Mexico Race Thread (RACE spoilers)

[marcus]

The 14th and Final Round of the 2007 Champcar World Series takes place in Mexico this weekend.

Sebastien Bourdais has already taken the title and is about to drive in what could be his very last Champcar event (you never know he could b back in a year or so)

he will want to part on winning ways and if his form in Australia continues he will be very hard to beat here in Mexico.

PREVIOUS WINNERS

2002 Kenny Brack
2003 Paul Tracy
2004 Sebastien Bourdais
2005 Justin Wilson
2006 Sebastien Bourdais

An interesting track with a great history , with Formula One visiting here many years ago and even a Nascar Busch Race is held here.

The track has changed since its early days with the now famous Peraltada corner not as frightening as it once was.

2.774 Miles around it should provide for interesting racing.

Champcar have also announce an increase to the Push to pass for this round as well as stated Here

I havent heard any news on the proposed entry from jensen either which was rumoured a few weeks ago , maybe someone else knows more ?

anyway sit back and enjoy the last round of 2007 and lets pray for a short off season.

check out the tracks site at http://www.granpremiotecate.com
and dont forget your final predictions in the fantasy forum

[marcus]

STARTING GRID

1. Will Power 1.23.558 (6th Career Pole)
Team Australia Racing
30th Career Start


2. Sebastien Bourdais 1:24.698 (15th time starting 2nd)
Newman/Haas/Laningan Racing
73rd Career Start


3. Robert Doornbos 1.24.152 (4th time starting 3rd)
Minardi Team USA
14th Career Start


4. Oriol Servia 1.24.324 (10th time starting 4th)
PKV Racing
126th Career Start


5. Justin Wilson 1.24.365 (6th time starting 5th)
RSPORTS
54th Career Start


6. Simon Pagenaud 1:24.394 (3rd time starting 6th)
Team Australia Racing
14th Career Start


7. Graham Rahal 1:24.515 (1st time starting 7th)
Newman/Haas/Laningan Racing
14th Career Start


8. Paul Tracy 1:24.608 (15th time starting 8th)
Forsythe Championship Racing
261st Career Start


9. Dan Clarke 1:24.764 (3rd time starting 9th)
Minardi Team USA
27th Career Start


10. David Martinez 1:24.888 (1st time starting 10th)
Forsythe Championship Racing
3rd Career Start


11. Neel Jani 1:24.929 (3rd time starting 11th)
PKV Racing
14th Career Start


12. Bruno Junquiera 1:25.361 (4th time starting 12th)
Dale Coyne Racing
101st Career Start


13. Nelson Phillipe 1:25.405 (5th time starting 13th)
Conquest Racing
40th Career Start


14. Alex Tagliani 1:25.446 (7th time starting 14th)
RSPORTS
131st Career Start


15. Mario Dominguez 1:25.602 (6th time starting 15th)
Pacific Coast Motorsports
86th Career Start


16. Katherine Legge 1:26.277 (7th time starting 16th)
Dale Coyne Racing
28th Career Start


17. Alex Figge 1:26.582 (5th time starting 17th)
Pacific Coast Motorsports
13th Career Start

[marcus]

RACE RESULTS

1.Sebastien Bourdais 31st Career Victory


2.Will Power 1st time finishing 2nd


3.Oriol Servia 9th time finishing 3rd


4.Graham Rahal 1st time finishing 4th


5.Paul Tracy 11th time finishing 5th


6.Simon Pagenaud 2nd time Finishing 6th


7.Mario Dominguez 4th time Finishing 7th


8.Bruno Junqueira 2nd time finishing 8th


9.Neel Jani 2nd time finishing 9th


10.Justin Wilson 2nd time Finishing 10th


11.Alex Figge 1st time finishing 11th


12.Nelson Phillipe 4th time finishing 12th


13.Alex Tagliani 4th time Finishing 13th


14.David Martinez 1st time finishing 14th



DID NOT FINISH

Dan Clarke 12th Career DNF

Robert Doornbos 1st Career DNF

Katherine Legge 12th Career DNF


CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS

1 Sebastien Bourdais 363
2 Justin Wilson 281
3 Robert Doornbos (R) 268
4 Will Power 261
5 Graham Rahal (R) 243
6 Oriol Servia 237
7 Simon Pagenaud (R) 232
8 Neel Jani (R) 231
9 Bruno Junqueira 231
10 Alex Tagliani 205
11 Paul Tracy 171
12 Tristan Gommendy (R) 140
13 Dan Clarke 129
14 Ryan Dalziel (R) 116
15 Katherine Legge 108
16 Jan Heylen 104
17 Alex Figge (R) 95
18 Mario Dominguez 80
19 Nelson Philippe 28
20 David Martinez (R) 18
21 Matt Halliday (R) 18
22 Roberto Moreno 9


