NASCAR president Steve Phelps says he does not expect “massive, wholesale” changes to the 2021 Cup Series calendar. The series revamped its calendar in 2020 and Steve O’Donnell, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief racing development officer, said at the time that the “fans and the industry as a whole have been vocal about the
Month: July 2019
MotoGP race winner Danilo Petrucci will remain part of the Ducati factory team in 2020, the Italian manufacturer has announced. Petrucci was brought in to replace Jorge Lorenzo at the team on an initial one-year deal for 2019, and convinced Ducati to extend his tenure with the outfit through a solid start to the campaign,
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff thinks Formula 1 should not talk itself down and should remember the Austrian Grand Prix the next time there is “polemic” criticism about racing. An entertaining Red Bull Ring race came one week after an uneventful grand prix at Paul Ricard that provoked condemnation. Wolff compared that reaction to comments made
Pierre Gasy needs a mental “Control-Alt-Delete” reset in a bid to recover his Formula 1 season, reckons his Red Bull boss Christian Horner. Gasly has had a difficult start to the campaign, and his misery continued in the Austrian Grand Prix when he was lapped for a third race in a row, while team-mate Max
Hayden Paddon has secured a World Rally Championship return with a last-minute deal to drive M-Sport Ford’s third Fiesta WRC on Rally Finland. Overlooked for a Hyundai return in favour of Craig Breen for the event, Paddon decided not to “cry about the decision” in order to find an alternative. His agreement to return to
Mercedes has revealed the cooling problems that made its Austrian Grand Prix “painful” were a legacy of the fundamental design of its Formula 1 car being too “optimistic”. Valtteri Bottas finished third while championship leader Lewis Hamilton finished off the podium for the first time this season in fifth, as Mercedes 100% winning start to
The world’s only twilight race returns to the Yas Marina Circuit. After a decade on the Formula 1 calendar, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix has established itself as the season finale. With time running out to secure a seat at the showdown and packages starting from £999, this is a race you won’t want to
Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne deserve a “lot of credit” for helping McLaren develop a much better Formula 1 car this year, says its new team boss Andreas Seidl. Although both drivers endured frustrations with McLaren’s lack of competiveness over recent years, Seidl thinks that the job they did in steering the team down the
The result could not have been better for PETRONAS after unveiling the second strand of its potent performance oils in MotoGP. Petronas Yamaha Sepang Racing Team’s Fabio Quartararo used his Yamaha M1 to set a third pole position of 2019 at the historic Assen TT circuit ahead of a second consecutive podium for the rookie
Hyundai has joined the race to sign Ott Tanak for the 2020 World Rally Championship, with team boss Andrea Adamo declaring he has no qualms about chasing a ‘superteam’ line-up. Adamo’s opposite number at Toyota, Tommi Makinen, has always talked of the need for each of the four WRC manufacturers to have a top-line driver
Marc Marquez says the Dutch TT was the “best race” for his MotoGP championship hopes, as the Honda rider increased his points lead to 44 after finishing second. Despite qualifying off the front row for the first time this season amid a “difficult weekend” at Assen, Marquez battled with eventual winner Maverick Vinales and third-placed
McLaren boss Andreas Seidl says teams and drivers cannot complain that there are too many rules in Formula 1, because they pushed for them in the first place. For the third time in three races, F1 had a penalty controversy in Austria after Max Verstappen’s race-winning move on Charles Leclerc in Austria prompted an investigation
Scott Dixon says the Red Bull Advanced Technologies aeroscreen will have no impact on the vision of IndyCar drivers after taking part in an intensive test of the device. IndyCar formed a partnership with the technology arm of the Red Bull Formula 1 team to evolve its cockpit protection system following the introduction of the
McLaren engineering director Pat Fry is understood to have been put on gardening leave after indicating that he wants to leave the Formula 1 team. Fry had rejoined McLaren after eight years away on a short-term contract while it awaited the arrival James Key, who had been recruited from Toro Rosso as technical director but
Formula 1 race director Michael Masi says the FIA is trying to avoid bogging the championship down with pedantic punishments. Masi took on the FIA F1 race director role following the shock death of Charlie Whiting on the eve of the season-opening Australian Grand Prix. Stewards’ decisions have been in the spotlight lately following the
