NASCAR and F1 were off, but there was still plenty of racing on tap this past weekend, in Canada and elsewhere. Dave Mathers gives us his take on all the action in this week’s Motion Motorsports Report for InsideTrackNews.com.
With F1 on its summer break and NASCAR and some other series staying quiet during the Olympics, it was a very light weekend of racing on the international scene. I found it interesting that NASCAR wisely took a break for the two weeks of the Olympics while Formula One – racing right next door at Spa two weekends ago – didn’t start their mandated summer break until after the Belgian GP.
Looking back to last weekend, at Spa, the disqualification of George Russell at the Belgian Grand Prix was rather shocking as he was a mere 1.5 KG ‘light’ in post-race inspection. What was more shocking were the reasons. The team had decided to have Russell stop only once for tires.
This meant that his last set of tires had to run more laps, meaning they shed more rubber and lost more weight. Couple that with the cars not doing a cooldown lap at Spa (because of its length) – which denied Russell the opportunity to pick up some weight in the form of rubber ‘marbles’ en route to Victory Lane – and the result was Russell being too light.
Ouch. Talk about an expensive lesson to learn. And the official race results listed only 19 cars, thereby totally excluding George. Thanks for coming out, George!! Interestingly, NASCAR always credits a DQ’d racer with a last place finish.
It appears that Liberty Media may have had a hand in Red Bull retaining the beleaguered Sergio ‘Checo’ Perez, whose job had been in jeopardy due to a ‘lack of performance.’ They feared a huge drop in attendance for the Mexican Grand Prix, which is scheduled for October 27. Makes sense.
Treyten Lapcevich and his team turned out to be the peacemakers during the post-race brawl at their race at Hickory Speedway last weekend. Jack McNelly the CARS Tour founder was escorting another driver, Andrew Grady (no relation to Ontario racer Rich Grady!! LOL), to the trailer when that driver knocked Jack to the ground, hitting his head.
Treyten’s crew jumped in to help break up the fight. As the race had a ‘throwback’ theme (Treyton’s car was a Junior Hanley replica complete with number 72) that was definitely old school.
Former crowd favourite Juan Pablo Montoya who has raced and won in Formula One, IndyCar, NASCAR and IMSA will be returning to Cup racing next month driving the Team 23XI #50 Toyota at Watkins Glen.
With Corey LaJoie being released from Spire Motorsports, how long will it be until Marco Andretti gets that seat? After all Marco’s sponsor, Gainbridge, is already connected to Spire.
Canadian Grand Prix president and CEO Francois Dumontier will be stepping down from the job after thirty years. His replacement in the Octane Racing Group job will be Jean Philippe Paradis. Suffice it to say, Dumontier has done a great job.
Red Bull Sporting Director Jonathan Wheatley is leaving Red Bull to join the new Audi team as Managing Director. This is the second top level member of the team to leave this year, the other being Adrian Newey.
The United Racing Series’ APC Late Model Series dropped into Sauble Speedway on the weekend, and I was reminded of an event that happened there about 45 years ago. Ken McIlroy led Don Biederman for the entire hundred lapper and ‘Bieder’ was very unhappy that he couldn’t get around Ken.
The checkered flag dropped on McIlroy and Don proceeded to push him right off the end of the front-straight, and over the edge. ‘And the crowd went wild.’
McIlroy was a local favourite there, and things did not go well for ‘Daytona’ Don. A cinder block was thrown through the windshield of his hauler and an OPP escort was needed to get him safely off the property. Everyone in the crowd, including me, was stunned.
Canadian ace Treyten Lapcevich won the zMAX CARS Tour race at the recently rejuvenated North Wilkesboro Speedway on the weekend. The cool series is owned by NASCAR notables Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Justin Marks, Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton.
UPDATE: On Tuesday, August 6, it was announced that Lapcevich had been DQ’d as the winner.
The statement from the CARS Tour read, in part:
Upon further investigation with CARS Tour technical officials and the team’s owner, Chad Bryant, it has been verified that the unapproved part was indeed on the car throughout the event. Lapcevich’s team, Chad Bryant Racing, admitted to misinterpreting the rule as it is printed and CARS Tour management accepted that explanation.”
According to a report on Short Track Scene, “The part in question is the team using a 9″ Ford rear end housing as opposed to a quick change.”
With the DQ, Corey Heim was given the win.
In a post on Facebook, Lapcevich strongly disputed the idea that there was a misinterpretation of the rules on the part of he or the team – characterizing that statement as “a lie,” and said the facts would be disputed in court.
Treyten Lapcevich: “… Our team takes immense pride in the hardwork that went into this win, and in doing it legally. I’m at the shop every single day working alongside these guys, and I know what has gone into this. The press release reads as though we misinterpreted the rules, but I will assure everyone that that is a lie. That’s all I can say for now, and we will let the courts do the rest. Until then, I will continue to stand by my team in defending our complete, and legal domination.”
