The 2019 champion, who was denied victory in 2015 following contact at the last corner with Mattias Ekstrom, led semi-final one from lights to flag to secure the front row for the all-important final. As on day one, the Swede didn’t have things all his own way in qualifying on Sunday, with Dutchman Kevin Abbring and

Frijns, who shared the winning #31 WRT ORECA-07 Gibson with Ferdinand Habsburg and Charles Milesi on the Belgian team’s first Le Mans outing, came out of the night with a 45-second lead over the #41 sister car of Robert Kubica, Yifei Ye and Louis Deletraz. But on Sunday the #41 car steadily closed the gap

Uruguayan Urrutia was handed a free run to the first corner after fastest qualifier Rob Huff was forced to start from the pitlane after the British driver clipped a tyre stack in the first race and incurred severe damage to his left-front suspension. His Zengo Motorsport team ran out of time to repair the Cupra

The #7 Toyota Gazoo Racing entry had a 68sec lead despite a wayward moment for Lopez at Mulsanne Corner, when Kaz Nakajima pitted the #8 car pitted at the end of the 17th hour. However, when Lopez handed over to Conway, the pitcrew struggled with a sticking wheelnut and gave up 40sec of its advantage

Hot on the heels of his first victory in 2021 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course last time out, 2014 IndyCar champion Power denied Andretti Autosport driver Herta by less than 0.1mph to nail the 63rd open wheel pole position of his career. The third driver to go out, Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet’s Felix Rosenqvist,

The final step in the convergence of regulations for the top prototype classes across IMSA and the World Endurance Championship was announced in July. This will allow LMH machinery to compete in IMSA against the new breed of LMP2-based LMDh prototypes from 2023, but Glickenhaus would be excluded by a series rule in North America

Japan is set to host the championship’s final round from 11-14 November although the rising number of COVID-19 cases has resulted in confirmation this week that October’s Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix will be cancelled for a second consecutive year. MotoGP has already scrubbed its Japanese GP from its calendar earlier this year before this

Yamaha announced on Friday that it had parted ways with Vinales with immediate effect for the remainder of the 2021 MotoGP season following his suspension by the team last week. Vinales was found to be trying to deliberately damage his YZR-M1’s engine during the final laps of the Styrian Grand Prix, and was subsequently withdrawn

The French manufacturer, part of the Renault group, has revealed that it is actively evaluating developing a Le Mans Hypercar or an LMDh prototype for the 2023 or 2024 season. Alonso, who resumed his F1 career with the marque this year after twice winning the Le Mans 24 Hours with Toyota, would be an obvious

Nicolas Lapierre got within three tenths of Kazuki Nakajima’s time-topping Toyota during the fourth period of free practice that followed the Hyperpole qualifying session. Nakajima set the pace from the beginning of Thursday evening’s night session in the #8 Toyota GR010 HYBRID, ending up on a 3m27.994s. Lapierre posted an improvement with 40 minutes to

The Belgian, who is part of Audi’s factory GT3 roster, explained that he got the maximum out of his Porsche 911 RSR-19 on the way to beating Ferrari driver Daniel Serra to the top spot in Thursday evening’s Hyperpole session by nearly two tenths of a second. “Normally I would always say I could go

The Le Mans 24 Hours is widely considered, and rightly so, to be a bucket list event that racers all over the world aspire to enter. But for every driver that gets to thrash around its 8.46 miles of hallowed tarmac in the dead of night, there are many more who miss the boat. For

The two-hour FP2 session was run in darkness throughout, with all drivers required to complete at least five laps at night ahead of Saturday’s race. Jose Maria Lopez set the early pace in the #7 Toyota GR010 HYBRID he shares with Mike Conway and Kamui Kobayashi with a time of 3m29.810s, while Kazuki Nakajima worked

Kobayashi set the session’s benchmark time of 3m26.279s aboard his Toyota GR010 HYBRID in the first half of Wednesday night’s one-hour qualifying, going over a second quicker than team-mate Brendon Hartley in the sister #8 car that currently leads the World Endurance Championship points standings. In the second half of the session, Alpine driver Matthieu

For with it well entrenched in that ultra-close midfield pack, any small pace advantage that rivals gained as they pushed on with their current cars risked shuffling the Hinwil-based operation down the order. Sure enough, with most of the grid bringing at least some major developments early in the campaign, it’s been perhaps a tougher

