Standings After The Shagall Grand Prix of Edmonton

1st
2615 - "Team IndyCart" - Robert Duffield
[Scott Dixon, Helio Castroneves, Oriol Servia, Milka Duno, Jaime Camara]

2nd
2409 - "Come back to Rockingham" - John Harbey
[Scott Dixon, Ryan Briscoe, Vitor Meira, Mario Moreas, Marty Roth]


3rd
2396 - "3.2 Million Bricks" - Michael Rennick
[Scott Dixon, Vitor Meira, Ernesto Viso, Enrique Bernoldi, Ryan Hunter Reay]


4th
2382 - "I am Timgray" - Tim Gray
[Scott Dixon, Ryan Briscoe, Danica Patrick, Townsend Bell, Mario Moraes]

5th
2294 - Doug Werner - "Drivers who weigh more than Danica"
[Scott Dixon, Oriol Servia, AJ Foyt IV, Enrique Bernoldi, Ed Carpenter]

6th
2161 - "RPH Racing" - Julie Werner
[Helio Castro Neves, Ryan Hunter Reay, Wiil Power, Ed Carpenter, Enrique Bernoldi]

7th
2139 - "Gerry Forsythe's 'Play your cars right'" - Declan Brennan
[Ryan Briscoe, Will Power, Bruno Junquiera, Helio Castroneves, Mario Moraes]


8th
2021 - "Chip, your name doesn't mean you have to eat Chips" - Matthew Hyndman
[Scott Dixon, Ryan Briscoe, Ryan Hunter Reay, Enrique Bernoldi, Milka Duno]

9th
1955 - Michael Gathman - "Weekend Warriors"
[Helio Castroneves, Tony Kanaan, Hideki Mutoh, Mario Moraes, Jaime Camara]

10th
1729 - "Tony George stole my Series" - Emiliyan Stoykov
[Vitor Meira, Scott Dixon, Bruno Junquieira, Mario Moreas, Enrique Bernoldi]

11th
1679 - "I Hate Tony George" - Jim Casey
[Ryan Hunter Reay, Tony Kanaan, Ryan Briscoe, Darren Manning, Jaime Camara]


12th
1838 - "Month of Mayhem" - Adrian Bourne
[Helio Castro Neves, Vitor Meira, Bruno Junquiera, Townsend Bell, Darren Manning]

13th
1779 - "Joe Blob & the Spoonerisms" - James Murphy
[Will Power, Ryan Briscoe, Hideki Mutoh, Mario Moraes, Buddy Rice]


14th
1760 - "no Ferrari Influence Apparent" - David Harbey
[Dan Wheldon, Marco Andretti, Darren Manning, Mario Moraes, Townsend Bell]


15th
1759 - "Team Bigger USA" - Jon Bigger
[Marco Andretti, Ryan Briscoe, Danica Patrick, Milka Duno, Vitor Meira]

16th
1753 - "Should We Stay or Should We Split Now?" - Andrew Harbey
[Dan Wheldon, Justin Wilson, Darren Manning, Enrique Bernoldi, Buddy Rice]


17th
1632 - "Indy Pace Car Speed" - Jason Kwok
[Enrique Bernoldi, Helio Castroneves, Hideki Mutoh, Oriol Servia, Will Power]

18th
1619 - "Sideways Sam's Sideways Tings" - Sam Collins
[Dan Wheldon, Hideki Mutoh, Danica Patrick, Jay Howard, Franck Perera]

19th
1614 - "PT Cruiser" - Maureen O'Neil
[Dan Wheldon, Graham Rahal, Ed Carpenter, Ernesto Viso, Mario Moraes]


20th
1515 - "Super Duper Best Friends" - Andy Blackmore
[Tony Kanaan, Marco Andrettti, Darren Manning, Milka Duno, Marty Roth]


21st
1483 - "I am Hindy" - John Hindhaugh
[Helio Castroneves, Hideki Mutoh, Ed Carpenter, Will Power , John Andretti]


22nd
1441 - "Danika Wheldon Crash Team" - Chris Vince
[Tony Kanaan, Ryan Hunter Reay, Bruno Junquiera, Graham Rahal , Mario Moreas]

23rd
1230 - "Why do we keep turning Left on our way to the merger?" - Nick Daman
[Tony Kanaan, Justin Wilson, Jay Howard, Jaime Camara, Mario Moraes]

24th
1217 - "Opposite Lock Motorsports" - Louis Berlan
[Dan Wheldon, Franck Perera, Will Power, Mario Moraes, Roger Yasukawa]

25th
1191 - "Empty Tank Racing" - Matt Thompson
[Marco Andretti, Will Power, Enrique Bernoldi, Danica Patrick, Marty Roth]


26th
1040 - "One Lap Down" - Jeremy Scott
[Will Power, Bruno Junquiera, Ryan Hunter Reay, Thomas Scheckter, Jaime Camara]

27th
913 - "Team IROC - Indignantly Racing Our Crapwagons" - Simon Speichert
[Graham Rahal, Will Power, Enrique Bernoldi, Justin Wilson, Oriol Servia]

- The Commish

The Harbey Colorado Travelogue I

Drag racing is the purest form of motorsport – discuss – part 1

Regular listeners to MWM will recall talk of two centre holidays. These, being MWM, have a distinct motor sporting theme, rather than visiting, for example, two European cities rich in cultural heritage. One J Hindhaugh Esq. probably started it with Sebring plus NHRA at Gainesville a couple of years ago. For us, last Autumn (Fall, even) we did Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta followed by NASCAR at Charlotte a week later. It was felt that NASCAR at Talladega the day after Petit might be a bit much when we had only flown in from London on the Thursday! Both events were thoroughly enjoyed.