Grand Bend Motorplex hit a HOME RUN on the weekend!! Their WDRA Canadian Nationals event was a smashing success. Mother Nature cooperated for a change (who knew??) and the exhibition cars were awesome, the crowd and car counts were huge and track prep was perfect. It doesn’t get any better than that.
Three, count ‘em, three Top Fuelers, Neale Armstrong’s crowd-pleasing Northern Warrior Jet dragster, a jet truck, Top Alcohol Dragsters and Funny Cars, Pro Mods and some bad fast bikes including a turbo Harley and lots of other turbo bikes were on hand. I loved watching the reaction of some of the ‘first timers,’ especially when the Fuelers and Jets went down the track. They WILL be back!!
It was sad to see the huge amount of money – reportedly well into six figures – that the track had to spend to replace their wooden grandstands, on the spectator side. The reason it was sad, you ask?
Twenty-nine years ago, when they reactivated the dormant facility, owner Andy Spriet – a REAL engineer – wanted to put up the normal, industry standard aluminum grandstands.
But, no… some local ‘bureaucrat’ decided that the track would have to install wooden grandstands instead. The reasoning? Wood would ‘absorb’ the sound better, thus reducing the noise impact on their cherished beachside village. The life span of aluminum would have been 50 to 60 years, compared to the 30-year wood planks. Sad, indeed.
Their next race is the Windsor Weekend, Saturday & Sunday.
IMSA: The series visited the beautiful and fast Road America on the weekend with all four classes. In qualifying the Albuquerque/Taylor Acura set fast time of the ten cars in GTP, P. Chatin and Hyet were quickest of the twelve in LMP2, the Catsburg/Milner Corvette topped the ten in PRO while Catsburg and Milner put their Mercedes out front of the fifteen in GTD. The Pfaff Motorsports McLaren of Jarvis and Kirchhöfe were 6th in PRO. The Multimatic Mustangs qualified 5th and 9th also in PRO. 47 cars took the green.
Well, that didn’t take long. On the first lap one of the Caddys got drop kicked off the track by one of the Penske Porsches but was able to keep going albeit at the back of the ‘P Pack’. Soon after one of the Multimatic Mustangs punted one of the Corvettes off track into the gravel and it resulted in a full course yellow.
Twenty minutes in a GTD Lamborghini pulled off the track emitting a little smoke. The driver got out and ran over to grab a fire extinguisher from one of the marshals but no fire was seen.
Another full course caution (for over 20 minutes). Just before halfway a BMW P car spun off track shedding body parts for another yellow. One of the _P Caddys had suspicious damage to the right front corner. Hmmm. In the ensuing pit stops Ricky Taylor got a warning for his pit lane entry beside a Porsche in the right-hand lane but no penalty. This yellow period took 23 minutes to clean up. With one hour to go one of the Multimatic Mustangs spit off its rear end in dramatic fashion for another yellow (just ten minutes this time).
With 37 minutes to go a GTD Porsche brought out another yellow after somehow losing part of its right front fascia. Over twenty minutes for the cleanup. If you are scoring at home that is well over one hour of yellows during the race.
At the flag it was the two Penske Porsches (Jaminet/Tandy and Nasr/Cameron) followed by the pole sitting Acura (Albuquerque/Taylor) in P, Hanley/Keating in P2, a Ferrari (Altoe/Serra), BMW (Snow/Sellers) and Aston Martin (Riberas/Gunn) in PRO and a BMW (Gallagher/Foley), McLaren (Schandorff/Iribe) and Acura (McAleer/Monk) in GTD. The Pfaff McLaren (Jarvis/Kirchhöfer) finished 7th in PRO.
A good, fast race on a great circuit overshadowed by lengthy caution periods.
Their next race is VIR, Sunday, August 25.
NASCAR Canada Series: Their next race is at Three Rivers, Sunday.
NASCAR Cup Series: Their next race is Richmond, Sunday, August at 6 P.M. on TSN 5.
NASCAR Xfinity Series: Their next race is MIS, Saturday, August 17 – Olympics break by NASCAR.
APC Series: The Late Models visited Sauble Speedway on the weekend. At the halfway mark of the 150 lapper the order showed Junior Farrelly, Kyle Steckly, Jake Sheridan, Connor Pritiko and Shae Gemmell. At the flag it was points leader Steckly getting the hard-fought win over Farrelly, polesitter Pritiko who just got around Gemmel at the line and Sheridan.
Meanwhile the Modifieds and Hot Rods were running at Peterborough Speedway. Wally Wilson grabbed his very first Modified feature win in the series over A.J. Emms, Jason Keen, Steve Trendell and my grandson Dave Mathers. In the Hot Rods Kenny McNichol, Jr. won over Dan Archibald, Rob Bromley, Jamie Cairns and Steve McCaw.