ROOKIE OF THE YEAR

1 Robert Doornbos (R) 268
2 Graham Rahal (R) 243
3 Simon Pagenaud (R) 232
4 Neel Jani (R) 231
5 Tristan Gommendy (R) 140
6 Ryan Dalziel (R) 116
7 Alex Figge (R) 95
8 David Martinez (R) 18
9 Matt Halliday (R) 18

[gomick]

my tip is that we will see a new race winner - i'm on Neel Jani for the win...

[enemy-ace]

Nah! Bourdais ends his Champ Car career with a dominating win

[marcus]

PRACTICE 1 RESULTS

1 J. Wilson 1:27.078
2 S. Bourdais 1:27.136
3 O. Servia 1:27.798
4 W. Power 1:27.927
5 S. Pagenaud 1:27.957
6 A. Tagliani 1:28.137
7 G. Rahal 1:28.216
8 B. Junqueira 1:28.321
9 P. Tracy 1:28.354
10 D. Clarke 1:28.441
11 M. Dominguez 1:28.632
12 A. Figge 1:28.742
13 N. Jani 1:28.814
14 N. Philippe 1:28.959
15 R. Doornbos 1:29.065
16 K. Legge 1:29.152
17 D. Martinez 1:29.253

[marcus]

PRACTICE 2 RESULTS

1 W. Power 1:26.461
2 S. Pagenaud 1:27.095
3 N. Jani 1:27.146
4 S. Bourdais 1:27.540
5 P. Tracy 1:27.617
6 J. Wilson 1:27.749
7 D. Clarke 1:27.945
8 O. Servia 1:27.966
9 M. Dominguez 1:28.101
10 N. Philippe 1:28.434
11 D. Martinez 1:28.440
12 K. Legge 1:28.725
13 A. Figge 1:28.744
14 A. Tagliani 1:29.200
15 R. Doornbos 1:29.434
16 G. Rahal 1:29.594
17 B. Junqueira 1:30.604

[marcus]

QUALIFYING 1 RESULTS

1 S. Bourdais 1:24.698
2 W. Power 1:25.199
3 J. Wilson 1:25.221
4 O. Servia 1:25.436
5 S. Pagenaud 1:25.952
6 D. Martinez 1:26.056
7 P. Tracy 1:26.130
8 N. Jani 1:26.156
9 G. Rahal 1:26.156
10 M. Dominguez 1:26.181
11 B. Junqueira 1:26.190
12 R. Doornbos 1:26.220
13 D. Clarke 1:26.617
14 N. Philippe 1:26.964
15 A. Figge 1:27.230
16 A. Tagliani 1:27.277
17 K. Legge 1:28.280

[Tony Clifton]

You can always buy a Panoz from Carl Haas..................you just can't buy Carl Haas's Panoz!

[marcus]

hmmm anyone else having problems opening the Champcar website ?

[marcus]

PRACTICE 3 RESULTS

1 S. Bourdais 1:24.815
2 N. Jani 1:24.882
3 R. Doornbos 1:24.918
4 J. Wilson 1:24.943
5 W. Power 1:25.072
6 P. Tracy 1:25.886
7 O. Servia 1:25.939
8 D. Clarke 1:26.216
9 S. Pagenaud 1:26.248
10 D. Martinez 1:26.305
11 B. Junqueira 1:26.516
12 G. Rahal 1:26.564
13 N. Philippe 1:26.642
14 A. Figge 1:26.780
15 M. Dominguez 1:26.808
16 A. Tagliani 1:26.957
17 K. Legge 1:27.903

[marcus]

Starting grid is posted above

[Hazard]

Nice steal there from Power - Bourdais off the pace in Q2 unless he just didn't bother.

