MotoGP legend Valentino Rossi has suffered a broken leg in a motocross training accident. Rossi sustained the injury to both the tibia and fibula of the right leg that he previously broke in his high-speed practice crash at Mugello in 2010. In a statement, Rossi’s Yamaha team said: “Following an enduro training accident on Thursday,
Month: August 2017
Andretti Autosport has announced that it will retain its relationship with Honda after it had considered a switch to Chevrolet for the 2018 IndyCar Series. Andretti only won once in 2016, at the Indianapolis 500 with Alexander Rossi, and it began considering returning to Chevrolet power. But Andretti has now signed a “multi-year agreement” with
Hayden Paddon has written off the remainder of his World Rally Championship campaign and says he is focusing his attention on a 2018 title challenge instead. The Hyundai driver has struggled to get comfortable with the marque’s i20 Coupe WRC, with a number of teething troubles with the new car coinciding with a dip in
Citroen has started gambling on the development of its C3 WRC to ensure it can fight to win the 2018 World Rally Championship opener in Monte Carlo next January. The French manufacturer withdrew its works entry for the 2016 WRC, focusing on a year-long development programme with the C3 built to the new-for-2017 rules. Citroen
MotoGP championship leader Andrea Dovizioso believes his title rivals doubted him and Ducati prior to his most recent victory in Sunday’s British Grand Prix. Dovizioso worked his way through from sixth on the grid at Silverstone to take his fourth win of the season, capitalising on Marc Marquez’s engine failure to retake the lead in
German driver Marijan Griebel has won a World Rally Championship outing in 2018 by clinching the European Rally Championship’s Junior Under 28 title at Rally Zlin. The ERC revamped its Junior category for 2017 and created the U28 element for drivers under 28 driving R5 cars, with the rebranded U27 strand catering for the R2-based
Thierry Neuville says he will stop focusing on World Rally Champonship title rival Sebastien Ogier’s position and take a “much more aggressive” strategy. Neuville had arrived at the last WRC round in Germany leading the standings on countback over Ogier, but damaged his suspension and transmission and failed to score. Ogier finished third and reopened
Dries Vanthoor and Marcel Fassler put themselves into title contention in the Blancpain GT Series Sprint Cup by completing a dominant weekend at the Hungaroring with victory in the feature race. Fastest in every session, the WRT Audi pair had converted pole position to win the qualifying race and continued their good form to beat
Will Power said cold tyres caused the frightening Gateway IndyCar crash in which Ed Carpenter’s car landed on top of him. Tony Kanaan had already spun into the wall during the parade laps, and when the race got under way properly polesitter Power lost control as Penske team-mate Josef Newgarden completed an outside-line pass on
Simon Pagenaud was left fuming at Penske team-mate Josef Newgarden’s wheelbanging pass for victory in the closing stint of Saturday night’s Gateway IndyCar Series race. Reigning champion Pagenaud had taken the lead of the race by just nosing out of the pitlane ahead of points leader Newgarden by a minimal margin under yellow. Pagenaud retained
Nakajima Honda’s Bertrand Baguette and Kosuke Matsuura won the Suzuka 1000km, while 2009 Formula 1 world champion Jenson Button finished 12th after a fraught Super GT debut. Troubles for Button’s #16 Mugen Honda team began when he was released into the path of the #7 BMW as he took the wheel at the first round
Kondo Nissan’s Joao Paulo de Oliveira and Daiki Sasaki claimed a surprise Suzuka 1000km pole, as 2009 Formula 1 world champion Jenson Button qualified ninth on his Super GT debut. Oliveira, who was nominated by Kondo Racing to take part in the second leg of qualifying, lapped the Suzuka circuit in 1m47.74s to secure Nissan’s
Nissan, Honda and Toyota have all committed to field factory teams in the inaugural Suzuka 10 Hours round of the Intercontinental GT Challenge next year. The three Japanese car makers made the pledge at the official launch of the race ahead of this weekend’s Suzuka 1000Km round of the Super GT Series, which the 10-hour
Kimi Raikkonen set the fastest time in first practice for the Belgian Grand Prix as Formula 1 returned from its summer break at Spa-Francorchamps. The Ferrari driver pipped title contenders Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel to top spot in the opening session, though had to use ultra-soft tyres to defeat the soft-shod Hamilton. Force India’s
Teenage rally star Kalle Rovanpera has been selected as one of the eight drivers who will fight for a Hyundai factory seat in the 2018 World Rally Championship’s WRC2 class. The seven drivers who join Rovanpera in the next stage of Hyundai’s process to find a future star are current WRC2 competitors Emil Bergkvist, Gus
