OCTOBER 16, 2006

Here and there

As the F1 teams head out to Brazil, the other championships around the world were in full swing with NASCAR settling its Busch Series in favour of Kevin Harvick at Charlotte. The Chase for the Nextel Cup continues, however, with Harvick's Richard Childress Racing team mate Jeff Burton remaining on top with third place, behind race winner Kasey Kahne and Jimmie Johnson. Burton is now 45 points ahead of Matt Kenseth but there are six drivers within 160 points of the leader. The maximum a driver can score each weekend is 190 and with five races to go the title is still open. However Burton's consistency has been impressive and he remains the favourite to bring the team its first Cup title since Dale Earnhardt won the last of his seven championships back in 1994.

In the World Rally Championship in Turkey Marcus Gronholm won for Ford, thus closing on the absent points leader Sebastien Loeb. With Ford's Mikko Hirvonen second the company now leads the Manufacturers' Championship. Loeb's replacement Colin McRae was running sixth when he suffered an electrical failure on the last stage.

At Le Mans Bernd Schneider tied up his fifth DTM title for Mercedes-Benz while victory in the race went to French-Canadian Bruno Spengler with Mika Hakkinen second and Audi's Tom Kristensen third. In the supporting Eurocup Formula 3 races there was good news for Paul di Resta who won the first event from fifth on the grid and increased his lead in the series to 15 points over his ASM team mate Sebastian Vettel. Japan's Kohei Hirate (Manor Motorsport) is a solid third. Reversing the top eight finishers put Richard Antinucci on pole and he duly won the second race, chased home by Charlie Kimball, from fifth on the grid, and Hirate. Vettel had a bad weekend, qualifying 11th for the first race, finishing ninth and then starting and finishing ninth in the second event. With 17 points available at the final race at Hockenheim in a fortnight, Vettel has little hope of success.