This year, we are combining NHRA drag racing at Bandimere Speedway in Denver with a long held desire to visit Pikes Peak Hill climb. As with NASCAR in 2007, the NHRA was a bonus – Petit Le Mans and Pikes Peak were the primary reason for the choice of holiday venue in each case – the second event really just a fabulous bonus when perusing the sporting calendar. As a quick aside, Colorado is well worth a visit for the scenery alone, or should you prefer, South Carolina has places like Charleston to enjoy.

We sat in the stands in the baking hot sun at Bandimere for the Mopar Mile High Nationals having seen all the top drivers presented to the crowd – with a positive invitation to go down and join them near the start. There’s also an open paddock – other forms of motorsport please take note.

I must confess, to my shame, that at this point I wasn’t really sure what would happen next, except that we would see the run offs through to the eventual winners in each category. I’d seen odd bits of British and US drag racing from time to time on TV; we’d also caught up on some highlights of qualifying on ESPN the night before – but had never even made the 30 minute drive from home to Santa Pod in the UK. Nor had I had time to look at Wikipedia or the NHRA website properly, both of which have good descriptions of what happens.

This lack of attendance at Santa Pod may be down to more mainstream motorsport roots or a resistance to yet another UK ex-WW2 aerodrome as a sporting venue! A good friend in the US (who grew up around NHRA with his father who worked with one of the teams) counselled that if NASCAR was redneck territory, then NHRA was even more down market ....

Back to Bandimere. Now, you might expect that they would start with slower categories, building up to the fastest, noisiest Top Fuel cars – but NO – the Top Fuelers were first on. The sound, the smell, the smoke, the visual spectacle of colourful dragsters was stunning. The sound reverberated around the rib cage as they flew past in a furious assault on the senses. And then 4 seconds and 300 mph terminal speed later, peace returned. Until the next pair and so on.

Top Fuelers were followed by Funny Cars – brilliant parodies of passenger vehicles – then Pro Stock and Bikes. Gradually eliminating the losers each time, we cycled through to the eventual winners. For the later semi finals, we stood at ground level – again we were struck by the controlled violence, the noise, the vibrations, the smells.

It was during the opening round of competition that the thought occurred to me – is drag racing not the purest form of motorsport? Yes, F1 is a technical highpoint; endurance racing is a test of the whole team; rallying requires two in the car and touring cars ... erm, don’t get me started on banger racing!

Perhaps then, pitching man or woman and machine against each other over a straight quarter mile stretch of tarmac is the ultimate – “who is best ?” - challenge. A test of reaction time off the start, the ability to control the dragster if it gets out of line and to reach the end of the timing strip first. Reaction times were typically around 0.06/0.07 seconds.

I am not suggesting it is necessarily the best form of motorsport, but rather the purest, the ultimate challenge – one that requires a huge amount of bravery – the risks are there for all to see - the Top Fuel and Funny Cars were running over 1000 yards only at Bandimere following the tragic death of Scott Kalitta just a few weeks ago.

No need for refuelling, changing tyres and human error (Peugeot at Le Mans so memorably described by Hindy as like Fred Karno’s army). No turning corners, simply a straight line, flat out, all the way blast of power.

So the question is posed – is drag racing is the purest form of motorsport? There is a strong argument that it is. However, I might need to revisit that opinion in a few days time. What could be purer than racing up a hill, or even a mountain, which they have been doing on Pikes Peak since 1916?

Part two will follow shortly...

The Harbey Colorado Travelogue II

Drag racing is the purest form of motorsport – discuss –

Part 2

So, here we are the day after Pikes Peak and the 86^th running of the International Hill Climb.

As with drag racing in part 1, my exposure to hill climbing has been minimal, apart from Shelsey Walsh and Prescott hill climbs in the UK being on my list of “must go to least once in my life“ motorsport events - oh, and looking for twisty mountain roads on the map when on holiday – and, yes, the big drop is always on the better half’s side of the car !

The Pikes Peak experience can take up the whole week. From Wednesday to Friday, competitors practice on sections of the mountain – and be in no doubt, this is not hill climbing – it is mountain climbing. The start of the 12.42 mile run is at 9,390 ft; the finish is at 14,110 ft. These days half is tarmac; half is gravel, although they are pushing on with plans to tarmac more and more of the road.

