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RACING SCENE Column - By Tim Kennedy
Los Angeles, CA. - DANICA MANIA: Danica Patrick, 26, finally won her first Indy Car race in an 18-car field for the 300-mile race on April 20 at the 1.5-mile track at Motegi, Japan north of Tokyo. It was her 50th Indy Car race. Having her mom, dad, sister and husband present at the Twin Ring Motegi track made it memorable for her and all her family. Danica flew back to California with Dan Wheldon, Helio "twinkle-toes" Castroneves and others. She made an appearance on the ESPN2 live telecast of the final ever Champ Car race at the Long Beach Grand Prix. Danica also was a guest on the CBS Late Show with David Letterman Monday, April 21 and on Late Night with Conan O'Brien Thursday, April 24.
Best Reflex Move of the Year Award: That award (if one existed) would have to go to the IRL Motegi, Japan race pace car driver. He swerved sharply to the right as he exited the pits to pace the field under a caution flag. The pace car driver just avoided the IRL No. 27 AGR Dallara of IRL rookie Hideki Mutoh who exited the pits and on new tires spun out sharply to his left directly in front of the moving pace car.
The Saturday, April 26 Los Angeles Times news section first page printed a feature story about top female athletes with photos of golfer Lorena Ochoa, WNBA basketball rookie (from Tennessee) Candace Parker and IRL's Danica Patrick on page A.1 below the fold. She is no longer "Danica Kournikova", a reference to pro tennis player Anna Kournikova, who was winless in major tournaments. The headline read: "Top female athletes are also-rans when it comes to big-money endorsements. But the field may start to level." The 32-paragraph story gave details and compared super-star salaries of male and female athletes. It showed Danica at $5 million a year in fifth place among females (behind two tennis players and two golfers). Danica's endorsements include Go.Daddy.com, Tissot Swiss Watches, Samsonite, Peak Anti-Freeze, Motorola and Air Tran Airways. The continued L.A.Times story on page A.25 had a large photo of helmet-less Danica in her Motorola light blue and black racing uniform applied to the side of an Air Tran Boeing 737 fuselage. The airline added three letters to the Air Tran name on the outside of the aircraft above the windows. It read "Air Tranica" in tribute to her becoming the first female Indy Car race winner. Danica also received congratulatory messages from Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone and singer Alanis Morrissette.
FEMALE WINNERS: Other female winners of note during April were ESPN pit/garage reporter Jamie Little and Simona DeSilvestro, 19 year old Swiss driver, in the Formula Atlantic 38-lap race with 23 drivers, including TV/movie actor Frankie Muniz. Both Little and DeSilvestro won in Long Beach Grand Prix Champ Car preliminary races on the 1.968-mile street circuit. DeSilvestro won the LBGP Atlantic Series pro race that Danica won in 2003 and England's Katherine Legge won a few years later. NHRA drag racer Ashley Force, 25-year old daughter of NHRA Funny Car legendary champion John Force, joined the female winners club on Sunday, April 27. Little won the annual Toyota Pro-Celebrity 10-lap race on Saturday, April 26. She beat NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series veteran and past champion Mike Skinner by a few lengths. All drivers raced in identical Toyota Scion TC sedans and the pro drivers started 30 seconds after the celebrities. Ashley, from Yorba Linda, CA., became the first NHRA Funny Car final race female
winner at Commerce, GA (near Atlanta). Making her accomplishment even more memorable was the fact she beat her dad John in the final Funny Car match race. ESPN2 showed the event on a same day, tape-delay basis.
IRL RENAISSANCE: The Indy Racing League must be living right. Things seem to be falling into place for a comeback against the dominant 1,000-pound gorilla-NASCAR. First, two-time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves brought recognition to the Indy Car series by winning the popular ABC-TV show "Dancing with the Stars" last year. Many fans of the show may attend or watch the Indy 500 because of Helio's dancing prowess. Earlier this year, the 13-year split between IRL and Champ Car ended when the two series merged during February. Then 19-year old American second-generation driver Graham Rahal won the St. Petersburg, FL IRL street race and became the youngest Indy Car winner in history. Then most recognized and publicized Danica won her first Indy Car race. The combined Indy Car series car count for the Kansas Speedway race reached 27, up from the usual 18. TV ratings for 2008 IRL races and the www.IndyCar.com web site hits are up over comparable 2007 numbers. Interest in the 2008 Indianapolis 500 on May 25 has increased as well. Time trials to fill the 33 starting position for the 500 should be more interesting with about 40 car/driver combinations entered. Actual bumping of slower cars should occur this year on bump day. New teams are being formed (e.g.--Sarah Fisher-owned "sponsors wanted" SF Racing No. 67-her old USAC Midget car number) and former Indy 500 teams are returning (e.g--car owner Ron Hemelgarn, driver and past winner Buddy Lazier and crew chief Lee Kunzman). Tomas Scheckter is returning to the 500 in the No. 12 driven last year by Ryan Briscoe, who moved on to replace NASCAR-rookie Sam Hornish, Jr. in Roger Penske's No. 6 Dallara. Davey Hamilton, who returned to the Indy 500 last year and placed ninth after a five-year absence, has returned to the 500 in a third Vision Racing entry sponsored by Hewlett-Packard. Veteran 500 drivers Roger Yasukawa, Jacques Lazier and Richie Hearn all hope to land 500 rides with teams such as the Mike Curb entry. Two-time 500 vet P. J. Jones is
another likely entrant for the second weekend when Honda engine leases are less expensive. Time will tell.
