Shiplett named as Carpentier crew chief

Gillet Evernham Motorsport announced this week that Mike Shiplett will act as crew chief for Patrick Carpentier's 2008 Sprint Cup campaign. Shiplett spent the 2007 season as crew chief for Kasey Kahne in the Busch series, where they obtained 2 victories together. Shiplett also spent the last 2 races of the 2007 campaign as crew chief on the #10 Valvoline Dodge in the Nextel Cup series.

Carpentier makes the field at Homestead

For the third time in as many attempts in the Nextel Cup Series, Patrick Carpentier was able to place his car within the top 43 in qualifying, ensuring himself a place on the starting grid this Friday at Homestead. The Nextel Cup series is running the old-style Cup cars for the last time in history , and ironically, this race is Carpentier first time behind the wheel of this car. He posted the 28th fastest time (31.017) for an average speed of 174.098 mph.

Once again, making the field was a difficult task as just 7 hundreths of a second slower than Carpentier, AJ Allmendinger posted a lap time of 31.089 and will miss the field for Sunday's race, despite running the 37th fastest time today.

Carpentier pulling double-duty. Villeneuve to race truck only at Homestead

I finally got my hands in this week-end entry list for the 3 NASCAR races at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Patrick Carpentier will drive this week's Busch and Nextel Cup races. He will again drive the #10 Dodge entry in the Nextel Cup race and will get behind the wheel of the #19 car the first time in the Busch Series.

Jacques Villeneuve on the other hand will only be driving his Toyota Tundra truck for the Craftsman Truck Series race. Earlier, Villeneuve said he would only be driving Car of Tomorrow Cup races and they will not be on site this week-end as NASCAR will run the old Cup car for the last time.

The Truck race will be on Speed TV Friday, November 16th at 7:30 PM EST
The Busch Series race will run Saturday, November 17th at 4 PM EST (televised on ESPN2)
The Nextel Cup qualifying session to determine the 43 starters out of 49 entries will be held Friday, Nov. 16th at 3:10 PM and live on ESPN2 while the green flag will drop Sunday, Nov. 18th at 3:45 PM, live on ABC

Carpentier wins first duel with Villeneuve

For the first time in their short NASCAR careers, Jacques Villeneuve and Patrick Carpentier went head to head in a Nextel Cup race. Carpentier came out as the clear winner this Sunday as he was the only one to cross the finish line, despite running 33rd place, 2 laps behind the leaders. Carpentier was pretty satisfied of what he learned. Before the race, Kenny Shrader told him he would have had a pretty good week-end if he completed 310 laps, which he exactly did. Patrick commented he still has a lot to learn, especially how to push the car without burning the tires.

Carpentier explained after the race : "It's so hard. You have to be so smooth that it's almost impossible. You have to go in hard and then get off the throttle. You abuse the car and then as soon as you do that for 10 laps you are done. The car just slides. Every time they put new tire on I was like yeah this is good. Oh I got it. I get the picture. Then 10 laps later I was back to battling the car."

For Jacques Villeneuve, the race was also a learning experience but in a whole other spectrum. Villeneuve was involved in a crash with Kasey Kahne which placed him down in 41st place in the standings. Jacques was still trying to figure out how the crash happened after the race : "We were all the way up there and there was someone on the inside and I didn't know there was someone on the outside and I just noticed them once I was already spun and touched them. I'm not sure what exactly happened and I'm very sorry."

Still, Villeneuve was pretty optimistic of the speed he had before the crash :"It was fun once we got the car running better. Earlier in the race it was a little challenging.[...] We got enough laps there. The car was very tight there and we fixed it with pit stops then it became fine and we were fighting our way back."

Both drivers should run next week-end at Miami-Homestead Speedway, Patrick Carpentier is listed by NASCAR in the Nextel Cup race but I could not find the entry list for the Busch and Trucks race to confirm where Jacques will run.

Carpentier and Villeneuve for the first time head to head

Phoenix International Raceway will host this week-end the first head to head confrontation between French Canadians Patrick Carpentier and Jacques Villeneuve on the Nextel Cup circuit. Both drivers appear on the entry list, which counts 49 cars. As both cars are out of the top 35 owners standings, this means they'll have to qualifying their cars within the top 8 cars out of the 14 in contention.

Villeneuve will be driving the #27 Toyota entry for Bill Davis Racing (sponsor to be announced) and Carpentier will drive the #10 Dodge for Gillett Evernham Motorsport painted in Valvoline and Stanley Tools colors.

Qualifications will be held Friday, November 9th at 5:40 pm ET and green flag for the race will fly at about 3:40 pm ET Sunday (Nov. 11)

Villeneuve and Pollock bought Bill Davis Racing?

According to reliable sources at Auto123, Jacques Villeneuve and Craig Pollock have purschased Bill Davis Racing. Apparently, the team would continue to run their current lineup of drivers plus a Nextel Cup car for Villeneuve.

Villeneuve and Pollock are not at their first attempt in team management as their were owners of BAR F1 team

Villeneuve back in the COT in Phoenix and Homestead?

Rumours have been circulating this week that, following his strong finish at Talladega, Jacques Villeneuve might be back behind the wheel of a Nextel Cup car very soon. The word around is that Villeneuve would run the races in Phoenix and Homestead and that he has tests scheduled in Nashville and New Smyrna to get ready for his next appearance in the COT.

