Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

The battle to be the first driver to clinch a spot in the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series Championship Round came down to a mad dash to the finish as Christopher Bell chased down Kyle Larson in the final twenty laps of Sunday’s South Point 400 but was unable to complete the pass.

The win is Larson’s fourth of 2023 and second at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Bell and Larson, rivals in dirt track racing and former development drivers, were the top drivers Sunday as they qualified on the front row. While Larson swept the stages, Bell finished second and third in each before mounting his pursuit during the final green-flag run.

“He kicked my ass for a few years straight like every race,” Larson remarked about Bell in his post-race press conference. “I don’t know if I ever beat him. He made me work really hard to get better as a driver, especially on the dirt track stuff. We’ve had our run-ins along the way, just tight racing for wins and stuff, then now I feel like we actually get along and we talk quite a bit, then get to race with a lot of respect on Sundays on TV in front of millions of race fans.

“It’s cool. Just need to get to race with a guy like that. I’m sure he’ll be one of the guys to beat at Phoenix too when he’s in the Final Four.”

Austin Jones has two Dakar Rally victories to his name, and is now keen on adding a World Rally-Raid Championship to his growing list of off-road achievements. On Sunday at the season-ending Rallye du Maroc, Jones answered some questions from The Checkered Flag via Cross-Country Rally News about the championship battle in the T3 category and his thoughts on what’s in store for the 2024 season.

The 2023 Championship

After finishing third in the 2022 T4 championship, Jones moved up to T3 for Light Prototypes with the new American-only Red Bull Off-Road Junior Team. He began the season on a strong note by winning the legendary Dakar Rally for the second year in a row over team-mate Seth Quintero.

Quintero returned the favour at the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge as he edged out Jones. Mitch Guthrie, the third Junior Team driver, scored a win of his own in Mexico at the Sonora Rally while Jones finished third to retake the points lead, albeit by just one point over Quintero. After being third in the standings and trailing Jones by twenty exiting Sonora, Guthrie became the new leader by winning the Desafío Ruta 40. Despite losing the lead yet again, Jones scored another third-place run to trail by just three points.

Entering Morocco, the trio was separated by just nine points. After two stages, Quintero leads the T3 overall with a minute and twenty-two seconds on Guthrie while Jones is further back at 12:29. Jones finished fifth in Stage #1 before improving to second on Sunday.

“I’m going up against Seth and Mitch and we’re all really fast and those guys have had really good years as well, so it’s been really hard,” said Jones. “We’ve been lucky enough to podium every single race this year, so that’s something that I don’t think anyone has done besides for us. Really happy with that. Yeah, it’s been a hard year. Every stage matters, every day matters, every kilometre matters. It’s been hard.”

Nasser Al-Attiyah could skip the rest of the Rallye du Maroc and still walk away with his second World Rally-Raid Championship. After winning Stage #2 on Sunday while his closest rival Yazeed Al-Rajhi finished fourth, Al-Attiyah is far enough in the standings that even a retirement while Al-Rajhi sweeps the rest of the event would result in a tie at most that is broken by wins, which Al-Attiyah holds.

Entering the season-ending round in Morocco, Al-Attiyah led Al-Rajhi by 51 points. The margin increased by one after they respectively finished first and second in Stage #1, while Al-Rajhi missing the Sunday podium while Al-Attiyah won the stage now makes the score 199 to 144. Should Al-Rajhi win the next three legs and the overall, it would only produce thirty-five points total (five points per stage win, thirty for winning outright).

“I’m absolutely happy to have defended our title from last year,” said Al-Attiyah. “Yesterday, we started thirty-eighth and we won the stage. Today we opened and we win the stage. It’s amazing, especially as everybody is here.”

While the main FIA world championship picture—which includes all three major classes but is a de facto T1 championship as the top category does not have its own trophy like the others—has mostly crystallised, it remains in the air in T3. Mitch Guthrie gained some relief in that points battle as he edged out Austin Jones and Seth Quintero for the Stage #2 victory; the Americans were separated by just nine points going into Morocco.

Eryk Goczał played spoiler by winning Stage #1, but the front differential broke 111 kilometres into the next day followed by the rear diff 100 km before the finish, which allowed the Americans to scramble for much-needed points. Thanks to his second- and third-place stage finishes, Quintero leads the T3 overall by 1:22 over Guthrie. Jones has a more uphill battle as he tails by twelve and a half minutes.