An FIA World Motor Sport Council vote on the 2020 World Rally Championship calendar is expected later this week and could lead to the Safari Rally being officially added. The result of the vote is likely to come on Friday but it could be pushed back until early next week. Sources close to the governing
Carlin will bring Sage Karam into its IndyCar line-up to replace Red Bull junior Patricio O’Ward in Toronto next weekend. Karam’s appearance will be his first IndyCar start on a road or street course since his season with Ganassi in 2015. O’Ward is competing in the Fuji Super Formula round for Team Mugen, having been
Martin Truex Jr believes Hendrick Motorsports’ strong performance at Chicagoland Speedway could have been a one-off in the NASCAR Cup Series. Hendrick’s Alex Bowman earned his first career win in the Cup Series on Sunday as all four of the team’s drivers finished 11th or higher in the 400-mile race in Chicago. Three of Hendrick’s
A full-factory Ferrari is among the 72 cars on the entry for the Spa 24 Hours Blancpain GT Series blue riband event later this month. The AF Corse works squad has entered a Ferrari 488 GT3 to be driven by World Endurance Championship regulars James Calado, Sam Bird and Alessandro Pier Guidi in the Belgian
Red Bull’s victory in the Austrian Grand Prix could be decisive in determining Honda’s Formula 1 future, amid ongoing high-level talks over whether the manufacturer will continue beyond 2020. Max Verstappen’s triumph at the Red Bull Ring ended a Honda victory drought that stretches back to 2006, and is its first win since it returned
Honda test rider Stefan Bradl will replace the injured Jorge Lorenzo at MotoGP’s Sachsenring round. Bradl has made three wildcard appearances on Honda’s RC213V bike since the start of his current role with the manufacturer and also raced for satellite outfits LCR and Marc VDS as a stand-in last year. He will now contest his
Cal Crutchlow says people cannot understand how hard fellow Honda rider Marc Marquez is riding to extract the most from his bike in pursuit of his sixth MotoGP title. Marquez has finished all bar the Americas Grand Prix inside the top two, with four victories and a second-place finish at the Dutch TT helping him
World Endurance Championship GTE Pro title winners Kevin Estre and Michael Christensen will race together in this month’s Spa 24 Hours. The Porsche factory pairing, who sealed the WEC GTE crown at the Le Mans 24 Hours last month, will race one of the German manufacturer’s 911 GT3-Rs for the Dubai-based GPX Racing team in
Toyota World Endurance Championship driver Jose Maria Lopez will make his Spa 24 Hours debut in an Audi later this month. Lopez, who is also racing in Formula E with the Dragon team in 2018/19, will race an Audi R8 LMS for the Land Motorsport squad in the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup double-points round
Max Verstappen suspects “a few doubts are going away” after Red Bull claimed its first Formula 1 win with a Honda engine in the Austrian Grand Prix. Verstappen qualified third-fastest at the Red Bull Ring and started second, but dropped to eighth on the opening lap after his anti-stall kicked in as the race began.
Lando Norris says he could take more risks than Formula 1 title challenger Lewis Hamilton when he went around the outside at the first corner of the Austrian Grand Prix. After lining up fifth on the grid, Norris moved up one place at the start after Max Verstappen nearly stalled, and then he muscled his
Danilo Petrucci feels his decision not to make a “risky” move on Ducati MotoGP team-mate Andrea Dovizioso in the Dutch TT ultimately cost him a position to Franco Morbidelli. Petrucci and Dovizioso were fighting for fourth during the race alongside Joan Mir, but their battle allowed Morbidelli to close in. Both started the final lap
Mercedes Formula 1 team boss Toto Wolff says it was “painful” to see Valtteri Bottas’s and Lewis Hamilton’s cars handicapped by cooling issues in the Austrian Grand Prix. Both cars ran Mercedes’ most extreme cooling set-up available in Austria, but were still forced to run at restricted power. Bottas and Hamilton, who finished third and
Maverick Vinales admitted that “a lot of pressure went out” after he crossed the finish line first in MotoGP’s Dutch TT and scored Yamaha’s first win of 2019. Vinales emerged victorious in a three-way fight, which included Marc Marquez and Fabio Quartararo, to win at Assen for his sixth career MotoGP top-class win and his
Jenson Button says the “terrible” crash that ended his SUPER GT race in Thailand was a racing incident, with the 2009 Formula 1 champion now 24-points adrift in the championship. Kunimitsu Honda driver Button collided side-on with Daisuke Nakajima heading into Turn 7, pitching his former team-mate’s NSX-GT into a spin and immediately out of