pet, the Delta Wing project powered by Nissan, finished sixth overall in the Petit Le Mans, driven by Gunnar Jeannette and Lucas Ordonez.

You will recall that Jeanette was knocked for a loop late in the week during practice and the race car emerged a mess. Once again, it was the crew that saved the day.

They repaired and reworked the car in time for Saturday’s race – an amazing achievement.

Panoz, in an interview, said he still thinks there is an open-wheel future for the car. 

Take it to Indy next May, I say. If Andy Granatelli could get his turbine to work there in 1967, Dr. Don should be able to find a way to get the DW into the 2013 classic's qualifying line, don’tcha think?

'Numbers' tell the IndyCar season story

Following Ryan Hunter-Reay’s IZOD IndyCar Series championship victory at the weekend, reporters covering the series were inundated with "numbers."

Andretti Autosport, Hunter-Reay’s employer, issued 30 "numbers of interest" and the IndyCar PR people sent out 26.

Both organizations were stretching things, so I’m not going to publish all 56.

But here are the Top Ten that I find most interesting.

1 – There is only one driver who has won races in IndyCar, CART/Champ Car, the American Le Mans Series and the Grand Am Rolex Sports Car Series. That driver is Ryan Hunter-Reay.

3 – Final points separating champion Ryan Hunter-Reay and second-place Will Power. It was the closest margin since 2006 when Sam Hornish Jr. beat Dan Wheldon on a tiebreaker. Only IndyCar 1996 (a tie between Scott Sharp and Buzz Calkins), CART 1999 (Juan Pablo Montoya won a tiebreaker over Dario Franchitti) and CART 1985 (Al Unser Sr. beat Al Unser Jr. by 1 point) were closer. It also tied the 1989 CART championship when Emerson Fittipaldi beat Rick Mears by 3 points.

8 – The points finish for Oakville racer James Hinchcliffe in his second IndyCar season, an improvement on his first year. "Hinch" also led 8 races, fourth best among all drivers in 2012.

8 (again) - There were eight different winners in the 15 races in 2012 as well as eight different pole-position winners.

18 - Positions gained by Ryan Hunter-Reay en route to his championship-clinching fourth-place finish at California Speedway, most of any driver in the field (which showed that even with Power out of the race, he really had to work for his title). In short-track racing, he'd be given the Hard Charger Award.

28 - Hunter-Reay's car number represents the 28 million people around the world who are suffering from cancer. He lost his mother, Lydia, to the disease in 2009. He let it be known at the Honda Indy Toronto that she was originally from Hamilton. Her death inspired him to help launch the Racing for Cancer Foundation. He is also one of 13 worldwide envoys for Lance Armstrong's Livestrong organization. 

88 – Podium finishes for Dario Franchitti (who finished second on the weekend) in his Indy car career, tying Al Unser Jr. and Bobby Rahal for fifth on the all-time list.

196 - Consecutive Indy car starts for Tony Kanaan going back to the 2001 CART race in Portland. Kanaan is second to Jimmy Vasser's 211 straight starts.

1,968 - Total race laps in 2012. Helio Castroneves completed almost all of them: 1,965, most of any driver.

$1,000,000 - Prize money for winning the 2012 Izod IndyCar Series title.

Hunter-Reay wins IndyCar title in nail-biter

Last year’s IZOD IndyCar Series finale ended in tragedy with the death of Dan Wheldon. This year’s finish was triumphant, with a dramatic, down-to-the-wire, championship won by Ryan Hunter-Reay and an exciting, final laps pass for the victory by Ed Carpenter.

For the third year in a row, Penske Racing driver Will Power was poised to capture the title but yet again it was not to be. Going into the MAVTV 500 at California Speedway, all the Australian had to do was keep it between the walls. Once again, his inability to race on ovals did him in when he lost control and crashed on Lap 55 of the scheduled 250.

Although crew members from all three Penske Racing entries – a total of 20 from Power’s team as well as helpers from Ryan Briscoe’s and Helio Castroneves’s – literally rebuilt the car in the garage and sent it back out for Power to finish 24th and score enough points to force Hunter-Reay to finish fifth or better, it was for naught as Hunter-Reay made it through to the end of the race uninterrupted, ending up fourth to win the championship by three points.

Ironically, Power nearly collected Hunter-Reay when he crashed, the eventual champion passing him on the high side as he spun out of control. As the new champ collected his thoughts afterward, he made mention of Power jokingly suggesting that he might crash his opponent in order to win.

Hunter-Reay’s first words upon exiting his car, however, had nothing to do with Power. "Oh, my God," he said as he stood up in the cockpit.

"We were struggling all week," he told a television reporter a short time later. "We were really in the woods. It hasn’t sunk in yet. I just drove 500 miles like it was for my life. I can’t believe we are IndyCar champions. My dream has come true."

To his credit, Power congratulated the new champion. "He’s a deserving champion," he said. "He’s a fighter."

And he owned up to his own shortcoming. "Obviously, it’s ovals where I lack."

Dario Franchitti, who was champion the last three years, finished second in the race behind Carpenter. He’d been leading but had to check up as they came upon a slower car and Carpenter went by him on the high side for the lead and the victory.

Scott Dixon finished third, Hunter-Reay (who signed to continue driving for Michael Andretti before the race) was fourth, Castroneves was fifth, Graham Rahal finished sixth, Takuma Sato (he crashed on the white-flag lap, just as he did at the Indianapolis 500 in May) still finished seventh, pole-sitter Marco Andretti was eighth, Katherine Legge was ninth and drove the best race of her IndyCar career in so doing, and Charlie Kimball was tenth.

