In this week’s Motion Motorsports Report, Dave Mathers comments on some recent news from the world of motorsports, before summarizing some of the action from this past weekend.
The Professional Racer Organization, made up of drag racers in the professional categories, have announced a million dollar plus event next February 8-10 called the PRO Superstar Shootout Invitational. It will be held at the beautiful Bradenton Motorsports Park, Florida and will post a purse of $250,000 to win in both Top Fuel and Funny Car with $125,000 to win in Pro Stock. ‘If you build it, they will come’!!! Can’t wait!!
Formula1 team Alpha Tauri is being renamed for 2024. The team, owned by the Red Bull conglomerate, entered F1 17 years ago as Toro Rosso but was renamed Alpha Tauri five years ago.
Thanks to a major sponsorship alliance beginning next year with clothing giant Hugo Boss the new name will be known as ‘Boss’ or ‘Boss Orange’. Hopefully the name change will bring with it a much needed improvement in performance. Also heard that they might be using the Red Bull team’s RB19 cars next season, which should still be pretty good.
Chicago Cup race winner and Australian Supercar Champ Shane van Gisbergen will be making his first NASCAR oval start Friday night in the Craftsman Truck Series race at Indianapolis Raceway Park. Rumours have him moving to NASCAR next year.
Next year’s IndyCar race at Nashville will move from this past weekend to become the season finale next year. This will allow their Awards Banquet to be held in the Music City, a great spot for it.
IMSA has announced part of their 2024 schedule and there will be no P-cars at Mosport, just the LMP 2 units. One of the purest REAL road courses on their schedule and they are instead sending the P-cars to Detroit, a street course. Wow.
In a presser at MIS Martin Truex, Jr. announced that he is coming back to drive the No. 19 car in 2024. GREAT news.
NASCAR CUP SERIES: Christopher Bell (Toyota) won the pole for the Cup race Sunday at Michigan International Speedway ahead of Ross Chastain (Chev) and Ty Gibbs (Toyota).
Well, that was interesting. The cars went out on track under VERY overcast conditions, did some pace laps and then the rain arrived to spoil the picnic. After an hour and a half of talking heads, driver interviews and track dryers they went back out to try again. Success!!
On lap 14 Kyle Busch slid up into Ryan Blaney in corner 1 and spun up and into the wall but kept going. Yellow! On lap 34 Chase Elliott appeared to have a tire go flat and spanked the wall hard. Martin Truex, Jr. won Stage 1. Meanwhile coming to the flag William Byron nailed the wall HARD in corner 4.
Not sure why but Truex came into the pits when they were closed and he had to restart from the back. On lap 51 Josh Berry, filling in for the suspended Noah Gragson, spun up by himself into the wall for another yellow.
On lap 64 Christopher Bell passed under Alex Bowman to grab the lead but then spun going into corner 1 for a caution.
On lap 74 the yellow, then the red, came out for rain. The race was postponed until Monday at noon hour for completion.
The yellow came out on lap 102 when Ryan Preece had a flat tire going into corner 1 and slowed on track. On the subsequent pit stops Denny Hamlin’s car stalled on pit out and required a control/alt/delete to get going again dropping him from a top five spot to way back in the pack (30th). Truex won Stage 2 even after having pitted earlier. VERY impressive run through the pack to pass Suarez coming to the flag.
On lap 127 Alex Bowman spun hitting the wall apparently due to contact from behind as everybody slows to miss a couple of cars getting together ahead of them. Yellow. Bowman got towed back to his pit with four flat tires.
At the flag it was Chris Buescher followed very closely by Truex and Hamlin further back. They got the race in even though the skies threatened and it was very overcast and dull.
Truex extended his regular season points lead to 57 over Hamlin and by 96 over William Byron.
Their next race is Indy Road Course, Sunday on TSN 5 at 2.30 P.M.
NASCAR XFINITY SERIES: Josh Berry won the pole at Michigan Saturday ahead of Justin Allgaier and Austin Hill all in Chevrolets.
It didn’t take long for the first yellow as Kaz Grala spun on lap 4 after contact with Sheldon Creed. Emphasizing that ‘cautions breed cautions’ just after the restart five cars tangled on the back stretch for the second yellow. Caught up in the wreck were Ty Gibbs, John Hunter Nemechek, Mason Maggio, Sammy Smith and Carson Hocevar.
Eight laps later Maggio stopped on the back stretch for the third caution. Justin Allgaier picked up the Stage 1 win. Jeb Burton spun on pit entry and was penalized going to the back on the restart.
