Weekend Preview: 17-18 October 2009

Various series the world over are coming to the end of their 2009 season and the weekends are becoming ever more sparse of racing, there are only a few short weeks until it stops completely, with seemingly only NASCAR continuing on into November, and of course Macau. In the meantime let’s enjoy the championships being decided!

Feature Events

FIA Formula 1 World Championship

– Formula 1 Grande Premio Petrobras do Brasil 2009
– Autodromo Carlos Pace
– Interlagos, São Paulo, Brazil
– (16/17)
– www.f1.com
–

And so to Interlagos! This should be the season finale, such a great venue, much like Silverstone the atmosphere bleeds through the TV screen and into your living room and there aren’t many venues you can say that about. Yes the facilities are dire, the place is falling to bits and the resurfaced track sort of emphasises it but we don’t care. Interlagos is a modern classic and what’s more, ANYTHING can happen there!

This is the penultimate round of the season and could be the championship decider and for those in Europe and the Americas it is at a really favourable time so you really have no excuses, you must watch this race.

Button leads Barrichello by 14 points and Vettel by 16 points, with 20 still on the table.

For Button to win the title, he must:
– Simply finish 3rd or better at this race regardless of what Barrichello and Vettel do. If JB finishes 3rd it puts him on 91pts which is the maximum score RB can achieve this season, and Jenson would win the tiebreak (most wins).

For Barrichello to win the title, he must:
– Score 1 x 1st and 1 x 4th or better from the last two races, and that’s assuming Button does not score in either race. Long shot.

For Vettel to win the title, he must:
– Win both races and hope the Brawns have terrible weekends! He can still do it – just as Kimi did in 2007 when he came from 17 down with two races to go to win the title.

UK TV: LIVE on BBC ONE from 4pm Sunday.

US TV: LIVE on SPEED from 11.30am ET Saturday.

FIM MotoGP

– Iveco Australian Grand Prix
– Phillip Island
– Victoria, Australia
– (15/17)
– www.motogp.com
– with 250cc, 125cc

UK TV: LIVE on BBC ONE at 5.45am Sunday (highlights 12pm, full-length repeats may be on Red Button before the F1?)

US TV: DELAYED on SPEED at 6pm ET Sunday.

Since the TV coverage utterly sucks because it is not live, listen in live to www.radiolemans.com at 10.45pm UK / 5.45pm ET US.

Other Events

Stock Car:

NASCAR Sprint Cup

– Bank of America 500
– Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
– www.nascar.com
– UK TV: SKY SPORTS 2, Saturday night (Sunday morning) 12.30am
– US TV: LIVE on ABC, Saturday 7pm ET

NASCAR Nationwide Series

– Dollar General 300
– Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
– www.nascar.com
– US TV: LIVE on ESPN 2, Saturday 7.30pm ET (not covered in UK)

Sports Car / Touring Car:

Super GT

– Autopolis, Japan

Other:

BRSCC Formula Ford Festival

– Formula Ford Festival
– Brands Hatch, Kent, England, UK

The long-running Festival remains the event all F.Fordsters want to win, and long may it be so. A host of ‘name’ drivers have won the Festival over the years on their way to stardom and it looks as though this year’s crop will be no exception with the likes of Newgarden and Cole certain to rise up the junior series ladder over the next few years with an eye on F1, or perhaps sportcars or IndyCars.

The main event is for the Duratec-engined cars but as always there is a support event for the Kent cars, and a return this year of a separate race for the Zetecs.
A final note – if you are reading this from the US, or are just interested in American talent outside of ovals, and want to keep up with the latest on Newgarden in the Duratecs and the Team USA Scholarship drivers in the Kent race, you’d do well to keep up with Junior Open Wheel Talent.