Suitcase of Courage

Rally America special

    Your Suitcase of Courage correspondent was in far off Northern Minnesota this weekend to catch a glimpse of Rally America, the closest thing you'll find to WRC in these United States. Rallying has been around a long time and offers some of the most incredible displays of car control and action anywhere. The WRC is pretty much in a massive slump right now (try finding any coverage whatsoever on American TV, you won't) with only a few manufacturers taking part, but salvation may be coming from precisely the market which has shunned it the most.
    It doesn't take a genius to figure out that rally cars fit pretty nicely into the bro-bre-ed out extreme sports gnar gnar demographic, and last year ESPN made exactly that connection by including the sport in the holy grail of trucker hat culture, the X-Games. They even had the insight to bring in old yellow teeth himself, Colin McRae, to give it some serious credentials. He instantly become the odds on favorite for the event and although he didn't end up winning he did give the crowd some textbook Scottish car bashing moments. In his final run the notorious car destroyer managed to barrel roll his Subaru WRX STi and continue on to take second place at the finish.
Rally America's most famous, Travis Pastrana chats up the crowd

    The glory went to moto-cross sensation Travis Pastrana, fresh off pulling the world's first double back flip in the Moto best trick comp. Rally had finally made a mark on Americans, and DC shoes founder Ken Block only ratcheted up the sports appeal with his insanely ridiculous Subaru huck on Discovery's Stunt Junkies.

    This year rally returned to the X-Games and the momentum seems to be carrying over to the Rally America series. With that in mind I set out to catch my first glimpse of live rallying. The Ojibwe Forest Rally, a sort of American version of Rally FInland complete with yumping, deer strikes, and lots of backwoods locals with unpronounceable Scandinavian names, started things off with a super-special stage at the Bemidji Speedway. Usually a dirt oval set up for sprint cars and fender-banging stock cars, the Speedway had been littered with gates and jumps for the rally-ers to negotiate.
    Cars ran from slowest to fastest, and although the crowd was undoubtedly waiting to see Pastrana, Block and pals run their factory Subarus the action leading up to the big dogs was just as exciting. Everything from a hugely lairy rwd 80's Mustang with dirt tires, to a Chevy pickup, to the more standard Mitsubishi Evos and Ford Focuses (Foci?) coated the adoring crowd with inches of fine dirt as they flew around the course. It was awesome, and it just went to show that its not about how much technology is in a car, but how well the racing is set up for the fans.
Pastrana checks out directions to the next stage

   

What F1 Doesn't Need: Ferrari-gate Saga

Often F1 surrounds itself with off-track shenanigans that only the world of international world of cycling can compete with. There are no drivers doping here, but instead an ugly boil is becoming more apparent in this years Championship. The Ferrari Spy scandal involving current Ferrari employees who allegedly leaked classified documents to other teams has taken the center stage in 2007. McLaren was on the recieving end of this drama, but how much the recieved, what they did with them and when they got the documents is still a mystery.

The FIA has reared its head and bullishly approached the subject in that they will be heavy handed if McLaren are found guilty of any sort of espionage. The news cycle has convoluted the truth in these matters especially when Honda came out to say that they too had been approached by the duo conspiritors with Ferrari documents. Honda and Nick Fry both confirmed these talks at different points when the F1 circus was moving about Europe.

The season thus far has been a great one with a brilliant 4-way battle for Champion and for everyone to get sidetracked by a scandal is a damn shame. McLaren had great speed early on and now it seems that they will have to fend off a Ferrari resurgence. The season is set up to be a real thriller. Granted, everyone in the sport was a bit tired of the Hamilton mania that has ensued since in his insanely successful first races, but his team being disqualified would be nothing short of a farce. A farce which would make Indy ’05 look like a mere blip on the outrage meter.

That is the worst case scenario, but judging by Ron Dennis’ body language last race at Silverstone he is more than modestly concerned. For such a well run juggernaut like Ronzo’s shop, it seems out of character for the alleged behavior to occur. As much as some like to lambaste McLaren for being cold and overtly corporate, that’s much different than being cheaters. McLaren’s D-day is July 26 at the World Council where they are to answer questions from the governing body.

We at the Suitcase of Courage hope that the Championship is saved from lawyers and more shit hitting the fan. Really, we just want to see an even better end of the season than the start of it.

