So what a relief that Force’s injuries — though career-threatening — were not as horrific as the strange accident which tore his car in half. The sight of his bare feet in the front window of a medical evacuation helicopter was comic relief, so to speak. And, of course, we’re told Force was talking, directing and asking, “Did I win?”

Perhaps the greatest tribute to Force’s influence on the NHRA comes after each round in the pro classes. Almost to a man, the guys on the winning side imitate his rapid-fire delivery with upbeat appraisals and catch phrases. But nobody can quite match the barrel-throated, wide-grinned rap of Force himself. He’s the ultimate funny car driver.

The man will play anything for laughs, and gets away with it because everybody knows he’s serious about going faster and winning. He once continued to wear a heavily singed firesuit that had been burned in a flaming wreck he was lucky to escape until the suit about fell apart. It was his take on “Elvis is dead and I don’t look so good myself.”

We all watch motor racing, in part, because it’s dangerous. And what could be more dangerous than being hunkered underneath full bodywork and straddling a monstrous, nitro-burning, super-blown V-8?

Oftentimes after a winning pass, it’s not so much Force’s humor after he climbs out as a delivery based on runaway enthusiasm. It’s impossible to watch without feeling caught up in a giant energy field, perhaps even alloyed to greatness.

Drag racing is the ultimate expression of the people’s motor sport, a subculture even within racing relatively devoid of pretense and dedicated to pure speed. Force represents the ultimate people’s champion. The fans see him as one of them and vice versa without the messyness of NASCAR’s huge success or the solitary knighthood of open-wheel racing.

The first time I met Force, the day’s qualifying at the Atlanta Dragway was over. He walked into the media room that overlooks the drag strip unannounced, wearing blue jeans and a Castrol shirt, carrying a glass of whiskey on the rocks. John sat down in one of the chairs at the back of the room and fielded whatever questions came up. It was more like a clubhouse meeting among friends than an interview.

Eventually, somebody asked if he had seen any good movies lately? Force started talking about how much he liked the movie “Tombstone” and the role of Doc Holliday played by Val Kilmer. “I’ll be your huckleberry,” he said with a laugh, repeating the character’s odd, but effective psychological ploy used in gunfights.

It was a reminder how much all drag racers live for one-on-one duels. Not much imagination was needed to think Force may have recognized himself in the character played by Kilmer. With so much on the line, how do you beat such a nutty character who’s so damn fast?

The men and women in drag racing have to be tougher than chrome moly steel, because there’s nowhere to hide from errors, defeat or worse, the oddball crash scenario. Force is no different in his stone-hard courage. Beyond his humor and broadcast-strength enthusiasm, what sets him apart is the ability to remain one of the regular guys when he’s not testing himself against the mountain.

I’ll leave it to others to dissect the problem of a car breaking in half due to a blown tire. But I will suggest the eerie prospect that the effort Force’s team put into safety after the tragic testing accident of Eric Medlen earlier this year may have come into play. Whether that’s for good or not from a technical and safety perspective remains to be seen.

It’s undeniably good that Force has a strong team, a daughter who has followed his career choice effectively and that John can be expected back at the track in full voice as a team owner if not driver.

It’s a voice that defines a racing generation.

Jonathan Ingram can be reached at jonathan@jingrambooks.com.

9. Speaking of processions, the World Motor Sport Council has more than a few members who vehemently argued that McLaren should not only be excluded from this year’s constructors championship. They argued its drivers should lose all points in the championship as well. Had that been the case, we’d see an excellent battle among four drivers reduced to Ferrari designating Kimi Raikkonen as the next world champion. It’s hardly a matter of major material advantage gained in the Stepneygate scandal. And isn’t a $100 million fine and the loss of one championship enough? How is it that so many obtuse people reach such high levels in motor racing?

8. Some teams in NASCAR these days are spending a lot of time, energy and money looking for the next big star. Why don’t more try the Richard Childress method? The team owner first saw Clint Bowyer in an ARCA race on TV while sitting in his hauler one afternoon. Childress placed a call the next week to Bowyer and a contract deal was done shortly thereafter.

