Categories
2017 Racing Season

Find Your Way Back

Last weekend I rubbed shoulders with Mika Hakkinen at Laguna Seca, booked a trip to Austin for the USGP, moved into first place of my hotly contested racing fantasy league and watched an amazing Indycar show at the tricky triangle.  The previous weekend I was inspired by the Marquez/Dovi duel at the Red Bull Ring and Kyle Larsen’s mind melting feat of 2nd at The Knoxville Nationals in a 410 Winged sprinter on a Saturday night and 1st the next day in The Cup race at Michigan.  And do I need to remind anybody that Spa is this weekend?  I guess what I’m trying to say is motorsport has found it’s way back into my heart and I’m feeling the need to peck the keys and preach the good word.

 

Motorsport, This song’s for you!

So where do I start?  I have such a blank canvas to work with here.  Because modern motorsports takes quite a bashing on a regular basis, I’ll begin my soliloquy with all the good that exists out there.  

 

The Good

 

We have a legit title fight on our hands in F1 between Vettel and Hamilton!  We’re talking Ferrari vs Mercedes.  Two drivers at the top of their game with a combined 7 world titles already in their trophy cases having at it not just to be the 2017 champion, but to improve upon their place in the Pantheon of the Greats.  Lewis has been sublime on Saturdays with 6 poles to Vettel’s 2, but Seb has been the more consistent operator of the two when it counts and they are currently level at 4 wins apiece.  They started the year a little too friendly towards each-other for my liking, but after rubbing wheels at Barcelona and Lewis then giving Seb the infamous Baku Brake Test, which brought out another episode of “Seb’s Gone Wild” from the normally happy go lucky German, it’s now game on for the final 9 races.  

  • Prediction:  Lewis wins 4, Seb 2, Bottas 2, Max 1.  Trophy to Lewis!!  (Thank God they don’t have a Ladbrokes down the street)

 

Fernando Alonso!  You would think that with a best finish of 6th in 11 races and a DNF at Indy, this year would be considered a complete and utter catastrophe for the Spaniard.  While it must be incredibly frustrating to be in Alonso’s shoes, his reputation as the best in the business has actually gained momentum.  His entire month of May at Indy was just a thing of beauty.  He quickly assimilated to the hang loose world of Indycar and was peddling that cool looking McLaren-orange Dallara like a seasoned Brickyard vet in a matter of hours. In the race he was going to be right there at the finish if it wasn’t for yet another Honda, albeit a HPD built motor, going kablamo and leaving him walking back to the paddock to a rousing standing

A Little R&R
A Little R&R

ovation from the locals  In his regular job, ALO has crushed his highly regarded rookie teammate Stoffel Van Doorne, climbed into a grandstand in Montreal to chill with his peeps after a DNF, set the fastest lap of the race in Budapest and then stole the parc ferme show by reenacting a scene from Brazil last year when he decided to sun himself in a lounge chair after being stranded out on track yet again.  Bravo Mr Alonso for showing us your prodigious skills and newfound sense of humor.

 

Sato wins Indy!  If you have been a regular reader of this blog over the past 5 years, you will know the great admiration that I have for Japanese F1 drivers of the past.  When pressed for my top 5 of all time, Sato is #2 behind the almost mythical Ukyo Katayama.  Witnessing Sato make an outside turn 1 pass stick in the closing stages of The 500 and cross

Ukyo The Great
Ukyo The Great

the row of bricks to take the checkered flag was certainly the high point of my season and something I will not soon forget.

 

Robert Kubica is back!  No not back in a rally car or touring car or some wacky WEC prototype, Kubica is back and ready to resume his F1 career that was tragically cut short six years ago.  After what at first seemed like a publicity stunt by the Renault team to give their former driver a go in a 2012 machine at Valencia, Kubica stunned when he immediately got down to business and made easy work of their regular test driver on hand with no ill effects from the injured arm.  Things really got serious when Kubica was called into the post Budapest test a few weeks back in the 2017 car and he acquitted himself very well.  Considering that he had never sat in the car prior to the test, he was able to do a couple of race distances without putting a wheel wrong and proved that if he can Kubicahandle the Hungaroring, then he’s fit to go.  We at Bulseyeview are hoping and praying that Renault does the right thing and hires the Pole for 2018.  