Read the latest "Coughlan confided with several colleagues" via Autosport.com

Melbourne Two Weeks Out...

If you happen to live in the United States of Americaland, two weeks from now will be a Saturday night full of beer and celebration as the F1 season kicks off for 2007. Australia, like Japan, China, and Malaysia, is a special treat for us American tv viewers as the time zones line up to make them night races. In other words, unless you are a scotch swilling commentator for Speed who's content with hitting the bottle at 5am these races offer us our only opprotunity to enjoy F1 with a drink in hand. So cheers it is, but lets take a look at how the teams seem to be shaping up thus far.

At the front of the field it's the usual suspects, with Ferrari and Mclaren throwing down the most impressive times the most often. Fernando Alonso commented this week that he feels slightly behind the red cars, while Massa and Raikkonnen have seemed confident in their pace. All the signs coming from Woking seem positive, but as we know there can be a big difference between pre-season spin and real performance. The biggest surprise thus far among the top two teams is how well Massa has looked against Raikkonen. Popular opinion had Kimi arriving at Ferrari and immediately dominating his less experienced team-mate, but so far the two ex-Sauber-ites have looked pretty even, with Massa coming out slightly ahead in most timed sessions. Maybe this is some Finnish mind trick, but I know I'm dying to see how they stack up come race time.

Chez Renault, its been another winter of understated performances. The world champions have made a habit of keeping a low profile over the off-season only to arrive at the season opener a step ahead of their rivals, and you can bet your baguettes Flavio will be hoping the technical team have again done their homework. Both of their championships came from seasons in which they weren't favorites, and although losing a star like Fernando has to be devastating, I find it hard to discount a team of this caliber... And by caliber I mean the both size of their gun barrels as well as the quality of their character...

Beyond the big three (not Ford, Chysler and GM) it is, as usual, hard to predict. BMW have shown excellent form, with many touting them as the big challenger to Ferrari and Mclaren instead of Renault. I always felt that Sauber had an excellent program that only lacked cash, and so far BMW seems to be taking advantage of that. If they really can make it to the pointy end of the grid this year it will be quite an accomplishment, with none happier about it than quick Nick Heidfeld. I'm sure the irony wouldn't be lost on him if he managed to get the ahead of Ferrari, a team made up entirely of drivers he was passed up for in the Sauber days. Until that happens though, I would tell Nick to focus on not being put on the Polish trailer by newbie Robert Kubica.

Other than these four, the rest of the grid has been working their asses off and finishing in various unremarkable grid combinations. Williams has comprehensibly outshone their engine supplier Toyota, which should be pissing off both the team from Cologne and Mark Webber, who once again seems to have made an unwise career decision. While I can understand the appeal of driving for Red Bull, and even more so the appeal of driving an Adrian Newey penned Red Bull, Webbo better put in some inspired performances to avoid the wrath of Red Bull's driver ADD. At this point it looks like he'll have his work cut out for him as all signs from the Red Bull camp seem to be "thumbs down."

Honda My Earth Dream Green Car Honda have been pounding round the test tracks trying to keep a low profile this winter. The last two seasons they routinely broke track records and won the "off season world championship" before under performing in the real season. After Jensen's win in Hungary last year the team definitely wants more, and they may have made a conscious decision to downplay their off season in the hopes of concentrating on what really matters. Also, Nick Fry has made it known that they have developed their car extensively in their wind tunnel and computing facilities without testing the parts on the track. If they can indeed make their simulations come true in Australia expect this to become a major trend in car design as it allows you to keep pieces secret until you bolt them on the car and kick everyone's ass with them. The downside is that many teams have found massive inconsistencies between what the wind tunnel tells them and what real world conditions tell them. Williams had a hell of a hard time with this issue last year.

ed's note: this morning Honda announced a major revamp of their car in time for the Malaysian GP. Which means that computational fluid dynamic boffinery didn't work out quite as well as hoped. Oooops for the Earth car. At least they're debuting version 2 at another night race! We'll be cheersing snake blood for this one.

As always though, the off season in F1 is a hard thing to judge, with teams running different programs and not necessarily trying to outdo each other. So really all we know is that there will be a bunch or races Michael Schumacher won't win, and somebody needs to step up and fill that void. As far as SofC's preparations for the season, we just need to figure out what we're serving Saturday night in two weeks time. Foster's oil cans? So predictable. Suggestions are welcome from our esteemed readership.

