2006 CCWS Rd. 9-Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose

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Okay, admit it......last year's inaugural ChampCar race on the streets of San Jose was not the vest of races.....but wasn't it fun to watch those Lola's bounce over the train tracks on the front-stretch?

Anyway, last year's race was an attrition-fest as over half the starters failed to see the checkered flag at the end of a timed race; track conditions and the heat of a July summer in central California conspired to leave drivers and teams feeling drained. With the myriad of track improvements, expect this year's running of the Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose to be a better event than last year's. Here is the event schedule for this weekend...................(note times U.S. EDT, -4 hrs GMT)

Practice Session #1}1:15 pm, 28 July 2006
Practice Session #2}5 pm, 28 July 2006
Qualifying Session #1}5:20 pm, 28 July 2006
Practice Session #3}1:30 pm, 29 July 2006
Practice Session #4}5 pm, 29 July 2006
Qualifying Session #2}5:20 pm, 29 July 2006
Final Practice Session}11:30 am, 30 July 2006
Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose, 3:30 pm, live on NBC Sports

As always, there will be qual. and race reviews, commentaries, observations and anything else that comes to mind........

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On a vastly improved street circuit in the "Capital of Silicon Valley", CTE-HVM Racing's Nelson Phillipe(#4 Sherwin-Williams FC/L) paced the field of 17 drivers, setting the early pace w/a time of 50.856 sec.(102.147 mph); indeed, all 17 drivers set times in Friday's combined practice chart faster than Sebastien Bourdais's pole time/speed from last year's inaugural running of the Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose. Here are the top-5 from the first two sessions..................

1}N. Phillipe, #4/CTE-HVM..................................50.856 sec
2}A.J. Allmendinger, #7/Forsythe........................50.991 sec
3}O. Servia, #6/PKV Racing................................51.027 sec
4}S. Bourdais, #1/Newman-Haas.........................51.188 sec
5}C. da Matta, #10/RuSport................................51.244 sec

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Remember all those classic heavyweight title fights........Frazier v. Holmes, Ali v. Foreman, Tyson v. Douglas..........today's QS-1 on the streets of San Jose resembled those, with ChampCar's two big protragonists, Sebastien Bourdais and Paul Tracy, seemingly going mano-a-mano in provisional qualifying; at session's end, though, it was "the Thrill from West Hill" who prevailed by the narrowest of margins, 4/thousandths' of a second. Here are the top-5 from the QS-1........

1}P. Tracy, #3/Forsythe.....................................50.156 sec
2}S. Bourdais, #1/Newman-Haas........................50.160 sec
3}A.J. Allmendinger, #7/Forsythe........................50.246 sec
4}(R)D. Clarke, #14/CTE-HVM............................50.278 sec
5}A. Tagliani, #15/Team Australia.......................50.373 sec

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Now, where is everybody......well, Julian's on the Mythbusters set, T-K's lost on Alcatraz, and I'm on the south end of San Francisco Bay, in the heart of San Jose, where they just debuted the new Panoz DP01 racecar that the Champ Car World Series will use, beginning in 2007. And, now.....the friday notebook........

1}A vastly improved track........remember last year's race; you know, the one where they seemed to catch major air going over the trolley tracks on the frontstretch. Well, those are gone, and while the track's a hair shorter(1.448 miles vs. 1.453 miles), all the drivers said, to a person, that they were immensely pleased with the track surface. Then again......

2}What happened? Of the 17 drivers that started the day, brake failure sent the #5 Aussie Vineyards car of rookie Will Power right smack into the turn 1 tirewalls; fortunately, he was on his outlap and was nowhere near the 180+ mph the cars will hit on the long frontstraight.......on the other hand, Team Australia couldn't get the car repaired, so he was credited w/17th in QS-1. Reports are he'll be ready for Saturday's QS-2.

