So who won what championship in the 2006 season.. First up is NASCAR, starting with the Craftsmen Truck Series, at the season finale on Friday night in Homestead, Todd Bodine scored his first Truck Series championship and brought home the first NASCAR championship for the Bodine family. For the NASCAR Busch Series, this season was no contest with Kevin Harvickclinching the 2006 Busch Series championship four races before the finale in Homestead in a huge domanating fashion.
Finally, the Nextel Cup Series and The Chase for the Nextel Cup Championship saw a shoot out down to the final laps this evening at the Homestead finale with Jimmie Johnson clinching the 2006 Nextel Cup Series Championship. The Unofficial Top 11 drivers in points were: 1. Jimmie Johnson 2. Matt Kenseth 3. Denny Hamlin 4. Kevin Harvick 5. Dale Earnhardt Jr. 6. Jeff Gordon 7. Jeff Burton 8. Kasey Kahne 9. Mark Martin 10. Kyle Busch and the million dollar bonus for 11th goes to Tony Stewart.
For all you NASCAR Nextel Cup Series fans, the 2007 Daytona 500 is just 91 days away.
In Formula One, Brazil played host to the season finale were it was Fernando Alonso becoming the yet again the youngest-ever champion for the second straight year. The 2006 Formula 1 Season will mark the end of Michael Schumacher's Formula 1 career and the youngest-ever champion Fernando Alonso taking the top spot going into the unknown (rules wise) 2007 Formula 1 Season.
Looking ahead to the two rivals in open wheel racing, the IRL Indy Car Series crowned Sam Hornish Jr. the 2006 IRL champion in a tie breaker for the most victories over Dan Wheldon back in September at the finale and in the Champ Car World Series, in no surprise here, Sebastien Bourdais clinched his 3rd consectutive Champ Car Championship down-under in Austrilia over Justin Wilson and A.J. Allmendinger.
In the Sports Cars two series, the Grand American Rolex Series, Jorg Bergmeister clinched his first daytona prototype championship and in the GT Series, it was Andy Lally and Marc Bunting in the #65 TRG Pontiac GTO.R. clinching the 2006 GT Championship.
In the American Lemans Series, the four champions were: In LMP1 was Allan McNish and Dindo Capello in the domanate winning Audi, LMP2 had Sascha Maassen and Lucas Luhr in a Penske Racing Porsche, GT1 had Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta in a Chevrolet Corvette and for GT2, Jorg Bergmeister in a Porsche 911 GT3 RSR.
Finally, (at least in what I covered/watched this season) the NHRA, three of the four points championship went down to the finale race with Top Fuel being rated as the come from behind victory in NHRA history as Tony Schumacher grabed the 2006 NHRA Top Fuel Championship, as he had to win the race and set a national ET record to win the championship over Doug Kalitta. In the Funny car Division, after beating Ron Capps in round 2 at the finale in Pomona, John Force clinched his record 14th NHRA Funny Car Championship over his teammate Robert Hight. In the Pro Stock Cars, Jason Line beat out his boss Greg Anderson for the 2006 Championship and in Pro Stock Motorcycles, Andrew Hines took the 2006 Championship.
Well, thats it for the 2006 Motorsports Season, Congraduations to all of the champions.
For the last time, See Yeah! By Brian Vermette, RaceDriven.com
That title begs the question in two different Motorsports Series.
In the NHRA, this past weekend in Pomona was the season finale and along with that, two divisions still had points championships still yet to be crowned, the first one was in the Funny Car division with a three-way fight beteen John Force, Force's teammate Robert Hight and Ron Capps. This championship came down to if John Force won two rounds, then he would became champion. In round 2, the biggest matchup was John force vs. Ron Capps, if John wins, he clinches and he did just that, he clinched the 2006 NHRA Funny Car Championship, his 14th NHRA Funny Car Championship. With the championship already decided, it was time to race and would you have know it, John Force ended up winning the event.