No official announcement has been made yet.

Carpentier signs with GEM

Although his manager still says they're negotiating, multiple sources confirm Patrick Carpentier has a contract signed for 2008 where he would run the whole Sprint Cup (ex. Nextel Cup) season for Gillett Evernham Motorsport (GEM) in the #10, replacing Scott Riggs. The deal also includes about half the Busch races in the #9 car along.

If the #10 doesn't end this season in the top 35 owner's point, GEM might put a past champion behind the steering wheel for the first 5 races for the season, as to use the provisional starting positions it would benefit them.

Villeneuve learns a lot and finishes 21st

Jacques Villeneuve had qualified his #27 Camry in 6th place for Sunday's Nextel Cup race at Talladega but opted to start at the back of the field, a place where he'd learn a lot more since his car was prepared for a fast qualifying run and not in the race. During the race, Villeneuve went up as high as 4th place and managed to finish 21st, still on the lead lap.

Villeneuve also faced a lot of unusual situations for him where he gained a lot of experience. He dodged his first big NASCAR crash, lost the upper end of his shifting stick and at some point lost radio contact because the wired got unplugged. On the last restart, Villeneuve also lost the 3rd gear on his transmission.

Villeneuve makes the field at Talladega

Jacques Villeneuve made an excellent qualifying run this afternoon at Talladega for his first Nextel Cup race and put his Unicef Camry on the third row with a lap of 50.88 seconds for an average of 188.215 mph. The Toyotas were very fast as they grabbed 5 of the 6 first starting spots.

UNICEF colors for Villeneuve at Talladega

UNICEF Canada announced today they would be sponsoring Jacques Villeneuve Toyota Camry Nextel Cup car and Toyota Tundra Craftsman truck for the week-end races at Talladega.

Villeneuve rides will be in a blue and white livery with the legendary #27 on the sides.

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck series will be held Saturday at 3pm. Qualifying for the Nextel Cup race will run Saturday at 11:15 and, if Villeneuve makes the field, he will drive the 500 mile race Sunday at 1pm.

NASCAR veterans unhappy about Villeneuve's decision

Jacques Villeneuve was certainly not expected a warm welcome from the NASCAR stars and it's exactly what he received.

Jeff Gordon was quoted this week saying : "I don't agree with it, but I'm not going to lose sleep over it either.
"Jacques did a nice job at the (Talladega) test, but you can't base anything on a test. I mean, that's just crazy. . . I think you need to get some experience in something else before you go stick them in the Cup race at Talladega, especially when it's so crucial for the championship." Gordon refers to the fact that Villeneuve's Nextel Cup debut will be on the fastest track of the circuit, right in the middle of the Chase for the championship.

Kyle Busch had about the same reaction : "He's doing what? [...] Holy cow, that's not good."

After the controversy, NASCAR reaffirmed their decision to allow Villeneuve to run the race since he passed all the criterias they were looking for.

Villeneuve will enter Nextel Cup race at Talladega

After successful tests at Talladega in Nextel and ARCA cars and a clean race in the Truck series at Las Vegas, Jacques Villeneuve was allowed by NASCAR yesterday to run races on super speedways. On the same day, it was announced Jacques would enter the Nextel race at Talladega on October 7. Villeneuve was already entered in the ARCA and Trucks race but it was also announced Villeneuve would not run the ARCA race because he would be too busy on that weekend.

Villeneuve will have to fight his way through qualifying for the race as the car entered is not in the top 35 in the owners standings. Villeneuve commented it would be a good place to try to qualifying as it was not so much about driving but keeping your foot down and hoping the engine and the car are fast.

That race at 'Dega will be the first time a COT race is held on a super speedway.

Carpentier tests at Kentucky Speedway

Patrick Carpentier participated yesterday in a test with Gillett-Evernham Motorsport (GEM) at Kentucky Speedway. Carpentier drove the #10 old-style Nextel Cup car usually run by Scott Riggs for about 140 laps around the track, along with Nextel regular Elliott Sadler and 2 Red Bull cars. Carpentier seemed quite happy as he got out of the car : "Our goal was not to achieve a new track record, but to get used to the car, but still, I registered good times. The team was satisfied with the day and I brought the car back in one piece"

During the day, Carpentier was served a variety of different car settings to see how he reacted to each of them and, in he recorded his best lap time at a tenth of a second faster than Sadler

Carpentier will be in Carolina this week-end to work out the details of a possible contract with GEM

Villeneuve spent the first Talladega day getting confortable with the Cup car

Jacques Villeneuve today told SceneDaily a bit about his first day of testing at Talladega with the Nextel Cup teams : "We got going very late this morning and only got a couple runs in - we haven't been able to work on setup at all yet[ ... ] I was just getting used to running the fast laps out there as far as staying up to the top of the race track as long as possible before coming back down. I'm still working to figure everything out, but we will get more time this afternoon"

When questioned about the drafting practice that would take place later in the day, he added "I've been told that I will be wondering what this bunch of lunatics is doing out there running so close to each other the whole time - just like kids I suppose, but it should be fun [...] I am probably going to stay in the back and watch what happens."