 

Indycar has a 5 man battle for the title with 3 races remaining and a new bonafide American star!  The Newgarden/Penske combo has the look and feel of a budding dynasty and Jo New’s pass on Power at Mid-Ohio must have made Nigel Mansell drop his 5-iron and applaud.  That fake to the left and cross-over to the right was right out of the Nigel playbook.  Alexander Rossi is also looking like Honda’s favorite son so we may soon see the day of Rossi in a Honda vs Newgarden in a Chevy fighting for Indy glory.  It will be Mikey vs Little Al, Mears vs Sneva, AJ vs Parnelli all over again.  On second thought……..

  • Prediction- Jo New will do just enough to hold off that wily Dixon at the treacherous double point finale at Sears Pt.  Chip will then fire Kanaan, Chilton and Kimball for not looking out for their mate.  Michael Andretti will switch to Chevy, leaving Rossi and Sato to join Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist at Ganassi.

 

Like Indycar, MotoGP also has a 5 man battle for the title with plenty of races still on the calendar!  Marquez, Maverick and Dovi each have 3 wins while Rossi and Dani P are hanging around and staying within striking distance.  Johann Zarco has also shown that he is a man to be reckoned with in the future with a few brilliant rides.  These riders are the last of the maniacs in motorsport and we are lucky to have them in our midst

  • Prediction- When Marquez is not sliding into the gravel on his rear end he’s next to impossible to defeat, so I’m going Marquez, Maverick and Dovi.   

 

Other good things worthy of a mention:  

  • Force India continuing to punch above their budget as best of the rest and their driver combo of Perez and Ocon pushing each other to the limit (and sometimes beyond)
  • Carlos Sainz P9 overall in a Toro Rosso
  • Kyle Larson taking Nascar by storm
  • Indycar rolling out a 2018 car that looks cool and based on Montoya’s feedback, should put more emphasis on driver skill
  • Pirelli World Challenge continuing to gather momentum
  • Penske announcing a full fledged assault on IMSA’s top prototype class with two factory Acura’s, one driven by JPM and Dane Cameron
  • Felix Rosenqvist driving everything under the sun and winning wherever he turns up.
  • Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris looking like the surefire can’t miss next Max Verstappens
  • Next generation drivers with names such as Alesi and Herta winning races in competitive series.
  • The Road to Indy Mazda ladder system  
  • Kamui Kobayashi

 

The Bad

 

Hands down, the most disappointing aspect of the 2017 season is Red Bull’s lack of pace.  If we were treated to Max and Ricciardo mixing it with the Mercs and Ferrari’s on a week in and week out basis, this season would be epic.  I really do think that these two drivers are the key to take F1 to the next level.  Max is like a ticking time bomb ready to go Senna all over us and Ricciardo is the right there in the Lewis, Alonso, Vettel class.  They started the season about 30 seconds slower over a race distance and have more than halved that gap, so if we can just find a few more tenths here and there then they are going to make life miserable for the boys in Silver and Red.  Tickets to Spa are sold out with the Max Army arriving in force so one can only hope that the game begins on Sunday.  

 

Seb Bourdais breaking his pelvis while attempting to qualify for The 500.  Leading up to Indy, Bourdais had been the feel good story of the year for Dale Coyne Racing.  Reunited with his engineer Craig Hampson from their glory days at Newman Haas, they started out the year with amazing strategy calls and won at Homestead and then followed it up with a 2nd at Long Beach.  At Indy, Bourdais had a rocketship and would have likely been a contender for the Borg-Warner trophy until his wicked crash put an end to his season.

 

Quick Easy Quiz to see if you are paying attention: (see answers at the bottom)

 

  1. Name 5 former Indycar winners who sported glasses?
  2. Where was Mika Hakkinen’s first GP?
  3. Who has more Knoxville National Titles between Sammy Swindell and Danny “The Dude” Lasoski?
  4. Did Max Verstappen win the 2014 Euro F3 Title?
  5. Who won the 2017 Long Beach GP?