After 139 starts over five years, Riley Herbst can finally call himself a NASCAR Xfinity Series race winner. To make it even sweeter, he finally knocked that milestone at his home track Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Herbst, whose family is an off-road racing and Las Vegas staple, dominated Saturday’s Alsco Uniforms 302 as he led 103 of 201 laps. He and Stewart-Haas Racing team-mate Cole Custer each won a stage before combining to lead all but one lap in Stage #3; Kyle Sieg, who races for ally RSS Racing, led the only other lap during green-flag pit stops before Herbst reclaimed it.

The dominant performance by SHR culminated in Herbst securing their 100th victory across all three national series. His run was such a masterful performance that he beat second-placed John Hunter Nemechek by nearly fifteen seconds.

The victory also comes just days after signing a contract extension with SHR for the 2024 season.

“I love this town. I love this team,” began Herbst. “Davin Restivo (crew chief) believes in me, but I have to give a big shout out to Richard Boswell (SHR’s Xfinity director) because I wouldn’t be the person I am or the race car driver without him. I can’t thank Monster Energy enough: Mitch Covington (senior vice president of sports marketing), Dave Gowan, everybody said I couldn’t do it and those two people stuck behind my my whole career. You don’t even know what this means and what this takes off my chest. I can’t believe it. I love you, Las Vegas.

If Ross Branch decided to get a little wild for his Dakar Rally Stage #8 win, he would have had a child the next time he was atop the RallyGP stage podium. Nine months after his last win, he added his second stage victory of the 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship by taking the first leg of the Rallye du Maroc.

After finishing third in the Prologue, Branch elected to start Saturday further back in twelfth to allow the leaders to test the course before him. This quickly paid off as he was already the fastest bike through the first checkpoint as the Hondas of Pablo Quintanilla and Prologue winner Tosha Schareina gave chase. By the end of the 314-km stage (710 total, the longest of the rally), Branch led Quintanilla by over a minute.

The Botswanan has developed into a fast starter in Morocco, having also claimed the Prologue and Stage #1 in the 2022 edition. His Hero MotoSports team-mate Sebastian Bühler was the first bike on course and mainly focused on navigation to finish ninth.

“It was a very long day on the saddle. We started around 3 AM this morning, and rode over 700 kilometres on the bike. The liaisons were quite long, but when I got to the stage, it felt amazing,” said Branch. “The stage was quite hard and rocky, but I enjoyed it. I was able to navigate well right from the beginning; I caught up with some other competitors around refuel, and we pretty much rode together till the finish.

“I’m very happy with my result, finally got a stage win this year. This is exactly what I and the team needed before the Dakar, and we’re happy with our progress, and where we are physically and mentally now. Tomorrow is going to be interesting opening Stage #2, but I’m up for the challenge.”

In one week, SKARLAT-XTRM Team will travel to Spain to compete in the Rallye TT Cuenca, the final round of the Spanish Cross-Country Rally Championship. Programme leader and Dakar Rally alumnus Vadim Pritulyak will drive a SKARLAT buggy with Sergey Romanovsky as his navigator, while Olexandr Gonzul will call the shots in a Toyota FJ Cruiser piloted by Ivan Barbero.

The team was formally revealed at a press conference on Thursday. Both entries will race in the non-competition ParaBaja category for racers with limited mobility or other disabilities.

With the exceptions of Barbero and the Toyota, the team is a Ukrainian effort whose co-drivers served in the Armed Forces of Ukraine before suffering serious injuries in combat against Russian invasion. Romanovsky lost his right leg in an accident during a 2014 battle, while Gonzul’s left arm and right leg were destroyed by a land mine in 2022. Both soldiers have prosthetic limbs that enable them to resume walking. While not sustained in war, Pritulyak lost vision in his right eye due to complications from botched medical treatment for a 2018 accident; he raced the Dakar Rally from 2009 to 2011.

The effort started to took shape in late July when Pritulyak’s friend Vladyslav Kushchynsky met with ParaBaja Step by Step director Natalia Bettonica at the Baja España Aragón. Two weeks later, the Real Federación Española de Automovilismo’s inclusivity committee, which Bettonica chairs, formally invited the Automobile Federation of Ukraine to bring a wounded soldier to the Rallye TT Cuenca where they would take part as a co-driver. Pritulyak did not find out about the offer until it had gone public, but quickly connected with Kushchynsky and agreed to prepare both a full crew and their own vehicle.