The road is open to the public every day, bar race day, and for the requisite number of dollars you too can drive up, but at clearly marked maximum speeds ... So practice has to happen early, very early, in fact so early that we did not get up to go and watch, having finally got used to the minus 7 hour time difference to the UK.

We drove up at more normal hours on Tuesday to suss out where we wanted to watch from. Glen Cove, roughly halfway has a cafe, the obligatory gift shop and other necessary facilities. You can walk up to a tarmac hairpin, down to gravel hairpins – but remember to take your time, you are at 11,000 feet and the air is considerably thinner.

We also re-watched the Ari Vatanen video (see the MWM Collective Facebook site – thanks for posting it, Dex) to get us in the mood. You don’t need me to tell you that he is a star ...

Friday night saw the Fan Fest in downtown Colorado Springs. Now I’m not one for over-hyped American hullabaloo, but I was pleasantly surprised. A good number of people, some stunt MotoX, a lot of loud “Green Day” sort of music, and quite a number of competing cars / bikes. We found Nobuhiro ‘Monster’ Tajima, the favourite for the quickest time this year and current record holder, standing by his Suzuki – had a quick chat and photo – a very quiet unassuming man.

We also found Richard Meaden – British journalist and racing driver - who was returning for his second attempt at Pikes Peak as Paul Dallenbach’s team-mate. His description of his 2007 attempt in Evo (where he then worked) was useful as we made our plans. You can find his blog at his new venture www.drivers-republic.com. Also to be found was the Lotus 23 that Bobby Unser – the Unsers are THE Pikes Peak family - drove to a class and divisional win in 1964. Having driven up Pikes Peak in our Toyota Highlander, it seemed too low, too fragile – it is a Lotus after all.

04.45 Sunday morning – the alarm goes off. To get the “Race to the Clouds” underway at 9 am, there are strict times for accessing the mountain. We arrived at Glen Cove before 7 am to find the car parking space almost full – the advice we had received was sound. A beautiful sunny morning with a fulfilled promise of fine weather all day – although just a couple of years ago they had rain and snow at the highest elevations on race day.

The local AM radio station was broadcasting from the event and available on-line– sort of Radio Le Pikes Peak – and was a useful addition to the experience. There was also streaming video apparently – so we need not miss out next year !

It was cars first, a mix of Baja type buggies, vintage (Carrera Panamericana), rally cars, drift cars and Unlimited. Highlights were Rhys Millen (of the Millen family) in his drift Pontiac Solstice in Red Bull colours executing a perfect slide round the gravel hairpin where we were watching; Paul Dallenbach’s open wheeler and Tajima of course. The bikers, including sidecars and quads made up the bigger portion of the entry and were started five at a time leading to some good battles as they passed us.

Oh, and then we finished with the trucks ... not Craftsman Trucks (pick ups to the Brits) but proper big rigs – without trailers though ! The faster one set a better time through the speed trap than many of the bikes !

After every competitor has made it up the hill - or retired along the way – they all parade back down together. At Glen Cove, spectators line the road to give high fives to the riders and drivers as they pass – a nice touch. Not everyone did make it, we had 14 red flags during the day leading to some long gaps in action and a couple of hospital trips for competitors.

We were also teased with the possibility of a sub 10 minute run from Tajima – but the weather was too dry and hot and some of the work preparatory to laying tarmac on the upper section seemed to have slowed things down there as well – never fear though, to see cars sliding round a fast uphill gravel hairpin is no bad thing !

Now, to return to the original premise – that drag racing is the purest form of motorsport. Firstly what about Pikes Peak ? It has history on its side, it is against the clock and fellow competitors, but as they said on the radio coverage, this year the winner was the mountain. We came expecting Tajima to better last year’s 10 mins 01.408 secs and get below the magic barrier, but he failed by 18 seconds – although he did beat everyone else by a huge margin !

I’m not sure there is a purest form of motorsport – each to his or her own – every variety relies to a greater or lesser extent on external factors, the weather, the vehicle preparation, the driver’s state of mind on the day, fellow competitors sometimes.

Perhaps the purest form of motorsport has 1 hp vehicles - that is 1 human power – the human body ? It’s a bit like asking who was the greatest Grand Prix driver –the answer, of course, is Jim Clark – in my humble opinion ...

The best advice is to enjoy your motorsport – whether watching or taking part ! We certainly intend to return to NHRA and Pikes Peak one day – perhaps when the latter is all tarmac – now that will be quick ! In the meantime, where is that Santa Pod fixture list, oh and the European Hill climb Championship calendar for 2009 ... ?

David Harbey

Footnote #1 – I have posted a few photos to illustrate the above on the Collective Facebook site

Footnote #2 -I should acknowledge the huge and willing contribution of my Mrs H. Madeline is a wonderful woman with great forbearance and fortitude who I hope one day to take to V8 Supercars at Bathurst, Indianapolis 500, WRC in Corsica, Monaco Historic GP and many other events !