Pierson, who lies fourth in the 2021 USF2000 Championship on the Road to Indy ladder, is on course to beat the record set by fellow American Matt McMurry in 2014 should he make the grid in one of United’s LMP2 ORECA-Gibson 07s at Le Mans on June 11/12 2022. He will be 16 and 117

Porsche locked out the top three places in the GTE Pro class on Sunday, with works driver Kevin Estre laying down the benchmark of 3m52.901s in the #92 car in the morning session – just 0.003s up on team-mate Gianmaria Bruni’s #91 RSR-19. The afternoon session was headed by WeatherTech’s Earl Bamber, whose 3m52.938s lap

Espargaro was one of a handful of riders – including eventual race-winner Brad Binder – who gambled on staying out on slicks when the rain intensified in the closing stages of last Sunday’s Red Bull Ring contest. The Aprilia rider found himself in second as he started lap 26 of 28, but tumbled back to

Stoker’s ‘Motor Sport for All’ paper has been overseen by nine-time Le Mans 24 Hours winner and FIA Drivers Commission president Tom Kristensen, who is the candidate for FIA deputy president for sport. It covers all areas of motorsport development from safety and education to diversity and access. Its objectives include: Prioritising safety in the

As rainfall intensified in the closing stages of last Sunday’s 28-lap Austrian GP, Binder was the only rider of the leading six to stay out on lap 25 as conditions worsened. This proved to be an inspired decision as he managed to keep his KTM upright to take a stunning victory on his team’s home

All-new car rules will be introduced in the sport in 2022, the goal being to have closer racing and increase overtaking through simpler aerodynamics revolving around ground effect. Although the DRS didn’t feature on the full-scale model of a 2022 car revealed last month at Silverstone, F1 bosses have decided to retain it at least

Denny Hamlin led the way entering the second, two-lap overtime but Chase Briscoe ran off course and cut the track and was immediately handed a penalty by NASCAR. Briscoe, however, continued racing on the track and battled Hamlin hard for the lead, hitting him in the right-rear corner and spinning him. Allmendinger, running third at

The Swiss-Italian entered the season finale second in the drivers’ table with a three-point deficit to Nyck de Vries, but Mortara and Evans were eliminated in a major early crash. Evans suffered a suspected driveshaft failure and lurched forward off the line but then sat prone, with cars parting around him to leave Mortara unsighted

Alpine, then called Renault, and McLaren were embroiled in a tense three-way fight for third in the 2020 constructors’ championship, a battle which also included Racing Point, now Aston Martin. While McLaren continued its upward trajectory in 2021 and now has to contend with a resurgent Ferrari for third place, Alpine and Aston Martin have

Palou, who had qualified sixth, was compromised with an engine mapping issue from the drop of the green flag, but had picked his way forward once the team allowed him to use three of his engine map settings. He had just eased his way past one of his prime title rivals, Arrow McLaren SP’s Pato O’Ward

The Brazilian driver overhauled the front-row starting DS Techeetahs of Jean-Eric Vergne and Antonio Felix da Costa and then fended off Venturi driver Edoardo Mortara to claim his second win of the 2020-21 season. The result comes ahead of Audi’s departure from Formula E following Sunday’s finale at the same venue, having announced in December

The Northern Irishman whisked his Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N around 0.125 seconds clear of the BTC Racing Honda Civic Type R of Josh Cook. Cook’s team-mate, Senna Proctor, sat on top of the times for most of what was the only dry session at the Scottish circuit. But in the 39th minute of 40,

May’s GP of Indy winner Rinus VeeKay of Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet was the first driver to duck into the 71sec bracket, with a 1min11.8641sec effort on his fourth lap, with Jack Harvey of Meyer Shank Racing-Honda – traditionally fast around here – his nearest competitor, 0.155sec behind. With 20mins to go, Lundgaard, Formula 2 race winner, jumped

The local hero produced a masterclass, dominating the evening loop of stages as the sun began to set in Belgium, winning all three tarmac tests to open up a 7.6s lead over Breen. Neuville and Breen proved the class of the field making the the most of their knowledge of Rally Ypres’ peculiar tarmac roads

A heavy thundery downpour at the end of the Moto3 session left the Red Bull Ring soaked for the start of the second MotoGP practice of the Austrian GP weekend. Tech3 KTM rider Lecuona was first out on track in the conditions followed by factory KTM counterpart Brad Binder and Tech3 team-mate Danilo Petrucci. Lecuona