3}A roomy new car.......really, very roomy. The only complaint drivers have about the venerable Lola B2K chassis is that, for the, uhmm....taller drivers(think 6'5" Justin Wilson, for example) it can get a bit cramped. The only advance details prior to tonight's unveiling that the series released were that the new Panoz DP01 chassis fits the lanky Brit Wilson just fine.

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After seeing his arch-rival win the provisional pole in San Jose yesterday, current series champion Sebastien Bourdais(#1 McDonald's FC/L) returned the favor, winning the pole for Sunday's Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose over the Canadian, with a Saturday crowd of over 40,000 present to watch. Here is the starting grid for Sunday's race...........

1}Sebastien Bourdais, #1 McDonald's FC/L...................48.989 sec
2}Paul Tracy, #3 Indeck/Forsythe FC/L........................49.810 sec*

3}A.J. Allmendinger, #7 Indeck/Forsythe FC/L..............49.264 sec
4}Cristiano da Matta, #10 Western Union FC/L..............49.659 sec

5}Oriol Servia, #6 Gulfstream FC/L................................49.813 sec
6}(R)Will Power, #5 Aussie Vineyards FC/L......................49.867 sec

7}Bruno Junquiera, #2 Hole in the Wall Camps FC/L.........49.887 sec
8}Andrew Ranger, #27 MSR Houston FC/L.......................49.962 sec

9}(R)Dan Clarke, #14 CTE Racing FC/L............................50.161 sec
10}Mario Dominguez, #19 Sonny's Real Pit BBQ FC/L........50.215 sec

11}Nelson Phillipe, #4 Sherwin-Williams FC/L....................50.312 sec
12}Justin Wilson, #9 CDW/Plantronics FC/L.......................50.341 sec

13}Alex Tagliani, #15 Aussie Vineyards FC/L.....................50.373 sec
14}(R)Charles Zwolsman, #34 GoldenPalace.com FC/L......50.435 sec

15}(R)Katherine Legge, #20 Bell Micro FC/L......................50.457 sec
16}(R)Jan Heylen, #11 Diamall/Muermans FC/L.................50.838 sec

17}(R)Nicky Pastorelli, #8 Curacao FC/L...........................51.628 sec

*-by virtue of winning the provisional pole in QS-1 Friday, Tracy starts 2nd regardless of the time set in QS-2 Saturday

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Where is everyone? Oh, I forgot.......Julian's still over at Mythbusters, T-K's stuck on the 101 south towards San Jose, and I'm standing along the turn 1 wall heading to the turn 1 hairpin........oh, well. Here's the weekend notebook.

1}He's back........when Cristiano da Matta joined RuSport, everyone wondered why the 2002 series champion was struggling, especially when compared to teammate Justin Wilson(and in comparison to Wilson's former teammate, A.J. Allmendinger). However, things have begun to click for Shorty, who starts today's Taylor Woodrow Grand Prix of San Jose in row 2. On the other hand, Wilson's weekend has been nothing but abysmal; he had troubles in QS-1, then saw several flyers go out the window courtesy of red flags in QS-2.

2}Jekyll and Hyde day at Team Oz. As with RuSport, Team Australia has had a similar kind of weekend. On Friday, it was rookie Will Power who had the abysmal day; yesterday, it was veteran Alex Tagliani who had the abysmal day, having to depend on his time from QS-1 to slot into the field after sliding into the turn 6 walls in Saturday practice.

3}Welcome aboard! When next year's season begins, at least one new team will be present; at Friday night's unveiling of the 2007 Panoz DP01 chassis, Gelles Racing announced that they will be fielding a two-car team in the series next year....and that's for starters. In addition to a 2-car ChampCar team, the Virginia-based team will field a 4-car Atlantic team and a 6-car Formula BMW-USA team, thus providing a big feeder connection btwn. the top and bottom of the ladder.

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Note....more detailed race review to follow later in the evening.

What's that saying? I went to a race, and a fight broke out....... Well........