7. Here’s another procession. IndyCar drivers looking at the greener (as in richer) pastures in NASCAR and deciding to make a career move after winning the Indy 500. Do they really understand the commitment it takes to go back to the bottom of the heap and start working your way up again? (See Sam Hornish fail to qualify at New Hampshire.)

6. Newman/Haas/Lanigan recently tried to jump into the NASCAR frenzy by signing a deal with Robert Yates this summer to provide engineering services to the former engine builder’s team. Did Robert ever mention he was going to retire in a couple of months and sell the team to his son Doug — which would immediately render any agreement with Newman/Haas/Lanigan null and void? Where was Ford on this one? Was Ford pushing for a deal with the Champ Car guys or for the eventual agreement reached by Doug Yates to use Roush Fenway Racing as an engineering resource?

5. Is there any difference between the curent ownership of Champ Car and the CART ownership that preceded it? Kevin Kalkhoven and Gerry Forsythe, despite their riches, have palms outstretched at every turn of the daily calendar to locate the next opportunity for a cash infusion from a promoter. I honestly wonder if the importance of maintaining a consistent schedule with date equity has ever entered their minds when considering the success of F1, NASCAR, the Indy 500, American sports cars, World Rally, the FIA GT, etc., etc.

4. Ron Dennis may be a stone wall when it comes to the issue of F1 teams’ independence and rights under the Concorde Agreement. And, he may have a peculiar and careful oral presentation, which can obscure his intent at times. But, other than those who hate the McLaren team for the usual fan/sporting reasons, is there any specific reason to believe he’s Nixonian?

3. If you create big, unwieldy cars that are equal in performance, do you really expect no contact in close championship races? (See the Grand American Rolex Series finale at Salt Lake City.)

2. Nigel Stepney believed he could follow in the footsteps of Ross Brawn at Ferrari and become a technical director after working as a mechanic for many, many years. If the opportunity had not knocked yet, why would sheer loyalty and hard work be considered enough? For his part, Brawn went through many intermediate steps at several teams before his transition from mechanic to a technical director was complete. In retrospect, there seems to be a great deal of reason to lack confidence in Stepney’s judgement.

1. How is it we have lost another racer to an aviation crash after retirement from such a dangerous business? How sad to add the name of Colin McRae to a list that most famously includes Graham Hill and Curtis Turner.

Jonathan Ingram can be reached at jingrambooks.com

Within two years of the debacle at the U.S. Grand Theft Auto at Indianapolis, we have arrived at Stepneygate. The latest chapter concerns supposedly damning e-mails between two McLaren drivers that betray the use of performance secrets stolen from Ferrari.

The pursuit of this issue by the Ferrari team combines its usual Machiavellian mindset with the beserk style reminiscent of Italian proscecutors. The integrity of Italy’s international symbol of style, speed and grace has been compromised and Ferrari has insisted on satisfaction from governing body FIA in the form of penalties against McLaren.

But how much of the issue is a criminal matter, how much is civil litigation for damages and what are the sporting issues?

At this stage it pays to remember that Giorgio Piola’s drawings appear nearly every week and betray the latest intimate details of each F1 team’s newest technical gambits.

Ferrari has accused Nigel Stepney of stealing the design documents, which would place the theft some time after late October. That’s when it was confirmed accused traitor Stepney would not move up in the Ferrari hierarchy. If so, who’s to know during the winter design period that next year’s plans for any team will produce more speed or less? (See Honda.)

In fact, the extraordinary meeting of the World Motor Sports Council in July cleared McLaren of any theft of design ideas in its MP4-22 chassis.

Personally, if I’m getting a driver like Fernando Alonso, like McLaren was anticipating, I would be curious about something very specific at Ferrari. Alonso likes a slightly understeering front suspension on initial turn-in and won the world championship back-to-back with Renault on Michelins with just such a set-up. But with McLaren forced to move to Bridgestones along with all the other former Michelin teams this year, I would be curious about how to create a design that would enable Alonso to sustain his proven driving style on a Bridgestone tire that is different in concept and compound as well as construction.

