Q&A: Darren Manning and Phil Barker - Pt.1.

This weekend's Rockingham 500 sees the debut of a new, all-British entry, as Yorkshireman Darren Manning pilots the Team St George Lola-Cosworth against the regulars of the CART FedEx Championship Series.

Here, the former British Grand Prix support race winner and Macau F3 champion, talks about his hopes and aspirations for the race, along with Team St George team manager Phil Barker, who will be overseeing the historic debut on Saturday.

Merrill Cain:
We're pleased to be joined today by two representatives from the newest team competing in the CART FedEx Championship Series - Team St George - which is set to make its debut this weekend at the Rockingham 500 in Corby, England. We'd like to first welcome in Darren Manning, who will be driving the #19 Team St. George Ford-Cosworth/Lola Bridgestone in a few days. Darren, I'd like to welcome you in. Congratulations and thanks for joining us this afternoon.

Darren Manning:
Thanks very much. It's a pleasure to be here.

MC:
We're also joined by Phil Barker, who is the team manager for Team St George. Thank you for taking some time to talk with us today.

Phil Barker:
Thank you.

MC:
We'd like to give a little bit of background on our guests before we open it up for questions. Darren is a 27-year old high-stakes racer, having run competitively in the FIA International F3000 series for two seasons, finishing tenth in last season's standings. He has been a test driver for British American Racing and the Williams team in the Formula One ranks, and was the winner the prestigious Macau Grand Prix - which is the all-star race in F3 - in 1999. Lately, Darren has been trying his hand at oval track racing, running cars in the ASCAR series in his native England. This will be his first race on an oval in an open-wheel car this weekend.

Phil is a Northampton native who began his racing career as an engineer for Ray Mallock Ltd, a specialised automotive engineering company in the UK. After working as an engineer in Formula One for several years, he rejoined Ray Mallock and headed up several touring and sportscar programmes for the company, including the 24 Hours of Le Mans over the last two years.

Phil, let's start with the questions with you. First off, tell us about the formation of Team St George and what you've been doing over the last couple weeks to prepare for the race this weekend. We also know that you are working with Dale Coyne Racing as well as Ray Mallock Ltd, so can you give us an overview of the team?

PB:
The project came together from the first discussions about a [month] ago with Rockingham. They were looking effectively to see whether we would be interested in Team St George. Essentially, we were. Two weeks ago, we got the green light on the project. At that point, we was aware our partners would be Dale Coyne Racing. In the last two weeks, we've had a lot of busy contacts with Dale Coyne Racing, sorting out exactly which company can provide which resource for the project, bearing in mind we don't have a massive history, to be honest - no history in single-seat racing, but a wealth of history in other formulas. We went through all of the resources needed, engineers, mechanics, fabricators, etcetera, and picking the skills from both parties until we came up with a team which we think is capable of running one of these cars.

MC:
Tell us what your efforts have been like as you're trying to get the team up to speed for this weekend. I imagine it kind of a feverous pitch for you.

PB:
Yeah, things have been rather busy for us. We checked the car on a Saturday evening from Stanstead. Tuesday, we endeavoured to start the rookie test for Darren. We had a few little glitches with the telemetry, and couldn't run the car, so we finished the test on the Wednesday. We've slowly been getting the guys working together nice and steady, no major panics. Over the week at the RML factory, the guys have been gelling together quite well, culminating in the car being finished today and having quite a heavy session on pit-stop practice, just generally seeing which guys could perform at what level. It was very interesting.

MC:
Tell us a little bit about what went into the selection of Darren as your driver.

PB:
Well, there was a lot of consideration. I mean, the primary consideration that went in was that the driver had to be English. As you know, we've got quite a few hot shoes that are actually doing Formula One test driving but, essentially, a short-list of drivers was collated. It was systematically a case of going through the drivers to see who fits into our criteria. As it happened, Darren shone through.

MC:
Darren, this is a good opportunity to switch over to you. I know you're familiar with the Rockingham track from your ASCAR experience, and also in testing over the last week or so, as Phil mentioned the rookie test there. What are your thoughts on the Champcar? What do you think about the performance of the car compared to other things you've driven? What are your realistic expectations for this weekend, keeping in mind it is your first go around with a team in the CART series in general?