[D.R.T.]

I am liking the look of Servia. Competitive again in the PKV car. Power looks good.

Lets hope for another cracker like the 2006 event.

[stradlin21]

I see Figge is proving his worth

[cptkablamo]

Yeah...where is that Jensen Car...btw the money was never coming from KK...the car was going to be leased to Jensen (PKV spare) for the event - but Jensen was to be the money - THAT was never KK...

And Figge was always going to struggle - coming from sportscar to a new team - no one was ever in doubt of that - in a year or two he will be ok I reckon...

But Bourdais will take it...I reckon.

[alonso11]

Me hopes Bourdais wins this one, would be just a perfect way to finish his adventures overseas.

Besides it could be his 31st career win, which would equal Tracy's record. Slight diference is that Bourdais scored all these victories alongside with 4 titles in 73starts, 27% of Tracy's 261 starts

[marcus]

MORNING WARM UP RESULTS

1 S. Bourdais 1:26.373
2 W. Power 1:26.942
3 K. Legge 1:26.984
4 S. Pagenaud 1:27.268
5 O. Servia 1:27.294
6 J. Wilson 1:27.334
7 R. Doornbos 1:27.468
8 G. Rahal 1:27.497
9 N. Philippe 1:27.899
10 M. Dominguez 1:27.927
11 D. Clarke 1:28.001
12 P. Tracy 1:28.100
13 D. Martinez 1:28.245
14 A. Tagliani 1:28.398
15 N. Jani 1:28.488
16 A. Figge 1:28.664
17 B. Junqueira 1:28.778

[Leighton Irwin]

Warm up times. Kat 3rd!!!! Keep it up!

[marcus]

The Race is due to get underway soon

[marcus]

Full race results and final championship positions are posted above

[JohnSSC]

Sarcasm Alert!

What a Race! The start was a real attention-getter with 3 cars stalling and 2 of those deep-frying the clutch. We were treated to that extra Power-to-Pass, which, as the commentators happily pointed out: "Allowed cars with bad setups to pass the faster cars." That is what I look for in racing: teams that work their butts off getting their tails kicked by less industrious drivers/teams simply because they can push the Happy Button.

Beekhuis was masterful in describing (confidently) Wilson's "misfire" as an electrical problem rather than the fuel pickup problem it turned out to be.

The tension that built while they spent a ridiculous amount of time cleaning up an end plate was just what Champ Car needs! If a contrived finish is NASCAR's forte, then this was a masterpiece in how not to do it. Will Bourdais have enough P 2 P (sounds like a Flomax commercial) to hold off Power's P 2 P advantage? Stay tuned! Stay tuned some more as we wait, and wait, and...

Bourdais made Power look like an amateur on the restart - either that or Power fell asleep waiting for the Mammoth Task of finding and removing an endplate to be completed. Rumor has it that the endplate had turned mean and actually attacked two of the corner workers requiring the Police to be brought in to subdue it.

Kudos to Rick Benjamin and Beekhuis for coming up with the nick name of "Suitcase" Servia to put a whimsical spin on Servia's attempt to drive for every team in CC in a single year.

Rumor has it Legge has an opportunity to go to DTM next season. If she is smart, she will jump on it with both feet. The beer is better there and likely she could land with a team that has actual engineers and mechanics. Wilson will be the Master of All He Surveys if he goes to NHL, as I think they are using a completely different car than anyone else and if I hear the announcers say: "Bobby D" one more time I'll puke.

Otherwise, this was the perfect way to spend a rainy afternoon. Thank God I didn't need to take a nap. I can see why KK and GF found better things to do...

[alonso11]

just missed the race on Eurosport2, happy for Bourdais.

But tell me one thing, Dornbos did the fastest lap, over 2 sec faster than Bourdais'?? 1.3 sec faster than anyone else's?? On lap 8 too?? What was that all about? Have the track condition gone so bad after lap 8? Or did Robert indeed go crazy in that lap?

[gomick]

another great win for sebby (#31) - glad he is of to f1

good drive by will power too - just needs a bit more consistency in 08 to have a real crack at the title...

[Knowlesy]

Well, all I can say is I am glad to see the back of this season and hope for better things in 2008.