Simon Pagenaud was fastest in third practice for the 2017 IndyCar season at Sonoma as he looks to become the first driver to successfully defend a series title since ’11. Pagenaud set a record lap time of 1m16.0329s to finish ahead of Ganassi’s Scott Dixon by 0.1125 seconds. The top five positions were filled by
Month: September 2017
Blancpain Sprint Cup leaders Franck Perera and Maximilian Buhk extended their championship lead to seven points with a thrilling qualifying race win at the Nurburgring. The HTP Mercedes duo were not the first to cross the line, failing to overcome a stunning defensive drive from Ezequiel Perez Companc, but a penalty for the Grasser Lamborghini
IndyCar rookie of the year Ed Jones is close to signing a new deal to remain at Dale Coyne Racing, despite interest from rival teams. The 2016 Indy Lights champion graduated to IndyCar this season, partnering Sebastien Bourdais at DCR. Bourdais’ high-speed crash at the Indianapolis 500 then pushed Jones into the leading driver
Brad Keselowski has hit out at what he believes is “complete ineptitude” from NASCAR to keep the manufacturer playing field level in its flagship Cup series. The Penske driver, who races Ford machinery, caused a stir when he tweeted “Haven’t seen NASCAR let a manufacturer get this far ahead since the ’70s” after four Toyotas
A decade ago today (September 15) Colin McRae died and the world lost arguably its most charismatic rally driver ever. Undoubtedly it lost one of the quickest and most committed. From a rally career that spanned 22 of his 38 years, we look back and pick 10 of the biggest, best and most influential results
Valentino Rossi’s relationship with Maverick Vinales is “completely different” to his fractious partnership with Jorge Lorenzo, says Yamaha team boss Lin Jarvis. Vinales replaced Lorenzo alongside Rossi at the factory Yamaha squad at the start of this season, immediately proving to be on the pace during winter testing and the early rounds. But, despite his
To mark the 10th anniversary of the loss of 1995 World Rally champion Colin McRae on Friday, a special edition of The Autosport Podcast looks back at his life. With contributions from Prodrive boss David Richards, former Subaru technical director David Lapworth, brother Alister McRae, rival co-driver Robert Reid and four-time WRC title winner Sebastien
Citroen insists a potential reunion of Sebastien Ogier and Sebastien Loeb will not produce a repeat of the pair’s volatile relationship during their previous stint as World Rally Championship team-mates. Team Principal Yves Matton said last week that signing M-Sport driver and current championship leader Ogier was now Citroen’s priority for the 2018 season, while
Danica Patrick has lost her Stewart-Haas Racing seat for 2018 and her future in the NASCAR Cup series is unclear. Patrick announced on her Facebook page on Tuesday that she would not be staying with SHR “due to a new sponsorship arrangement in 2018”. She had begun 2017 with Nature’s Bakery as the primary sponsor
Richard Petty Motorsports is expected to replace Aric Almirola with his injury stand-in Darrell Wallace for the 2018 NASCAR Cup season. Wallace contested four Cup rounds in RPM’s #43 Ford earlier this season while Almirola was sidelined with back injuries from a crash at Kansas Speedway. Smithfield, Almirola’s backer throughout his time at the Petty
Dale Earnhardt Jr apologised to his fans after missing out on the NASCAR Cup playoffs at Richmond, in his final season before retirement. Earnhardt came into the regular season finale needing a win to guarantee a playoff spot, and he ran a longer tyre stint in the hope a late caution would help him to
Valentino Rossi’s enduring ability in MotoGP against a host of young rising stars is an inspiration to Daniel Ricciardo in Formula 1. Ricciardo has faced intense pressure from teenage team-mate Max Verstappen at Red Bull over the past two seasons, and says coping with the situation has been a significant learning experience. Rossi, 38, is
Marc Marquez says he cannot understand why MotoGP fans “cheer” when he crashed at the Misano round, and admitted it left him feeling “sad”. Honda rider Marquez won the San Marino Grand Prix with a last-lap pass on Pramac Ducati rider Danilo Petrucci, and was booed by the partisan crowd on the podium. The reigning
Mercedes chief Toto Wolff believes this weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix street circuit will favour Formula 1 rivals Ferrari and Red Bull. Though it has excelled on low-downforce tracks this year, Mercedes has had to work on developments to improve its high-downforce performance, with Valtteri Bottas admitting recently he did not expect them to be ready
Schmidt Peterson Motorsports says Le Mans 24 Hours winner Brendon Hartley and Robert Wickens are part of a 28-driver list to race the team’s second full-time IndyCar entry in 2018. Mikhail Aleshin left the team to help develop BR Engineering’s Dallara-built LMP1 car last month, and the vacancy at Schmidt Peterson has become a key
Jorge Lorenzo says he crashed out of the lead of MotoGP’s San Marino Grand Prix as a result of losing concentration while trying to change an electronic map. Ducati rider Lorenzo dominated the early stages of the Misano race, quickly pulling away from the field after making a lightning getaway from fifth on the grid.