The SKARLAT that Pritulyak and Romanovsky will race is a Ukrainian UTV brand. Built upon the platform of the Massimo Warrior 1000 MXD Crew with Pritulyak leading development, it was designed to quickly evacuate injured Ukrainian soldiers from the battlefield. UTVs are cheaper to produce and easier to repair than standard emergency vehicles while their off-road capabilities allow them to go through difficult terrain.

As much as Maurik van den Heuvel enjoys competing in rally raids, his day job understandably takes priority. Consequently, due to ongoing business obligations, he will have to push back his Dakar Rally return to 2025.

Van den Heuvel’s Dakarspeed team last appeared at Dakar in 2022, where he completed seven stages before being forced to retire when he hit a patch of camel grass and rolled his Scania truck. Although the team tried to repair the vehicle, they were not allowed to continue due to substantial roll cage damage.

The team initially planned to return in 2023 but delayed it by a year as their owner had to focus on his company Van Den Heuvel Logistiek, a logistics firm that specialises in moving bulk warehouse items for corporations. The postponement to 2025 also buys the team more time to continue work on their truck.

“Unfortunately, Team DAKARSPEED will NOT participate in the Dakar Rally 2024 due to a busy agenda in our business lives,” reads a team statement. “We want to focus on preparing a new Rally truck in perfect race condition, and for this we need more time to develop and prepare it.

“Our new target is the 2025 Dakar, where we hope to shine with a new, competitive truck. We appreciate the unconditional support and patience of our sponsors and team members during this time.”

When the 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship was at its halfway point, BAIC ORV was third in the manufacturer’s championship with 100 points. Two races later, they will end the season last and penniless.

On Friday, the FIA announced BAIC has been docked all 100 points and fined €10,000 for not running enough races despite being registered for the manufacturer’s title. Marques are required to enter at least four of the five rounds in order to maintain eligibility. BAIC appeared at the first three events of the season at the Dakar Rally, Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, and Sonora Rally but did not do so at the Desafio Ruta 40 or Rallye du Maroc.

“A Manufacturer undertakes to participate in a minimum of four of the Rallies of the Championship with at least one vehicle of Groups T1, T2, T3 or T4 complying with the technical regulations in force,” reads Article V1 3.4.3 of the FIA’s Cross-Country Rally Regulations.

BAIC, a Chinese manufacturer, began the season with Guoyu Zhang and Zi Yunliang respectively finishing fifteenth and twenty-seven in the top T1 category at the Dakar Rally. They placed seventh and eighth in Abu Dhabi, where they were the last T1 cars to complete every stage without retiring, followed by sixth and eighth in Sonora.

2023 was the company’s first year competing in the T1+ subcategory after upgrading their BAIC BJ40 to meet regulation. Outside of the world championship, Zi and Zhang finished 1–2 at the Taklimakan Rally in their home country, though Zi was not competing at the event as a a BAIC ORV factory driver. Zhang’s runner-up finish still netted him the T1+ class win, while Liu Yangui won in T1.1 in a BJ40.

Skyler Howes‘ début with Monster Energy Honda Rally Team was over before it really got started when he crashed in the nineteen-kilometre Prologue to the Rallye du Maroc.

Howes, new to Honda after moving over from Husqvarna, was running his first World Rally-Raid Championship round since fracturing his scapula at the Sonora Rally in April. Although he was able to get back up from his crash during Friday’s leg without particularly serious injury, he reported back and knee pain that has sidelined him for the rest of the rally and ruins his hopes of repeating.

“Halfway through the prologue I hit a big hole in the sand. I didn’t think it would be bad but the back end stepped out and I went down hard. Just a good old fashion swap out yard sale,” wrote Howes. “Right away I knew my race was over just as fast as it began. I have some pain in my back and knee, but the feeling and movement is all good so I’m hoping for the best outcome and quick recovery. Before this, I was feeling really good and putting in a fast prologue effort. I’m proud of the work we’ve done as a team and was feeling more than confident for a good result, but as things go, sometimes you’re the hammer and sometimes you’re the nail.”

While Howes is already out of the race, his Honda allies quickly stepped up in his place. Tosha Schareina, the Desafío Ruta 40 bike winner, narrowly beat out Howes’ fellow American Monster Energy Honda rider Ricky Brabec by just four-tenths of a second. Ross Branch was back by just two seconds.

In the four-wheel classes, a pair of Audis led a pair of Toyotas as Mattias Ekström topped Stéphane Peterhansel by four seconds, with Yazeed Al-Rajhi and new Toyota driver Guerlain Chicherit in tow. Carlos Sainz, the third Audi, was sixth.

