10/04/2006 - Fresh from their winter of racing around the globe in the inaugural A1 Grand Prix series, some of the stars of the show have hit the ground running in their 'summer' campaigns.
In Formula One feeder formula GP2, A1 Team Brazil's Nelson Piquet Jr tops the points table after the opening round at Valencia ahead of A1 Team France's Nicolas Lapierre after winning the opening race from pole position and finishing fourth in the second race.
Lapierre was fourth and third to come away from Spain ranked second overall. Fellow A1 Team France racer Alexandre Premat will be disappointed to have collected just a ninth place followed by a non-finish after showing strong form in pre-season testing. A1 Team Malaysia's Fairuz Fauzy hit the points in the second of the pair of races, finishing 10th, up from 15th in the opening race.
At Long Beach in California, two drivers with an A1GP involvement raced into the points at the first round of the Champ Car series, with A1 Team Australi's early-season racer Will Power coming home ninth on the famous street circuit, one position behind series debutant Katherine Legge who had a test run for A1 Team Great Britain at the A1 Grand Prix of Nations, Dubai in December. Hers was the best ever finish for a woman racer in the Champ Car series.
In the Champ Car Atlantic supporting series, teenager Graham Rahal demonstrated the progress he'd made through his late-season involvement with A1 Team Lebanon by racing to fifth place on his debut. A1 Team South Africa's Stephen Simpson wasn't so fortunate, dropping out of the race after qualifying strongly.
Not all A1GP racers will be spending their summers racing single-seaters, with A1 Team Mexico's Luis Diaz also busy at that Long Beach meeting. And he came away a winner in the GrandAm sportscar race there, triumphing with partner Scott Pruett. A1 Team Brazil's Christian Fittipaldi wasn't so fortunate, retiring from the race.
Alex Yoong - winner of the Sprint Race at the series-closing A1 Grand Prix of Nations, Shanghai International Circuit - was also busy in sportcar racing, driving an open-topped prototype in the opening round of the Le Mans Series at the Istanbul Otodrom. He joined A1 Team Netherlands boss Jan Lammers in the Racing for Holland Dome and, having qualified third, Alex was then second fastest in the race morning warm-up and was running second behind the Emmanual Collard/Jean-Christophe Boullion Pescarolo Sport entry, and closing in, when the starter failed just short of the two-hour mark. The Pescarolo Sport entry went on to win.
In Japan, A1 Team Ireland's Ralph Firman was another driver out of luck, retiring the works Honda NSX he shares with Daisuke Ito from the Super GT race at the Okayama International Circuit as one of his sister cars won the event.
Two further A1GP drivers were in action with a roof over their heads, in the DTM (German Touring Car series): A1 Team Germany's Timo Scheider and A1 Team Austria's Mathias Lauda, racing at Hockenheim. They finished eight and 11th respectively, with Mathias doing particularly well to advance from 18th on the grid.
So, weekend one post A1 Grand Prix has produced some strong performances from our cast of drivers, and we will keep you informed of their progress through the summer months. No doubt, those not fortunate enough to have raced in A1 Grand Prix series one will also be doing their best so that they can race in our second series, starting at Zandvoort in Holland on 1 October.