In the Top Fuel Division, the same outcome for the points leader Doug Kalitta would be challeging one with second in points Tony Schumacher coming hard. For Tony Schumacher to win the championship in a come from behind fashion, he had to win the event and set a national ET record. Believe or not, Kalitta went out in round 2 and that ment that Tony Schumacher still was in the championship fight. All he had to do was win all of the racing (event) and set a national ET record...and in one of the biggest come back victories in history, Tony schumacher won the 2006 NHRA Top Fuel Championship with a record pass of 4.428 at 327.98 mph.
For the second year in a row, the NHRA series has had there championships go down to the finale and in two cases, down to the winner takes all. Next year, the NHRA will adopt a NASCAR style 8 race championship showdown. (Read more on the NHRA Showdown..)
Now in NASCAR, coming out of Phoenix following yet another domanating performance by Kevin Harvick as he swept both of the 2006 Nextel Cup Phoenix races with Jimmie Johnson finishing in 2nd place yet again, the points championship has a more open picture, there are still five contenders mathamatically in the hunt for the 2006 Nextel Cup Championship with the points leader Jimmie Johnson having a 63 point lead over Matt Kenseth. Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin in 3rd and 4th are tied with 90 points back and in fifth is Dale Earnhardt Jr. with 115 points behind.
Now thinking about the idea of any of the five contenders could win the championship in homestead, it makes me wonder why some are giving the championship away to the points leader Jimmie Johnson before the checkered flag has flown. Looking back at the NHRA's Top Fuel Championship battle that had a come from behind championship winner, we might not all be so quick to say that the Chase for the Nextel Cup Championship is over.
Looking ahead to next weekend in Homestead, if Jimmie Johnson can finish 12th or better, then he will become the 2006 Nextel Cup Champion regardless of what the other contenders do, and that will cap off an already winning season for the #48 team.
See Yeah! - Championship Edition next week after Homestead.
Going beyond the Nextel Cup racing from Atlanta and the Chase for the Nextel Cup Series, NASCAR fans were shocked on friday when Hendrick Motorsports and Chevrolet unveiled the all new Chevrolet Impala SS that was shown off in the #48 Lowe's Chevy colors for Jimmie Johnson. Chevrolet will now run the Monte Carlo SS on the current car for 2007 and 2008 and the Impala SS on the COT starting at Bristol next year. There is also talk about Dodge doing the same with the Dodge Avenger, no confirmation...we will all know when Dodge makes there announcement.
Now in all fairness, I have writen about the COT a couple times before, but with all of the talk going around and some drivers and teams coming out publically and saying what they think of the Car of Tomorrow including this article on NASCAR.com and another article on Motorsport.com, this issue deserves at least one more blast from me. Now my readers know what I already think of the COT, its ugly, its also begining to remind me of an IROC (granded I like the look of the IROC cars for only 12 of them) or TRAC car crossed with an Grand-american Rolex car. Its rear spoiler and front spliter is not what NASCAR's fans are use to seeing on track, but all NASCAR fans really want or at least me is a racecar that looks similer to the street verison with the safety and technology features of the COT, thats it. Its an R/T racecar model of the street verison.
My Closing Statement: To everyone in the NASCAR community, for NASCAR to really understand were its drivers, teams, owners, and fans are coming from on this COT issue, NASCAR will have to see this car in action starting at Bristol in order to fully understand just what we all are talking about, I will say that the 2007 Nextel Cup Season will be one for the record books and beyond, it will be a season of testing this COT in race format to see it all unfold...we are all going to have to live with it, unless the heads of NASCAR say otherwise, but I will say that after Bristol, things will start to be come clearer with every passing COT involved race, its NASCAR's show,
Now what about cost, safety and how do we get it to look better and create better/safer racing?
As far as Formula 1 racing goes, I have not been a fan for that long (meaning watching every event and even getting up to watch them live on TV), I started watching F1 sometime before the first United States Grand Prix, so when the question came up last Sunday night on WindTunnel, who is the greatest Formula 1 driver in history, I really had no one to compare to the 7-time champion Michael Schumacher too. But from the way the comments went on WindTunnel, most F1 fans would say the Schumacher is the greatest of all time. He was willing to what it took to win.
