In the A1GP championship, Team Ireland has dominated, with Adam Carroll's triumph leaving the team on top. Justin Hynesreports
IT'S BEEN a long time since Ireland last enjoyed major motorsport success, as long as five years since Eddie Jordan's Formula One team took a final win at the Brazilian Grand Prix with Giancarlo Fisichella at the wheel. In recent weeks though, a new story of open-wheel success has emerged, and from a completely different arena.
A1GP, the self-titled World Cup of Motorsport, in which national teams race across a global 10-race weekend series, is this year being dominated by Team Ireland and its driver, Portadown's Adam Carroll. Last weekend at Malaysia's Sepang circuit, Carroll, coming off the back of victory in China a fortnight earlier, dominated proceedings, finishing fifth in the Sunday morning sprint race, and then racing from pole to a lights to flag win in the afternoon's feature race.
The result, making Carroll the only repeat winner of the season so far, leaves the Irish Team on top of the standings with an eight-point lead over Portugal, and 12 points clear of 2005/06 champions France, and with a Christmas break looming before the next round in New Zealand in late January, team principal and ex-Jordan team member Mark Gallagher is confident the run can continue, thanks to an injection of new talent.
"Several things have changed in the last while for us," says Gallagher of the team that has been in A1GP since the series inauguration in 2005. "The first thing is that we have a new technical director in Gerry Hughes, who came to us after nine years in Formula One, with Jaguar, Jordan, Red Bull Racing and Super Aguri. The key thing is that he has brought a modern scientific approach to engineering and running a car and the driver.
"I think he's brought with him an almost military approach to getting the best out of the car and the driver, and that's been a huge step forward," he says. "He's established a really strong relationship with Adam, and ultimately I think that's the most important thing.
"In motorsport, that understanding between engineer and driver is crucial. It's like baking a cake. You have to get the ingredients right, get the right mix. If that's working, then good things will come of it."
Those good things began late last year when Carroll made the Irish squad's breakthrough with a first win for the team in Mexico City, after being drafted into the team from F1 feeder series GP2 for the Czech round of the championship.
"Adam is an amazing asset," Gallagher insists. "We have the good fortune that he was overlooked by Formula One and came to us as a proven winner in GP2. But when he came to us, it was at a low ebb. Despite five wins in GP2, it seemed as if his time was over there. He started last season in DTM (German Touring Cars), but the car was uncompetitive and it looked like his single-seater career was over.
"Then he got a call to race again in GP2, and despite not having any testing or any familiarity with the car, he was immediately quick. He won in Silverstone and Hungary, but again it just didn't happen for him. So when he came to us, I think he wasn't sure where it was going. It was a bit of a fallback for him.
"But he discovered that it's incredibly competitive and also that it's fun. He really enjoyed it, so much so that after the win in Mexico, he came to me and said 'right, that's that, next season we'll nail it.'"
So far so good. At the season opener in Zandvoort in Holland, results were poor, with just six laps completed in the weekend's two races. But over the past month, Carroll has stamped his authority on the series, winning the sprint race in Chengdu, China, and finishing second in the feature race there before taking last weekend's win in Malaysia. New Zealand beckons.
"In the first season of A1GP, France dominated," says Gallagher. "It was Germany the year after and Switzerland last year. In a one-make series (A1 teams all run the same chassis and Ferrari engine) that is unusual, but it seems to be simply down to getting the right people in the right place and, as I said, having a driver and engineer mix that really works. We have that now, and that means we're in good shape for the rest of the season.
"We don't expect to win every race or to get lights to flag results every time, as we had last weekend, it's about consistency. If Portugal or Switzerand look like they're running away with a race weekend, then it's our job to tuck in behind and bank valuable points. And win whenever we can, of course," he says.
"There's a bit of magic in the team at the moment. The hard thing is to keep the magic going, but we're working on it."