 

A couple of other bad things to mention:

 

  • The tragic passing of Nicky Hayden from a bicycle accident.  After all of those brutal falls at high speeds, a fricken bicycle accident?  RIP Kentucky Kid.
  • Pay drivers (yes I’m talking to you Lance)
  • Quiet F1 engines
  • DRS zones. Do you remember the days when a pass was a pass?  Think Prost/Senna Portugal ‘88 or Montoya/Schumacher Brazil 2001 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ikq2G-qakY)
  • Fuel Saving
  • The Nascar debri yellow with 10 to go
  • Halos.  These guys signed up for danger so let’s keep it that way
  • Dirty Air

 

A final thought.  Every week it seems like a new major manufacturer is planning to join Formula E.  This almost feels like the manufacturer led breakaway series that we were hearing about a few years back.  The current on track product certainly doesn’t merit being considered a threat to F1, but when you see that Mercedes is dropping the DTM to go electric racing, Porsche is disbanding their Le Mans program to join the fray, BMW is on board, Jaguar, Renault, etc., suddenly this becomes a big deal.  The manufactures will want to win, drivers will want to get paid and the big independents like McLaren and Williams may see this as a new revenue stream for their coffers.  Even Ferrari is turning to hybrid technology for their road cars.  So what if we suddenly see a Max Verstappen or Daniel Ricciardo decide to spearhead a Porsche or Mercedes entry for top $$?  Will that start the fan migration over to the E-side?  I currently don’t watch E but do closely follow their results because the driver lineup is very impressive.  I would say top to bottom, FE is  is on par with Indycar at the moment.  If suddenly a few major stars are in the field, my curiosity would be too much to resist.  Say what you will, but my estimation is 70% of the people who are sitting in the grandstands or watching at home are doing so because of their allegiance to the drivers.  I want to see the best, so if suddenly the best are in FE, that could spell big trouble for F1 as we know it.

 

The Lights Go Out and ……….WHOOSH!!

 

Enjoy the Races!

 

Quiz Ans:  1. Rahal, Moore, PT, Bourdais, JV.  2. Phoenix ‘91. 3. “The Dude”. 4. No – Ocon. 5. Hinch

 

Rare Condor Sighting!
Rare Condor Sighting

 

You Sure You Want to Do This Mika?
You Sure You Want to Do This Mika?

 

Categories
2015 Racing Season

Indycar Recap

I’ll admit it, I’ve been suffering from a severe case of summer writer’s block.  I’ve got a backlog of post ideas floating around my head, ranging from a look back at the gorgeous Ferrari 643 to unveiling the Top 5 Studio Drummers of the 70’s, but I just haven’t been able to wrest the cold beer from my hands and turn the TV off long enough to get the creative juices flowing.  The primary reason is the lack of intrigue in the sporting and racing landscape of late, but I’m also placing the blame on the fact that my wife went to work for a ride sharing mobile app technology company, leaving me with morning and evening Mr Mom duties in addition to my day job. (Note: One of the perks of Mr. Mom duties is unlimited access of the Elmo song catalog.  Seriously, “Elmo’s Got the Moves” is getting more airplay in my head than The Beatles, Stones and Kinks combined.)  But witnessing the thrills, spills and heartbreak over the past fortnight in Indycar, I think it’s time for a few Indycar Random Thoughts.

Tragedy

Being a racing fan can be difficult at times.  Sadly, the emotions of losing a beloved racing driver are feelings that I’ve become accustomed to since I was a child.  I will never forget the moment in our family room when I found out that my first driving hero, Gilles Villeneuve, had perished in qualifying for the ‘82 Belgian GP in Zolder.  I had witnessed Gilles at the ‘81 & ‘82 Long Beach GP’s and had been mesmerized by his flair behind the wheel.  It was love at first sight and I quickly set about transforming my room into a mini shrine filled with posters on the walls, magazines and books in every corner, die-cast models, t-shirts, and I was eagerly counting down the days to the ‘83 LBGP.  And then I came home on a Saturday afternoon and was told by my emotional father that Gilles was gone.  “Gone?  He can’t really be gone?” I thought.  I had no experience in dealing with death of any kind other than burying a goldfish or two.  It was a surreal experience and I can remember crying a few times over my loss, but I was a resilient 11 year old and was quickly looking forward to hearing about the next race.

