2010 gears up to be great year

Norris McDonald

MOTORSPORT WRITER

In 2010, Formula One auto racing will enjoy an almost serene year as compared to the one just ended.

The return of Michael Schumacher and the addition of four (maybe) new teams will put attention-attracting sideshows like race-fix scandals and manufacturer exits on the shelf.

It will – mostly – be about the sport again.

In other big-league racing, I suggest NASCAR's premier series, the Sprint Cup, will see a new champion, which should give it a badly needed boost.

Meantime, it will be business as usual for the Indy Racing League, the two sportscar series – ALMS and Grand Am – and the top drag-racing series in the world, the NHRA.

But there won't be all that much to get excited about. Too much same-old, same-old for my taste. Let's take a quick look at each:

Formula one

It really will be a brand new Formula One we'll see when the season opens in Bahrain in 10 weeks (March 14). That's correct: 10 weeks – and that's why the first thing we'll discuss is whether or not all those new teams will make it onto the grid.

Lotus F1 appears to be the healthiest of the new group, primarily because it's owned by people directly supported by the Malaysian government. Veterans Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen are the drivers.

Manor Grand Prix – which will compete as Virgin Racing because of a sponsorship arrangement with Richard Branson and his Virgin Group – also appears in good shape (it has extensive experience in Formula 3 racing) and has signed Timo Glock and Lucas Di Grassi as pilots.

Now it gets interesting. Bernie Ecclestone maintains that several teams won't make it onto the grid for 2010 and who knows more about F1 than Bernie?

Team Campos Meta is the creation of ex-F1 driver Adrian Campos (the "Meta" in the name is a Spanish sports marketing agency). This team has been wobbly right from the start and there have been suggestions that Campos has either tried to sell the team, or a part of the team, to investors such as Nelson Piquet Sr.

When Bruno Senna, nephew of the late Ayrton Senna, signed to drive for Campos (he's the only announced signing), he said he'd been taken on, in large part, to improve the team's chances of landing sponsorship.

Uh-oh.

Lastly, there is USF1. Every time somebody says this team won't make it (Ecclestone, Ross Brawn), partner Peter Windsor (a well-connected journalist and Speed TV commentator) shoots right back that everything is coming along nicely and the team will be in Bahrain.

However, with only those 10 weeks till the first race, USF1 has yet to sign a driver.

Even if all the new teams make it to the Middle East, there's no guarantee any of them will be even remotely competitive.

Remember when Craig Pollock (Jacques Villeneuve's old manager) talked British-American Tobacco into giving him a gazillion bucks to create BAR? And the first thing he did was purchase an existing F1 team, Tyrrell?

Even with that head start, the team's first year in 1999 was an unmitigated disaster. A sign of the season ahead came during the first practice session of the first race at Australia when the wing went flying off Villeneuve's car. Everything went downhill from there.

On the bright side, there will be plenty of passing this season because the "real" F1 teams and drivers – Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso in Ferraris, Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button in McLarens, Schumacher and Nico Rosberg in Mercedes' and Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel in Red Bulls – will make mincemeat of the new teams as well as just about everybody else on the grid.

This is not an F1 preview, so my prediction for the championship must wait till March. But it will be an exciting year and the focus will – as I said – mostly be on the racing, where it belongs.

NASCAR

Gerhard Berger once said there are only two types of racing in the world worth following – Formula One and NASCAR. F1 seems to have its act together but NASCAR has its work cut out.

As the season rolled to an end in '09, three things became apparent:

1. Jimmie Johnson was going to win yet another championship (his fourth straight);

2. An awful lot of empty seats were in the grandstands;

3. TV ratings were declining.

So far as 2 and 3 are concerned, I've argued in previous columns and blogs that with the exception of three big races – Daytona, the Charlotte 600 and the 400-miler at Indy – NASCAR must cut the length of its races back to 150 or 200 miles so they'll fit into two or 2 1/2 hours.

People are bored because the races are way too long. They are showing their dissatisfaction by not showing up (NASCAR suffered an estimated 15 per cent decline in live admissions in '09) and not tuning in on TV.

This falloff will continue unless NASCAR takes action.

On the personality side, Danica Patrick's dabbling in NASCAR in 2010 will attract the curious (and the journalists looking for a different story) but won't make any appreciable difference in attendance or ratings until she makes the move full-time.

However, one of the Busch brothers, Kyle or Kurt, will win the championship. This will give fans somebody to talk about other than Johnson and give NASCAR time to make the changes it desperately needs to rescue the business.

The Rest

Except for Danica, the IRL doesn't have a star. It sure needs something. Suggestion: become the league of female racers.

It still has Danica – for awhile – plus Milka Duno and Sarah Fisher. Does anybody know if the NHRA's Ashley Force Hood can turn left and right? Some enterprising team owner should find out.

And the IRL should arrange rides – fast – for Indy Lights drivers Ana Beatriz and Pippa Mann, Formula Atlantic's Simona de Silvestro and USAC midget star Alison MacLeod (of Mississauga, incidentally).

And bring back Katherine Legge.

They might be talented and good, but who needs another colourless, robotic, male driver?

Of which the IRL has plenty.

Car counts will tell the tale for the American LeMans Series and the Grand Am. Audi and Peugeot will show up for the ALMS's Sebring round (and half the NASCAR stars will be in cars for the Grand Am's Daytona 24) but the "regular season" will be what counts and, if both suffer, talk of a 2011 merger may heat up.

The NHRA? Ashley Force Hood is going to the IRL, isn't she ...?

Norris McDonald writes an auto racing blog at Wheels.ca.nmcdonald@thestar.ca

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