Canadian Alex Tagliani of Montreal looked for awhile as if he might win the race but lost his engine in the late going. He eventually was classified 20^th and finished the season 17^th in points.

James Hinchcliffe of Oakville did not have a good race. He was assessed a drive-through penalty for jumping a restart and eventually finished three laps off the pace in 13^th place. He finished the season in eighth position.

"Hinch" will soon be off to Australia – his girlfriend’s from there – to race in the Australian V8 Supercars Championship Gold Coast race next month. His sponsor, Go Daddy, is making a big push Down Under and Hinchcliffe will be racing and promoting his sponsor’s brand.

OTHER WEEKEND RACING

– D.J. Kennington of St. Thomas won his sixth race of the season at Riverside Speedway outside Antigonish, N.S., Saturday night but it still wasn’t enough to clinch his second NASCAR Canadian Tire Series national championship.

He’ll have to wait now till next Saturday at Kawartha Speedway near Peterborough, where it’s expected he’ll wrap things up.

J.R. Fitzpatrick of Cambridge was second in the Down East contest, with Mark Dilley of Barrie third, defending champion Scott Steckly of Milverton third and Ron Beauchamp Jr. of Windsor fifth.

– At Virginia International Raceway, Muscle Milk Team Picket’s Lucas Luhr and Klaus Graf won the American Le Mans Series race in their Honda Performance Development P1 car.

Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner wrapped up the GT class championship for Corvette Racing and Cooper MacNeil (wiith Leh Keen for this race) won the GT Challenge championship.

The ALMS will end its season Oct. 20 at Road Atlanta when the Petit Le Mans will be run.

– Back at California Speedway, Carlos Muniz might have won the Indy Lights race but David Ostella of Maple finished second and that is the best finish for this young Canadian racer in that series and the first time in his Indy Lights career that he’s been on the podium. Congratulations, David!

Will Mike Conway get the same sympathy as Niki Lauda?

Director Ron Howard is putting the finishing touches to his new Formula One racing movie, Rush, that dramatizes the season-long fight for the World Championship between James Hunt and Niki Lauda in 1976.

That was the year when Lauda barely escaped with his life from a horrible crash and fire at the Nurburgring during the German Grand Prix. He had not wanted to race at the ‘Ring because he was worried about safety but the other drivers voted to go ahead and he went along. Terribly burned, it was almost unbelievable when, just six weeks later, he returned to race in the Italian GP.

The championship went down to the final race in Japan with Hunt trailing Lauda by three points. The race started in a torrential downpour and Lauda called it a day after two laps, saying he considered his life too precious to risk in those conditions, thus losing the championship to Hunt by a single point.

It was called as brave a decision as the one he made to return to the cockpit so soon after his crash in Germany.

I thought of that today when the news arrived from California that Mike Conway had stepped out of the cockpit of A.J. Foyt’s car on the eve of the season-ending race of the IZOD IndyCar Series at California Speedway because he’d decided oval racing was too dangerous. He’s been replaced by Wade Cunningham.

"I'm truly sorry for putting the team and our sponsors in a difficult position, but this is the hardest decision I have ever made in my racing career," said Conway, who missed the 2010 season after being hurt in a crash at the Indianapolis 500 (left). A talented road racer who had success in British F2 and GP2 — Conway finished third in this year’s Honda Indy Toronto — he escaped injury at Indy in May when he had another bad crash.

"I've come to realize I'm not comfortable on the ovals and no longer wish to compete on them,” he said in his statement. “I want to stress that I am not finished racing and to this end, I would love to continue with Foyt Racing, but that's something we need to discuss in the future."

A.J. Foyt’s son Larry Foyt, who runs Foyt Racing, said that he respected Conway's decision.

"Mike's been a great asset to our team, and I'm disappointed that we can't finish out the season together," he said. "However, it took a lot of courage for Mike to come forward and we respect him highly for that and we certainly want to honour his decision."

I have no idea how Conway plans to continue his career, at least in the Indy car series, where oval racing is a fact of life.

And to admit to being scared is not something that goes over well with most oval-track racing fans – or with old oval racers like A.J. Foyt.

Larry Foyt might have said all the right things for public consumption, but you can bet his father was saying something else behind closed doors.

For the Indy fraternity, it’s better to own up to having reservations in advance, rather than to back out later.

Take one of the greatest car designers, builders and mechanics in Indy car racing history, A.J. Watson, who one year in the 1950s built most of the cars that were on the track at Indianapolis.

He tried driving once but never again.

How come? he was asked.

“I suffered from severe stomach problems,” said Watson.

“No guts.”

#

Conway’s departure has taken some of the wind out of the sails of the Indy car finale, in which Ryan Hunter-Reay and Will Power will fight it out for the series championship.

Instead of only running stories about the championship battle – Power leads Hunter-Reay by a mere 17 points going into the MAVTV 500 (see George’s TV Listings for Race Fans for time and channel) — the major Internet racing sites carried stories about the Foyt driver’s defection, sometimes more prominently.

Although it’s said that there are upwards of 30 different scenarios in which one or the other of Power or Hunter-Reay can win the championship, this is not last week’s NASCAR race for the Chase, in which there was potential for genuine surprise.

