The Heroes of Denver

Last Sunday, Champ Car had its best race of the season, in Denver, Colorado, with more overtaking than seen in an entire Formula One season.

The reason was that Bridgestone's ultra-sticky street-course red-walled tyres simply weren't up to the task of dealing with Denver's bumpy mix of asphalt and concrete for a sustained period of time. To quote the winner AJ Allmendinger, they 'turned to junk' after 10 or 12 laps. To be fair to Bridgestone, though, they hadn't brought alternate tyres to Denver last year so they had no experience of the 1.657-mile course's tyre-shredding tendencies.

The side-effect of ultra-soft tyres is that there is an excess of rubber marbles off the racing line. That means if you're forced off line by a passing car, not only do you slide wider, it also takes a good couple of laps to clean your tyres and regain 100 per cent grip.

But it's deeper than that. There were many heroic performances among the drivers across the Grand Prix of Denver weekend (and some inspired efforts from pit personnel too) - some subtle, some emphatically not so... but with just one or two exceptions, everyone did themselves proud.

And yet at the start of the weekend, there wasn't much hint of the entertainment in store. The atmosphere in Denver's Champ Car paddock was downbeat, predictably enough. When your 2002 champion is lying in intensive care following a freak accident little more than a week earlier, this is hardly surprising. When he's a man of such honesty, affability and integrity as Cristiano da Matta, it hits harder.

Bear in mind that da Matta has never driven for Forsythe Championship Racing, never been teammates with Paul Tracy or AJ Allmendinger, yet that whole team withdrew from the Road America test following Cristiano's accident. It had little to do with fears over the circuit's safety, but mainly because the team personnel had lost focus, were way too distracted and upset over what had happened. That is the kind of affection in which da Matta is held.

A giant get-well card for da Matta © LAT

The RuSPORT paddock and hospitality area, of course, was particularly subdued. The team had distributed a lot of stickers bearing an image of Cristiano's helmet, and drivers and teams had quickly added these to their own helmets, cockpit-sides and sidepod farings. There was a 'Get Well Cristiano' autograph board, and much of the RuSPORT team were wearing t-shirts imploring the little Brazilian to 'push please'.

Mario Dominguez, the man who took over da Matta's seat at Dale Coyne Racing, has always been quick in Denver, and after qualifying I went over to congratulate him on his ninth place. "I thought you were going to be in the top six at one point," I added.

"Yeah, I left about a tenth and a half on the track," said Mario. "The car was capable of it; it was just a mistake on my part. Still, we have Dale Coyne's best grid position of the year. The previous one was Cristiano's 10th at Long Beach."

That of course got us on to the subject of his absent rival. Mario and I share a hero-worship of Michele Alboreto (that's why Dominguez's helmet is blue and yellow) and he is therefore someone whose judgement of human beings I trust.

He shook his head solemnly: "It's so bad, what's happened to Cristiano. Such a freak accident. And it's really weird being here without him. The worse thing is that it happened to him, of all people, the nicest guy in the world. Really, do you know any racing driver as nice as him?"

On race day, Dominguez was immediately promoted to seventh as Alex Tagliani snagged Paul Tracy at Turn 1, sending the Forsythe car to the back of the field and his own Team Australia car to the pits with terminal suspension failure. On lap nine, under pressure from the recovering Tracy, Dominguez passed the CTE Racing-HVM car of Nelson Philippe for sixth.

Four laps later, though, Tracy dived down the inside of Dominguez, got out of shape and caused Mario to spin. Later, the Dale Coyne Racing entry retired with suspension failure, possibly as a result of contact with the Forsythe car. Given what happened in the final turn of the race, Mario would likely have finished third. In fact, as will soon transpire, Mario's name here is interchangeable with several drivers.

Let's go back to Alex Tagliani for a moment. Usually he is a hero at some point of a weekend, and his highlight in Denver was Friday, when on the harder compound black tyres he qualified third, beaten only by AJ Allmendinger and Sebastien Bourdais. As Justin Wilson and Paul Tracy recovered to their customary positions in Saturday's qualifying, Alex dropped to fifth, but was less than a tenth of a second from maintaining third.

Paul Tracy (Forsythe) and Alex Tagliani (Team Australia) tangle in Turn 1 of the first lap © LAT

Of course, at the start he then goofed trying to do too much. Being on the inside kerb, he was missing crucial braking force when he needed to avoid Tracy's right-rear tyre. And so, as in Milwaukee and San Jose, Tagliani had lost a chance to finish second. But, to be facetious for a moment, even if we ignore his excellent qualifying performance, and his admission of guilt for the first corner crash, Alex also deserves hero status for allowing us to witness another man's heroic drive... more of which later.

If RuSPORT had their emotions to override, they also had to deal with the practical deficiency of having just one car, as Justin Wilson explained in the post-qualifying press conference.

"I think the biggest thing about being down to just one car is we don't have Cristiano with us. Everyone is thinking about Cristiano, hoping he's going to get well soon. And everyone is being very professional, doing their job.

"We just don't have the data to look at with two cars. We have to make our own path and go in one direction, whereas when you have a two-car team you can have two separate directions or the same direction for the both guys, they're both saying the same thing. You back each other up. So it's slightly different, but we'll just do the best under the circumstances."