Rally Poland will be dropped from the World Rally Championship schedule for 2018 following repeated breaches of spectator security, with Turkey taking its place on the calendar. The event’s demise after four successive years (six in total) in the WRC was telegraphed when the FIA experienced further problems in trying to control spectators at the
Citroen driver Kris Meeke will have to wait until the start of September before his participation in the World Rally Championship’s Rally Catalunya round is confirmed. Meeke broke the suspension on his C3 WRC on last Thursday night’s opening spectator stage of Rally Germany in Saarbrucken. He returned under Rally2 rules and was forced to
Joe Gibbs Racing driver Kyle Busch says the 2017 NASCAR Cup season had made him want to pull his hair out before his recent victories at Pocono and Bristol. Busch has led all but five races so far this season, but two second-place finishes – at Martinsville and Charlotte – were the best results he
Ott Tanak says his Rally Germany win has played him into the thick of the fight for this year’s World Rally Championship title. The M-Sport Ford Fiesta WRC driver scored a comfortable victory last weekend, after an inspired tyre choice in Friday afternoon’s wet conditions propelled him to the front. Tanak’s win narrowed the gap
Sebastien Ogier has revealed he found World Rally Championship title rival Thierry Neuville’s Rally Germany stoppage “difficult” and “strange” to deal with during the event. The rivals had arrived in Germany level on points and started the second day third and fourth, with Neuville ahead. Neuville’s Hyundai’s left-rear suspension broke in a cut on Saturday’s
Ott Tanak clinched victory in Germany as his M-Sport Ford team-mate Sebastien Ogier rebuilt a 17-point World Rally Championship lead over Thierry Neuville. In the lead fight from the outset, Tanak hit the front for good amid Friday afternoon’s torrential rain – when he was one of a handful of drivers to give the WRC’s
Ott Tanak protected his lead over Andreas Mikkelsen on the first loop of Rally Germany’s final day, as Sebastien Ogier lost touch with the leaders in third. Although Citroen driver Mikkelsen went faster than Tanak’s M-Sport Ford on both early Sunday stages and declared he wanted to keep the pressure on, he was only able
Kyle Busch took his sixth NASCAR Cup victory at Bristol in a hard-fought race with rookie Erik Jones. Starting 18th on the grid, Busch picked his way up into the top 10 and took the lead for the first time just half-a-dozen laps before the end of the first stage. From that point on, the
Ex-Formula 1 driver Will Stevens will return to the WRT Audi team for the Blancpain GT Series Sprint Cup round at the Hungaroring later this month. The former Caterham and Manor F1 racer will take up his place in the Belgian team’s Sprint Cup line-up alongside Markus Winkelhock in Hungary on August 27. The 26-year-old
NASCAR Cup points leader Martin Truex Jr says he did not consider moving over for team-mate Erik Jones to help the rookie qualify for the playoffs in Sunday’s Michigan race. Furniture Row Racing pair Truex and Jones held first and second in the latter stages of the race, but the Toyota drivers were trumped on
Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyle Larson passed NASCAR Cup points leader Martin Truex Jr on a final restart after a red flag stoppage to claim his third successive win at Michigan. Larson led just two laps of Sunday’s race but hit the front at the right time to deny Truex a second win in as many
Chevrolet has unveiled the Camaro ZL1 its teams will use in the NASCAR Cup series from 2018. The manufacturer has used its SS model in the series since the introduction of NASCAR‘s Generation 6 stock cars as part of a push to make cars look more like their road-going versions in 2013. Since replacing the
Hendrick Motorsports team owner Rick Hendrick says he was “blown away” by new NASCAR Cup signing William Byron’s junior racing success. Byron, who has not raced in NASCAR’s top tier, will replace the outgoing Kasey Kahne, after a deal was formally announced by Hendrick on Wednesday. He will complete the team’s four-car line-up alongside Jimmie
Hendrick Motorsports has chosen teenage protege William Byron to replace Kasey Kahne in its 2018 NASCAR Cup line-up. Autosport has learned that the 19-year-old will be promoted from the Xfinity Series to join Jimmie Johnson, Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman at Hendrick next season, with an official announcement of the move expected by next week.
The number of past champions and veterans losing NASCAR Cup drives is a symptom of declining sponsor interest and drivers having been overpaid, reckons Dale Earnhardt Jr. Monday’s news that Hendrick Motorsports was dropping Kasey Kahne for 2018 with a year left on his contract followed Stewart-Haas Racing’s decision not to take up 2004 champion