New Champ Car orders begin

UPDATE #2 As it turns out, the new car will not test this coming week at Road Atlanta like we previously heard. We are told that the test is about three weeks away as work is completed on the new Hewland gearbox. The gearbox will have essentially the same Hewland internals as the existing Champ Car gearbox, but the casing, which was designed by Lola for the existing car, is being redesigned to fit the Panoz chassis. We also learned that the onboard starter will have enough battery for three attempts at a restart.

07/29/06 In a story first broke here on AutoRacing1.com, this rumor is upgraded to 'fact' today as Bob Gelles (pictured right) announced to the public at last night's Champ Car launch gala that he would be entering Champ Car in 2007 and has ordered new cars.

07/23/06 Word in Edmonton is that Champ Car announced to the team owners in a meeting Saturday the new Panoz DP01 will test at Road Atlanta in Georgia Wednesday through Friday after the San Jose race weekend. We hear Roberto Moreno will do the initial shakedown tests and that Jimmy Vasser might follow.

We also hear that the first batch of DP01's will be delivered to team owners on November 15th – all together. After that, each team will get their 2nd car on a first order, first delivered basis.

We hear purchase orders for the new cars were handed out to all team owners at the meeting and Bob Gelles was the first to sign the contract for the first two DP01's. This means that Gelles Racing, an Atlantics team that plans on moving up to Champ Car in 2007 with a 2-car team, will be the first to get their 2nd car in December. We suspect we will hear some announcement to that regard in the not too distant future.