by Joe Faraldo, NAADA president

On Thursday, July 22, the World Cup bus rolled off a main highway into an area laced with beautiful lush green and light brown rolling hills. We’ve landed in the Champagne country of Epernay en route to the Hippodrome at Reims.

On the bus they commence the ceremony of drawing the pills for the last legs on Saturday; each driver draws his own pill and fate. The US entry draws for himself the 13 hole in the second line. For the last race in Enghein we must draw in the first line, as those are the rules, and this time Alan Schwartz draws himself the five hole.

These rolling hills bring us to the Chateau Moet Chandon/Dom Perignone. There the tour is all about Champagne; how it was discovered, how it is made and how many turns there are to every bottle every day until 15,000 turns are accumulated and the bottle is tilted so the sediment can be removed from the neck by a quick freezing process in the neck. The sediment is then replaced with a small quantity of alcohol and yeast to continue the process of fermentation in the bottle. This small 85,000 acre vineyard is the smallest, but most famous in the Champagne region, exporting 80 percent of its production of which the United States consumes the most.

After the tour we stop at the Cathedral at Reims where Ike accepted the surrender of the German forces in France during World War II. Then it’s off to the races at the Hippodrome where our guy has a breaker and we get disqualified after the Russian driver steps on our wheel.

Next race sees Alan on a 37-1 shot and after his mount tried unsuccessfully to duck under the gate twice he managed to get away OK, sitting third over for most of the 2,450 meters. In this 1-3/4 mile race the racing is different than in the USA as drivers sit and conserve their horses for the longer journey ahead.

Sitting in the judges car that tracks the horses every move from inside their infield vantage point I could clearly see the German driver drift out and hook Alan’s wheel and the USA rep had to take back and lose a crucial step or two heading into the last turn.

In the straight, as they call the stretch, the American started to gain on the point and race leader Cristian Mayr. After collaring the Austrian it looked pretty much like a USA victory was at hand until the last moment when the cold war heated up as the Russian driver appeared from out of the clouds on the outside fence to grab the win.

The USA now sits eighth in the competition with 26 points behind Austria at 41 points. Spain, France, and Sweden are all in the high and mid 30s. Sweden jumped up in the point standings by winning the first race at Reims. A win is absolutely necessary for the USA to have shot with only two races to go. Two wins could seal the deal so long as the cards fall right, meaning that those with little points need to do better than those in the lead right now.

Competitions on foreign soil do tend to favor the foreign born who are used to a different style of racing over familiar surroundings — a fact some very talented professional drivers like Andy Miller and Jason Bartlett found out when they very ably represented the USA in the World Professional Driving competitions in recent years.

In 2011 that competition will come to the USA and hopefully the tides will turn. Back here and now our hopes ride on a Saturday with some good luck thrown in at the Racetrack near Paris.

Current leaderboard after two days of competition:

1-Mayr-Austria-11-12-10-8=41
2-Cruellas-Munar-Spain-14-11-7-5=37
3-Poree-France-10-14-12-1=37
4-Pilenberg-Sweden-8-5-14-9=36
5-Kulin-Finland-7-7-11-4=29
6-Makarevich-Russia-5-8-1-14=28
7-Van Pollaert-Belgium-6-4-8-10=28
8-Schwartz-USA-12-1-1-12=26
9-Felber-Switzerland-1-9-5-7=22
10-Jessen-Denmark-1-10-6-1=18
11-Pogel-Germany-1-6-9-1=17
12-Kriechbaumer-New Zealand-9-3-1-1=14
13-Turbucz-Hungary-1-1-4-6=12