INDY ROOKIES: The 2008 Indianapolis 500 class will have from IRL ranks Ryan Hunter-Reay (Rahal-Letterman Racing), Hideki Mutoh (AGR), plus Jay Howard (Roth Racing), Alex Lloyd and Jaime Camara from the Indy Lights driver development series. Champ Car rookies at Indy this year will include 2008 LBGP winner Will Power, St. Petersburg winner Graham Rahal, past Champ Car multiple winners Justin Wilson and Mario Dominguez, E. J. Viso, Enrique Bernoldi and Mario Moraes. Wilson and Bernoldi raced in past Formula One GPs at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Veteran Champ Car driver Oriol Servia will make his Indy 500 debut after one aborted attempt earlier this decade. Bruno Junqueira is returning this year for his second Indy 500. A serious crash sidelined him for one season after he and A. J. Foyt IV collided in a turn during the 2005 Indy 500. Last year three female drivers-Danica Patrick, Sarah Fisher and rookie Milka Duno-raced in the 2007 Indy 500 and all three have rides and are returning to compete
in the 2008 Indy 500. Major family names from Indianapolis 500 glory days are back this year. Andretti (Marco), Foyt (A. J. IV), Rahal (Graham) and who knows about Unser (Al, Jr and Al III will be present), Jones (P.J), Luyendyk (Arie, Jr) could move up from Indy Lights as he did several years ago at Indy when he had a ride and missed the 500. Indianapolis Motor Speedway management respects 500 history and honors past winning drivers and cars. The Unser family had its own day of honor this year and family members Bobby, Al Sr., Al Jr., Al III, Robby and Johnny participated in ceremonies.
On Wednesday night April 2 the first open practice session of 2008 at Industry Speedway for Speedway Cycle racers took place will 22 riders present. The site was the smooth dirt track at the hillside Grand Arena in the City of Industry overlooking the East San Gabriel Valley, 20 miles east of downtown Los Angeles. Year five at Industry Speedway has a new promotional team-1981-82 World Speedway Cycle champion Bruce Penhall, 50, and his long-time business manager Jeff Immediato. Fans from Ascot Park in Gardena will remember Jeff for working with the Agajanian Enterprises promotional events at Ascot. Opening night of a 15 Wednesday night season took place on May 7. There were almost 1,000
spectators present and a full compliment of pro and youth riders. Riders in division 1, 2 and 3 (the rookies) use 160-pound, 500-cc alcohol-burning engines without brakes or suspensions. Junior riders to age 16 use 250-cc engines and pee-wee riders (age 5 up) use 50-cc mini cycles. The division one (expert) usual four-lap main event went to 2007 track champion Charlie "the Edge" Venegas, 40, in a five rider field. The five main event riders accumulated the most total points (9-8-7) in the three preliminary heats of four-rider per event races by 16 division one riders present. With all five riders starting alongside each other at the starting gate, Venegas (No. 43) started third, went to the outside, passed pole starter Buck Blair (No. 39) at turn two and led all four laps. Blair pressed Venegas all four laps and trailed by one length at the checkered flag. Jimmy Fishback (No. 25), movie stunt-man Shawn McConnell (No. 6) and John Marquez (No. 41) followed. Newcomer Brad Moreau won the D-3 main. Austin Novratil and Sam Ramirez won the two youth mains. Dean Cameron, the 5-year old son of Irwindale's Super Truck driver Todd Cameron, led all four laps and won the pee-wee three rider main in his first night of racing. Main events for division two (intermediate level) and the four sidecar teams were canceled because racing had passed the 10:00 p.m curfew.
The excellent ten-hour PBS-TV mini series "Carrier" ran five consecutive nights (Sun. April 27 through Thursday, May 1). The TV crew spent six-months embedded on board the U.S Navy nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CV-68). The crew taped daily life aboard the vessel. It showed activities, views and personal stories of some of the 5,000+ crew of enlisted, petty officers and commissioned officers during the ship's deployment to Persian Gulf waters off Iraq and visits to various ports. One of the Navy F/A 18E Hornet jet fighter pilots has a connection to auto racing. Lt. D.B "Hersh" Booher was one of the
Nimitz crew followed during the nightly two-hour installments. His brother Joe Booher raced stock cars at major tracks in the South with ARCA in past decades. "Becoming a Navy flier is the one way I could go faster than my older brother who raced stock cars," is the way Lt. Booher put it during one of his taped segments when he gave the reason why he became a Navy fighter pilot. His tour of duty and Navy career ended during the Nimitz deployment. The PBS program showed him flying off the Nimitz on a Navy cargo plane to return to civilian life.
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