Grid Expansion In 2007 And Beyond ??
April 19, 2007

This subject has been on everybody's minds for quite a few years now... but now that our new car has arrived - namely the Panoz-Cosworth DP01 - and everybody is aware of costs involved, plus KK & Co refusing to provide any subsidies (anymore), it isn't that simple to come up with funds when sponsors are not knocking on the doors... so let's take a peek at what we might expect this year:

a/ a second Conquest car may materialize - with either Jan Heylen or Nicky Pastorelli driving

b/ Minardi most likely will field a third car at Euro races - latest names in the basket are: Zsolt Baumgartner, Patrick Friesacher, Bas Leinders, and whatever will pop to Paul Stoddart's mind at the time

c/ Walker Racing may field a third car at Euro races for either Arie Luyendyk Jr or Nicky Pastorelli... and they'll definitely field a 3rd car at Surfers for either Karl Reindler or some other Aussie

d/ Brooks Associates Racing is planning to enter CC next year but may "rent" a car for this year's Zhuhai event with Tengyi Jiang driving

Although there are a couple other new teams that have expressed their desire to enter Champ Car this year I doubt it will be feasible... so here is whom we might see come next year:

a/ Brooks with Jiang Tengyi (as mentioned earlier)

b/ Sierra Sierra with Raphael Matos

c/ Hylton Racing with Hoover Orsi or someone else

d/ Stefan Johansson may finally get his dream together - with Alx Danielsson most likely the driver

e/ Derek Mower's "Nordic Racing" might resurface (previously in F3000) - with Jaroslav Janiš or someone else for a driver

So, add it all up and we may as well say that the future looks promising... especilly now that KK & Co have realized that getting American sponsors is very difficult when the series has only two American drivers out of 17 - and so that is the reason why we have two races in Europe this year and two more are planned for next year = to attract European sponsorship money into the series...

Yes, it isn't the direction we all expected and wanted Champ Car to go, but consider this: it's series' survival vs failure and getting swallowed by TG's dinky toy series...

zerO

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