A.J. in the afternoon

To the Ex in Toronto to see A. J. Allmendinger win the Grand Prix of Toronto - a blue riband event on the Champ Car tour. They can no longer call it the Molson Indy but the beer company remains on board for the annual joust around the exhibition grounds.
Allmendinger, sacked by the Rusport team a month ago, was picked up by Forsythe Racing. He has completed a hat-trick of victories at Toronto, following those at Portland and Cleveland, to silence the critics. Champ Cars has a bright new star, but double-champion Sebastien Bourdais has found out to his cost that success in the category does not rate in F1 circles.
I pitched up as the Formula Atlantic cars were on the parade lap. Quick parking [$20] and I'm trackside in time for the first caution on Lap One [ticket $45]. A kerfuffle at Turn One was followed by a shunt at Turn Three involving polesitter Graham Rahal, who made contact with fellow rookie Raphael Matos.
The 38-lap race was won by Robbie Pecorari (Who he? Ed) in the new-for-this-year Mazda engined Swift spec chassis. Second was Jonathon Bomorito followed home by Brit Ryan Lewis who started from 14th on the grid. Simon Pagenaud of France finished fourth to take over the Atlantic series lead. Rahal set the fastest race lap on the sixth tour and continued to fifteenth place followed home by erstwhile championship leader Andreas Wirth.
Time for a quick trip round the paddock. Frank D'Angelo is fronting a 13-piece soul band and doing a fine job of drowning out all other sounds. The Champ Car series is an all-Ford show these days with sidekicks Mazda stepping in to sponsor the Atlantic series. In the on-track parade Police Motorcyclists precede a gaggle of Mustangs and Ford Crewcab trucks, carrying the drivers, more Mustangs driven by insignificant local politicians and an Armored Personnel Carrier with what looked like the entire Canadian Army aboard.
Brit Justin Wilson was on the pole for the 86-lap feature race and he led in the early going, after winning last year. Nearly all the field started on red-sidewall tyres although the significance of this is lost on the spectators who can't follow the race due to lack of a track commentary. Mind you we were watching from an area that had been blanked off by netting, helpfully removed by spectators just prior to the Grand Prix. Handling problems dropped Wilson down to fourth behind winner Allmendinger, Paul Tracy and Sebastian Bourdais. Fifth was Cristiano da Matta, a long drop from a Toyota F1 contract.
Champ Car has sunk a long way down from the glory days. It lacks entries [eighteen cars is a bare minimum], sponsors and strength in depth. The sooner the IRL/Champ Car split is healed the better. They took a good thing and broke it in two.