A.J. had yet to win a race with RuSport, so his departure is not unprecedented. However, his talent is obvious and the fact that he is now without a ride is certainly no help to Champ Car. Those paying close attention will also note that Allmendinger was the only American driver in the series. More importantly, he has a distinct character and is readily likeable.
Dale Coyne Racing now has an open seat which may be offered to A.J., but the reality is that DCR is not consistently competitive and A.J. may decline to drive for a backmarker team. His presence in Champ Car is a positive one, so we can only hope that he finds himself back behind the wheel shortly.
-----UPDATE-----
Effective immediately, Mario Dominguez has been released from Forsythe Racing, leaving the #7 INDECK car without a driver. The announcement came this morning, citing "changes in the engineering structure of the team." Dominguez has crashed in to teammate Paul Tracy twice this season, taking them both out of both races. This includes a first-corner-of-the-first-race incident at Long Beach, and Forsythe's "engineering structure" may simply be changing to a model where one team car does not take out the other. Forsythe Racing, and particularly Paul Tracy, were expected to be the primary challengers of Sebastien Bourdais and Newman/Haas Racing, but have struggled so far this season. An interesting note is that A.J. Allmendinger came up through the karting ranks on Paul Tracy's karting team, and the two are longtime friends...
-----UPDATE-----
Earlier today, Forsythe Racing announced the addition of A.J. Allmendinger to the team. The move reunites Allmendinger and Tracy, gives Forsythe arguably the two most aggressive drivers in the Champ Car World Series, and should dramatically increase Forsythe's ability to challenge Sebastien Bourdais and the Newman/Haas team.
Assuming the near-inevitable placement of Mario Dominguez in the vacant seat at Dale Coyne Racing, the rearrangement of drivers and teams should make for a better show. Former champion Christiano da Matta is now back with a competitive team, and will be directly challenging the team he won his championship with. A.J. Allmendinger still has a competitive car to drive, and the mix of his personality with Tracy's will be nothing short of wildly entertaining. Mario Dominguez has suffered a downgrade in terms of equipment, but he joins a team that has in the past resuscitated the careers of both Oriol Servia and Christiano da Matta.
2 comments:
Hey AJ! - Fired, Engaged, Hired, Qualified, & Won!
And all of this happening in about one week.
What do you do now? Go to Disneyland?
A great American race car driver story has just been written by AJ Almendinger at Portland Raceway in Oregon, and he was actually named by his father for AJ Foyte. AJ delivers a really neat present to his dad on Father's Day (and his dad actually teared up).
The race itself was a pretty good story as well. AJ, from his #2 qualifying position, took the lead into the first corner (the festival corners), and was challenged a little more than halfway by his former teammate, Justin Wilson.
This set up a bit of a grudge match for a few laps until Wilson flat spotted his right front tire during braking into the same festival corners at the end of the front straight away.
At the end of the race, Steve Johnson, president of Champ Car World Series, was interviewed by Derek Daly. Steve said that the talks between the IRL and ChampCar about a possible merger are still alive ... "The good thing is that we are still talking". Also, Phoenix wants to run a race in downtown using the temporary street circuit set-up ala Long Beach and that ChampCar is working with the Mayor Phil Gordon's office to put this together. Steve said that the Mayor expressed the desire to have a race in the streets of downtown Phoenix, "even if we have to race frogs!”
At Portland? a good, clean race with no yellows - rare that!
http://maxine-log.blogspot.com/2006/06/hey-aj-fired-engaged-hired-qualified.html
Hey AJ! - Fired, Engaged, Hired, Qualified, & Won!
And all of this happening in about one week.
What do you do now? Go to Disneyland?
A great American race car driver story has just been written by AJ Almendinger at Portland Raceway in Oregon, and he was actually named by his father for AJ Foyte. AJ delivers a really neat present to his dad on Father's Day (and his dad actually teared up).
The race itself was a pretty good story as well. AJ, from his #2 qualifying position, took the lead into the first corner (the festival corners), and was challenged a little more than halfway by his former teammate, Justin Wilson.
This set up a bit of a grudge match for a few laps until Wilson flat spotted his right front tire during braking into the same festival corners at the end of the front straight away.
At the end of the race, Steve Johnson, president of Champ Car World Series, was interviewed by Derek Daly. Steve said that the talks between the IRL and ChampCar about a possible merger are still alive ... "The good thing is that we are still talking". Also, Phoenix wants to run a race in downtown using the temporary street circuit set-up ala Long Beach and that ChampCar is working with the Mayor Phil Gordon's office to put this together. Steve said that the Mayor expressed the desire to have a race in the streets of downtown Phoenix, "even if we have to race frogs!”
At Portland? a good, clean race with no yellows - rare that!
http://maxine-log.blogspot.com/2006/06/hey-aj-fired-engaged-hired-qualified.html
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