To this day, I still can’t stop thinking about the death of Ayrton Senna.  I’m at peace now with his passing but I could hardly function for a week after his death and from time to time I still have a good cry thinking about the man.  It’s like a part of my youth died with him and I had to grow up and become a calloused adult.  The F1 fantasy bubble that I had existed in with Ayrton, Nigel and Prost from the ages of 13-23 had burst and the sudden change was a shock to the system.  From that day on, I had to construct an emotional barrier to these drivers because I wasn’t equipped to experience sadness like I felt for Ayrton again.  The experience hardened me and made me come to view drivers as extraordinarily brave men following a passion and if they happened to perish in the car, then they went out doing what they loved and I was at peace with that.  To my young adult mind, it was a life well lived.  

A few months after Senna’s death, I used to have the following philosophical debate with fellow buzzards after a few too many cold ones:  If you could have Ayrton’s 34 great years on the planet, would you trade your life for it now, not knowing what your future is going to look like?  Of course the 23 year old me would always answer a resounding Yes!  

Even as a hardened racing fan,  I’ll never shake the images of watching Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Krosnoff, Greg Moore, Dan Wheldon, Marco Simoncelli and Justin Wilson perish on live TV.  It’s just hard to believe that a larger than life hero, someone who you feel like you know personally, can be entertaining us one second and in an instant, be lost forever.  

I was hiking solo a few days ago and was questioning how the other drivers continue on after losing one of their competitors and friends?  The scenario in my head was:  What would I do if I was riding with my mountain bike gang on Sunday and one of the guys had a large tree branch fall on his head and kill him instantly.  Would I want to go back out the next Friday with the gang and do it again?  These drivers with “The Right Stuff” certainly are a different breed.

So farewell to Justin “Badass” Wilson!  I’ve been a fan for many years, dating back to his days as the 2001 F3000 champion, and I’ve had the good fortune of witnessing him score his only World Championship Points for Jaguar in the 2003 Indy GP and podiums in Cart and Indycar at Long Beach and San Jose.  Being 6’5” myself, I immediately took a liking to a 6’4” driver who could contort his lanky frame into a chassis and still have the feel and touch in the ass, hands and feet to get it done at the highest level.  JWill joins a long list of drivers who never got a fair shake in F1, but I’ll always be confused why a few of these knucklehead Cart/Indy team owners didn’t snatch him up immediately when he crossed the pond in 2004.  Even in cars that should have been mid-pack at best, Wilson’s prodigious skills still shone through and for those of us hard-cores who truly get it, Wilson will be remembered as one of the greats of his era, right there with the Dario’s, Dixon’s and Kanaan’s of the world.  It breaks my heart that a quality man won’t get to grow old with his wife and two young daughters, but he died following his passion and we have to respect the choice that he made when he stepped into the car.  A life well lived indeed!

 

Randoms

-Moments before the Pocono race took a serious turn for the worse, I was loving PT in the booth referring to Sage Karam as “Dangerboy.”  Very appropriate for this youngster.  Cheers to NBCSN for the team that they assembled to broadcast the races.  Now if the series could just rid themselves of the ABC contract.

-I still can only watch an Indy race on the DVR.  For green flag racing, Indycar is tops in my book but the prolonged yellow is a lifesucker.  The instant I see that yellow bugger being waved I’m on the gas pedal until they are back to green.  On the road circuits, do they really need the local street sweeping crew to come out and perform a 15 minute demonstration on how to clean a racing line?  The reality is one green flag lap with Sato and Colletti in the field will bring back all the dirt and then some.  These guys are pros and can still put on a show with a little dirt to contend with.  I know that it’s difficult to concede that the brains running F1 are incredibly innovative, but Indycar needs to invest a little money into the virtual safety car idea so the races can continue to be races and not 4 heats with 3 long yellow parades.  Call me old fashioned but I think the fastest cars should win the race most of the time.  Right now it’s completely a roll of the dice.  