DM:
Firstly, with regards to the car, the guys, especially David Watson, the engineer, gave me a great car to perform our rookie test, instilled a lot of confidence in me, enabled me to just basically go faster and faster with each lap I completed. You know, Formula One cars are still pretty fast-paced in their own right. At Monza, [where] I've done quite a lot of testing, top speeds are over 230 miles per hour. Everybody knows the performing capabilities of a Formula One car with the carbon brakes and the downforce. I'm used to extremely fast cars, but not particularly on oval tracks where you don't really decelerate very much and you have to carry a lot of momentum. But I felt I coped with that pretty well.

It's difficult to say what my expectations are. As a racing driver, obviously I want to win as much as the next guy. But, obviously, I'm very realistic. Being in racing for as long as I have, I know that obviously lots of things can go wrong, and you don't necessarily always get the rub of the green. I might not get the best qualifying slots. Who knows? Everybody is well aware of what racing is all about. But on the other side of that, we know [that], in oval racing, you can win from anywhere on the grid effectively. We see guys like Paul Tracy regularly winning from midway down the field after a pole qualifying or something. In that respect, we could maybe get lucky. But I'm looking for a good result and possibly sneaking into top ten.

MC:
We know you'll have a strong fan contingent over there. No doubt about that. Let's open it up and take a few questions.

Q:
Darren, first of all, over here in the States we always talk about home field advantage with every sport. Do you have home field advantage?

DM:
I hope so, I really hope so [laughter]. You know, hopefully it's a good excuse for the English guys to get the England jerseys back on after the World Cup, you know, really give us some support. In motor racing, you very rarely get a car that's flying the flag for your country, so I think it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and a very rare thing. I think the weather is going to be fantastic apparently next weekend. Hopefully the grandstands are going to be packed with white and red shirts.

Q:
As an Englishman, you have some pretty big shoes to fill on the CART series....

DM:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'm pretty experienced in racing, starting karting when I was ten years old, but I'm not putting too much pressure on myself. I'm a great believer of deserving - you know, if I'm tenth on the grid, for example, that's where I deserve to be. I'm faster than the guys behind me, not as fast as the guys in front of me. Not too much pressure put on myself. But if I'm not on the pace, I certainly will be putting a lot of pressure on myself to make myself go faster.

Q:
Talk about the first time that someone said "we think we may be able to give you an opportunity to race at Rockingham"?

DM:
It was a bit of a jaw-dropper really. We've been negotiating. My name had been touted around, as Phil had been saying, for about eight weeks or so. My name had been in the frame but, as soon as they told me, it all happened so quickly, you know, the team and everything, the car getting or here. I think I found out on something like the Saturday, then I had a seat fitting on the Monday straight after that, out in the car on Tuesday. I'd been preparing physically in the gym and things, but nothing as quick a jump-in as that.

Q:
Darren, just want to know, oval racing to most Europeans, both fans and drivers, is still a bit of an unusual kind of an animal. This is something that is North American in that aspect. Do you ever think you'll feel comfortable on ovals? Do you think that the English race fan will ever really cotton to just going around in circles? It's more complicated than that....

DM:
Yeah, definitely. I mean, like you were saying, the ASCAR series, this is pretty new over here. This year, the crowds have been absolutely spectacular. The British Touring Car Championship has been very big in English motor racing for the past couple of decades, but now I believe the crowds that they're getting at some of the ASCAR races are equalling - if not out-doing - the touring cars. So people are tending to want and get a bit more experienced.

Also it's a lot more exciting. There's a lot of coverage on English television, in the media and things. People are getting more excited. For example, I watch Champcar racing. I generally never watch Formula One, put it that way. Things like this, I think we're really pushing hard to get people in the seats, to get them excited, and hopefully Team St George is another step in that direction.

Q:
Phil, we had heard initially that some of the equipment you'll be using is stuff used at Sigma Racing. Is it Ford, Lola, Bridgestone tyres?

PB:
Yeah, that combination is still together. We think we have a competitive package.

Q:
Have you had any updates on that thing at all, or is it basically stuff as it sat on the floor at Sigma?

PB:
It's been updated to the current 2002 package. We expect it to be competitive.

Q:
Darren, this is your very first Champcar race. Would you have preferred it to be on a road course or do you think you'll adapt to the oval quickly?

DM:
To be honest, I'm just so delighted and honoured to be out in a Champcar, I'm not too worried about either. I mean, probably I would have preferred it to be on a street circuit or a road course, if you like, as that's where my forte has been, but I'm sure I can do a good enough job on the oval.