Mr. Bourdais

When you finally see the interviews I did with the broadcast team, make note of the very last clip of part 3, cause although I was kidding around with Rick, I was actually quite serious about Sebastien Bourdais. Basically I ask Rick if there’s anything to stop Bourdais and he goes on and on about the competition and everybody stepping up their game and gunning for him. A political, yet accurate answer by Rick Benjerman. The problem is, in this case, I don’t think I agree with him. Sebastien is that damn good!

As you obviously know by now, he won the season opener. Before Long Beach, he had a 15-race streak where he qualified in the top 3. He just won the IROC race in Texas on Friday night, beating guys who do nothing but ovals on a full time basis. He’s run about a handful in his career.

He won the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, and though he benefited from a timely pit stop, he nevertheless dominated the field at the last restart, despite running the regular Bridgestones, while the rest were running the Reds. He’s come in the series and has been totally dominated on 95 percent of his races.

Does it help running with Newman/Haas? Yes, obviously. But we are still supposedly running a ‘spec’ series here and he does beat his teammate on a regular basis. The thing with Bourdais is that he’ll win in just about any type of car. Regardless of what he’s driving or where he starts on the grid, he’s a real threat. That’s what makes him so special. Whether he’s in front of you or behind you, he’s someone you keep in mind.

Naturally, it’s too early to call Bourdais any kind of legend. He’s got many years of racing ahead of him. That, in itself, is a little scary. But what he’s accomplished in a short period of time is remarkable. The thing that’s truly annoying about the situation is the many question marks about his abilities, given the stature of Champ Car. It was proven when Sir. Frank Williams didn’t want to give him a Formula One test, stating something to the likes of ‘Champ Car ain’t what it used to be”. It’s an annoying tag that’s associated with Champ Car (but ever so slowly fading away). Given where Champ Car has been during the last few years, it’s slightly understandable that we are perceived that way. Again though, it’s changing. The field is getting better and the ‘spec’ series seems like a good idea. If you hear the rumblings from engine manufacturers in the other series, you know what I mean. The Cosworth engines have been fantastic and Bridgestone keeps raising bar. And if you hear about how the guys from Europe love coming here to drive Champ Cars, then you know what I mean.

But that makes his accomplishments all the more impressive. Which leads me to my question/point of this essay. Is this good for the series?

Forget about the strong field for a second. Forget about anything but what Bourdais has done and will very likely continue to do. Regardless of how you feel about him (though he’s one of the nicest people around, so you’d be hard press to find a non-fan out there), he is dominating the Champ Car World Series. (Presented by Bridgestone and powered by Ford) :)

When I see Formula One these days, I see a series that is doing whatever they can to keep ONE driver down. I see a team that is willing to spend as much money as possible for the best driver in that series. I don’t think what the series is doing is right. My feeling is if Ferrari is willing to shell out that kind of dough, and they have the best driver available, then they should win. I don’t think its right for the series to be taking this approach. It comprises the sport and all the traditions and customs associated with it.

If Bourdais has another dominant season like he did last year (and he’s off to a pretty good start), should Champ Car do something about it? No! There isn’t much they can do anyway, given that our series puts the emphasis on the driver and not the computers. But a series with a dominant driver, is that a good thing?

On the one hand, fierce and tight competition is always good. If a series has a handful of drivers vying for that championship, it makes for a more interesting story line, no question about it. But, on the other hand, you could argue that Bourdais is worth the price of admission alone. I mean, if you know nothing about a certain sport, but hear that when they come to town, an absolute phenom of the sport is participating; won’t you be more incline to tune in?

At the end of the day, this is still a question that remains to be answered. And of course, the season is so young and the competition is so fierce and he’s bound to have some bad luck through out the season. All in all, we are set for a fantastic season that had a very good season opener. All the while, we are all very privileged to be watching a special young man doing what he does best. And maybe one day, will be known as the driver who did it better than anyone else!

Champ Car Baby! Champ Car for Life!

I just put some more pics of the weekend in Long Beach.

hope you enjoy them, even if they are pretty silly. :)

Alright, I know I put two of the same pictures at times. I am trying my hardest right now to delete the duplicates, but can't figure out how. so...we'll all have to live with it!

http://www.albumtown.com/showalbum.php?uuid=19860&aid=25262

I'd like to thank Vivian Tracy for not only telling me she's looking forward to Overheard, but also for volunteering to help me out during a race weekend. If that doesn't have potential for hilarity, I don't know what does. I will hold you to that Mrs. Tracy. I need a strong cameraperson for the next race!

Speaking of which, I got the hotel to FedEx me the cord for my laptop, so I should be recieving that in a day or so. Then I can begin working on these features. It may be tough though, because right now I am obsessed with NASCAR 2005 on my PS2. Great game. I finally made it to the Nextel Cup and now can't seem to put the game down.

