Planet-IRL

My name is Jimmy Clark and I’ll be co-writing on Planet-IRL from time to time now. I hope everyone who reads this blog will enjoy what I have to say, at least most of the time that is.

Something that has been on my mind is the matter of championships within auto racing. If anyone tuned in to ESPN this past weekend, it is a certainty that you saw something regarding Jimmie Johnson’s 3-peat that was completed in Homestead this past Sunday. It got me thinking, what does a second Indycar Series Championship mean to Scott Dixon?

Not to dwell on NASCAR for too long, but Johnson’s 3-peat has apparently cemented his status as one of the best drivers ever to race a tin top. Obviously, the IRL/Indycar championship hasn’t been around for nearly as long as NASCAR’s, but the entity of open wheel racing has been around much longer. Look at it this way: in another type of open wheel racing, Formula One, just one F1 points championship is considered a HUGE deal. Just ask Lewis Hamilton, who is now believed to be the greatest thing since Michael Schumacher…after only one championship. That he one by one point.

MY point is this: what is REALLY more important: a championship trophy or an Indy 500 victory? To me, it is quite obvious. If a driver was able to choose between a victory at Indy or a points championship, and the answer “both” was not valid, the driver would choose Indy. That is why you always will hear more about Mears, Foyt and Unser winning 4 500’s a piece, rather than Hornish’s 3 championships in 6 years. If a driver ends up accomplishing both feats in one year, like Dixon did this past 500, and Dario did last year, and Hornish did the year before, and Wheldon did the year before that (I see a trend here, too bad Buddy Rice couldn’t win the points in ‘04 or I could have kept going), then more power to him (or her, if that ever happens). Very few people are going to remember that Jimmie Johnson won Daytona in ‘06 along with the championship, even though Daytona is the most important race on the NASCAR schedule. Not that many will remember that Hamilton won Monaco, F1’s most nostalgic and important race, along with the championship in ‘08. People will just remember that they were celebrating at the end of that certain season. It is because what matters the most to these two organizations is obtaining the most points….nothing surprising about that fact.

But at the end of the day, a 500 victory during the Indycar season will be the one thing that stays in everyone’s minds for years to come. That is what makes this series so unique and more fun to watch. It’s more than just points. I’m not saying that the points don’t matter to Indycar drivers…just ask Helio about that one….but it takes a back seat to the month of May every year.