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6 - Orono Weekly Times Wednesday, March 18, 2009 LOCAL SPORTS LeMans Series starts this weekend The American Le Mans Series - which makes its only Canadian stop at Mosport August 27-30 - kicks-off the 2009 season with the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh from Florida March 21. The entry list reads like a "Who's-Who" in motorsports, with champions from all forms of racing competing in the 57th edition of this sports car endurance classic. SPEED's live coverage of the start begins at 10 am EDT. Heading the entry list is endurance racing's all-time winner Tom Kristensen, The eight-time Le Mans winner has a chance to become Sebring's first five-time winner. Driving the new Audi R15 TDI, Kristensen will be joined by an all-star cast of drivers that includes past Le Mans winners Marco Werner, Allan McNish and Dindo Capello. This year's field includes three recent Indy 500 winners: Scott Dixon, Dario Franchitti and Gil de Ferran. All three will be driving for Acura. Dixon is defending champion of both the Indy Racing League and the Indy 500. Current Formula One driver and three-time ChampCar Champion Sebastien Bourdais will be driving for Peugeot, as they attempt to become the first French manufacturer to win overall at Sebring. Other entrants with extensive resumes in open wheel racing include Scott Sharp, former Indy Racing League Champion and Adrian Fernandez. No less than 18 current and former American Le Mans Series champions are entered at Sebring this year, including LMP1 champions: Marco Werner, Allan McNish, Dindo Capello and Tom Kristensen; past LMP2 champions Lucas Luhr, Clint Field, Ian James, Chris Dyson and Jon Field; GT1 winners Johnny O'Connell, Jan Magnussen, Oliver Gavin, and Olivier Beretta; and GT2 champions Wolf Henzler, Jorg Bergmeister, Jaime Melo, Patrick Long and Dirk Mueller. Toronto's Tony Burgess is the lone Canadian in the field and he'll suit up for Autocon Motorsports in a LMP1 Lola/AER package, driving with Americans Bryan Willman and Chris McMurry. In addition to the American Le Mans Series, several of the US-based race championships visiting Mosport this year are holding their season-openers at Sebring, March 20-21. Mosport has added a longtime fan favorite, the TransAm® Series, to its 2009 season-opening Victoria Day SpeedFest Weekend, May 15-17. Joining the Trans-Am will be one of North America's most popular road racing championships, the SCCA Pro Racing SPEED World Challenge. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Trans-Am Series was the featured event of the Victoria Day weekend. Mosport has hosted 25 TransAm races with Scott Pruett winning the last series appearance at Canada's Home of Motorsports in 2003. Mosport has hosted the World Challenge since its inception in 1990, this year trading its traditional August date for the first Canadian long weekend of the summer. Operated by WC Vision and SCCA Pro Racing, the nineevent SPEED Channel- sponsored Championship runs as two separate series and races (SCCA SPEED GT and SCCA SPEED Touring Car) at major venues across the continent and features the world's most popular manufacturers, like Porsche, Cadillac, Acura, Mazda and Chevrolet. In addition to the SPEED GT, fans will get to enjoy a SPEED Touring Car doubleheader and the homegrown Castrol Canadian Touring Car Series, a Saturday night fireworks show, plus other races. The feature races for Mosport's Victoria Day SpeedFest, the SPEED World Challenge GT & the SPEED World Challenge Touring take to the track with both champions, GT's Randy Pobst and Touring's Peter Cunningham back to defend their