-Watching the three 500 mile races this year, I’m sort of amazed that there was only one fatality.  I know that sounds horrible, but these guys were racing each other inches apart for 1500 miles like the world was coming to an end.  Great viewing for us fans, but man that must be nerve wracking to compete in.  I still can’t stop thinking about the fact that during one of the restarts at Pocono, they were running 7 wide {7 WIDE} at over 200mph for turn 1.  Besides watching Isle of Man TT videos on YouTube, 7 WIDE is the craziest thing we’ll witness this or any motorsports season.  Seriously, if Hamilton, Rosberg and Vettel were to just go 3 wide at Monza this weekend, books would be written about it 30 years from now celebrating the great 3 wide battle at Monza.  Come on with 7 wide already!  

-Scott Dixon is the perfect driver for Indycar’s Roll The Dice Racing.  He’s as safe as they come, can put the hammer down or coast with the best of them, and doesn’t get too rattled when he suddenly finds himself in P15 after dominating the first 20 laps due to getting caught out in a yellow.  4 titles and counting for the likable Kiwi.  I’ll be surprised if he’s not a 6 timer before hanging up the helmet.

-Mike Hull and the Target Box Crew are also the best in the business.  It’s sort of amazing how they continually pull one over on the Penske brain-trust.  The championship winning pit stop where Dixon jumped Power and Newgarden was a thing of beauty and their ability to get Kimball and TK into the top 4 to give Dixon the cover he needed was phenomenal teamwork.    Since Penske, Ganassi and Andretti all defected from CART to Indycar, Ganassi has produced 7 driving champions, Andretti 4 and Penske 2.

-Revelation of the Year:  Newgarden is a quick as anybody in the field and should be hired by a top team immediately.  Or, Gene Haas should snap him up for the new USF1 team and get him alongside Vergne or Buemi.

-Surprise of the Year:  Rahal and his team totally elevated their game and carried the fight for Honda against the Chevy armada.  Graham was a man possessed with some drives for the ages and seeing him whip the local Ohioans into a frenzy usually only witnessed for Euro megastars at Mid-O was exactly the sort of the development that Indycar needs to get back into the spotlight.  Maybe the fact that Graham’s fiance, Courtney Force, drives a 8,000 horsepower funny car for her day job spurred Graham on to greatness?  It must be amusing to listen to their Sunday evening debriefs.

-Disappointment of the Year:  Simon Pagenaud’s first year at Penske was shit.  I honestly thought the Frenchman was immediately going to be the Dixon-esque driver that Penske has been seeking and was going to be the perfect blend of speed, engineering smarts and poise.  I don’t know what just happened but here’s to hoping he gets a new engineer and crew manager for 2016.

-Worst Driver of the Year:  Stefano Coletti.  Indycars are heavy and difficult to drive and the Monaco native simply could not adapt.  He’s very fortunate to be going home with his brain and body still intact.

-Final thought:  It was great to see JPM get his game back and lead the title fight from St Pete’s until the final lap of the final race, but I feel like Juan went into point protect mode way too early this year and it ultimately cost him the title.  The man is a fighter and it was painful to watch him cruise around for points.  It was like the football prevent defense that always backfires. Penske needs to just let the Columbian charge and the points will take care of themselves.  

Here’s to hoping for a continuation of this mega battle next season and added races at Road America, Phoenix and Mexico City.

I am Indy!

 

justin-wilson-jaguar_3341618

 

 

 

Wilson

Categories
Drivers

RWA

By now most people have heard the term DWA or Driving While Asian.  If not, look it up in the Urban Dictionary and take it for a spin on Youtube.  Chances are you have been a victim of a DWA.  While it can be construed as being a racist claim, I tend to look at life through a humorous lens and find it rather amusing.  Living in San Francisco, being able to quickly identify a DWA in progress can be a matter of life or death.  It’s amazing how the human evolves and develops an acute awareness of potential threats in their environment. Like the prehistoric man who had the ability to tap into all five senses to learn of the presence of a predator, the modern city dweller can spot a DWA upwind at 200 hundred yards while texting and watching an episode of Breaking Bad at a bus stop.

