Champ Car Atlantic Championship

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The Champ Car Atlantic Championship is a formula racing series with races throughout North America. The series is often considered the top developmental open-wheel racing series in North America, typically the last series a driver in which a driver will compete before moving to Champ Car World Series or the Indy Racing League. The series is sanctioned by Champ Car, and most of its races are support races for the Champ Car World Series.

Starting in 2006, the series will be run exclusively with Swift 016.a chassis powered by Mazda-Cosworth 2300cc DOHC inline-4 engines producing 300 bhp. The new formula is expected to lower the costs of running a full Atlantic season to around $500,000-$600,000. In addition, Champ Car will award a $2 million sponsorship prize for the 2006 champion towards a ride in the Champ Car World Series. These changes are expected to increase car counts, which have dwindled over the past few seasons.

Although the series had been run on Yokohama tires since 1991, the Japanese company elected to end its relationship with the series after the 2006 series, at which point it will be replaced by Cooper Tire.

1 History
2 2006 Champ Car Atlantic Championship Schedule
3 Atlantic Series Champions
4 External links

[edit] History

The history of Formula Atlantic begins with the SCCA Formula B class, created in the early 1960s for single-seat formula cars with engines not exceeding 1600cc in capacity. Prior to Formula Atlantic, professional Formula B races were held in the United States from 1969 to 1972 as part of the SCCA Formula Continental Championship (along with the larger, more powerful Formula 5000 cars), although they were largely overshadowed by the V8-powered F5000 cars.

Formula Atlantic as a class evolved in England in 1971 from the US Formula B rules, with 1600cc production-based twin-cam engines (primarily Cosworth FVA, then Cosworth BDA and BDD, however other engines like Alfa-Romeo were also eligible). Conceived by John Webb of Brands Hatch (who would later also develop the Sports 2000 class) as a category for national competitors with the performance near a Formula Two car but running costs at or below that of a contemporary Formula Three car.

As a result, Formula Atlantic typically used chassis similar to Formula Two and Formula Three cars -- with performance somewhere in between the two -- so most of the manufacturers were familiar from those classes, particularly the likes of Brabham, Lotus, March, Chevron early on, with Ralt and then Reynard later. US manufacturer Swift came to displace the British imports and dominate in North America.

The first professional races run under Formula Atlantic rules were conducted in 1974 by the CASC in Canada (now ASN Canada), drawing much attention and large fields due to its national CTV television coverage. IMSA in the United States took advantage of the large number of teams and organized their own series in 1976.

During these years, the series attracted guest drivers from Europe, including Formula One, particularly at the Trois Rivieres street race in Quebec, Canada. Guest drivers included James Hunt, Jean-Pierre Jarier, Riccardo Patrese, Patrick Depailler, Jacques Laffite, Didier Pironi and Vittorio Brambilla.

In 1977, the SCCA sanctioned the US events and in 1978 the CASC and SCCA series merged, and conducted the series jointly until 1983, when it ran as the Formula Mondial North American Cup. The series could not sustain the success of earlier seasons and was cancelled for 1984.

In its place a "Pacific" series was conducted exclusively on the US West Coast in 1985. This rebirth expanded to an East Coast "Atlantic" series the following year and the two ran concurrently through 1990. From 1990 to 2005, the series was sponsored by Toyota and the cars were powered by Toyota's 1600cc 4A-GE engines available in kit form from Toyota Racing Development. With the support of Toyota, the two US series were reunited into a single North American championship and have remained so to this date.

The same rules were adopted as Formula Pacific (not to be confused with the US Formula Atlantic Pacific Championship) and races were run in Australia, and New Zealand (where Formula Pacific became the top class of racing); for a few years the prestigious Macau Grand Prix was run to Formula Pacific rules before becoming a Formula Three race. South Africa also adopted Formula Atlantic rules, but later mandated that the cars were fitted with Mazda Wankel engines.

In recognition of the global acceptance of the formula it was briefly renamed 'Formula Mondial' in 1983, but its peak of international popularity was some years past.

Former drivers in the series include legends such as Gilles Villeneuve, Jacques Villeneuve, Bobby Rahal and Michael Andretti, and many current IRL and Champ Car drivers including Jimmy Vasser, A.J. Allmendinger, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Andrew Ranger, Ronnie Bremer, Danica Patrick, Alex Tagliani, Patrick Carpentier, Buddy Rice, Dan Wheldon, Sam Hornish, Jr. and Roger Yasukawa.