The next Late Model race is at Sunset, Saturday along with the Super Stocks.
NASCAR Craftsman Trucks: Their next race is Richmond, Saturday at 7.30 P.M. on Fox Sports Racing.
Formula One: Their next race is Netherlands, Sunday, August 25.
IndyCar: Their next race is Gateway, Sunday, August 17.
NHRA: Their next race is Brainerd, Sunday, August 18.
Delaware Speedway: On Friday night, there was a 75 lapper for the Late Models and a 50 lapper for the Super Stocks. Andrew Ferreira won the first Super Stock heat over Lonny Thompson and Ethan Orr. David McCullough won the second heat ahead of Pete Vanderwyst, Jr. and Randy Kyukendall.
Ferreira started from the pole ahead of Thompson, Orr, Brody Rickwood and Vanderwyst. Points leader Trevor Collver won the race over Vanderwyst (who finished with the right side of his hood flapping in the breeze!!), Lane Zardo, McCullough and Ferreira. Time of race – 34.36.
The Late Models time trialed in groups with Brady Smith quickest in Q1 with an 18.776, Marshall Schrenk was fastest in Q2 with an 18.658 while Gary Adriaensen topped Q3 with an 18.625. Matt Robblee started on the pole followed by Smith, Jesse Kennedy, Ray Morneau and Adriaensen. Coming off 2 on the second lap Robblee and Smith did their best Olympics ‘synchronized spinning’ demonstration at the front sliding down off track for a yellow after ‘contact.’
In the ensuing chaos Ron Beauchamp ended up with damage and a flat tire plus J.R. Fitzpatrick was forced to retire. The race ran smoothly with the leader Morneau finally passing the last car on the lead lap on lap 47. The red flag came out on lap 58 when Kennedy appeared to have something break in the right front and he went hard into the first turn wall.
This bad luck came after spending a bunch of money following his big wreck recently with Dale Shaw. At the flag you could throw a blanket over the top five with Morneau winning by inches over Schrenk, Robblee, Smith and a fast-closing rookie and track co-owner Jonny Aarts. Time of race – 45.24.
Their next race is Late Models, V/8 Stocks and Bone Stocks, Friday.
Toronto Motorsports Park: Their next race is RC Points Races, this weekend.
Flamboro Speedway: Their next race is the Pro Challenge & Spectator Drags, Saturday.
Edmonton International Raceway: This Saturday, Western Canada’s only NASCAR sanctioned track is back in action with their annual Transportation Night, featuring Thunder Cars, Pure Stocks and Future Stocks.
Laird International Raceway: This Thursday, August 8, Laird Raceway will be back in action. The Sault Ste. Marie, ON paved oval will host the Possamai & AIM Recycling 100 lap Enduro, along with their regular, full show, including: the Lakeway Automotive Factory Stocks (30 Laps to Win $1,000), the Northland Autobody Factory Fours (20 Laps), the Service Rentals and Sales Super Late Models (30 Laps) and the NAPA Reyco Automotive Modifieds (20 Laps). For details, go to https://www.lairdraceway.com/.
Oyster Bed Speedway: Their next race is Saturday night with the Street Stock Super Series 50, plus Championship Point Racing for the Bandoleros, Mini Stocks, Outlaws and Street Stocks.
Ouellette Car Cruise: The Ouellette Car Cruise builds on the nostalgia of Windsor’s storied automotive history and seeks to engage car enthusiasts, hobbyists and the community at large in celebration of our deep automotive roots. The event takes place Friday, August 9 with events running from 1 p.m. to 9 p.m. Vehicles include Street Rods, Muscle Cars, Vintage, Classic, Custom, Collector and special interest cars. For route and other details, go HERE.
St. Thomas Dragway their next race is the Misener Shootout, Saturday, closed Sunday.
Ohsweken Speedway: Their next race is the Lone Wolf Fireworks & Abate Associates night Friday.
Full Throttle Motor Speedway: Their next race is Ontario Sportsman Series, Saturday.
Grand Bend Speedway: Their next race is Home Track classes + Touring Series, Saturday.
PMRA: Their next event is August 15 – 17 with Pro Mods, Quick 32 Sportsman Series & Pro Bike & Sled Series, Empire Dragway.
Maritime Pro Stock Tour: Their next race is Saturday at Halifax’s Scotia Speedworld.
660 Sportsman Nationals: Their next race is Grand Bend, August 16 – 18.
Shannonville Drags their next race is August 17 & 18.
Ontario Sportsman Series: Their next race is at Full Throttle Speedway, Saturday.
Buxton Speedway: Their next race is Crate Invite, Saturday.
Any comments can be sent to Dave Mathers via email at motionman@rogers.com or by Facebook Messenger.
