Category: Too Much Racing

Weekend Preview: 7-8 March 2009

Some more championships get going this weekend with the WTCC and IRC both starting their seasons in Brazil, and interestingly they will be at the same location. More on that later.

Note – My copy of Autosport hasn’t arrived today due to snow, so I’m relying on internet links and prior notes – this means no ‘minor races’ this week.

* * * *

NASCAR Sprint Cup
– Kobalt Tools 500 (4/36)
– Atlanta Motor Speedway
– Atlanta, Georgia, United States
– www.nascar.com

Yet another 500 miler, those guys get through a lot early in the season don’t they? This time we head to the fast Atlanta track. Midweek Motorsport said this week that you get 8 lap manic sprints followed by 15-20 laps of running on worn tyres. Can they not do what they did in Days of Thunder and back off for the first bit, then in the later bit pass them all as if you have another gear?

UK TV: 6.00pm, Sky Sports 3 & 3HD
US TV: 1.30pm, FOX

Also racing at Atlanta:
Camping World Truck Series
UK TV: No deal.
US TV: 1.30pm Saturday, SPEED.

* * *

FIA World Touring Car Championship
– HSBC Race of Brazil (1&2/24)
– Autodromo Internacional de Curitiba
– Curitiba, Brazil
– www.fiawtcc.com

The WTCC gets started for 2009 with another visit to Curitiba, where for the 3rd year running there is a charity initiative to help the less well off of the locality, of which there are many. If a spectator brings 2kg of food they can watch the racing for free. I absolutely love this idea, last year the stands were packed and they collected 52 tonnes of food!! More here.

It’ll be interesting to see if one manufacturer dominates again. It took a few rounds last year for the balance to be restored. This year there is a new performance balancing formula to replace weights, which I’ve forgotten to read up on because I didn’t realise these guys were starting already…

UK TV:
Race 1 at 4.00pm, Eurosport 2
Race 2 at 7.00pm, Eurosport 1

US TV:
No deal.

* * *

Intercontinental Rally Challenge
– Rally Internacional de Curitiba (2/12)
– Autodromo Internacional de Curitiba
– Curitiba, Brazil
– www.ircseries.com

The second round of IRC is under way already and comes to a close on Saturday afternoon. That’s not a typo in the location section – the service park is stationed behind the main grandstand of Curitiba race circuit. Both IRC and WTCC are backed and promoted by Eurosport Events so this marks an interesting cost-saving move whilst bringing a variety of motorsport to one location. It’s certainly the first time I’ve heard of a race and rally being held in the same place.

UK TV:
Updates throughout the weekend on Eurosport’s channels.

* * *

Other:

AMA Superbikes at Daytona. I imagine this is on SPEED in the US. It isn’t available here, not live anyway.

Weekend Preview: 28 Feb – 1 March

This week is a stock car week so if that’s not your thing you may as well move along. I’m not planning to stay long either, I’d rather talk about sportscars and the ACO’s entry list so I’m off to do that now!

* * * *

NASCAR Sprint Cup
– Shelby 427 (3/36)
– Las Vegas Motor Speedway
– Las Vegas, Nevada, United States
– www.nascar.com

427 laps or 427 miles? What sort of distance is that? They either picked it with a random number generator, or I smell a sponsorship tie-in of some kind.

British air time: 9.30pm GMT, Sky Sports 3
American air time: 3.30pm ET, FOX

Now we already know from two weeks ago that 3.30pm ET = 8.30pm GMT so we’re missing an hour. Sky have put it on a tape delay due to live rugby coverage. They’ve got live golf on SS1, live cricket on SS2 and live Spanish footie on Xtra, so they’ve run out of room – a busy Sunday night for Sky! The other thing I just thought of – maybe FOX has an hour of pre-race and Sky is jumping straight from rugby to the green flag.
By the way, The Sum of All Fears is on Film4 at the same time, you should watch that instead, that’s a great film.
It’s quite a friendly time so if I’m about I’ll see if I can jump in.

The Nationwide boys take to the track on Saturday. Americans can see it on ESPN2, I’m fairly sure there has been no late UK deal so no coverage for us for the first time in years.

Speedcar Series
– Dubai (2) (4/6)
– Dubai Autodrome
– Dubai, United Arab Emirates
– www.speedcarseries.com

Speedcar visits Dubai for a second time in their current season but this time it will head the bill, what with GP2 Asia taking a long break before Malaysia.

TV coverage: none but try the website

Other
I’ve decided to shunt smaller things to a little section at the end else things are going to get very crowded as we get to mid-March. Yes I know Speedcar ought to go here, it will next time!

New Zealand V8 Supercars
– Manfield (6/7)

And although I never usually do bikes unless it is MotoGP, the World Superbikes are starting their season this weekend at Philip Island in Australia. There’s live coverage on Eurosport at 4am with repeats at a more sensible time. I’m sure there’s US coverage on Speed or ESPN or some place.

On The Limit

I’ve been toying with the idea of an occasional series spotlighting videos of onboard laps, perhaps one a week, perhaps featuring an upcoming racetrack or someone in the news at the moment – and generally enjoy drivers pushing at the limit of their ability.

I’ve just seen a video which has prompted me to start the series a few days early. Head over to http://www.nofenders.net/ and check out the vid of Robert Doornbos in the 2007 CCWS Assen event.

I plan to use this feature in lieu of writing my own ‘track guide’ before F1 or IRL events, for I am lazy and this is the easy route.

Weekend Preview: 21-22 February 2009

It’s all about A1 and NASCAR this weekend, and in the UK both of these will air live on Sky Sports 2.

A1GP World Cup
– Gauteng (5/?)
– Kyalami
– South Africa
– Website: www.a1gp.com

The World Cup of Motorsport pays its first visit to Kyalami, although for some reason A1GP calls it Gauteng. South African rounds were previously held on a street track by the beach in Durban which was far too narrow, there were always silly little crashes at the hairpin first turn, but despite that it was still entertaining! Let’s see how the newer bigger cars get on at the former home of the South African Grand Prix.
(I put a question mark in the # of rounds section above, ‘cos really, who knows?)

British air time: Sunday 11:30am GMT, Sky Sports 2
Elsewhere: check listings or use a1gp.com

NASCAR Sprint Cup
– Auto Club 500 (2/36)
– Auto Club Speedway (which is really California Speedway)
– Fontana, California, United States
– www.nascar.com

I’m not sure why, but NASCAR thought it would be idea to make the teams drive from Florida to California in a few days between a couple of 500 mile races. Good plan, NASCAR, nothing like tiring out your teams at the very beginning of a 36 race season. Tune in to see how the boys cope. It’ll be late here and I’ll be sleeping.

British air time: 11pm GMT, Sky Sports 2
American air time: 5pm EST, FOX

Support races at Fontana include:

Saturday:
NASCAR Nationwide Series
– Stater Bros 300

:shrug: I know nothing.

British air time: Not found.
American air time: Saturday 7pm EST, ESPN2

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series
– San Bernadino County 200

Is that a local county? If they are sponsoring it, times must be tight..

British air time: Not found.
American air time: Saturday 3pm, FOX

Seems the 3rd tier event gets to run on Fox while the 2nd tier doesn’t, not sure of the logic but there you go.

* * *

This is all very interesting but probably the most interesting events of the next seven days happens on Tuesday where we will have two important announcements:

1) USF1 making an announcement on SPEED.
2) BBC announcing full details of their F1 coverage, I’m looking forward to that more than the USF1!

Okay, have a great weekend.