And so he did. He couldn't have expected those circumstances to be quite so dire, though. As last year, RuSPORT's set-up for their home race in Denver was some way off, but Wilson, who like Bourdais started on blacks and was running third, was at least able to close on Allmendinger when AJ's reds went off.

However, on the same tyres, Wilson was no match for Tracy, despite the fact that by the time he reached the Briton, Paul had only six seconds of power-to-pass left. As the Forsythe car came past, Wilson hit his radio button: "I want what he's got," he muttered.

In an ill-handling car, though, true aces - of which Justin is unquestionably one - are an absolute joy to watch in a Champ Car. As at Monterrey, as he tried to keep up with the clearly faster Bourdais-Newman/Haas package, Wilson's car control was breathtaking to watch. He kept on it, and was able to grab third back when Tracy skated wide on entry to Turn 1 when Bourdais chopped off his passing attempt.

Ultimately, though, in his third stint and now on red tyres, it all got a bit silly for Wilson, the tail-slides became too lurid, too time-consuming and as he free-fell down the order, it became less a joy and more of a pain to watch him. With on-track ethics as flawless as his, though, there is not a driver in Champ Car who could have done a better job in that car on that day.

Of course, it didn't need to be quite as bad as eighth. For one thing, once Bourdais passed him and he fell to fifth, Wilson was approximately 25 seconds up on sixth-placed Dan Clarke. As RuSPORT team president Jeremy Dale pointed out: "Had we pitted him at that moment, we could have put him on blacks without losing a place. However, the tyre degradation was so dramatic that in the two laps we spent debating it, the moment was gone."

Instructing Wilson to let himself be lapped by leader Allmendinger so that the hobbled RuSPORT car needed to complete one less lap proved an unsound move, too. It meant that despite being wrecked at the final corner, Tracy and Bourdais were classified ahead of Wilson in the finishing order...

Paul Tracy and Sebastien Bourdais clashed in and out of the cockpit © LAT

Speaking of Paul Tracy and Sebastien Bourdais, they of course produced the most heroic drives of all, even if, given their ultimate outcome, each is unlikely to give the other credit where it's due... Had he not been punted into a spin at Turn 1 and had his car not had a fuel pick-up problem, I would lay money on Tracy to have won that race. As it stands, it was his best drive of the season.

Unlike Bourdais and Wilson, Tracy started on the much derided red tyres. Now, as is well known, he doesn't like the softest red compound, and in his column on autosport.com, he has compared the experience to driving on Gummi bears. (Obviously his point of reference on this is open to question). Thus it was no surprise to see him struggle in qualifying and wind up fourth.

And yet from the back of the field at Turn 1 (15th, once his assailant Tagliani had retired), Tracy's progress was awe-inspiring. The yellow flag had allowed him to pit for an extra splash of fuel, which at least meant he didn't need to worry about fuel consumption. But even so...

He cruised round to the back of the pack for the restart, and in the course of the first green flag lap, he dispatched Nicky Pastorelli and Katherine Legge. Next lap, Jan Heylen was dismissed too. The following lap, both Dan Clarke and Andrew Ranger fell to the sword. Charles Zwolsman and Will Power failed to hold back the tide in successive laps.

The lazy git took a whole four laps to find a way round CTE Racing-HVM's Nelson Philippe, and a further three to nail Dominguez, before Oriol Servia's car yielded one more spot as it died with falling oil pressure. On lap 15, then, Tracy was fifth.

His detractors would point out that he had had a somewhat devastating effect on his quota of power-to-pass boost, having now used 54 of the allotted 60sec. I would argue that seldom has the extra 50bhp been used to such devastating effect.

Bear in mind also that Tracy came past in fourth place on lap 18, as a result of his teammate Allmendinger pitting from second place, having lost 2.5 seconds to the man he was chasing, Bourdais, and dropping to within two seconds of his nearest pursuer, Wilson.

AJ's tyres were the same compound with which Tracy had just charged from the back of the grid, in the course of which the Canadian had had to drive off-line and on to the surrounding rubber trash more often than anyone else would the whole race. And yet only Bruno Junqueira and Katherine Legge would make their first set of tyres last longer...

With Bourdais having his nightmare red-tyre stint in the middle of the race, Tracy and Wilson passed him, and Paul got past Justin too with the aid of his last six seconds of boost. He had nothing left to throw at Allmendinger, and their lap times in the final stint kept the gap between them at 12 seconds. AJ's no slouch.

Having dropped as far as fifth on red tyres before his pitstop, Sebastien Bourdais was in the mood for a fight. Being the reigning champion yet made to look inept by a poor tyre compound was never likely to sit well. I found it particularly admirable that, aside from his slightly rude chop on Tracy, Sebastien's behaviour towards his rivals was unquestionable as he lost pace and places.

Back on blacks, though, Bourdais's charge was always going to be pretty special, if not especially pretty. If the car looked better behaved than some of the others, so he used it to the max. He was going to put up with no nonsense from Wilson's hobbled RuSPORT car, and that left his route clear to hunt down Newman/Haas Racing teammate Bruno Junqueira.