In short, Power will win or Hunter-Reay will win and possibly because one will get caught up in a crash or suffer some kind of mechanical difficulty.

If the past is any indicator, Power won’t win because he is not a good oval-track racer. He’s been in this situation before and he's always come out on the low end.

IndyCar’s insane engine-change rule might have an effect, as well. That’s where the driver is penalized 10 starting positions because the people who make the engines don’t do their jobs correctly and the engines just about all have to be changed.

In the case of California, more than half the starting field — 14 drivers, including the two fighting for the title and stars like our own James Hinchcliffe, Alex Tagliani and Helio Castroneves — will be handed 10-grid-position penalties for unapproved engine changes.

I mean, you want stupid? Cunningham, who doesn’t even race for Foyt but has been called in to fill Conway’s seat, will be penalized 10 grid positions because Foyt changed the car’s engine.

So he’s penalized before he even sits down in the car?

Nuts.

#

The NASCAR Canadian Tire Series is racing at Riverside Speedway outside Antigonish, N.S., this weekend. It’s unlikely that D.J. Kennington of St. Thomas will win the championship and the title fight will most likely be settled in the season finale next week at Kawartha Speedway outside Peterborough. . . . And unless the weather creates a problem, the eighth annual Canadian Sprint Car Nationals will be held Saturday night at Ohsweken Speedway on the Six Nations Reserve outside Brantford. . . . If dirt trackin’ ain’t your style, the British Empire Motor Club’s annual Indian Summer Trophy Races will be held at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park at the weekend. A highlight is the annual three-hour enduro-GT Challenge, which will go to the post later on Saturday afternoon.

Danica Patrick has to start fighting back

If Danica Patrick wants to survive in NASCAR, she’s going to have to start fighting back.

She’s been wrecked, or nearly wrecked, in every Sprint Cup race she’s started this year.

Saturday night, it was obvious she was just getting too uppity – it was late in the race and she was on the lead lap and closing in on a strong top 20 finish (in the two Cup races she’d actually finished earlier this year, she was no threat to anybody) – so Regan Smith just went up the track and ran into her for no particular reason other than she was there and he felt like taking her out.

Now, NASCAR’s veterans think it’s hilarious to initiate rookies, particularly drivers who aren’t regulars.  But it’s time for her to show them that enough is enough.

My advice to her today is simple: the next Sprint Cup start she gets, dump somebody. Pick a target and put him into the wall. Just do it. Send a warning to every driver out there: mess with me and I’m coming right back at ya.

Her boss, Tony Stewart, would approve, I’m sure. He let Matt Kenseth know how he felt on Saturday night. Yes, it was a little over the top when he threw his helmet at Kenseth after the two of them got together and crashed, but you can bet that Kenseth will have second thoughts about getting too close to Tony Stewart again this season.

And yes, I know Matt Kenseth is a tough guy in his own right and Tony Stewart didn’t exactly throw the fear of God into him with his little hissy fit. However, don’t ever kid yourself that Matt Kenseth won’t be thinking from now on about the possibility of getting wrecked every time Stewart goes to pass him or he goes to pass Stewart. Intimidation is the name of the game in big-league stock car racing and everybody has to learn how to play and that includes Danica Patrick.

Of course, if she starts fighting back on the track, that could open up another can of worms in the pits.

NASCAR drivers have been known to get physical. Not often, but it happens. Would anybody be foolish enough to take a swing at Patrick? Would she be foolish enough to take a swing at another driver? It’s not likely to happen – but it could.

And here’s another thing that some of those drivers would be wise to internalize: do any of them really want to be the driver whose deliberate actions result in her suffering a serious injury? Or worse?

The only time NASCAR will ever be on the front page of the New York Times is if Danica Patrick wins a race or, God forbid, what happened to Dan Wheldon happens to her.

I guarantee you that would be a disaster for NASCAR.

It is 2012 and sponsors might want to be associated with car racing on one hand but, on the other, they sure don’t want to be associated with a sport in which people are killed. Ten years ago, or 20, it was okay. Not any more.

IZOD has disappeared completely from the IndyCar series and that came about precisely because of what happened to Wheldon. The only reason IZOD’s name is still associated with that series is because of the contract.

And the same thing could happen to NASCAR if anything happened to Patrick.

Racing is racing and she’s out there taking her chances with everybody else. And when you have cars travelling in a pack at 150 or 200 miles an hour, negative things can and do happen.

But the next time somebody like Regan Smith sees Patrick and figures she’s an easy target, she might be – but to then take advantage of the situation might wind up doing far more harm to the sport than anybody realizes.

Patrick can help herself, and the sport, by letting everybody know now that it's time to lay off.

Oh, yeah: Denny Hamlin survived Bristol to win the Cup race. Jimmie Johnson was second and Jeff Gordon was third. Click here for story and results. There are two races left until the Chase field is set. Time for some people to get serious.

Friday night, Joey Logano won the Nationwide Series race – his sixth in that series this season. Click here for story and results.

Next weekend’s TV schedule illustrates perfectly why Randy Bernard is so keen to get IZOD IndyCar Series races off of TSN and onto one of Rogers Sportsnet ‘s national channels next year.

The Baltimore Grand Prix goes to the post next Sunday at 2:30 p.m. TSN has CFL football on the main channel that afternoon and U.S. Open tennis on TSN2. So they’re full up, it appears.

Rogers has a national channel plus four regional channels and their purchase of The Score this weekend will soon give them a second national channel.

