GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma Preview

GoPro President Tony Bates shows the green flag to start the 2014 GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma at Sonoma Raceway.  [Chris Owens Photo]

Sunday’s GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma was supposed to be a joyful celebration of the Verizon IndyCar Series’ crowning of its 2015 season champion. Instead, with a sad, dark cloud hovering over the track, the race will be run with the death of Justin Wilson at Pocono Raceway fresh in the minds of those in the paddock. As a respected one of their own, the Andretti Autosport team driver will be remembered by all, even as cars take to the track and the Astor Cup is presented to the champion.

Juan Pablo Montoya leads the season’s championship battle as five other drivers hope to score enough points to derail the Team Penske Chevrolet pilot who has led the standings since the first race at St. Petersburg back in March. Graham Rahal is the closest challenger, 34 points behind, having lost ground to the Colombian after enduring his own crash at Pocono last Sunday.

“We had an awesome year. We’ve got a win (at Indianapolis). We’ve done everything. If we win the championship it’s a plus,” explained the 1999 CART champ who played a conservative hand at Pocono while looking forward to the double-points offered in Sunday’s Sonoma finale. “We took our time and were smart. I think we had a car that could win the race, but it wasn’t worth risking it. We did what we needed to do.”

Rahal, who has mounted a late-season charge for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Honda, was just nine points behind JPM and closing fast going to Pocono, but a crash there with Tristan Vautier on lap 92 dropped him to a 20^th place finish; now 34 points behind the leader.

“At this point we have to go there to win, we have no other choice. In order to beat Montoya for the championship, we have no choice,” said Rahal who thought he had a chance at Pocono to overtake the leader, but now can’t take a conservative approach on the natural road course. “We’re going to go all out, do the best we possibly can, and see what happens. I still have a lot of confidence going into race weekend.”

Montoya knows what a tight championship race can be like as he tied Dario Franchitti for that 1999 CART crown but was awarded the championship on a tiebreaker based on his seven season wins vs. three for Franchitti.

Three-time IndyCar Series champion Scott Dixon sits third behind the two leaders, likely the only other driver with a legitamate chance for the title. Dixon was the 2014 Sonoma winner and a win could lead to a championship trophy on Sunday, especially if JPM and Rahal have problems.

“I’m excited that Team Target is still in contention for the championship with this being a double-points race. Sonoma is huge for us from the standpoint that it’s Targets biggest race, too, said the veteran Chip Ganassi Chevrolet driver. “Hopefully we’ll be celebrating with a lot of wine in Victory Circle for a championship and a race victory.”

2014 Verizon series’ champion Will Power (-61), Helio Castroneves (-77) and Josef Newgarden (-87) are all still possibilities to win the crown but it would likely take a certain set of circumstances to get past the three point leaders. Dixon (2013, 2008, 2003), Power (2014) and Montoya (1999), have each won an Indy car championship during their career.

Sonoma opened in 1968 and first hosted a USAC Indy car race in 1970 that was won by Dan Gurney over Mario Andretti and Al Unser. IRL and IndyCar have run ten races there since 2005 with Power having three wins and four poles while Team Penske leads the competition with five victories on the 2.38-mile, 12-turn natural road course located north of San Francisco.

Dixon won the 2014 race here as he passed a slowing Mike Conway (running out of fuel) with two laps remaining. Ryan Hunter-Reay, Simon Pagenaud, Takuma Sato and Montoya rounded-out the top-five as Conway fell to 14^th.

Montoya will try to hold serve Sunday while the other five take their last shot at scoring a win and with it a possible championship.

Montoya has led the points since March 29^th and hopes to make it five consecutive months in first place, but as the veteran Montoya knows all too well, anything can happen, especially on a road course…“You never count it before it’s yours.” And he hopes to make it his on Sunday. It should be interesting.

Wine Country Notes:

• Sunday’s race will be 85-laps/203-miles.
• Chevrolet leads Honda for the engine-manufacturer’s championship 1429-1083.
• Previous Sonoma winners in the field include: Power (3), Dixon (2), Tony Kanaan, Marco Andretti, Ryan Briscoe and Castroneves.
• 2015 will mark the 10^th season that the series’ championship will be decided at the final race.
• The Grand Prix of Long Beach has announced that Toyota, its title sponsor since 1980, has signed a multi-year renewal.
• TV: NBCSports Network—Saturday, Practice (1:30 pm ET), Qualifying (6:30pm ET). Sunday, Race (4:00pm ET).

Paul Gohde

Paul Gohde heard the sound of race cars early in his life.

Growing up in suburban Milwaukee, just north of Wisconsin State Fair Park in the 1950’s, Paul had no idea what “that noise” was all about that he heard several times a year. Finally, through prodding by friends of his parents, he was taken to several Thursday night modified stock car races on the old quarter-mile dirt track that was in the infield of the one-mile oval -and he was hooked.

The first Milwaukee Mile event that he attended was the 1959 Rex Mays Classic won by Johnny Thomson in the pink Racing Associates lay-down Offy built by the legendary Lujie Lesovsky. After the 100-miler Gohde got the winner’s autograph in the pits, something he couldn’t do when he saw Hank Aaron hit a home run at County Stadium, and, again, he was hooked.

Paul began attending the Indianapolis 500 in 1961, and saw A. J. Foyt’s first Indy win. He began covering races in 1965 for Racing Wheels newspaper in Vancouver, WA as a reporter/photographer and his first credentialed race was Jim Clark’s historic Indy win.Paul has also done reporting, columns and photography for Midwest Racing News since the mid-sixties, with the 1967 Hoosier 100 being his first big race to report for them.

He is a retired middle-grade teacher, an avid collector of vintage racing memorabilia, and a tour guide at Miller Park. Paul loves to explore abandoned race tracks both here and in Europe, with the Brooklands track in Weybridge England being his favorite. Married to Paula, they have three adult children and two cats.

Paul loves the diversity of all types of racing, “a factor that got me hooked in the first place.”

racingnation.com

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