Round 4 Portland event Thread (RACE Spoilers)

[marcus]

Champcars are back !!!!

Here we go for Round 4 at Portland International Raceway.



A 1.964 mile road course situated in one of the most picturesque (sp) places in all of the series calendar in my opinion.

a huge history comes along with this track which has held a Champcar race since 1984 with an impressive list of past winners.

1984 Al Unser Jnr
1985 Mario Andretti
1986 Mario Andretti
1987 Bobby Rahal
1988 Danny Sullivan
1989 Emerson Fittipaldi
1990 Michael Andretti
1991 Michael Andretti
1992 Michael Andretti
1993 Emerson Fittipaldi
1994 Al Unser Jnr
1995 Al Unser Jnr
1996 Alex Zanardi
1997 Mark Blundell
1998 Alex Zanardi
1999 Gil de Ferran
2000 Gil de Ferran
2001 Max Papis
2002 Cristiano da Matta
2003 Adrian Fernandez
2004 Sebatien Bourdais
2005 Cristiano da Matta
2006 AJ Allmendinger


Check out the tracks website at http://www.globaleventsgrouppdx.com/...car/index.html

DRIVER CHANGES

Paul Tracy will return to Champcars this weekend , taking his place back at Forsythe Championship Racing , while it seems poor Mario Dominguez will not retain his seat at Forsythe , Oriol Servia has done enough in his replacement role for Tracy to continue on with the team.

Conquest Racing have announced that Matt Halliday will not be driving for them any more but have announced that Jan Heylen will return to the series after driving for Dale Coyne's team last year , he will apparently complete the season with Conquest.

I do not know of any other driver line up changes.


Dont forget your predictions and fantasy team line ups in the Champcar fantasy Forum

and to steal a line from Darrell Waltrip "Lets Go racing Boys !!!"

[marcus]

Due to Rain in Final Qualifying Pole Position has been determined by Fridays times.

1. Justin Wilson 58.000 (5th Career Pole)
RSPORTS
44th Career Start


2. Robert Doornbos 1.11.629 (1st time starting 2nd)
Minardi Team USA
4th Career Start CAREER BEST QUALIFYING


3. Sebastien Bourdais 58.308 (9th time starting 3rd)
Newman/Haas/Laningan Racing
63rd Career Start


4. Alex Tagliani 58.363 (11th time starting 4th)
RSPORTS
121st Career Start


5. Tristan Gommendy 58.399 (1st time starting 5th)
PKV Racing
4th Career Start CAREER BEST QUALIFYING


6. Simon Pagenaud 58.448 (1st time starting 6th)
Team Australia Racing
4th Career Start


7. Will Power 58.469 (5th time starting 7th)
Team Australia Racing
20th Career Start


8. Graham Rahal 58.639 (1st time starting 8th)
Newman/Haas/Laningan Racing
4th Career Start


9. Dan Clarke 58.692 (2nd time starting 9th)
Minardi Team USA
18th Career Start


10. Neel Jani 58.805 (1st time starting 10th)
PKV Racing
4th Career Start


11. Oriol Servia 58.926 (7th time starting 11th)
Forsythe Championship Racing
116th Career Start


12. Jan Heylen 59.181 (3rd time starting 12th)
Conquest Racing
15th Career Start


13. Paul Tracy 59.418 (8th time starting 13th)
Forsythe Championship Racing
251st Career Start


14. Bruno Junquiera 59.696 (1st time starting 14th)
Dale Coyne Racing
91st Career Start


15. Alex Figge 59.708 (1st time starting 15th)
Pacific Coast Motorsports
3rd Career Start CAREER BEST QUALIFYING


16. Katherine Legge 1:00.421 (3rd time starting 16th)
Dale Coyne Racing
18th Career Start


17. Ryan Dalziel 1:04.275 (1st time starting 17th)
Pacific Coast Motorsports
5th Career Start

[marcus]

RACE RESULTS

1.Sebastien Bourdais (25th Career Victory)

Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racings 100th Champcar Victory

