Fans robbed of classic decider
Comment by James StanfordWe were all robbed of a classic final-round heavyweight title decider the moment Rick Kelly hit Craig Lowndes on the second lap.
Kelly also blew the chance to finally prove he is a better driver than Lowndes.
Kelly raced with his brain more than his heart this season and he went into the final round leading because he had been remarkably consistent despite not winning a round.
Lowndes had some shocking results, but he always raced hard and took four round wins.
Kelly has always said he was driving conservatively because the points system rewarded consistency, and he said he could have gone faster if he had needed to take more risks.
The final race at Phillip Island gave him the chance to prove he really
could outpace Lowndes.
Within the rules, the stewards made the right decision to give Kelly a drive-through penalty and uphold that decision yesterday.
But Kelly's move, deliberate or not, had wider implications.
It gave him his first title.
But he will have to prove next season that he is the true champion.
December 12, 2006
Rick Kelly's a real nice bloke, I've chatted with him a couple of times, and helped him out at Bathurst last year when he was feeling really crook. However he'd got to be the most controversial driver in the series. In 2005 he had that tangle with Jason Bright at Indy and was branded a dangerous driver, he was also involved in the Marcus Ambros 'break testing' at Indy and made a lot of media hype with his comments. Throughout his career he's either made mistakes, or comments at times when he really needed to not have, and it's given him a name for being the controversial guy. It's a shame his championship win has got that tag now too.
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