So I will be surprised if all of the Indy car races in 2013 aren’t available live and in colour on one of Sportsnet’s national channels and I trust Bernard won’t sign a contract until he has that guarantee.

Meantime, I will likely listen to the Baltimore race in my car on my XM Satellite radio. Mike King and Davey Hamilton do a good job announcing. I discovered this when I was driving home from the drag races at Toronto Motorsport Park on a Saturday night in June and tuned into the Indy car race from Iowa Speedway.

It was kinda nice that night, bombing along Highway 6 South with the cruise control and the radio both on. The drag races had been terrific, the moon was bright and although I’d hoped to be home in time to watch the race on TV, the King-Hamilton broadcast on XM meant I didn’t miss a thing.

Now, I don’t want to be too critical of TSN. They reacted really well last year when I complained that they had filler stuff on TSN2 the second day of Indianapolis 500 time trials. Low and behold, somebody was paying attention and they threw out all the recorded stuff and put the time trials on live.

And next Sunday, they are televising the F1 race from Belgium in the morning and the very important NASCAR race from Atlanta on Sunday night. So thank you for that.

But do we really need 11 hours of U.S. Open tennis? Starting at 11 a.m. and continuing to 11 p.m. except for an hour of SportsCentre at 6? And this isn’t even the finals. We’re talking the third round here.

Is there no way to sneak in two hours of car racing at 2:30 in the afternoon (we can skip all the pre-race stuff)? Except for the people watching the race, I betcha hardly anyone will notice. . .

Meantime, the race from Sonoma yesterday – which was shown live at 4 p.m. on TSN2 (hooraaayyy!!!) – featured some great driving (winner Ryan Briscoe was perfect from start to finish and his pit crew was even better, essentially winning him the race at the last pit stop), some really sloppy driving (Helio Castroneves clipping Scott Dixon, Alex Tagliani knocking Ryan Hunter-Reay out of contention) and one of the scariest crashes seen in recent years.

Will Power finished second and, with two races remaining in the 2011 season, seems to be heading toward his first national IndyCar championship. He currently holds a 36-point lead over second-place Hunter-Reay with Castroneves five points further back. Dario Franchitti was third and F1 refugee Rubens Barrichello recorded a career-high IndyCar race finish of fourth.

The crash featured veteran Sebastien Bourdais and rookie Josef Newgarden. Bourdais lost his steering and, unable to control his car, essentially pushed Newgarden off the track and into a retaining wall that was protected by several rows of tires.

As ex-racer, team owner and colour commentator Robbie Buhl noted, the combination of the tires and the HANS device likely saved Newgarden from serious harm.

He did suffer an injury to one of his fingers because he held onto the steering wheel instead of letting it go. Remember the ribbing Danica took when she crashed for the first time in NASCAR and an in-car camera showed her letting go? Now they all do, because there’s a reason for it and Josef Newgarden’s broken finger illustrates exactly why.

James Hinchcliffe of Oakville had a rotten weekend and dropped out with mechanical problems. He was credited with 26^th place in the 27-car race.

One last thing about the Indy car race. Hunter-Reay was the victim when Tagliani went up the inside during a late-race restart and couldn’t stop, hitting RHR, spinning him around and really hurting his chances for the championship. But moments later, RHR ran into E.J. Viso and spun him around.

After the race, Hunter-Reay went to see Tagliani to "discuss" the incident between them. I was kinda hoping Viso would show up to give hell to Hunter-Reay for running into him – but no such luck.

Oh, Chevrolet clinched the engine manufacturer's championship when Briscoe crossed the finish line and Simon Pagenaud won rookie of the year. However, Pagenaud is a former Champ Car World Series driver and a veteran of the American Le Mans Series so, in my books, he ain’t no rookie.

Click here for full story and results.

Other weekend racing:

– Uxbridge native Alex Welsh captured his first career Canadian Pro Superbike victory Sunday at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. It was one of the most exciting Superbike finishes in series history.

Jordan Szoke of Brantford, who won his record eighth national title on Saturday, finished second and Kevin Lacombe of St-Cesaire, Que., finished third.

The three riders went back-and-forth for all 20 laps before Welsh went low on the last turn to squeeze past and take the checkered flag.

Lacombe was later disqualified for a technical violation. Bodhi Edie of Warman, Sask., was elevated to a podium finish.

In Moto GP action at the circuit in Brno, Czech Republic, Dani Pedrosa beat Jorge Lorenzo to the line in another thriller.

By the way, the photo at the top of this report was taken by John Walker and shows Alex Welsh leading Jordan Szoke and the rest of the Canadian Pro Superbike field.

– Canada’s Robert Wickens played bumper cars on the first lap of the German Touring Car Series (DTM) race at Zandvoort, Holland, on Sunday and a 12^th-place qualifying effort for Mercedes went for naught.

As Autosport.com reported, Wickens and Miguel Molina collided twice on the run to the first corner; the Spaniard ending up beached in the gravel at the Tarzan turn, while the Canadian was spun by Christian Vietoris two turns later and collected within seconds by Rahel Frey. All three retired.

The race was won by Edoardo Mortara in an Audi. Canadian Bruno Spengler finished sixth for BMW to keep his championship hopes alive.

– Audi won the manufacturers championship in the first year of the new FIA World Endurance Championship when Andre Lotterer, Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler drove their Audi e-tron quattro the 2012 Six Hours of Silverstone on Sunday.

