Simon Pagenaud won his third race of the IndyCar season and it was Pagenaud's first time winning from pole position. Elsewhere, brothers went at it. Silverstone put on a phenomenal British Grand Prix and we will have five more years of panicking about Formula One leaving Silverstone. Patricio O'Ward made his debut in a dreary Fuji. Formula E had an anti-climatic finale to decide the championship. World Superbike came to the United States and now the series will have two months off. There were some sports car races. Here is a run down of what got me thinking.
A Lot of Talent on the Curb and Many Conflicts
This is a complicated topic and the more I think about it, the more I am not sure it is an issue. With the Formula E season closing this weekend, it came back to mind.
While Formula E has a slightly uncommon schedule, starting late in the calendar year, right around the start of winter, and ending in the summer of the following year. This allows drivers to split their responsibilities and many drivers have done that, most notably with the FIA World Endurance Championship.
Despite the differences in calendars, both series cannot seem to avoid conflicting weekends. The most notable clash was in 2017, when the Brooklyn Formula E round clashed with the 6 Hours of the Nürburgring, leaving a few drivers in an incongruous situation. Sébastien Buemi and José María López choose Germany. Sam Bird, Adam Carroll and Nelson Piquet, Jr. all raced in the United States.
The two series managed to schedule a conflict the last two seasons, although this year saw André Lotterer miss the Sebring WEC race due a simulator testing session with the Techeetah Formula E team. Next year's schedule has fallen into an unwelcome return to a rut both had hoped to avoid.
There are three scheduled conflicts between the 2019-20 WEC schedule and the 2019-20 Formula E schedule. Bahrain and a TBC Formula E date are both scheduled for December 14th. Sebring and a TBC Formula E race in China are both scheduled for the weekend of March 20-21st. The penultimate WEC race at Spa-Francorchamps on May 2nd clashes with Formula E's inaugural Seoul, South Korea race scheduled for the following day.
The good news is it appears there is flexibility. For starters, the first conflict might not be a conflict at all. If Formula E does not find a venue to fill the December 14th date then great for WEC and Bahrain. Although, I would suggest the two series run together at Bahrain that weekend because it would make sense. Bahrain has two sets of garages. WEC would run on the Saturday and Formula E could run on Sunday night because all Formula E needs is one day for an event and it would be nice to see Formula E use a permanent road course. It will eventually have to use permanent road courses one day.
With the Chinese venue not yet decided, that event could move in either direction and get off the same weekend as the Sebring weekend. The Spa-Seoul clash appears to be set in stone, even though WEC released the 2019-20 schedule in October 2018, over eight months before the 2019-20 Formula E schedule was released!
It is sad to see drivers forced to choose between series, although some are already picking a side. Lotterer and Neel Jani are set to move on from sports car racing and become full devoted to Formula E. Bird seems fine with maintaining two jobs. López's Formula E future is not as clear but he is set with Toyota for next season. Felipe Nasr ran a few Formula E races this season but his IMSA ride was his top priority.
It has to be wondered if these conflicts should be enough to steer teams away from drivers already with commitments. When looking around the world of motorsports, there are many notable names left without a full-time ride. Some are fortunate and are able to at least find a part-time gig but others have nothing. These aren't a bunch of nobodies without seats or with scare opportunities. There are respected drivers that spend too much time on the sidelines and would be happy to have a full-time gig with a committed team.
Starting in the United States, how no one has called Carlos Muñoz to drive anything is disappointing. James Davison has experience in single-seaters and sports cars. Oriol Servià is a veteran driver that has still got it. Conor Daly, J.R. Hildebrand, Sage Karam, Charlie Kimball and Kyle Kaiser are all drivers on the sideline more than they are in a race car.
The biggest fish on the sidelines is Esteban Ocon and I know he is a Mercedes reserve driver but what a year wasted if he does no competitive racing even if it means he is a Mercedes driver in 2020. There is no guarantee of that. He could be the reserve driver and take the role of standing at the back of the garage with a headset on and still drive something in his spare time.
The sideline is only getting more crowded with the changes in sports car racing. With SMP Racing stepping away from LMP1 competition and Rebellion Racing cutting its program to one car, a lot of drivers are going to be available. We know Mikhail Aleshin, Vitaly Petrov, Sergey Sirotkin and Stéphane Sarrazin are available. Could Gustavo Menezes be on the outside of the Rebellion contraction? What about Bruno Senna?
