WHAT FUTURE MAY COME

 

Well boys and girls, reports of your correspondent's demise have been greatly exaggerated - though such will at some point be indisputably factual.

Inasmuch as this scribe is absolutely certain the Grim Reaper will someday pay a visit, the former only asks that before finally checking out he be granted time to wade through and possibly answer the 1,016 legitimate, no-spam emails which filled his "In Box" over the last couple of months.

Then again, if the mail hasn't been answered, who'll really care?

For now, though, it's back to writing about things that go 'round and, sometimes, "bump" in the night.

THERE'S NO "I" IN "CHAMPEEN"

Discombobulating at least a few types, particularly those who believe themselves keepers of the mythical "true racing" flame, Jimmie Johnson was named the Associated Press' Athlete of the Year - the first race car driver in the poll's 78-year history (yep, JJ even whupped Michael Schumacher).

According to a few AP ballot casters, at least some gave the nod to Johnson's versatility, especially noting that when he's not in Hendrick Motorsports' No. 48 Lowe's Home Improvement Chevrolet, the four-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champ also competes in the GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing No. 99 (now) Chevrolet-Riley Daytona Prototype - whose fulltime drivers, Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty, in 2009 themselves captured a NASCAR driving championship.

Add Mr. Consistency, Jimmy Vasser (hisownself an open-wheel champion), and once again Bob Stallings has gathered sufficient in-car talent to capture the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

The biggest challenge for the El Diablo Rojo team is for each of the team's members - not just the driving talent - to fire on all cylinders for a single, season-opening race that alone in time and distance will roughly equal nine "regular" sprint races.

Remember, while there isn't an "I" or "U (you)" in "team," with minimal effort one can find "me."

THERE AIN'T NO "58," EITHER

The 2010 Rolex Sports Car Series will seriously dip its toes in 2010's competitive waters later this week (Friday through Sunday) when the "Roar Before The Rolex 24" commences upon Daytona International Speedway's 3.56-mile road course.

Defending champion Brumos Racing - which at the end of the 2009 Rolex 24 At Daytona spoke for two of the three top Daytona Prototype podium finishers - has pared its 2010 rostrum to one entry, the No. 59 Porsche-Riley.

It's at this point when things may get a tad confusing - who's gone where and why. Yet, what else is new when at the start of a new season? Hang in there, don the Ol' Thinking Cap, kick back for awhile and we'll plow through most of it.

First, let's note the real 2009 Rolex 24-winning No. 58 Brumos Racing Porsche-Riley is no longer with us at least in number (carefully preserve those photographs and paraphernalia, folks).

Ironically, Brumos Racing's No. 58 (first competing as a Porsche-FABCAR) wasn't supposed to last beyond the DP-class' introductory race - the 2003 Rolex 24 (prevailing at the end of which was The Little Porsche That Would - the famed No. 66 TRG Porsche GT of Kevin Buckler, Michael Schrom, Jörg "Don't Call me George" Bergmeister and Timo Bernhard).

For the No. 58 first race David Donohue (right) teamed with Mike Borkowski, Chris Bye and Randy Pobst.

Donohue, first with "Bork" in 2003 and then Darren Law (below), since, firmly helped steer the "Red Bull" (as it at one point came to be singularly known) into sportscar history in the wake of serious door-banging, do-or-die racing - especially at Phoenix International in 2003.

Still, all good things must end sometime. May the No. 58 - all of 'em - hereafter peacefully rest.

Superficially shifting in 2010 to Brumos' Porsche-powered 3.9 liter flat-six No. 59 - which won the season-closing 2009 Grand Prix of Miami - are 2009 Rolex 24 winning drivers Donohue and Law.

Reportedly, Law is not closely related to actor Jude Law (though it can be said, owed to at least one supercomputer run, that the two hunks are no further removed than 51st-cousins).

Joining Donohue and Law for 2010 Rolex 24 driving chores are Raphael Matos (below, atop car, Mike Shank at right) and Butch Leitzinger.

From when he in 2008 helped Ian James and John Pew co-drive a Michael Shank Racing Ford-Riley, blindfolded, to a 2008 Miller Motorsports Park win, Matos has transitioned from hardly known to a favorite of racing fans, drivers and owners, alike.

Leitzinger, one of the, most approachable drivers in the sport, knows what it's like to win a Rolex 24 ('94, Cunningham Nissan 300 ZX; '97 & '99, Dyson Riley & Scott Ford) but also knows the agony of finishing elsewhere, like his second-place in 2004 with Elliott Forbes-Robinson and that aforementioned Johnson fella in David Brule and Rick Howard's black-on-red Crawford-Pontiac DP03.

Disbanded for 2010 is the second-place driving team who drove the Chip Ganassi Racing w/ Felix (y José) Sabates No. 01 TELMEX/Target Riley to a closest-in-history 2009 Rolex 24 race finish, although past Rolex Series driving champs Scott Pruett ('04, '08) and Memo Rojas ('08) remain.

Joining them in the now BMW-powered TELMEX Riley are Marino Franchitti and Justin Wilson (Wilson finished 2nd in 2006 in an MSR Ford-Riley).

Juan Pablo Montoya, Dario Franchitti, Scott Dixon and surprise co-driver Jamie McMurray, who for his 2010 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series ride joins Juan Pablo at Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing after stints with Roush Fenway Racing (2006-2009) and Chip Ganassi Racing (2002-2005).

However, Mr. Ganassi has been known to at the last minute change driving arrangements, so the above is hardly chiseled in stone.

At the heart of bringing the CGRw/F(yJ)S team to a rare, early December DIS test was the team's desire to accumulate as much knowledge as possible about the team's new-to-it BMW engine, which the team chose after concluding a six-season, two-championship run (2004, 2008) with Toyota Racing Development.

According to both TRD and CGR representatives, the bottom line on TRD's end-of-season 2009 departure (though the engine remains available through longtime Toyota race-engine tuner Don Miller) was economic: only one team, TELMEX, ran the engine in 2009.

"I believe TRD was a victim of our success," Ganassi right-hand man Mike Hull recently said between off-season golf games.

As other engine manufacturers built better engines and behind-the-scenes support programs, Hull contends the TRD engines (first branded as Toyota and later as Lexus) alternatively suffered in development due to the initial 2004 success of Pruett and Max Papis, who combined to win that year's Rolex Series' driving championship, and again with Pruett teaming to do the same in 2008 with Rojas.

"We're concerned it'll happen again with the BMW engine," Hull said. "We're concerned that Steve (Dinan) will get the short end of the stick because of Ganassi Racing's success on the track. We're accustomed to winning and while an engine certainly plays an important role, it's not the sole reason behind winning."

One might additionally note: over the last couple of decades the Ganassi organization has been victorious on a number of tracks in various forms of racing.

Indeed, GRAND-AM competition chief David Spitzer reportedly has been studying off-season engine dynamometer data that, some observers believe, will result in issuance of post-Roar BMW engine and/or transaxle restrictions not unlike multiple rules adjustments endured by three Porsche flat-six teams early in 2009; reversed by season's end.

First exacting anonymity so as to spare possible reprisal, one former team principal pretty well summed more than a few others' expressed thoughts on the subject, garnished during the offseason.

"So many ($#*@&!) bulletins were issued in 2009 that I set my browser to open the ($#*@&!) page every time I logged onto the 'Net because you didn't know what the ($#*@&!) was coming next. It would've been ($#*@&!) comical if it hadn't hit my pocketbook so ($#*@&!) much," he calmly said.

Monday: FACING THE MUSIC

Later,

DC