– It’s hardly worth mentioning . . . but Sebastien Loeb won his seventh World Rally Championship event of the season, and his fifth straight, when he won the German Rally for the ninth time at the weekend. When I say it’s hardly worth mentioning, what I mean is: who else?

Inactivity is making F1 people crazy

You can tell that even the people in Formula One are going a little crazy, what with the series taking the entire month of August off.

For instance, the teams usually send out their pre-race briefings three days in advance on the Tuesday prior to a Grand Prix weekend. They started arriving this week on Monday, 11 days out from first practice in Belgium.

Oh, and the beat writers are making stuff up in order to fill space, which is also a sure-fire way of telling that nothing is going on.

For instance, a spokesman this week for Volkswagen Group had to deny, yet again, that a Formula One program was imminent.

You always know it’s August when VW announces it’s not planning to enter F1.

Roll on September. Please.

NASCAR is back at Bristol this weekend to take a shot at racing on the high-banked track that’s had some work done on it since the spring race, which was bo-RING.

The jury is out on how much grinding the top lane will have on the quality of competition, which in NASCAR means bumpin’ ‘n bashin’ ‘n tradin’ paint.

Timothy Peters won the Craftsman Series truck race on Wednesday by going almost wire-to-wire. He took the lead on the second lap and was never headed. Two hundred laps without a lead change does not make for riveting oval-track racing.

Please check George’s TV Listings for Race Fans on wheels.ca for channels and start times for all of this weekend’s major races.

The focus in Bristol, as usual, will be on Danica Patrick, who will race in the Nationwide Series Friday night and in the Sprint Cup on Saturday night.

All of the big racing web sites and the newspapers published stories Thursday and today about how hard a time she’s having making the switch from open-wheel Indy car racing to stock cars.

I think she’s done just fine. She qualified fourth for the Nationwide race at Montreal and was leading when mechanical problems forced her out. Time and again she’s been right in there and something has happened to eliminate her.

Anyway, I’m tired of the whole business and the reason I’m tired is because the people writing this baloney about "making the switch" don’t know what they’re talking about.

I’ll give you a test. Here is a paragraph that was published in USA Today. Read it and tell me what is wrong with it:

"Many open-wheel stars have tried to make the transition, including four-time IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti’s failed 10-race foray in 2008. Three-time IndyCar champ Sam Hornish Jr. has only recently found solid footing in NASCAR in his fifth season. Only Juan Pablo Montoya has made it stick at NASCAR’s top level."

Oh?

Give up?

Well, what about Tony Stewart? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I do believe that Tony Stewart was a triple crown U.S. Auto Club champion (midgets, sprints and Silver Crown, all in the same year in the 1990s) before winning the Indy Racing League championship before going to NASCAR where, if I’m not mistaken, he has won three Sprint Cup titles.

I’d say open wheel drivers, as exemplified by Tony Stewart, can do just fine in stock cars if given the right opportunity.

The problem, in order to make a comparison, is that no stock car driver of this generation has tried to go the other way and race in Indy cars. It might be fun to put the shoe on the other foot, for a change, and see what happens.

Except for one-offs in the Indy 500 back in the 1960s (Cale Yarborough, Lee Roy Yarbrough and Donnie and Bobby Allison), the only stock car driver who ever left NASCAR to drive most of a season in Indy cars was in 1971 when Cale Yarborough had a go. 

Know what? He didn’t do all that well - but I don't recall any of the hand-wringing stories that we're subjected to just about every day whenever poor Danica or poor Sam strap themselves into a stock car.

Of course, reporters didn't have agendas then -- and making Danica look stupid is right at the top of the list for some of those alleged impartial observers who make their living writing about stock car racing.

Speaking of open wheel, the IZOD IndyCar Series returns to action on the road course at Sonoma, Calif., on Sunday and – mathematically – there are still 15 drivers in the hunt for the championship.

Realistically, there might be seven who could do it – Will Power, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Helio Castroneves, Scott Dixon, Tony Kanaan, Simon Pagenaud and Canada’s very own James Hinchcliffe of Oakville.

If you’re wagering, you can even trim that list down to the top four.

Dario Franchitti, who has won the title every year he’s been in it going back to 2007, looks like his reign is about to end.

Which would be only fair. It’s time somebody else won that championship.

Did Woodbridge seal AIM deal with Ferrari?

When I enjoyed my first conversation of the 2012 season with AIM Autosport of Woodbridge team principal Ian Willis, it was in February at the Canadian Motorsports Expo and he was telling me how thrilled he was to be running full-time in the Grand Am Rolex Sports Car Series with – wait for it – a Ferrari.

Willis and AIM are no strangers when it comes to big-league sports car racing, having campaigned a Daytona Prototype for years with drivers like Mark Wilkins, Bruno Junqueira and Burt and Brian Frisselle.

But the Ferrari deal came out of the blue when an old friend, Grand Am driver Nick Longhi, telephoned Willis to chat.

"I’ve known Nick since he was an instructor at the Bridgestone Racing School," Willis said. "He called to say that he and others were working on a deal to run a Ferrari in the GT class of the Rolex series.

"Nick operated the Ferrari driving experience up at Mont Tremblant and is very well connected within the Ferrari network. He thought of us because he knows we’re capable of winning in the Grand Am series (two Daytona Prototype victories in 2008, for example) and he figured we would be a great fit.

"He’s also worked with (AIM drivers) Emil Assentato and Jeff Segal and so everything just seemed to fall into place."