As current series champion Sebastien Bourdais(#1 McDonald's FC/L) seemed to cruise to a 6+ sec. win over Cristiano da Matta and Justin Wilson, Canadian drivers Paul Tracy and Alex Tagliani got into a bit of a fight following on-track contact. Around lap 54, Tracy, who had run into the run-off area at turn 6, was attempting to return to the racing surface when Tagliani came around and plowed into PT, demolishing both cars. When the two got back to pitlane, there was a shouting match btwn. the two, and it devolved into a full-blown fight, which lasted a couple of seconds before race stewards broke the two up. Race control is reviewing the incident and the aftermath, and it's almost certain that there will be penalties from this incident.

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In an action-filled race which saw some on(and off)-track activity, polesitter Sebastien Bourdais(#1 McDonald's FC/L) led most of the race and comfortably held off the competition to win his fifth race of the 2006 season and expand his points lead in the race for the 2006 Vanderbilt Cup.

Although Paul Tracy(#3 Indeck/Forsythe FC/L) led the first three laps, Bourdais retook the lead on the first caution when race control ruled that PT had jumped the gun on the start. Two laps later, the first caution of the race came for an on-track incident involving Will Power(#5 Aussie Vineyards FC/L) and Oriol Servia(#6 Gulfstream FC/L) which somehow ended up knocking innocent bystander Bruno Junquiera(#2 Hole in the Wall Camps FC/L) out of the race. At race's end, Servia had some heated words, first w/Power and then w/Team Oz co-owner Derrick Walker over what occurred. Meanwhile.......

Back on the track, Bourdais set a comfortable pace ahead of PT, Cristiano da Matta(#10 Western Union FC/L), Andrew Ranger(#27 MSR Houston FC/L) and "Speedy" Dan Clarke(#14 CTE Racing FC/L) beginning with the restart. Several drivers made moves up the ladder, including Clarke, who passed both Ranger and da Matta at the turn 1 hairpin, and then got by Tracy when he went off at turn 6(the first of his two visits to that escape road.... ). It got easier still later on when fellow Brit Katherine Legge(#20 Bell Micro FC/L) had minor contact with the tires, bringing out the second caution of the day. Once everyone had gotten fresh Bridgestones' and fuel, the race resumed, and Bourdais stayed in first, with Clarke in 2nd, then Tracy, Nelson Phillipe(#4 Sherwin-Williams FC/L) and Alex Tagliani(#15 Aussie Vineyards FC/L). For Clarke, PT and Tag, though, their days would end in.....interesting manners.

First, Speedy Dan's race ended when the gearbox went klabammo on lap 50, stopping his day and prompting him to kick the right-rear on his ChampCar afterwards. PT and Tag, though(read above posting......) got into an off-track fight after exchanging some.........colorful words. (According to reports, Tag dropped the f-word a couple of times; someone, get the FCC, quickly! )
The day got worse for Forsythe still when PT's teammate, A.J. Allmendinger(#7 Indeck/Forsythe FC/L), after suffering a cut rear tire, was black-flagged and copped a drive-through penaly when he pitted for a new tire.......when the pits were closed.

As exciting as all the off-track.....activities were, on-track it was a runaway win for Bourdais, who collected his 5th win of the season with 5 races to go in the calendar. Here are the top-10 from San Jose..............
1}#1 Sebastien Bourdais.....................................97 laps
2}#10 Cristiano da Matta.....................................-6.686 sec
3}#9 Justin Wilson..............................................-8.100 sec
4}#4 Nelson Phillipe............................................-11.058 sec
5}#19 Mario Dominguez......................................-12.146 sec
6}(R)#5 Will Power.............................................-12.956 sec
7}#7 A.J. Allmendinger.......................................-13.287 sec
8}#6 Oriol Servia...............................................-15.919 sec
9}(R)#34 Charles Zwolsman...............................-16.458 sec
10}(R)#8 Nicky Pastorelli....................................-21.579 sec