A .2 second example of the brain at work processing a DWA:

  • Car three blocks away going 18mph and straddling two lanes, just ran a red light

  • Driver behind the wheel: short, dark hair in bangs, over-sized glasses, Asian features, torso too close to wheel, no spatial awareness

  • Conclusion- RUN for Cover!

Sure it’s fun to laugh and celebrate all things DWA, but RWA or Racing While Asian, now we are delving into another matter altogether.  In fact, is there a more noble pursuit than RWA?  Particularly the brave men who risk life and limb to race under the Flag of the Rising Sun.  In my humble opinion, a Japanese F1 driver is to be cherished and held in the highest buzzardly regard.  

For years I’ve been waiting for a Japanese driver to arrive on the scene and take F1 by storm.  Some sort of mythical character with rock star sensibilities and a nasty cigarette habit plucked out of the drift car wars of the Tokyo underworld and hand delivered by Honda to the McLaren young driver program.  So far, I’ve had to be content with just a few podiums spread out of the years.

It’s a head scratcher as to why this hasn’t happened yet.  Japan is a car crazy nation with a passionate F1 fan base.  Honda, and to a lesser degree Toyota and Yamaha, have played a major role in the sport the last 30 years. They have a multitude of sophisticated national racing series with big horsepower and high downforce.  When their economy is healthy, drivers are able to find sponsorship money.  But still no Akira Senna.

One would probably need a PhD in Sociology to unlock this answer, so in the name of time and money, I will grant myself an honorary degree from Texas Southern University and volunteer three of my own theories:

Theory 1:  Japan, like the USA, doesn’t have the level of karting that is prevalent in Europe and Brazil.  The average 14 year old kart kid running the CIK-FIA series all over the European continent is essentially a professional driver.  Making F1 by 20 is just the natural progression for those with skills or huge bucks.  By the time the Japanese driver hits the scene in his late teens, he’s already too far behind the development curve catch up.

Theory 2:  Even if a Japanese driver has all the natural abilities in the world, the cultural polite factor and the language barrier between driver and engineers is just too big of an obstacle to overcome.  I just haven’t seen a Japanese driver with the me first mentality of say, a Nigel Mansell, be the dominant personality within the team and dictate to the engineers exactly what he needs the car to do in order to get results.  Look at all the greats and you will see an enormous personality orchestrating the entire operation like Leonard Bernstein presiding over the New York Philharmonic.    

Theory 3:   I have a friend who lived half her life in Japan explain that in school Japanese kids are taught to strictly memorize and recite.  Improvising and thinking outside the box are not encouraged.  When applied to this conversation, there could be something there.  After all, isn’t  driving an F1 car on the limit with constantly changing conditions best suited for an improvisational artist ala Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost or Michael Schumacher?  In watching the Olympics from Sochi, I see Japanese athletes winning medals in figure skating and ski jumping, sports that require extreme repetition.  But where are the Alpine skiers, a feat that is all improvising on the ragged edge?*

*Authors internal debate: Ahh maybe there are no Japanese winning downhill skiers because they don’t have great skiing mountains??

Even if a single F1 driving championship never materializes, Japan’s place in the history books is secure.  From the Godfather Satoru Nakajima, to Aguri Suzuki to the current ace Kamui Kobayashi, here are my 5 favorite Japanese F1 Drivers or カーレーサー:

 

5.  Toranosuke “Tiger” Takagi:  Tora burst on to the international scene in 1998 as a driver for legendary team owner Ken Tyrrell with enough hype to whip me into a frenzy.  He had The Godfather, Satoru Nakajima, proclaiming him as the best yet to come from Japan.  He had a mullet.  His name was just plain old fun to say.  I was Tigersold.  I’m still sold.  When I first laid eyes on Tora Tiger Takagi at the 1998 Canadian GP, I was instantly a fan.  His Friday morning hairpin exits reminded me of a 1980’s high school kid in a ‘69 Camaro leaving the AM-PM after receiving word of a keg being tapped just two miles away.  He was all right foot and blackies through 3-4 gears.  In two seasons in subpar equipment, Triple T never managed to score a world championship point, but you always had the sense that he was giving the car a proper thrashing. After returning home to capture the 2000 Formula Nippon title, Tora raced Stateside for two seasons in a deep CART field, managing a couple of 4th place finishes and a Rookie of the Year at Indy.