 

 

Willis said it wasn’t a slam-dunk, though; that other teams were in the mix. In the end, it was the municipality where their business is located that might very well have sealed the deal for them.

"Ferrari is Italy’s team, it’s Italy’s brand," he said. "Woodbridge, where we're based, is 50 per cent Italian-speaking and that really opened the door for us."

He said he and the drivers went to Italy to get the car and they did a shakedown test at Fiorano, the official Ferrari test track.

"It’s hallowed ground," Willis said. "Emil (Assentato) sent me a note afterward and said it was like a country priest visiting the Vatican. Me? I just kept pinching myself."

So that was in February. The next time I talked to Willis was a month or so ago on Bayview Ave. in midtown Toronto. He and his sweetheart were out for a stroll with their young pup dog in tow, or the dog had them in tow, I’m not sure which. In any event, we talked about the season to date.

"Our goal is to win the championship," he said at the time (as of today, with two races remaining, both in September, Segal and Assentato are in first place in the GT driver standings, AIM is in first place among teams and Ferrari leads all manufacturers ).

"We’re on a one-year contract and our long-range plan is to grow to two cars for 2013. We’re working toward a Canadian sister car for the one we have now, which has an all-American lineup (Assentato is from New York and Segal is from Miami and Philadelphia).

"The nice thing about being Canadian is there are a lot of good Canadian drivers to choose from. Daniel Morad drove for us. There’s also Robbie Wickens, James Hinchcliffe, Andrew Ranger, Jacques Villeneuve, Mark Wilkins. They’re all good drivers.

"But right now, that’s pretty far way. Our focus is to get a championship for this car and our drivers. That’s our priority. Hopefully, the rest will fall into place."

The last race of the Rolex season is at Lime Rock, Conn., the weekend of Sept. 28-29. After that, Wilkins might know more about next year.

I’ll phone him up then and find out. And I’ll bring you up to date, too.

Is Dodge name in NASCAR up for sale?

Erica Enders (left) and Courtney Force each claimed victories during the NHRA O'Reilly Auto Parts Northwest Nationals at Pacific Raceways. (NHRA Photo)

Precede to this column:  It's official. Dodge has withdrawn from NASCAR as of the end of 2012. Click here for the official video statement. However, the premise of my analysis still stands. If a team wants to lease the name, Dodge, from Chrysler Corp., and get a leg up on the competition in advance of the company returning to NASCAR, then a deal can surely be made. Meantime . . .

It’s always interesting to scan the headlines on numrous websites following a weekend of racing:

1. Katherine Legge returns as Dragon Racing gets back to two cars for Sonoma IndyCar race.

2. Lotus sure of stronger second half.

3. Furniture Row may switch to Dodge

My reaction to those three headlines is as follows:

1. Yippee. Can hardly wait.

2. Somebody better tell those guys that this is racing, and nothing is a guarantee.

3. Huh?

So, let’s focus on No. 3.

General Motors, Ford and Toyota are committed to NASCAR racing in 2013. Dodge, not so much. In fact, Dodge has been sending signals for some time that it really doesn’t know what it’s going to do in NASCAR in 2013, if anything.

Just this weekend, Penske Racing’s Tim Cindric told reporters that up till a week ago, Penske and Dodge had been talking about Penske continuing to build engines for a Dodge entry in NASCAR next season, even though Penske announced months ago that the race team would be running Fords in 2013 and would get them from Roush-Yates.

But the Dodge engine option is officially gone now, Cindric said. He went on: "Relative to us, they said they’re going in a different direction. We don’t see there being any more potential on the NASCAR side with Dodge."

Now, when I say that some manufacturers are still committed, that doesn’t mean what it once did. Hundreds of millions of dollars of investment are now tens of millions – if that.

Dodge is owned by Chrysler which is owned by Fiat. The guy who runs Fiat is Sergio Marchionne and he looks at the whole, not just the parts. He’s a guy who’s very aware of every dollar and cent that’s spent anywhere in the company in the world.

He knows, for instance, that it doesn’t look good for Chrysler to ask its auto workers in one country to take a pay cut and then turn around and spend millions on a racing program in another, particularly if that racing program isn’t going to be successful.

You would think the folks at Furniture Row Racing would know that. But team general manager Joe Garone said that "if Dodge comes to us, and says here’s the right deal, then we would do it."

As I’m sure anybody would. . .

But I don’t really think that’s what’s going to happen.

As a friend of mine who’s very involved in automobile manufacturing says: "In Chrysler’s case, they want the whole deal taken off their hands and to be paid for it. In exchange, they will licence or lease out the Dodge name. If no one can do it that way, then that’s it."

(Norris note here: I would suggest that’s what Cindric was saying when he said "they are going in a different direction . . . and we don’t see there being any more potential."  Translation: they want money and we ain’t payin’ . . .)

My friend continued:

"There’s as much money out there as ever before, it’s just being pushed in different directions. There isn’t the interest in NASCAR any more. NASCAR has had its day, the ROI (return on investment) is no longer there."

That doesn’t mean the end of NASCAR, or IndyCar, or whatever car. It just means the whole auto racing industry will have to get leaner, yet again, and to live much more within its means.

And to get along without manufacturer support.

Talking about living within your means, there’s a story on the speedtv.com site about Luis Perez-Sala, the new boss of the HRT Formula One team, and how everything was in disarray when he took over.