Given that Kimi Raikkonen to a degree also likes a slightly understeering front end, Ferrari’s new design for 2007 might well render a few insights into how the longtime Bridgestone team planned to handle this issue with its new hire once he moved over from McLaren in the wake of Michael Schumacher’s retirement.

Alas, this is one small part of a much larger package. And, it’s an area where any experienced F1 engineer can likely find the necessary results with a proper testing and development procedure. It can rest on a counter-intuitive strategy such as last year’s Renault, which left extra weight bias in the rear of the car (in an effort to reduce tire wear despite Alonso’s induced understeer at the front end).

Alas, how much value is such information when one’s current car, the MP4-22 of McLaren, is an evolution of last year’s MP4-21?

Ultimately, imitating any other team’s approach limits a team to just that — the same results, instead of getting ahead. Picking up ground in an area of deficiency can be immensely helpful. But each year it’s clear how teams imitate one another with what can be gleaned from the naked eye and a stopwatch. In many cases, imitations can be completed in, say, the three weeks between the Australian opener and the Malaysian round. Such development is more than likely to be the subject of e-mails, particularly if a team is soundly beaten in the season’s opening round as was McLaren by Ferrari.

Employees regularly carry secrets from one team to another and in fact are hired just for that purpose. (See Jaguar’s pursuit of Adrian Newey and more recently his switch to Red Bull.) The theft of design secrets is a significant crime in a world where intellectual property rights are a major international issue. But to what extent does the FIA need to step into a legal matter in regard to its championship?

How much does the FIA owe to the International Sporting Regulations in this case beyond the banning of individuals?

That question is highly leveraged by Ferrari’s motivation to win a championship under CEO Jean Todt as well as new technical and sporting directors in the first year after the departure of Schumacher. The pressuring to repair a slight to Ferrari’s honor merely adds hubris. Apparently in response to this pressure from Ferrari, the FIA has issued letters soliciting information, which apparently turned up the issue of e-mails between Alonso and McLaren test driver Pedro de la Rosa.

As a journalist, one often wonders what goes on the other side of closed doors. But it is easy enough in this case to imagine Ferrari threatening to withdraw from the championship if McLaren was not investigated further over this insult by one of the British rival’s employees. Then there’s the ultimate dagger to the heart: Ferrari can suggest to the FIA that ancient rival Le Mans (where Todt directed Peugeot to victory in the 24-hour shortly before moving to F1) has a new formula coming out in 2010 that may appeal to the Italian company’s desire to produce a greener performance image through endurance racing.

Most of the issue concerns the rather obvious motivation of individuals, not teams. A Ferrari employee (Stepney according to Ferrari) trades information to a McLaren employee (Mike Coughlin, caught red-handed with received documents). Where’s the payoff? It’s in both individuals finding new, higher-priced jobs armed with maximum information, away from their present employers. Each culprit, should that include Stepney, runs the risk of criminal prosecution and a ruined career if either one gets caught by the employer.

As a sporting proposition, the FIA’s case rests on the issue of whether Coughlin was induced by his bosses to gain information purloined from Ferrari, or approved of him using it. Further, did any information gleaned have a material effect upon the world championship?

The FIA’s integrity rests on the propostion that it already has acknowledged it cannot prove this information was sought by the ownership of McLaren and instead is the work of one employee with possible ambitions elsewhere. It will have to continue to face up to this fact without knuckling under to Ferrari’s world championship ambitions. In other words, it will have to demonstrate that the FIA is in charge of all the teams.

That may mean some penalty to McLaren suitable to any material gain, but one that fits the obviously slight advantage and falls well short of exclusion of any team. As has been regularly perceived elsewhere, if this is the act of individuals Ferrari bears as much responsibility for having a rogue employee as McLaren.

Given that the Canadian is a former Indy 500 winner, CART champion and World Championship winner, there’s no reason to believe otherwise. But there’s two very large question marks looming.