Bridgestone option and primary tyres © LAT

Initially it didn't seem Sebastien was going to make it before he ran out of laps. But then the gap started coming down by four tenths here, six tenths there, and with a devastating 60.319 on lap 90, No. 1 was all over the rear of No. 2. Junqueira's quickest time - set that very same lap - was a full second slower.

Bourdais's pass on Junqueira was pure determination and judgement. Bruno gave Sebastien no more room than necessary and forced him to use the kerbs on the inside of Turn 1, but use them he did, clattering his right-hand wheels over the sharp ridges, and forcing Junqueira out on to the marbles. Job done. Third place would be a pretty respectable result.

Except Bourdais had his eyes on a bigger prize. As at the end of his second stint, Tracy's car was struggling to pick up its last five laps worth of fuel, cutting out on right-handers, triggering to life again on straights, sputtering a little on left-handers. With just two laps to go, Bourdais was looking for a way past the Forsythe car. Unsurprisingly, Tracy made it as difficult as possible, and to hell with his probation.

Those outside Race Control didn't get to see the battle for second on that final lap via the television feed. By fair means or foul (Bourdais insists foul, especially at Turn 3) Tracy resisted the Newman/Haas car, despite having not had any power-to-pass boost for 50 laps, while Sebastien was urged by his race engineer Craig Hampson to use his plentiful supply to squirt past his rival.

Finally on Turn 6 - a right-hander - the Forsythe car was on the verge of dying, and Bourdais was now very close. Through Turns 7 and 8, Sebastien states that Paul weaved left, and held that line down to Turn 9. Jabbing his power-to-pass button, however, Bourdais drew alongside and was past... only Tracy's car had now found some meths and was up to speed.

As Bourdais was turning in, so Paul was diving down the inside, desperately trying to give the Newman/Haas car three options - submission, the wall, or driving into the Forsythe car's flanks. Unfortunately for him - well, both of them, actually - he had hit the brakes too late and too hard given that the inside line had less grip, and the rear of the car swung out, sending the 2003 champion into the 2004/05 champ...

It was a racing mistake, and though Bourdais might not agree, it wasn't personal. Given that there was a gap down the inside, and it was the final turn of the final lap, PT would have pulled that move on anyone... Yep, probably even his teammate. And anyone who in his position didn't at least think about doing the same isn't a race driver. However, Paul didn't just think about it, he tried to make it happen. This time it didn't work. Other days it will.

Equally, though, and here Tracy might not agree, Bourdais had to try and pass him and not just think about third place and the championship points. Why? Because he's a racing driver, and Paul should understand that better than anyone. Each will hate me for saying this, but it is their similarities, not their differences that put these two at odds so often.

Personally, I love seeing Bourdais and Tracy battling on track - but not if the result is elimination for either or both, because then a Champ Car race loses its hub, its focus, for an objective fan or journalist (or both). This time, with the clash happening as the curtain fell on the race, we didn't have time to feel gutted. We had to check out who was going to benefit.

AJ Allmendinger lead home Bruno Junquiera with Dan Clarke taking his first podium © LAT

And here, then, let us pay tribute to Dan Clarke. I have frequently been critical of this guy for his disingenuous remarks when trying to explain how one of his unnecessary manoeuvres messed things up for him, his CTE Racing-HVM team and/or a rival driver - see Monterrey qualifying, Houston qualifying and race, see Cleveland and Edmonton on race day. But he's also got the short end of the shaft at Toronto (from rivals) and San Jose (from mechanical failure). At the latter event, second place would have been no more than his due, and he was generally superb at Portland, too.

Thus a podium at Denver was merited, especially when one takes into account the fact that CTE Racing had - and I assume this is a temporary aberration - lost their way in set-up. Generally, the team have been excellent in 2006, but this day, when several of his more famous or highly-touted rivals made errors, Clarke made none and took an imperfect car to third. The team's part in this result came when Dan's crew gave him a perfect second pitstop to vault him ahead of Team Australia's Will Power and ahead of his teammate Nelson Philippe, too.

Nelson is another of those drivers who coulda woulda shoulda taken third, but a failed wheel gun dropped him down the order. He remains, however, a possibility for a podium in all the remaining rounds - he, and the team, have honestly become that good.

Conquest Racing's pairing of Andrew Ranger and Charles Zwolsman cannot go unmentioned either. Yep, here are two more drivers who might have reached the final podium place. Ranger, who had done his usual (for '06) excellent job in qualifying, only to have his sixth place on the grid neutralised by the Tagliani-Tracy clash, caught on to the coat-tails of Tracy and tracked his compatriot with great aplomb into the top six, and a gearbox failure left him ruing what might have been.

Zwolsman, meanwhile, was running ahead of Power and Clarke, and just behind Philippe, when he, like Nelson, had a traumatic final pitstop. A brief fire and the consequent smell of burning sent the Dutchman back to the pits for a quick check over. Tenth place was rather less than he and the Conquest team deserved.

And so there you have it, the best Champ Car race of the season. You want heroes? Just watch the next available replay of the Grand Prix of Denver.