The first thing he did, apparently, was to move the team "into plush new  headquarters" in Madrid.

The car might still stink, but the headquarters are plush and, like so much in F1 these days, that seems to be what counts.

Oh, and in the failed-drug-tests department, move over A.J., you've got company. Former F1 and IndyCar driver Thomas Enge has been banned for 18 months by the FIA for flunking a pee test. He was suspended once previously for using marijuana.

Weekend Results roundup:

– At Trois-Riveres, Que., D.J. Kennington of St. Thomas did not win the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series race. That is big news, seeing as Kennington had won the five previous races in Canada’s only national racing series.

Andrew Ranger of Roxton Pond, Que., who has won the Trois-Rivieres race four times out of the last six, was first again this year, with L.P. Dumoulin finishing second in front of his hometown crowd and J.R. Fitzpatrick of Cambridge coming home third. Kennington was fifth, behind Robin Buck of Campbellville.

The next outing for the NASCAR Canada series will be at Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve Aug. 18 as part of the NASCAR Nationwide Series race at the fabled circuit.

Also at Trois-Rivieres, Tristan Vautier won the Indy Lights race and Nick Wittmer of Hudson, Que.., won the new B-Spec class in the Canadian Touring Car Championship Series while Marc-Antoine Camirand won both Super Touring class races, with Paul Dargis and Alain Lauzier winning in Touring class.

– At the Mid-Ohio IndyCar race Sunday, James Hinchcliffe of Oakville drove a fine race to finish fifth (he had a poor qualifying session and went off 16^th) and improved his place in the points standings. Montreal’s Alex Tagliani had another Top Ten finish. The race was won by Scott Dixon, with Will Power second and Simon Pagenaud third.

It was the second straight IndyCar race without a caution.

– Bad weather forced the cancellation of the elimination rounds at Toronto Motorsports Park on Sunday so drag racing fans who show up at Grand Bend Motoplex this coming weekend for the Stratford Spectacular Hot August Nationals will be in for a real treat.

In addition to a full program featuring the Pro Modified Racing Association, the Quick 32 Sportsman Series and the Pro Bike & Sled Series, the elimination rounds from TMP will be added.

Bruce Boland of Hamilton qualified No. 1 in the PMRA, Kevin Wicke of Stratford and James Lichty of Linwood led the Quick 32 qualifyers and Danny Staples of Ingersoll was No. 1 in the PBSS. All will be looking to extend their dominance at Grand Bend.

– Speaking of drag racing, two women made NHRA history at the weekend. Courtney Force won the Funny Car class and Erica Enders won in Pro Stock. It is the first time in the history of the NHRA that women finished first in two of the top four classes.

– The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series will be at Watkins Glen at the weekend for the second road race of the season (and, to my mind, there should be at least a half-dozen among the 36 races flagged off each season, instead of just two).

Bill France Jr. once told me that Watkins Glen is a "Canadian race," as are the ones at New Hampshire and Michigan. I guess that means since we’ve already got three, we won’t be getting any more anytime soon . . .

In any event, Jeff Gordon will be fresh off his "victory" at Pocono Raceway last Sunday, which was red-flagged and declared official just before the 100-lap mark because of rain. Kasey Kahne was second and Martin Truex finished third.

Jimmie Johnson and Matt Kenseth were ahead on the restart but Johnson got sideways and pushed Kensenth up to the wall and Gordon, plus the rest, snuck past in the ensuing melee. Then the rains came.

Ron Fellows of Mississauga will be driving in the Nationwide Series race on Saturday, which will be a warmup for the Nationwide event at Montreal on Aug. 18. Of course, any time that Fellows climbs into a racing car, he’s at, or near, the front. So expect a show.

– Finally, the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series will be at Knoxville, Iowa, this coming weekend for the 52^nd Knoxville Nationals. No word on whether Tony Stewart will be there but I guarantee you that the series regulars are crossing their fingers he’ll be too busy at the Glen to fly out or else they’ll all be fighting for second place.

He’s raced with the Outlaws a couple of times this season and won twice, most recently a week ago at Ohsweken Speedway out near Brantford. It was no contest that time.

Elvis Stojko reveals plans to race cars

FLASH: Canada may soon have a new racing hero to cheer for.

As Paul Tracy, Patrick Carpentier and Jacques Villeneuve walk off into the sunset, leaving James Hinchcliffe, Robert Wickens and Alex Tagliani to carry the Canadian flag into battle, champion figure skater Elvis Stojko revealed today that he's about to launch a car racing career.

During an interview on the Fan 590 radio station in Toronto, Stojko - who'd been contacted to talk about the upcoming Summer Olympics in London (he's a three-time Olympic silver medalist in figure skating) - let it be known that he was in serious training for a season of shifter-kart racing.

There's a wonderful world-class kart facility at le Circuit-Mont Tremblant race track north of Montreal and Stojko said he was spending a week there to hone his skills as a kart racer.

"My arms hurt and my body aches but I'm having a great time," he said after telling his interviewer that the kart he's training in this week is capable of an average speed of 160 km/h.

Stojko said his wife, Mexican figure skater Gladys Orozco, used to race karts as a child and is fully supportive of his ambition.

It was then that he said his plan is to become a car racer, although he didn't reveal whether that would be in single-seaters, sedans or stock cars.

Now, if I was Francois Dumontier, president and CEO of Octane Racing, which promotes the F1 race in Montreal and the Edmonton Indy, I would be on the phone to Stojko asap to invite him to compete in the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series race he'll be promoting at Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve next month.