Scott Speed's Tips for Maintaining Masculinity in Motorsport

Always a team player, Scott Speed tries to convince Gerhard Berger of his commitment to Toro Rosso by diligently popping Tonio Luizzi's Vercace-encrusted man zit.

I would watch yourself, Scott. Those are some Italian eyes of adoration.

American Open Wheel, International Drivers and a dash of White Trash"

                                                                          

The Indy Racing League had their first test session of the '07 season this weekend.  However, they went to the "wrong" track in Florida to do so.  The season opener (March 24th) will be under the lights on the heavily banked oval at the Miami Speedway but with a field composed of some brilliant road racers, who could blame the truck drivers from taking the cars to Daytona where they tested the 100% ethenol powered V8's on the 2.72 mile road course instead.   This was a "Day of Firsts" for the IRL but one point stood out, reduced fuel cell size this season because of better gas mileage from ethenol: NOTE TO BERNIE and MAX, next time you want to bully TG around with the USGP, hold back the jeolousy of what he has done for his series-  the first to "green" racing engines.  The Euros shouldn't want to be out done by the boys in Indianapolis, especially with technology.  Oh yeah, and TG actually knows how to race one of these high tech things with wheels as well.

(Back to the point after a little Bern-Bashing)

This is the second time the IRL has tested here and whether they are looking to hop on the NASCAR bandwagon or finally balance the series by increasing the number of road courses is still undetermined.  I hope it's the latter for a few reasons: First, the IRL has a great pool of road racers combining passed F3 champs, Atlantic Champs, Brazilian Karting stars and 24 hour race winners.  Second, unlike CCWS, IRL has not sold out to rinky dink city races where the cars are getting airborn over railroad tracks.  They have gone back to the roots of North American road racing by taking on Watkins Glen and Sonom but have also developed new markets like the Streets of St. Pete, FLA.  This year they are also heading back to Belle Isle where the good old days of CART start popping in my head.  Adding Daytona, Road America and one more good street course would sure look a lot like the mid '90's when open wheel was more popular than NASCAR. But certainly it will get me tuned in every week for the racing as opposed to the Danica "I can't win a race but I'm really hot and can get sponsor dollars and have white trash stare at my t!tt!es" Mania.

One of the best in the business, Tony Kanaan, put Andretti-Green back on top of the speed charts by beating out the usual suspects of Marlboro Team Penske (Sam Hornish Jr. & Helio Castroneves) and Target Chip Ganassi Racing (Dan Wheldon & Scott Dixon).  While those two teams dominated last year, AGR has stepped up its game putting together a solid 4 car line-up including in addition to Kanaan, Marco Andretti, Dario Franchitti and Danica Patrick.  Rahal Letterman Racing may also be back in the mix of things after signing veteran Scott Sharp who is consistently fast on all types of tracks.  And, the defiantly have the best (think Robbie Gordon) paint job in the series.  Good work Gene Simmons in the IRL marketing department!! 

Paul Mitchell may even be the official hair stylist of the series, who knows??

 

Other notable moves include Vision Racing bringing AJ Foyt IV back into the series along side Ed Carpenter and Tomas Scheckter.  Any history buff knows that with a Foyt and an Andretti on the track, good things can happen.  Unfortunately, Marco holds a considerable skill advantage over AJ.  Sarah Fisher also got a ride this year putting the females count up to 2.  Take that Katherine Legge and your silly 1 woman race series!! 

The IRL has a bright future for the'07 season if they can consistently put on good showing that involves more than 2 teams.  There are honestly 10 drivers that could win if they have the equipment and the backing of one of the big teams.  A dark horse winner a few times this year could go a long way to shake up the standings up front.  Whatever happens, it is bound to be better than any show CCWS puts on so be sure to check it out and see the side-by-side action for yourself.  You never know, you might even watch the whole race!!   

Jewels of YouTube

Oh yea, I love Fanando Alanso and Philip Masser. CNN is in desperate need of an enema.

Mclaren Launch and Felipe Massa on track.