Danilo Petrucci says he considered giving up a place to fellow Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso on the final lap of the Misano MotoGP race – but felt that would be a “bad image” for the series. Petrucci, who rides a factory-spec Ducati GP17 bike for Pramac, led most of the Misano event in wet conditions,
Johann Zarco says pushing his Tech3 Yamaha bike over the finish line in the MotoGP San Marino Grand Prix at Misano to claim the final point was “better than nothing”. The Frenchman had been course to claim seventh place before his year-old Yamaha ran out of fuel on the final tour of the 28-lap race.
Sauber plans to increase its workforce by almost 100 personnel as it bids to haul itself back into the Formula 1 midfield in 2018, according to team principal Fred Vasseur. Vasseur is in the process of overhauling the team, having taken over from Monisha Kaltenborn, and is turning his attention to the staff numbers after
Formula 1 managers are evaluating ways to increase the number of Formula 2 drivers regularly participating in Friday grand prix practice sessions, according to Ross Brawn. Several F1 stars – including Ferrari’s current title contender Sebastian Vettel and Robert Kubica – made names for themselves when young drivers regularly took part in practice sessions during
Kyle Larson took a dramatic overtime win in the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Richmond for Chip Ganassi Racing, after a late caution denied longtime leader Martin Truex Jr. Team Penske’s Joey Logano finished second while Ryan Newman got third for Richard Childress Racing. Dale Earnhardt Jr missed out on a place in the Chase
Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales reckons a “really important” adjustment to his riding style helped him to go fastest in qualifying for the MotoGP race at Misano. Vinales, who put an end to his recent poor form by taking a close second place at Silverstone on Yamaha’s newly-introduced 2018 prototype bike, continued his resurgence by taking pole
Andrea Dovizioso says his strong performance in MotoGP’s San Marino Grand Prix qualifying is “confirmation” that he made the right decision to stick with the old Ducati fairing. Team-mate Jorge Lorenzo has been using Ducati’s new-spec aerodynamic fairing since Friday practice at the Czech Grand Prix at Brno – and had previously said he believed
Carlos Sainz has signed a deal to join Renault and trigger a series of domino changes that will secure McLaren the French car manufacturer’s engines for 2018, Autosport has learned. While news of McLaren’s progress in its efforts to switch from Honda engines has not been forthcoming in public, behind-the-scenes developments have been taking place
Yamaha rider Maverick Vinales took pole for MotoGP’s San Marino Grand Prix after topping an intense final qualifying session at Misano in which Marc Marquez crashed. Marquez had been the man to beat for much of the Misano weekend so far, and while he had to abort his first two hot laps in Q2, the
McLaren says it is unlikely to allow Lando Norris to go to any other Formula 1 team even for a learning season as he is “our star of the future”. The Formula 3 European Championship leader and McLaren Autosport BRDC Award winner Norris impressed when he tested for McLaren in the post-Hungarian Grand Prix running.
Formula 1 commercial chief Sean Bratches says there have been around 40 expressions of interest from potential grand prix venues since he became involved earlier this year. Liberty Media will now choose new events on the basis of what they can bring to F1, with a focus on street races in major cities, rather than
The Schmidt Peterson Motorsports IndyCar team has announced “an increased level of partnership” with Honda and a contract extension through 2020. SPM has been a Honda team since engine competition returned to the series in 2012, and ran Honda Performance Development’s side of the ’18 universal aerokit testing (pictured below). Piers Phillips, the team’s general
Penske NASCAR Cup driver Joey Logano says he is in a “do or die” situation going into Saturday night’s playoff cut-off race at Richmond. Logano is 15th in the Cup standings, but four drivers beneath him have qualified for a spot in the 16-person title shootout by virtue of race victories. Though Logano won at
Maverick Vinales says the new ‘2018 prototype’ chassis introduced by his Yamaha MotoGP team allows him to feel more “relaxed” on the bike, in addition to improving rear tyre drop-off. Yamaha, plagued by inconsistent form this season, trialled the prototype in a private test at Misano in late August – and it is understood both