Editor’s Note: Portions of this column originally appeared as a blog on nationalspeedsportnews.com. Visit to read regular blogs by Clayton, Dave Argabright, Sheena Baker, Mike Kerchner and Gary London.

For the love of all things Canadian, including curling, Canadian bacon and Paul Tracy, would someone in the IndyCar Series please hire Paul Tracy, eh.
Yes, he’s an occasional on-track menace. As a car owner, you can place bets on him saying something that’s going to cause a ruckus. He’s going to be unseemly at times. He’s going to be brash. He’s going to give you headaches, so be well-supplied with Extra-Strength Tylenol (maybe there’s a sponsorship opportunity there, who knows?).
But hire him.
He is exactly what the new-and-improved IndyCar Series needs.

Good or bad, Tracy, who became the odd-man-out when Forsythe Championship Racing decided not to jump to the IndyCar Series, will make headlines. With the reunification of American open-wheel racing complete, the series needs to give fans as many reasons to watch as possible. Love him or hate him, Tracy should be one of those reasons.

Good or bad, Tracy, who became the odd-man-out when Forsythe Championship Racing decided not to jump to the IndyCar Series, will make headlines. With the reunification of American open-wheel racing complete, the series needs to give fans as many reasons to watch as possible. Love him or hate him, Tracy should be one of those reasons.
Here’s why:
He is no longer just restricted to the road and street courses of Champ Car. He will spend more than half his time flat-out on an oval. Anything could happen.
He is Champ Car’s winningest active driver and the 2003 series champion. The IndyCar Series must trumpet itself now as the undisputed best in all disciplines of open-wheel racing. It can’t begin with one of the best on the bench.
But this is the most important thing — there is already a natural rivalry with Team Penske driver Helio Castroneves, who won the 2002 Indianapolis 500 at Tracy’s expense. Tracy’s appeal was denied despite Tracy’s claim that he had nosed in front of Castroneves prior to a last-lap caution that froze the field. He hasn’t forgotten, either. In interviews since the unification announcement, Tracy has referred to Castroneves, who won this past season’s “Dancing with the Stars” title, as “Twinkle Toes.”
OK, so “Twinkle Toes” maybe aren’t fighting words in the garage, but it could be the start of something bigger than Tony Kanaan vs. Sam Hornish, Sr.
Racing is in desperate need of a good rivalry, and this could be it. The advent of power teams such as Hendrick and Roush Fenway along with the fact that NASCAR drivers have been pre-programmed to play nice for so long it makes the coming of a Petty-Pearson or Waltrip-Earnhardt rivalry unlikely, despite the occasional Tony Stewart blow-up.
Connors had McEnroe. Evert had Navratilova. Palmer had Nicklaus. Nicklaus had Watson. Foyt had Andretti. The Steelers had the Raiders. The Patriots have the Colts.
“The Chrome Horn” has “Twinkle Toes” — the ever-smiling, popular Castroneves vs. Tracy, who is popular in his own right but would willingly wear the black hat in this scenario, just as Earnhardt did when he was putting the bumper to Waltrip and Jeff Gordon.
Good guy vs. bad guy. It’s just good for business.
Open-wheel racing has done a lot to help itself over the past few weeks. Now, it needs to do a little more by making sure Tracy is a big part of what so many hope is a brighter future.
If Tracy is on the sidelines in 2008, IndyCar has missed another golden opportunity in the marketplace.