Although the majority of Robin Miller’s rant on The Speed Report was focused upon the season ending IRL race, he did have a few interesting tidbits to report on Champ Cars...
Kevin Kalkhoven and Gerry Forsythe have packaged an extremely attractive lease option to entice new teams to move up to Champ Cars in 2007. For $1 million dollars you’ll be able to lease one rolling DP01 chassis, one Ford-Cosworth XFE engine along with a full complement of Bridgestone tires for testing and racing the entire season. Miller noted that this was a pretty good deal since he knew that the Ford-Cosworth lease alone was $950,000 per season with the IRL’s Honda engine lease running for over a million-plus...
Pacific Coast Motorsports has already taken advantage of the offer and will field a two car entry for 2007 with American Alex Figge and Scotland's Ryan Dalziel. Miller said what’s good about this is that there’ll be 3 American drivers in Champ Cars next season: AJ Almendinger, Alex Figge and Graham Rahal. (Look for Rahal to drive for Newman/Haas)
Miller stated that Polestar Racing may make the jump next year. This is the team that Katherine Legge won 3 Toyota Atlantic races for in 2005. Miller speculated that Legge would be their driver with financial assistance from Kalkhoven.
As for the Red Bull sponsorship deal that Christian Klien turned down to drive for PKV Racing, Red Bull’s money will most likely go to Almendinger since he’s already sponsored by them. If Legge departs for Polestar then there appears to be an open seat at PKV for next season…