On the first lap after the restart Joe Graf, Jr. tagged Connor Mosack going into one with Mosack getting substantial damage from hitting the wall. John Hunter Nemechek won Stage 2.
On the subsequent pit stops Allgaier got spun on pit road by Ty Gibbs. On lap 111 Patrick Emerling slows up in between corners 3 & 4 bringing out the yellow.
It didn’t look good weather-wise in the closing laps as the sky got quite dark. But everything ended up fine and the race ran full distance.
At the flag it was Nemechek over Berry and Brandon Jones. Nemechek is now tied with Hill for the points lead with Allgaier 3rd 34 points back.
Their next race is Indy Road Course, Saturday on TSN 5 at 5.30 P.M.
NASCAR CRAFTSMAN TRUCKS their next race is IRP, Friday on Fox Sports Racing at 9.00 P.M.
FORMULA ONE: They’re into their summer break. Their next race is the Netherlands, Sunday, August 27 at 8.55 A.M. on TSN 5.
INDYCAR: Scott McLaughlin grabbed the pole for the street course race at Nashville Sunday followed by Pato O’Ward and Colton Herta. Devlin DeFrancesco started 26th.
And once again the initial green was waved off as the drivers can’t seem to get it right!! Wow. On lap 13 the yellow came out for David Malukas stopping on track when it appeared that the rear wing supports collapsed.
With ten laps to go Linus Lundqvist hit the wall bringing out the caution. At about the same time Jack Harvey also hit the wall.
With six to go a three-car tangle brought out another yellow involving Agustin Canapino, Benjamin Pedersen and Felix Rosenqvist. They red-flagged the race leaving the drivers sitting in very hot cars on a very hot racetrack. Not fun for the drivers.
The green came out with three to go but a car hit the wall again. No yellow!! At the flag it was Kyle Kirkwood over pole sitter McLaughlin and Alex Palou.
Palou leads the points by 84 over Josef Newgarden and by 126 over Scott Dixon.
Their next race is on the Indy Road Course, Saturday at 2.30 on TSN 5.
IMSA: There were 45 cars entered for the race at Road America Sunday including 10 GTP cars, 7 LMP 2, 8 LMP 3, 5 PRO and 15 GTD entries. The Derani/Sims Caddy got the GTP pole, Kurtz/Hanley got the LMP 2 pole, Pino/Barbosa got LMP 3, the Gunn/Riberas Aston Martin won the pole in PRO (with the Pfaff Porsche of Bachler/Pilet 5th) and the Sellers/Snow BMW the pole winner in GTD.
The fun started early, less than five minutes in, as the de Phillippi/Yelloly BMW P-car got drop kicked off the track and into the tire barrier for a yellow. At the 35-minute mark the Ward/Ellis Mercedes went off track collecting a sign or two!!
Surprisingly, the race ran pretty much drama free even considering there were 45 starters out there.
At the finish it was the Campbell/Nasr Penske Porsche winning GTP, Chatin/Keating winning LMP 2, Burdon/Robinson winning LMP 3, Gunn/Riberas Aston winning PRO and Sellers/Snow BMW winning GTD.
Their next race is at VIR, August 27.
NHRA: Their next race is Topeka, Sunday at 8 on Fox Sports Racing.
SUPERSTAR RACING EXPERIENCE (SRX): The series put on race number 4 at Berlin Raceway in Marne, Michigan. We were at an ASA race there about thirty years ago and watched Bob Senneker (I think it was Bob) go off track in Corner 2, go down through the deep ditch off the back straight and come back up in 3 with grass sticking out of the front of the car. I noticed they had filled in the ditch – good move.
Brad Keseloski won Heat 1 which had a yellow on lap 19 for a lightning strike. Heat 2 was won by Ryan Newman and it had, believe it or not, a ‘Fun Flag’ yellow on lap.
The main had four ‘unexplained’ yellows???? I’m guessing it was based on the two-hour TV window? For the second race in a row, it was Kyle Busch over Keselowski, Ryan Newman, Marco Andretti and Haillie Deagan. Amazing how clean the racing was without Paul Tracy!! LOL
Their next race is Thursday at Eldora, on RevTV at 9 P.M.
NASCAR PINTY’S SERIES: While studying the entry list for the race at Three Rivers I was struck by the fact that 70 percent of the 30 entries were from Quebec. And the other nine were from Ontario.
One would naturally assume that a national series such as this one would attract entries from the West and the Maritimes. The old CASCAR Series had several regular western drivers. I realize that western drivers do show for the western swing. A sign of the economy perhaps?
Defending series champion Marc Antoine Camirand nabbed the pole followed by L.P. Dumoulin and Andrew Ranger.