2.Justin Wilson (6th time Finishing 2nd)


3.Robert Doornbos (2nd time Finishing 3rd)


4.Will Power (2nd time Finishing 4th)


5.Alex Tagliani (10th time Finishing 5th)


6.Dan Clarke (3rd time finishing 6th)


7.Tristan Gommendy (1st time finishing 7th)


8.Simon Pagenaud (1st time Finishing 8th)


9.Graham Rahal (1st time finishing 9th)


10.Paul Tracy (7th time finishing 10th)


11.Oriol Servia (9th time Finishing 11th)


12.Neel Jani (1st time finishing 12th)


13.Bruno Junqueira (4th time finishing 13th)


14.Ryan Dalziel (1st time Finishing 14th)


16.Alex Figge (1st time finishing 16th)






DID NOT FINISH

Jan Heylen

Katherine Legge

[D.R.T.]

Great to have CC back, it has been a poor 6 weeks without it.

Hoping for JW to turn his season around

[mountainstar]

Halliday will be back for the last 4-5 races in a 2nd conquest car.

[D.R.T.]

New Sponsor for PCM and Figge

http://www.champcarworldseries.com/N...e.asp?ID=11613

[BootsOntheSide]

We have a new frontrunner for the annual Cleanest Outfit award....

Not entirely clear how much money is changing hands, or if this is just a 'plug us and we'll give you a lifetime supply'-type deal.

[marcus]

First Qualifying results.

1 J. Wilson 58.000
2 R. Doornbos 58.214
3 S. Bourdais 58.308
4 A. Tagliani 58.363
5 T. Gommendy 58.399
6 S. Pagenaud 58.448
7 W. Power 58.469
8 G. Rahal 58.639
9 D. Clarke 58.692
10 N. Jani 58.805
11 O. Servia 58.926
12 J. Heylen 59.181
13 P. Tracy 59.418
14 B. Junqueira 59.696
15 A. Figge 59.708
16 K. Legge 1:00.421
17 R. Dalziel 1:04.275

[marcus]

Final Qualifying is due to get underway soon , they have a 20 minute practice session first)

according to Race Director it is also wet , so this should throw things around a little bit

[marcus]

Oh geez it is sopping wet out there

[Charlies]

Good to see RSports up at the sharp end, and a good performance from Gommendy. Forsythe unusually at the back of the grid.

Autosport are reporting that there'll be standing starts tomorrow. Fingers crossed...

[marcus]

Final Qualifying is underway

[Dutton]

It is good to see that Race Director has significantly improved the image quality of its feed this year.

Or perhaps I am remembering it incorrectly from last?

At least the Watkins Glen 6 hr is over now. I can cope with following two events at once (this and Nurb 24 hr), but three together gets too much.

[marcus]

Qualifying has finished , the starting grid is posted above

[Charlies]

It became a little processional, but it was still impressive how Bourdais bridged the gap to Wilson. Looks like a fourth title is almost a certain, now NHL have recovered from the early season teething troubles with the new car.

[D.R.T.]

Encouraging to see how the standing starts went off without a hitch. SHould only be able to get even better from here.

Bourdais impressive as always. Interesting to hear now that Williams could be a possibility for him

[Dutton]

You'd think F1 must be at least looking at him in some capacity...

It is accepted that CCWS is not what it was, but when a driver is constantly crushing all before him...it must imply that that driver knows what he is doing...

Anyway, as for the race, it was decent if not brilliant.

It was excellent to see the standing start get off without a problem, but, then, there is no reason it should really have caused THAT big a deal. The drivers still know what they are doing. Future ones I suspect we might see an incident or two (as confidence increases), but that is part of racing.

[gomick]

Sebastien Bourdais is just a race winning machine - impressive drive once again by Robert Doornbos ...
Wish we saw these races in Australia

[D.R.T.]

Rahal was very lucky, could have been a monster. Speedy was also extremely lucky for different reasons.

The speed of Minardi USA has been impressive this season, hopefully a bit more $$$ and a bit more time could see them start challenging Bourdais