Well, seven rounds have gone by in the Australian V8 Supercar series and it isn't really much of a surprise to see the two Toll HSV cars leading the way.
Showing the way...just like he did last year
Rick Kelly, the defending series Champion (who won the title without actually winning a round...go figure) was always going to be the one to beat this year and, up until last week, no one could match him. However, his teammate, Garth Tander, managed a series sweep last week at Queensland raceway while Rick missed out on a top three finish after having a shocker of a weekend by his own extraordinarily high standards. This meant that Garth was able to turn a points deficit to a slender lead going into round 8 in Sydney (which starts on August 17).
As the season kicks off its second half, here are the top ten in points;
In that list there are 4 former Champions; Rick, Craig, Skaife and Russell and only three not to have won the prestigious Bathurst 1000; Will, Winterbottom and Courtney (who now drives the car vacated by NASCAR Busch driver Marcos Ambrose).
Is Whincup the best hope for Ford to wrestle the title back from Holden?
Rather interesting to note that, despite the dominance this year in terms of round wins by the Holden boys, there are six Fords in the top ten. Perhaps just as interesting is that the top six drivers are all in team order; the two Toll HSV cars, the two Team Vodafone boys and the two HRT cars.
But, naturally, that isn't the closest fought title race...no, that honour belongs to see who will win Miss V8 Supercar for 2007. Maybe I should change the title of this to 'Midriff-season review' instead.
Will Miss V8 2006 repeat this year?
They'll have a hard time trying to figure out a winner
Now, if only I could find where I sign up to be a judge...*sigh*
Well, I couldn't do a mid-year review since we're well into July...and I couldn't do a mid-season one since they've done 20 races already so I was left to go with mid-winter (Southern Hemisphere remember), hope you don't mind.
Anyway, let's get into it; focusing on my fellow countryman, Mr M. Ambrose.
Marcos behind the wheel of his #59 Kingsford Ford Fusion
After a storming start to the year (finishing 16th on his debut race at Daytona Speedway, 8th in Mexico and 10th in Atlanta), that included gambling on tyres in Dover to come home an incredible 6th, Marcos hit a bit of a rough patch recently with only two top 15's since then, while the rest of the results have been outside the top 30.
Despite this, he still sits inside the top 10 in the points, thanks largely to the number of Cup drivers who don't race a full season. I've already gone on record as saying that if he manages to stay in the top 10 that he could end up in Cup next year (though I'd rather he raced in Busch again to gain further experience on ovals) and that he will beat Juan Montoya in the Rookie of the Year standings (although I thought Juan was going to run a full Busch schedule when I wrote that one...oh well), so let's see how close I've been so far.
- Juan isn't running a full schedule, so if Marcos doesn't beat him he'll be highly annoyed with himself. He'll need to pull a few stunners out if he wants to beat David Ragan for the Rookie title however...he has the talent, it's just producing the results that he's been struggling with lately. I think second will be the best he can do to be honest. - after listening to Trackside at New Hampshire, Jeff Hammond was saying that a lot of people have sat up and taken notice of his achievements this year...and who am I to argue with him? - every time I hear a radio or TV piece about Marcos, he always sounds/looks really excited to be there. Even the racing nuts on here say similar things and that they're impressed by his attitude, so he seems to be going the right way at winning over fans.
Ok, so that's a pretty high standard he has set so far this season and Marcos will only want to improve on what he's done so far...maybe there's a chance that he'll overdrive the car, but we'll see. He's proven to be a quick learner and doesn't have any problems listening to advice (soaking up the information Mark Martin gave him at Dover for instance) which is always a good sign for a driver.
But, again, what will 2008 bring? Is Marcos a chance for a Cup ride next year?
Well, Sonoma would have gone some way to answering that only the team pulled the pin on that, choosing instead to focus on the Busch race. So we look to Watkins Glen then; if he can qualify for the race, we'll see what he can do with the 'big boys' on the Sunday. My only question is if he can get used to the new car quick enough to be able to qualify it...he's a great road racer so learning the track shouldn't be a problem (particularly not when the Busch guys run there the same weekend so he'll get double the practice time). One thing is for sure, the Glen won't be his only shot in a Cup car in the future, I think this year has seen him prove he belongs there.
However, that's still to come, this is supposed to be about his season so far...and I've gone on about nothing for the whole time so let's give him a grade for this year so far; B-
There we go, I've rated him...not really all that hard either.
His qualifying has been a bit patchy (2nd in Nashville, 41st at California) but has been slightly better than his results; average qualifying is a tick under 20th while racing is just over 22nd.
All in all, he has been much better than I expected him to be and sits about 100 points clear of the other car in the stable so he's doing what he should be doing; beating his teammate.
And while Marcos will have an eye on staying where he is in the standings (10th) or even improving a couple spots on it, his other eye will be firmly fixed on New York and that elusive chance to race in the Cup series.
Tez is a rare creature; an Australian who was living in New Zealand before moving to Canada. He's also a Civil Engineer who is hoping to spend his Monday to Friday sitting in front of a computer surfing the inter...uh, working hard for an Engineering Consultant or Contractor when he finds a job. His heart is torn between his two loves; F1 and NASCAR.
Due to his high interest in those, his blogs will likely focus on them with the occasional foray into sports that don't get much (if any) mention on this website. All blogs and/or comments will more than likely have his usual dollop of sarcasm and general Aussie spin on them.
Amazingly, he also managed to score 2 MiB nominations on consecutive days (August 5 & 6, 2007) after announcing he had been keeping track of them...he's considering hiding under his bed as a result.