Well, THAT didn’t take long. On the second corner of the first lap Kevin Lacroix appeared to bounce off L.P. Dumoulin and then climbed right overtop of Andrew Ranger taking both Ranger and Lacroix out of the race.
The cleanup and removal took almost seven laps to complete. Racing continued with several cars taking a run out front as pit stops affected the positions. Just two laps before the halfway mark Benoit Couture, a lapped car, appeared to come down on leader L.P. Dumoulin and thus spinning out to bring out the yellow.
On lap 32 Alex Labbe, skipping the Xfinity race at Michigan to race closer to home, was one of four cars who got together on Corner 3 exit for a caution. The caution turned into a red flag for track cleanup and car removal (but the Live Timing still showed yellow, not red!!!). On lap 36 a stopped Jocelyn Fecteau did not get off the track far enough bringing out another caution.
At the flag it was Camirand flashing that mile-wide smile winning over L.P Dumoulin, Alex Tagliani, Gary Klutt and D.J. Kennington. Good and exciting race!! They could make it more exciting by adding the oval track into the mix!! That would make for some interesting tire selections!! LOL
In the points, Treyten Lapcevich leads Camirand by 31 and Tagliani by 52.
Their next races are Monday AND Tuesday on the dirt at the magnificent Ohsweken Speedway.
UNITED RACING SERIES: Partial results from the APC Late Model Series race from Sauble Beach show that the top 3 for Round 2 of the NTN Triple Crown were Kyle Steckly, J.R. Fitzpatrick and Andrew Gresel.
In the OSCAAR races at Peterborough Speedway, Rick Spencer-Walt won the Hot Rod feature ahead of Tyler Hawn and Rob Bromley. A.J. Emms won the Modified main followed by Chad Strawn and Jason Keen.
Their next race is at Sunset, on Saturday.
ONTARIO SPORTSMAN SERIES: Their next race is Full Throttle, Saturday.
DELAWARE SPEEDWAY: 48 Bone Stocks were ‘in the house’ Friday with Randy Martin winning Heat 1, Rob Wolliston getting Heat 2 and Heat 3 going to Craig Cole. The Last Chance/B Main/Consi was won by Donavin Clark. The Main was won by Jason Lovie ahead of Jeremiah Rabideau, Jason Craig, Jay Cox and Jordan Willms.
In the V/8 Stocks Cody Coburn won Heat 1, Doug Stewart won Heat 2 and in the Main Dave Evison picked up the win over Chad Clutterbuck, Jeff Ferguson, Coburn and Brent Pelley.
Ron Beauchamp won the Late Model Heat 1, Jesse Kennedy won Heat 2 while Connor Pritiko won the Main atop Gary Adriaensen, Kennedy, Ray Morneau and Chase Pinsonneault.
In the points, Cox leads Rabideau in Bone Stock by 1 and Willms by 15. In the V/8 Stocks Paul Fothergill has a 7 point lead on both Stewart and Ferguson. Pritiko continues to lead the Late Models by 34 on Adriaensen and by 39 on Morneau.
Their next race is Super Late Models, V/8 Stocks and Bone Stocks, Friday.
FLAMBORO SPEEDWAY: Their next race is the Klotz Night Saturday.
OHSWEKEN SPEEDWAY: Their next race is the JIBS Action Sports Night Friday plus the Pinty’s Series Monday and Tuesday.
GRAND BEND SPEEDWAY: Their next race is this Thursday and the Civic Long Weekend race Saturday.
GRAND BEND DRAGWAY: They hosted the Canadian Nationals this past weekend. Saw a video of Spencer Hyde going 307 mph in a 3.97 second run in one of the Fast Eddie Top Fuel cars. Grand Bend’s next race is the Windsor Weekend, this coming weekend.
ST. THOMAS DRAGWAY: Their next race is the East London Timing Association ‘LittleBigGo’ Friday 10 – 5 + regular racing Saturday and Sunday.
TORONTO MOTORSPORT PARK: Their next race is the Canada Heads Up Series this weekend.
SHANNONVILLE DRAGS: Their next race is August 26 & 27.
CAN AM STOCK/SUPER STOCK SERIES: Their next race is at TMP, Labour Day weekend.
CANADIAN MOTORSPORT HALL OF FAME: The CMHF’s annual Celebration of Speed takes place Monday, August 28 on the legendary Grand Prix Circuit at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. This is your opportunity to be a passenger in some incredible high-performance cars on this amazing track. Click here for info and tickets.
Any comments can be sent to Dave Mathers via email at motionman@rogers.com or by Facebook Messenger.
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