Let's not forget the shakeup with the Ford GT program. Stefan Mücke, Olivier Pla, Andy Priaulx, Ryan Briscoe, Richard Westbrook, Joey Hand and Dirk Müller are all unattached for 2020. They all won't be unemployed but there shouldn't be a question about whether or not these drivers will be unemployed. They should all be scooped up as soon as they are available.
Where is Dean Stoneman? It wasn't that long ago he had impressive showings in GP3, GP2 and Indy Lights and now he is among the missing. Matthew Brabham was tearing up the Road to Indy ladder system and even got an opportunity to race in Formula E and nearly won on debut but all he has is a Stadium Super Truck gig.
Where is Rio Haryanto? No, seriously, where is he? I know he caught a lot of flack for bringing money to Manor but he wasn't an awful driver in single-seater racing.
I know there are only so many seats and not everyone can be a race car driver but at times you have to scratch your head and wonder why some of these guys are not given a shot.
It is up to the teams. If a Formula E team wants to hire a driver with WEC commitments and then have that driver miss a race or two or vice versa then it can do that. We do like seeing driver run different disciplines and if they can run five different types of cars in five weeks we love it. Some drivers have the time to run two or three different series and they have to do it to make ends meet but at other times you wonder why a team puts itself in a difficult situation and has a driver who has to split his or her attention when the team could hire one driver who can dedicated himself or herself to the task.
The motorsports world is in a different place. IndyCar is not what IndyCar was 25 years ago where five or six cars would show up and be off the pace but could make it to the end of a race and get a top ten and be two laps down. Those seats provided opportunity for drivers. Formula One is tough to break into and there are no minnows on the grid. Sports car racing has provided a lot of opportunities for this generation of drivers.
I guess this is one of those cases where you are searching for answer and there isn't one. You try and figure out how a driver is unemployed and all you can come up with is he or she just isn't employed. It is the cruelness of life. Some get a shot, some take on multiple jobs and others are left on the curb. You just want good people to get the job they deserve.
Champion From the Weekend
Jean-Éric Vergne clinched his second consecutive Formula E championship with a seventh place finish in the season finale from Brooklyn.
Winners From the Weekend
You know about Simon Pagenaud but did you know...
Aaron Telitz and Oliver Askew split the Indy Lights races from Toronto. Daniel Frost and Kyle Kirkwood split the Indy Pro 2000 races. Darren Keane and Christian Rasmussenn split the U.S. F2000 races, the first career victories for each driver in the series.
Lewis Hamilton won the British Grand Prix, the 80th victory of his Formula One career.
Luca Giotto won the Formula Two feature race and Jack Aitken won the sprint race from Silverstone. Jüri Vips and Leonardo Pulcini split the Formula Three races.
Sébastien Buemi and Robin Frijns split the Brooklyn ePrix.
Álex Palou won the Super Formula race from Fuji, leading every lap from pole position on his way to his first Super Formula victory.
Kurt Busch defeated his brother Kyle Busch by 0.076 seconds to win the NASCAR Cup race from Kentucky, his first victory of the season. Cole Custer won the Grand National Series race, his fifth victory of the season. Tyler Ankrum won the Truck race.
Jonathan Rea won the first World Superbike race from Laguna Seca and the Superpole race, giving him 80 World Superbike victories. Chaz Davies won the second race and it was his first victory of the season.
The #88 AKKA ASP Team Mercedes-AMG of Vincent Abril and Raffaele Marciello and the #25 Sainteloc Racing Audi of Simon Gachet and Christopher Haase split the Blancpain World Challenge Europe races from Zandvoort.
The #34 Murillo Racing Mercedes-AMG of Kenny Murillo and Christian Szymczak and the #28 ST Racing BMW of Jon Miller and Harry Gottsacker split the GT4 America races from Portland.
Coming Up This Weekend
IndyCar returns to a Saturday night race at Iowa.
NASCAR will be in Loudon.
IMSA kicks off the weekend in New England with the GT classes at Lime Rock Park.
Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters makes its debut at Assen.
The European Le Mans Series has a night race in Barcelona and the FIA World Endurance Championship will have its Prologue test.
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