US Open Wheel Racing: Time To Bash Some Heads Together

From Patrick over at Motorsport Ramblings:

I was looking through some old copies of Autosport the other day, dating back to the early 1990s when reigning F1 world champion Nigel Mansell had defected to the CART series to partner Mario Andretti at Newman Haas. At the time, there were those who seriously wondered whether the CART championship, with its more open competition and its mix of ovals, wonderful road courses like Road America and Laguna Seca and successful street events like Long Beach and Surfers Paradise, might become a serious rival to Formula 1. In fact, if you were living in the US at the time, the question might have been better framed the other way round. The CART IndyCar series was much bigger news than F1 ever was - especially given that in 1993, there was no US Grand Prix and Mario's son Michael was taking one hell of a pounding over at McLaren.

Fast forward to the present and Champ Car drivers like Timo Glock and Antonio Pizzonia have defected not to F1, but to GP2, to further their careers. Leading young IRL star, Mario's grandson, Marco Andretti is talked about as a potential future F1 driver. Pundits reckon though that he too would first have to prove himself in GP2. Champ Car and IRL champions Dan Wheldon and Sebastien Bourdais can't get a drive in F1 at all. And could anyone imagine that Michael Schumacher might have decided to spend this year in the IRL as a prelude to retirement?

The simple fact is that, aside from a few open-wheel purists, nobody is really watching the Champ Car World Series or the Indy Racing League these days, even in the US. And if they ain't popular at home, there's no way these series are going to find a big audience abroad. In America, 'motor racing' is spelt 'NASCAR' to the average man on the street. And indeed, its to NASCAR that washed up F1 stars are now defecting - first Juan Montoya and now, if the rumours are to be believed, Jacques Villeneuve.

And the reason for this dramatic fall? Its always hard to know for sure, but it seems overwhelmingly likely that it hasn't been the promotional brilliance of the France family alone. Instead it has been the confusing and self-defeating split between Indianapolis circuit owner Tony George and the men behind the then CART series which must take the lion's share of the blame.

On the surface, having two major open wheel series rather than one might seem like a good deal for the fans. There are twice the number of races that there would otherwise be, and two championship contests to follow. In practice, though, it has not worked out that way. Neither series is in good health, and arguably, aside from Champ Car in the late 1990s, neither series ever really has been.

Read more of Patrick's article here at Motorsport Ramblings.

Golden Balls is headed to the LA Galaxy

Remember SOC's earlier post about how MLS might manage to screw up the Beckham situation? Turns out it was just a head fake (hey, here at SOC were are all about snap judgments and wild speculation). As has been rumored for months, David Beckham is going to be wearing the pukish yellow green LA Galaxy jersey next year. And it gets even better. The salary figure floated by the MLS PR hacks is $250 million for five years, which has sent the blogosphere into a tizzy. That would make Beckham the highest paid player in any pro sport in the US. Alex Rodriguez, who even corporate Yankees fans thinks is overpaid, only makes $25 million a year, playing a sport that is popular, actually makes money, and has real TV contracts. Soccernista is appalled at the deal:

"I can’t stop thinking about the overall quality increase MLS could have if it diffused $250 million throughout the entire league.  New players added, quality players retained, higher quality players available to the USL…a relegation system, perhaps?  But to spend it on a single player who doesn’t start for his current club team and will never again appear for his national team?  That makes my lungs hurt."

So at first blush the thought of Becks trousering (greatest English English word ever) $50 million a year - several times greater than the combined salaries of every  player in MLS - is completely ridiculous. However, the excellent Ives Galcerap has done some reporting and found that the $250 million figure is basically bullshit. A total fantasy based on what Becks  *might* earn if the Galaxy hit certain profit targets, sell enough jerseys, and his personal sponsors think he can still hawk cellphones. Even though MLS isn't quite stupid enough to pay Mr. Spice a quarter of a billion dollars guaranteed, they still managed to bungle the announcement and piss off a bunch of loyalists. Writes Ives:

"Whoever came up with the idea of floating that number is an idiot because that bloated figure has diverted attention away from the positive news of his arrival in MLS. It has also made MLS the laughingstock of world soccer. Most importantly, it has left a bad taste in the mouths of a number of MLS players currently in the league who can't fathom how a league could pay a player more per year than it costs to buy an MLS franchise.