Unlike former Indy 500 winner and CART champion Juan Pablo Montoya, Villeneuve does not have sponsorship already lined up for the seasons ahead in NASCAR. Nor is he returning to a longstanding team owner relationship. In fact, an informal conversation with journalists at the back of the team hauler by Bill Davis at Bristol is the only official word on Villeneuve’s status with the team.

Secondly, though Montoya was a disappointment in F-1 to many and a pariah to some, he was not the enigma that Villeneuve became during his later years in F-1.

The Canadian’s deal with Bill Davis Racing, according to sources close to the Toyota team, is a trial balloon looking for sponsorship. That course of action will begin Sept. 22 in Las Vegas at the Craftsman Truck Series event. He is scheduled to run the final seven Truck Series events and possibly the ARCA race at Talladega. The BDR website, meanwhile, says a start in the Nextel Cup is a possibility before the season is over.

So Villeneuve has his work cut out for him. The BDR team is already shopping the driver Villeneuve is scheduled to replace in the Truck Series, Ryan Mathews, for sponsorship. But there’s nothing to lose by placing Villeneuve in the unsponsored seat in the meantime.

As far as sponsorship for the Canadian goes, Villeneuve brings interest from a promising TV market in a large and affluent country where NASCAR would like to continue to expand.

Three years ago, I was in the province of Quebec for a brief vacation prior to the start of the inaugural Championship Chase. My wife and I searched high and low (i.e. in sports bars equipped with satellite dishes) for any coverage of NASCAR on TV to no avail the night of the Richmond race. The search in the print media afterward was equally dismal.

Having just been in Ontario recently, the situation was quite different. Not only did the local version of ESPN in Toronto carry the Nextel Cup race live from Bristol, it had long updates on the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series. In Quebec, a capacity crowd was on hand in Montreal last month to see the first Busch Series race at the track named for Jacque’s father Gilles Villeneuve. And, one of Montreal’s dailies has been following the Nextel Cup since the beginning of the season.

Despite a successful test and the likelihood Villeneuve can handle stock cars as well as ovals, the problem will be coming up with sponsorship. (This assumes Villeneuve and business manager Craig Pollock are not interested in seeding a Nextel Cup opportunity with some of the former world champion’s millions.)

The level of sponsorship for next year’s re-named Sprint Cup demands an American-based company that can leverage its investment in the 36-race schedule stateside. But like Montoya, who is backed by Chevron’s Texaco Havoline brand, it’s possible to locate a multi-national corporation with strong ties to Canada that would seize this kind of opportunity.

But which Jacques Villeneuve would a sponsor be backing? The desultory former champion — or a guy willing to do what it takes to win the Daytona 500?

In his defense, Villeneuve went down the same wrong road that others have succombed to in F-1 such as Jenson Button or more recently Rubens Barrichello. They all believed in the engineers at Honda and later in full ownership of the former BAR team by Honda. When the music stopped on his eight-figure contract (reputed to be as much as $15 million per year), there wasn’t much in the way of opportunity for Villeneuve outside of Sauber. Where Button outran Villeneuve at Honda, Felipe Massa and Robert Kubica did likewise at Sauber.

Midway in his Honda years, it was clear that Villeneuve was not nearly as committed as the guy who won the world title in 1997 with Williams. On the other hand, the Canadian tried his best to do such things as be the fastest guy through Eau Rouge at Spa no matter what the circumstances of his team or car. The results were not always pretty.

The longtime relationship with Pollock is also troubling. An ego-maniac who had a book published about himself as a preliminary to his deal to run BAT’s team as well as Villeneuve’s business affairs, former ski instructor Pollock soon became a laughingstock when it came to the sharp end of the business of F-1. But through it all, Villeneuve has never waivered in his loyalty. Together they have, after all, made a lot of money.

I for one would love to see the same energetic, switched on Jacques Villeneuve I first met in the Formula Atlantic series when he returns to the states in NASCAR. There was some indication indeed this may be the case at Le Mans this summer in his drive for Peugeot. But it remains to be seen which driver will try to run with the good ol’ stars.