This question was asked just hours after the 7-time champion competed in his last formula 1 race of his career for Ferrari, but just like in most of the races this year, Michael Schumacher didn't go quiety, but for Schumacher who was chancing his 8th world championship, Michael had a hard task to over come with his rival Alonso having a 10 point lead and for Schumacher to win, he must have won the race..Alonso would have had to finish outside the points to create the tie an the tie breaker would have come down to victories this season.
But during the sundays race, it was not to be, not the championship and not the victory. It would have been interesting to see Schumacher win in his final race and at least have a chance at the championship, but between Alonso running in the top 4 and finsihing in the second position and Schumachers bad luck with trying to pass another competitor, creating a flat tire, he just missed out, but in my opinion, that didn't stop Schumacher from showing that he is still the greatest driver out there when he had to make up all most a lap on the entire field, he kept setting fast lap after fast lap and driveing like he stole that car an d ended up finshing 4th, what a finish to an amazing career. We will miss Michael Schumacher in Formula 1, despite whether you liked or hated him, he was impressive to watch in pure domanating fashion.
As for the crowning of a champion, for Fernando Alonso, he showed the entire world that he is one of the best Formula one drivers on track today, to be one of the best, you must beat the best and he did just that, for the second straight year, Fernando Alonso became yet again the youngest driver to every win the World Championship in F1 history and he did it by beating Michael Schumacher. In my book, in 2007, Fernando Alonso will be the one to beat in F1, hands-down.
So after teh checkered flag dropped, it was Ferrari finishing 1-4 with Massa picking up the victory from pole and Renault picking up the 2006 World Championship with Fernando Alonso and the 2006 Constructors Championship, what a way to end the 2006 F1 season, next year, Fernando Alonso will be racing for McLaren-Mercedes, what will that be like.
With just five races to go in the Chase for the Nextel Cup, Last Saturday night's 500 miler at Charlotte (Lowe's) Motor Speedway showed that no driver is out of this championship yet even if you are 200 points out.
For Kasey Kahne, last Saturday night showed that he is still the one to beat on 1.5 milers and bigger and that he is not out of this championship by no means. With that for the second straight week, Kahne, who has finished 2nd at Talladega and won last Saturday nights Charlotte race has brought himself to just over one race out in the championship.
On the flip side of that was Jeff Gordon who had troubles during the race and yet again finishing well down in the standings, now finds himself 10th -216 points out of the lead, but still in the hunt. But surprisingly, No one driver has yet taken off with this championship points lead and it appears that no one will.
For all ten of these drivers, the championship chase is not over, one bad finish for the points leader like what happened last week at Talladega and one good finish or even a victory by another chaser could result in as much as 156 point swing. Its still too early for anyone to say that they are out of this championship hunt, but if Jeff Burton continues with top 5-10 finishes for the remainder five races, only to top 5 in points will have any shot.
Point Standings and finishing position in last Saturday night's race in Charlotte: 1. Jeff Burton Leader and finished 3rd 2. Matt Kenseth -45 -- 14th 3. Kevin Harvick -89 -- 18th 4. Mark Martin -102 -- 30th 5. Dale Earnhardt Jr. -106 -- 4th 6. Denny Hamlin -137 -- 28th 7. Jimmie Johnson -146 -- 2nd 8. Kasey Kahne -160 -- Winner 9. Kyle Busch -195 -- 6th 10. Jeff Gordon -216 -- 24th
Going beyond the Chase and looking toward 2007, the Car of Tomorrow continues to make noise with another test session this time down at Homestead Motor Speedway. This test has 56 COT cars testing between Monday and Wednesday. Most of the Nextel Cup teams have COT's already made and now there is talk about several teams asking NASCAR to consider debuting the COT superspeedway program, a little early at the spring Talladega race instead of the fall Talladega race. It seems that with the repaving of the Talladega superspeedway, it has made the track very different from its sister track Daytona and that now teams must build all new cars for just that one race.
I like this idea too, its at least $150,000 per car plus labor to build and for some of these car owners, triple to five times that amount. Don't forget the backup car as well. I hate to say this, but a couple of weeks ago, Jeff Gordon made the comment that he would rather wait until 2008 and just run the COT and I still agree with that.
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