Speaking of games, on Thursday there was a pre-event party at Smooths I think it was. Some private party for everybody type thing. They had two champ car race simulators and when I got there, Alex Tagliani was driving it. About an hour later when I left, Alex Tagliani was driving it. Doesn't he know he does the real thing for a living?? :) I didn't get a chance to see how fast he drove, but if anybody was going to do well, I would assume it would be him. I just hope he let others try it out. :)

trying this photo thing out

Bare with me a moment as I will send you a link (which I hope works) of SOME of the photos I took during the LB weekend. I'll have more shortly.

I think this link works. If it doesn't, let me know.

http://www.albumtown.com/showalbum.php?aid=25125&uuid=19860


Champ Car Baby! Champ Car for life!

LB baby!

Well, I just flew back home and I am settling back, still reeling from an incredible few days in Long Beach. The event was fantastic, working with Bruce, Terry, Rich and Dave was fun and informative as always and all three races were pretty darn good.

I managed to do some interviews with our broadcast crew and I hope to have those on the website as soon as possible. Naturally, I also gathered content for Overheard at the track and look forward to dumping some voices over the clips. Look for different Overheards to periodically appear in the next few weeks. I want to thank Jill and the Kelly who volunteered their time to be my cameraperson when I needed to do the interviews. I couldn’t have done it without them! I hope you enjoy them! I also hurried at the end of the race to try and capture some Podium celebration. But, like most of the stuff I will try and do this year, I tried to capture the celebration from different angles and such. Its probably a little wobbly and shacky at times, but I bet you won’t get that kind of footage anywhere else! Of course, being the bird brain that I am, I left my laptop cord at the hotel and my battery is dead. So it may be a couple more days before I get the chance to send out the clips. I know, bird brain!

However, I did take 60 odd pictures and I can’t wait to share some of them with you. What I need to do is get something like Yahoo photobook or whatever the heck its called so I can post them all up on that page, instead of here, where the page would then literally become 7 miles long.

Alright, let’s talk racing. First of all…Danica Who? The Toyota Atlantics race was by far the best Atlantics race I have ever seen live. Calling it was almost too easy as the action spoke for itself. What a freakin finish and what great battles all race long! In her Atlantic debut, Miss Katherine Legge demonstrated how gusty she is (ask Fernando Rees) and just how good she is. This is one of the rare instances that I’m glad the race wasn’t broadcast live, as I so look forward to watching it again on Speed in the near future. Seriously, if you get a chance, don’t miss it. If this is the start of things to come from this crop of new drivers participating, then the Atlantics should be something else this year!! Think there’s no passing on account of the cars being ‘specs’? tell that to Charles Swolsman who started last (he failed inspection after getting Pole) and finished on the podium. It was one of those drives that you wish there was a single camera following him the entire race. For a debut, it was pretty darn special. But of course, Katherine Legg is the driver everybody is talking about, as they should. I mean no disrespect to Danica Patrick and her driving abilities. But Rahal and the IRL can market her all they want, but the bottom line is that there is a NEW female racing phenom in America and her name is Katherine Legge!

Absolute heartbreaker to Rocky Moran Jr. he was not only running near the top, he occupied that spot for some time! The two-time Atlantic champion is running in the C2 category this year. Basically he’s still running a Swift 014 chassis, but his engine specification aren’t up to the same standards as the C1 and his car has about 35 extra pounds. And he was still in the top three for most of the race!! It’s a shame the way things turned out for him, but he’ll be back with a vengeance and will make the newly expanded C2 category very exciting.

Tracy breaking a qualifying record??? Didn’t those cars back in 2000 have something like 27000 horsepower??? That record wasn’t supposed to be broken for quite some time. But, the Cosworth, the Bridgestones, the team and Tracy came through and put down a hell of a lap.

Great race! Great on-track product. No question about it. Again, pretty darn easy to announce since they put on such a great race. Good battles all race long. A particularly good one between Tagliani and Glock who went back and forth for most of the race. Bourdais benefiting from that yellow on his pitstop, which allowed him to stay on pace. Nevertheless, he drove the H*** out of that car. He is really something special and worth the admission price alone.

I like the rules as they are. I like the elimination of the pit windows. It made those green flag pitstops really exciting. Huge Props to the new crop of drivers who were able to pull off some quick pitstops, despite it being their first ever real pitstops under race conditions.

All in all, a hugely successful grand prix as everybody went home happy (the fans that is). Some teams still have some work to do to get up to speed, but the good news is that it’s a matter of when and not IF.

If you were at the event, you probably heard the fact that you could email us in the booth with your comments and questions, which we would answer on air. I don’t know how many comments we had that stated something like “I’ve been coming here for so many years and if its not Champ Car next year, I won’t be back in 06”. I really wanted to announce those on the air, but I decided to use some discretion out of respect. But man, it felt good to read those comments!

I’ll blog some more stories of my weekend throughout the next few days.

Champ Car Baby! Champ Car for Life!