ROAD AMERICA 2012

Monte Cristo wrote:VILLENEUVE'S FUTURE: Jacques Villeneuve will run the Nationwide Series race at Montreal in August as planned for Penske Racing.

Villeneuve was embroiled in controversy Saturday after running into Danica Patrick on the last lap of the Nationwide race at Road America. She was battling for a top-five finish, and contact from Villeneuve caused Patrick to spin and fall to 12th.

"Where Villeneuve goes, there tends to be cars that have problems, whether it's his fault or the other car's fault or (just) stock car racing at the end of the race," Patrick said. "You all can make a decision for yourself, what you think happened there."

Bud Denker, senior vice president of Penske Corp., said Villeneuve would drive as scheduled at the Montreal course named after Villeneuve's late father.


"I talked to Jacques this morning, and he said the same thing he did after the race, which is that it was a racing incident," Denker said. "There was no intent, it was the product of road racing, and he took out Danica, which was unfortunate because she drove a great race. But he'll be racing at Montreal as planned."

Villeneuve, the 1995 Indianapolis 500 winner and 1997 Formula One champion, dominated the middle stages of the race but spun out on lap 33 and lost several positions. He blamed the incident with Patrick on racing hard with Max Papis.

"We were racing hard, and I wasn't even fighting with Danica, I was fighting with Max Papis," Villeneuve said. "And just before the braking (zone), I guess he was wanting to cross over and go to the inside of Danica. And he probably didn't know I was there so he pushed me into the grass, and you don't slow down that much in the grass. So by the time I was on the racetrack again, I was going a little bit slower than Danica. That's all."

Spitfire_garage wrote:Amazing how some of the stories about JV bumping Danica leave out the part about McDowell bumping him. This one just say's JV "spun out"

I think Nascar needs another "bad boy", if JV were American, he'd have a drive.