That race weekend needs help - the Canadian Tire series is part of a double-header with the NASCAR Nationwide Series - and has been successful in large part because of the presence of famous Canadian racers, particularly French-Canadian racing stars.

But Carpentier had to be enticed out of retirement for this year's race and Villeneuve and Tagliani are not the draws they once were. Danica Patrick will be there but the Cup stars (other than Carl Edwards and Marcos Ambrose) have never embraced that race.

But Elvis Stojko? In a stock car? I betcha that would sell some tickets.

Meantime, good luck to Elvis. His participation in motorsports will draw a lot of attention from people who wouldn't normally be interested.

Figure skating has a huge fan base and if even some of them become race fans as a result, it will be a real shot in the arm for the sport.

Earlier:

Latino top drag racer; Touring cars, Porsches thrill

Although this is a few days later, here is what happened last weekend in "local" racing:

(My definition of "local" racing is racing that is not Formula One, NASCAR, American LeMans/Grand Am or IndyCar . . .)

Before we concentrate on the major Canadian races in support of the ALMS at Mosport – Canadian Touring Cars and the Porsche GT3 Challenge Canada – let’s catch up with Ontario drag racing.

At the Bend Motoplex, Eric Latino of Whitby won the Pro Modiified Racing Association headline event at the IHRA MOPAR Nitro Jam Nationals. It was his fourth victory in PMRA competition.

Driving his Team Green ‘69 Chevy Camaro, Latino – who’d qualified fourth behind PMRA points leader Bruce Boland of Hamilton – defeated Rocky Di Lecce of Mississaugua in the final round.

Latino is now in second place in the PMRA 2012 Series presented by Global Emissions Systems, Inc., behind Boland, who has a 26-point lead.

Next time out for the drag racers is the August Civic Holiday weekend at Toronto Motorsports Park. In addition to the PMRA, the Quick 32 Sportsman Series presented by NAPA and the Pro Bike & Sled Series presented by Wiseco Performance Products will also compete at TMP.

Now, before we leave the drag racers, Melanie Simmons and her Toyrific Racing Top Dragster Team, based in Orillia, has signed a product marketing agreement with Aeroquip Performance Products and will be flying its colours at drag meets for the foreseeable future.

You know, it doesn’t matter whether it’s drag racing or circuit racing or oval racing, when you add it all up, Canadian companies and corporations are investing millions of dollars in motorsport and I urge fans everywhere to patronize the businesses and purchase the products of those companies.

Moving right along, the World of Outlaws sprint cars – the F1 and Indy cars of sprint car racing – are coming to Canada Friday for a four-speedway swing that will see them wrap up at Ohsweken Speedway on the Six Nations Reserve next Tuesday night.

At Williams Grove Speedway in Pennsylvania last weekend, Steve Kinser received a cheque for $10,000 for leading the series at the halfway point of the season.

Kinser, Sammy Swindell, Joey Saldana, Craig Dolansky and the rest of the Outlaws will race at Autodrome Granby and Autodrome Drummondville in Quebec on Friday and Saturday nights, then move to Cornwall Speedway on Sunday before finishing off the Canadian swing at Ohsweken on Tuesday.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if you have never seen an Outlaws race, you are missing one of the most incredible forms of racing in the world. They don’t come by this part of the world all that often, so don’t miss them.

Tony Stewart will be the big draw at Ohsweken. In fact, he’ll be there for a 360 sprint car race Monday night as well as Tuesday night with the Outlaws. Reserved seats are on sale now and can be purchased by calling the speedway.

Okay, last weekend at Mosport, the Canadian Touring Car Championship raced twice – on Saturday and Sunday and both at the end of the day, which meant the track was less than perfect.

In the first race Saturday, Remy Audette was the winner in Super Touring class, followed by Bob Attrell and Philip Fayer. Series leader Sasha Anis spun in fluid early in the race and crashed.

In Touring Class, Alain Lausiere was first, followed by Damon Sharpe and Jonathan Young. In B-Spec Class, Nick Wittmer was first, followed by his brother Karl. Guest media driver Russ Bond finished a wonderful third.

In the race on Sunday – the tenth round of the season – Anis recovered wonderfully from his terrible Saturday, starting 18^th and passing everybody to finish on the top step of the podium. Attrell was second again, followed by Scott Nicol. In the Touring and B-Spec Classes, the contestants finished exactly the same way they had on Saturday.

The series now goes to Trois-Rivieres, Que., the first weekend in August.

The Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Canada by Michelin, which is the fastest-growing single-make series in North America, also held two races.

In the first, on Saturday, Carlos de Quesada was first in Platinum class, with Perry Bortolotti second and John Ellis third. In Gold class, Chris Green was first, followed by Robert Maranda and Bruce Gregory. Finally, in Silver class, Robert Seitz was first, with Leho Poldmae second and Gavor Foti third.

In the second race on Sunday, Etienne Borgeat was first in Platinum class, with Jean-Frederick Laberge second and Bortolotti third. Green repeated as Gold class winner, with Gregory second and Peter Collins third. In Silver class, Seitz was first again, with Foti and Poldmae switching places from Saturday for second and third.

Both races were actually won by Kyle Marcelli of Barrie but, since he is a professional racing driver and the other participants are semi-pros or non-professionals (I hate the word amateur), he participated as a guest driver and his results were not counted.