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Nov302010

Tuesday, November 30, 2010 at 12:47PM

December 1, 2010

The racers of the year.

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. Picking racing drivers - and riders - of the year is fraught with peril, because wonderful individual performances over a season of racing are often overlooked and outweighed by the titles and championships at the end. I'm not going to attempt to cover all the bases here by any stretch of the imagination and I'm not suggesting one should be rated higher than the other - especially when we're discussing such diverse racing disciplines - but here are the performances that stand out for me in 2010.

John Force: At 61, Force returned to being a force in drag racing, recording his 15th career Funny Car title. Battered and broken in a devastating crash in 2007, Force fought all the way back to compete at the highest level - and win - and he did so consistently and with his indefatigable verve and style intact. The guy is truly one of a kind.

Dario Franchitti: With his third IndyCar title and second Indianapolis 500 win, Dario Franchitti now has to be considered to be one of the all-time greats by any measure. “Good haul, isn’t it?” Franchitti said after winning the championship. “Look back to the start of 2007, I hadn't won a championship. Won a lot of races, but not a championship or Indy 500. Now we find ourselves with two 500s and three championships. I’m just going to enjoy it. I think I’m just going to let it sink in, enjoy it. But I’m very proud of the achievement.”

Sebastian Vettel: The youngest driver ever to become a Formula 1 World Champion at 23 and a rocket behind the wheel, Vettel also displayed myriad quirks and foibles this season including blatant misjudgments, ill-timed moves, flat-out mistakes and just about everything else a young driver can do wrong. But make no mistake about this kid's prodigious talent, because he is going to be a force to be reckoned with in F1 for a long, long time to come.

Sebastien Loeb: Now a seven-time World Rally Champion and winner of 62 events worldwide, the French superstar is considered by many to be the best driver in the world simply because of the demanding nature of rally racing and the fact that you have to be fast on any surface and under any conditions. I don't know about that declaration but needless to say, he's an exceptional talent.

Simon Pagenaud and David Brabham: The Highcroft Racing duo was simply superb in the team’s HPD ARX-01c LMP2 prototype while delivering their second consecutive American Le Mans Series championship. And don't be surprised if the Duncan Dayton-led Highcroft Racing enters IndyCar racing for a limited schedule in 2011, with Pagenaud as their lead driver.

Jorge Lorenzo: For my money the most compelling motorsport of any kind is MotoGP racing, and to say that this year was sensational doesn't do it justice. Jorge Lorenzo - the blistering fast 23-year-old Spaniard and brand new World Champion - was simply magnificent, especially when he dueled his Yamaha teammate, the all-time great Valentino Rossi, who had to come back from a serious injury early in the season to make a go of it. If you want to see what MotoGP is all about, go here and see Rossi and Lorenzo's duel at the end of the race in Motegi, Japan, for third place no less. Absolutely incredible.

Jimmie Johnson: As I said last week, Jimmie Johnson's meteoric rise in the often times intransigent world of NASCAR has been awe-inspiring to watch. It may have annoyed the purists who stopped appreciating any of the "new" drivers who came along after Dale Earnhardt, and it may have found little favor among road-racing fans who deem NASCAR drivers as somehow beneath their station, but without exaggeration we have witnessed true greatness at work here, something that will be talked about for many years to come. And for those looking for comparisons to previous NASCAR greats, I believe Johnson's singular talent would shine in any era, and I also firmly believe he is the best who ever sat behind the wheel of a stock car. Jimmie Johnson is a man for this or any other racing season, a gifted, once-in-a-lifetime maestro behind the wheel who deserves all of the accolades being showered upon him.

And that's it, at least for now. I may add more to this subject before the end of the year.

Publisher's Note: As part of our continuing series celebrating the "Glory Days" of racing, we're proud to present another noteworthy image from the Ford Racing Archives. - PMD

(Courtesy of the Ford Racing Archives)
The great Rufus Parnelli Jones - "The Racer's Racer" - was a tough-as-nails competitor who excelled in every kind of race car he sat in. He won 25 Midget races, 25 Sprint Car races, 13 stock car races (including setting a stock car record at Pike's Peak in '63), and the 1963 Indianapolis 500. Jones also had the 1967 "500" won when the bearings failed in his STP-sponsored turbine machine's transmission with three laps to go and with almost a full minute lead. Jones also won in off-road racing in his famed "Big Oly" Ford Bronco including the Mexican 1000, the Baja 500, and the Mint 400, all in 1973. But perhaps the most memorable aspect of Jones' driving career - at least for many - was his sensational knock-down, drag-out performance in the now legendary 1970 SCCA Trans-Am Series, where he won five races against such competitiors as Dan Gurney, Mark Donohue, George Follmer, Peter Revson, Jim Hall, Jerry Titus, Ed Leslie, Vic Elford, Sam Posey and Swede Savage, while delivering the manufacturers championship to Ford and capturing the unofficial driver's title.

(Courtesy of the Ford Racing Archives)
Kent, Washington, September 20, 1970. Parnelli Jones in his No. 15 factory-supported, Bud Moore Engineering-prepared Ford Mustang before the start of the Trans-Am race at Seattle International Raceway. Jones would go on to win that day followed by Mark Donohue in his No. 6 Penske Racing AMC Javelin and Sam Posey in the No. 77 Autodynamics Dodge Challenger.

Publisher's Note: Like these Ford racing photos? Check out ford.artehouse.com. Be forewarned, however, because you won't be able to go there and not order something. - PMD

See another live episode of "Autoline After Hours" with hosts John McElroy, from Autoline Detroit, and Peter De Lorenzo, The Autoextremist, and guests this Thursday evening, at 7:00PM EDT at www.autolinedetroit.tv.