titles. Four championship that are part of the Grand Prix of Mosport in August will also see action at Sebring's legendary track: the Star Mazda, Patrón GT3 Challenge by Yokohama, The IMSA Lites, The Cooper Tire Presents The Atlantic Championship, Powered by Mazda. SPEED TV will kick-off its extensive broadcast package of the American Le Mans Series this season with more than 10 hours of live coverage from Sebring. Race day, they will hit air at 10 am (all times are EDT) for the 10:30 am start and stay with the race until noon. The network picks-up the race in its fourth hour (at 2 pm) and will stay with it until the chequered flags drops at 10:30 pm. In addition to race coverage, SPEED will also air two pre-race specials Thursday, March 19 beginning at 7 pm. Thursday, March 19: Twelve Hours of Sebring/ALMS Preview 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. (Live); Project LMP1: Acura's Next Challenge 8 p.m. - 9 p.m. (Live). Saturday, March 21: Twelve Hours of Sebring (The Start) 10 a.m. - Noon (Live); Twelve Hours of Sebring 2 pm. - 11 p.m. (Live). Newcastle BOWLING MIXED LEAGUE Thursdays 7 - 9 pm Top Scores 175 + over for Mar. 12th BOWLER Game Game Game One Two Three Bob Forget Fae Forget Greg Forget Bob Lewis Bob Kilgar MaryLou Trolley Don Wright Karen Wright 186 206 179 176 243 222 178 175 200 220 210 207 198 181 176 NEWCASTLE SENIORS Bowling Top Scores 150 + over for Mar. 10th GAME ONE BOWLER GAME TWO Alec Martin Bob Scales Ed Milgate Elaine Doty Jean Hall John Tigwell Marie Trim Maureen Powell Rita Roberts Roy Hopkins 188 150 184 175 161 203 164 225 164 170 184 172 175 242 LADIES' LEAGUE Mondays 7-9pm Atom reps off to St. Kitts by Vicki Haass The Lawrcon Electric atom reps finished its consolation round last week. The team started the series with a bang, beating Fenelon Falls 6-1 and 4-1, but then struggled as it lost to Beaverton 5-4 and 5-3, Newcastle 11-2 and 4-1, Millbrook 6-4 and tied Millbrook 5-5, putting the team out of the consolation finals. Points were earned by: Kyle Cordes (7g,2a), Devon Dennis (5g,5a), Aidan Goble (4g), Luke Olsen (3g,2a), Noel Kendall (2g,5a), Adrian Jacobs (2g,3a), Ben Jeffs (2g,2a), Zach Lagace (2g,2a), Tyler Morton (2g,1a), Mathiew Phillippe (4a), Gus Qualtrough (2a), and Ryan Zeus (2a); with single assists from Zach deBoer and Matthew Haass. Shoring up the defense was Seth Hampson for goaltenders Gibson Hegan and Kevin Gough. The team will travel to St. Catharines this weekend for the St. Catharine's Warrior rep tournament. Good luck team and have fun! results for Mar. 16th Top Scores 175+ BOWLER Game Game Game One Two Three Anne Arsenault Cathy Holmes Marilyn Major Stephanie Gionet 189 197 192 200 188 50/50 winner: Charlene Perrin REBEKAH HALL EUCHRE MAR. 11TH RESULTS 1st Francis Cathcart (tie) Rob Mackey 3rd Norma Moffat 4th Ann Julicher DRAWS TOP SCORES DURHAM COUNTY SENIORS EUCHRE MARCH 16TH RESULTS TOP SCORES GIRLS' NIGHT OUT results for Mar. 11th (over 150) BOWLER Sandra Martin Kim Cowan Game One Game Two 89 89 87 84 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th Reid Harness Jane Tomlinson Mary Henderson Helen Couroux Ina Smith DRAWS 91 88 83 80 76 215 151 155 The Orono Weekly Times wishes to thank all of our volunteer sports writers for reporting on our local teams. Please keep up the good work! Joan Sutcliffe (2) Joan Sutcliffe Jean O'Neill Herb VandenHeuvel NEWCASTLE SENIORS BOWLING EUCHRE MARCH 10TH RESULTS 1st 2nd 3rd 4th Russell Powell Kay Powell Alec Martin Jean Holmes TOP SCORES Stan Powell 50 Maureen Powell 46 Bertha Fisher 40 Marilyn Martin, Stan Powell Marie Trim, Jessie Milgate Ulva Calver, Ed Milgate HIDDEN SCORES LOW 59 59 57 55 DRAWS