I'll say it one more time. $250 million is NOT his salary. I am efforting to find out what the actual salary is. If I had to guess, I would put it in the $6-10 million a year range. Yes, that's still high but at least it's in the ballpark of European star players."

So what do I think? I don't think that Beckham is washed up, at least not enough to matter in MLS. He was actually ok for Real Madrid when Capello let him play, and it wasn't his fault that the Galactico era imploded spectacularly. His ability to hit crosses and free kicks is far superior to anybody currently in the MLS. He will score goals, and ESPN will show them on Sportscenter, with regularity. The man has captained the English national team through two World Cups and two European Championships. He has dealt with the crushing weight of the British press and the expectation to win big tournaments. Even though he will be under the media spotlight in LA, it won't be like it was at Man U, or Real Madrid. He might actually enjoy his time in the league. Although I'm still having trouble imagining him flying coach on the red eye to road games with his teammates.

As for what it means for the league, I think that signing a player like Beckham, who is only 31, is a big coup for the league.  MLS is on the front page of ESPN right now, and national media outlets are running big with the story. The general sports following public will at least give the league a look now. It also gives jackasses like me (the preferred appellation is "euro snob" I believe), who like soccer but generally can't be bothered to watch MLS games, a reason to follow MLS. And now that LA has made their big splash, the pressure will be on other teams, notably the Red Bulls, to do something comparable. By the middle of this summer, there could be a half-dozen name players plying their trade stateside. I should also say that I'm not worried about the MLS pulling a NASL and spending itself into oblivion. The MLS has always made sure that the sums add up, and its in their DNA to be financially conservative.  There is certainly more of a business case for paying Becks a huge salary, especially because it will mostly be from corporate sponsors, than their ever was for record execs to import Pele, Beckenbauer, et all to play for the Cosmos and do blow at Studio 54.

Its going to be fun to see how this pans out, and I'm excited that the MLS is finally doing something not-dull or mind numbingly retarded. So lets just sit back and enjoy the media circus. About soccer. In the US. Who'd have thunk it?

Oh, and now the tabloids get to follow crazy space robot with bolt ons Posh Beck's attempt to re launch her signing career.  That is sure to be a dismal failure, but watching train wrecks is generally entertaining. And now Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes will have some friends to invite over for dinner.

 

Dakar Day 5: Gordon Storms the Stage; Sainz Keeps Overall Lead

American Robbie Gordon won the longest and fastest Dakar stage today as the rally entered into Mauritania. With a seriously determined effort across the 394-km desert, Gordon has clawed himself back from 77th to 15th place overall in the standings, yet still nearly 4 hours behind leader Carlos Sainz in the VW. Even though Gordon is driving the most ostentatious vehicle on the car market (which I call the Earth Fucker), his non-factory backed budget is a fraction of the Manufactuers'. Gordon's H3 is fitted with an image sensor to capture video throughout the race which you can see on his video podcast or here on the Micron site.

Back at the front, Carlos' lead took a sizeable hit today with teammate Giniel de Villiers taking 25 seconds to end up a little more than 3 minutes behind Sainz's overall lead. Dual-sport athlete Luc Alphand sits in 4th overall only 24 minutes adrift of Sainz.

Can we Give our Shitty Buick Back, Tiger?

There is a part of me that will never understand the appeal of sports like Golf. Hitting a small ball into an even smaller hole while wearing ill-fitting hideous apparel doesn't make my blood boil whatsoever.

So in the glorious world of golfing, there is this bloke named Tiger who apparently is hugely popular with middle-aged white Republicans. Many say he was the best thing to happen to golf since Caddyshack, but with stunts like the following shilling a fat, nasty Buick concoction of steel and plastic could be Tiger's attempt to be Ashton Kutcher. That said, I don't think MTV will be knocking on his door just yet. He could be trying to broaden his appeal to ... I have no idea. Or maybe he could be doing an Oprah "You get a new Car" Winfrey to make these few suburban individuals happier with a truck with shut lines that a horse could make love to.

Or perhaps its this video's marriage of Middle American complacency, snore-inducing Sports and poorly made American cars that puts a ugly taste in my mouth. It is neither entertaining nor brave or new. Maybe this is a slightly below the belt jab at Golfers or Tiger, but seriously, what if Tiger was selling well-made cars instead of ones that are as disposable as those shorts he has on.

video via autoblog.