4.  Hideki Noda:  Noda first caught my attention when I read in Autosport that he had won a round of the British F3 series, becoming the first Japanese to do so.  (Funny to think that the only way to get motorsports news just a few years back was to wait for magazines to arrive in the mail)  What really sold me on Noda wasn’t the fact that he drove in 3 GP’s for Larrousse to close out the ‘94 season, it was a quote in Autosport from his race engineer proclaiming him the hardest braker in F1 history.  Supposedly his telemetry showed him pulling over 4g’s in the heavy braking zones.  Whether that claim has any validity or not, it was all the ammo I needed to be a fanhideki_noda for life.  And to add the icing on the cake, I was fortunate enough to witness Noda score a brilliant Indy Lights win in the wet at Portland in ‘97 over the likes of Castro Neves, Kaanan and Da Matta.  In honor of the feat, a friend even managed to invent “The Noda Dance” that left a few Pacific Northwestern open wheel fans scratching their heads in the grandstand that day.

3.  Kamui Kobayashi:  I’ll admit, I was slow to warm up to Kobe.  Watching him languish as a backmarker for two seasons in GP2, I wasn’t very excited when Toyota promoted him to replace the injured Timo Glock for the 2009 Brazilian GP.  But by the end of the race he had won me over after a spirited battle with the ‘09 champ, Jenson Button.  Button was driving to secure the title and Kobe couldn’t care less.  He fought Button for every inch Kobeof track like he was trying to take the crown for himself and had Button yelling into the radio that Kobe was “mad” and “crazy”.  As a fan, I always want my drivers to be first and foremost, mad and crazy!  From that day on Kobe has not relented.  He is a master at finding a way by under braking.  Hamilton and Alonso often get credited as being pass masters and rightly so, but Kobe is the best in the business.  

2.  Takuma Sato:  Sato had my buzzard antennas on full alert when he won the British F3 title, Macau GP and Zandvoort Masters in 2001.  I remember his engineers at Carlin Motorsports claiming that they had never worked with a driver who was better through the high speed stuff than Sato-san. In his first season in F1, he scored a glorious 5th place finish in his home GP in a poor Jordan chassis that essentially saved the sato03beloved team from having to close their doors.  I like to give myself credit for being somewhat of a good luck charm, or lucky buzzard, for Sato.  I was at Indy in 2004 when he scored a podium for BAR-Honda.  I was at Montreal in 2007 when he scored a remarkable 6th place for Super Aguri, highlighted with an outside pass of Alonso with just a few laps left!  And just this past year, I got to witness Sato win the Long Beach GP with an inch perfect drive.  
1.  Ukyo Katayama:  I fell hard for Katayama in ‘94.  A year when my unrelenting thirst for buzzardry may have equaled or surpassed my interest in women.  A year when on track tragedy left us vulnerable and looking for something to latch on to.  Ukyo, with his helmet bouncing around like a bobblehead in the cockpit, became my salvation.  His speed in the Tyrrell- Yamaha was a thing of beauty and he was regularly UKYOgetting the better of his highly regarded teammate, Mark Blundell.  I was in the Hockenheim stadium marveling at his commitment as he qualified 5th, sandwiched between Schumacher and Coulthard in the mighty Williams.  His style always looked ragged, like a rodeo rider hanging on to a wild bronco.  I recall Schumacher being astounded how Katayama could go into a fast corner, turn it into a 3-4 apex mess, and still come out flying on the exit.  He is a one of a kind and worthy of a place in the buzzard hall of fame.