McLaren F1 Team accomplished their 500th podium in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship at the Qatar Grand Prix, with both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris achieving top three results in Lusail. 

McLaren Team Principal Andrea Stella said that the team had a “fantastic day” and adapted well to the unusual conditions in Qatar, including the extreme heat and tyre life limitations set by the FIA. 

Along with the team’s successful finish, McLaren broke the world record for fastest pit stop with a 1.8 second stop for Norris. 

“A fantastic day for the team as we achieve our 500th podium in Formula 1. Both Lando and Oscar drove great races in difficult conditions to finish P2 and P3 to add to the success in the Sprint yesterday.

“A double podium rewards the team both trackside and at the factory for their brilliant work and my thanks go to them for their continued commitment and dedication to McLaren.

With Carson Hocevar moving up to the NASCAR Cup Series in 2024, Niece Motorsports has named Matt Mills as his successor in the #42 Chevrolet Silverado RST for the 2024 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season.

“I’m really excited to join the Niece Motorsports team for the full Truck Series season next year,” said Mills. “This is a great opportunity for me to get into top-tier equipment. It felt good to get on track this year and show speed, and I’m looking forward to the opportunity to continue that.”

Mills has raced sporadically in the Trucks since 2016, including six races for Young’s Motorsports and two for Kyle Busch Motorsports in 2023. The latter team was Mills’ first in the series with at least competitive equipment, and he showed out in his KBM début when he finished fifth at Richmond; it was his best career finish in any top-three division race and just the second top ten in his national series career.

Although he has never run a full schedule in any of the top three series, he did every Xfinity Series race outside of the road courses from 2019 to 2022 for B.J. McLeod Motorsports. He scored a tenth at Daytona in 2019 en route to his best career points finish of twenty-first. For 2023, Mills has run four races for Emerling-Gase Motorsports with a nineteenth at Kansas.

“I think a lot of people took notice of Matt this year at Richmond and Milwaukee,” commented Niece general manager Cody Efaw. “He’ll be a great addition to our organisation as we look to continue the success the #42 team had this season. Matt has a lot of laps under his belt in both the Truck and Xfinity Series. It’s tough to get in these trucks just a few times a year and show speed like Matt did, so I think there will be a lot of growth next season as he’s able to race week after week.”

Toby Price has dominated the Finke Desert Race on both two and four wheels, having won the last three editions in a Mitsubishi Triton Trophy Truck, and is one of the top rally raid bike riders today as a two-time Dakar Rally champion. However, as he ponders tackling the latter in a four-wheel vehicle as well, Mitsubishi will not be joining him for such a journey.

In an interview with Motorsport.com, Price revealed he is no longer a Mitsubishi ambassador after splitting to provide flexibility if another manufacturer recruits him to race the Dakar Rally in a car. He had attempted to persuade Mitsubishi into reviving their Dakar programme but noted “it seems like it’s not in the goal and vision for them to do that, which is fine for their business structure. But it’s hard. I don’t want to be locked into something if an opportunity comes along to get into the car category, so we had to part ways.”

Price, the 2016 and 2019 Dakar Rally overall bike winner, is contracted to race the event for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing through at least 2024. Besides Dakar, he is contesting the World Rally-Raid Championship with KTM and is currently second in points entering the season-ending Rallye du Maroc that begins Friday.

While one of the top rally bike riders today, he has long been keen on trying out four-wheeled racing. Outside of Finke, he has competed sporadically in the Stadium Super Trucks run by Dakar veteran Robby Gordon since 2015. He and SST colleague Paul Weel also race a Mason Trophy Truck in SCORE International.

This interest also extends to Dakar, where he explains that switching to a car would allow him to prolong his career until he turns sixty. As driving a car obviously has more safety advantages than a bike, it is not uncommon for Dakar two-wheeled stars to eventually race on four in their later years: Stéphane Peterhansel won the Dakar six times on a bike before adding eight more victories in a car, while Nani Roma has a win apiece in each class. Although both of Josef Macháček‘s Dakar triumphs were in four-wheeled vehicles, one was on a quad and the other came in an SSV.

Kyle Larson has had quite an eventful week in Indiana, all without stepping into his NASCAR Cup Series car. On Tuesday, the 31-year-old captured the High Limit Sprint Car Series title at Lincoln Park Speedway in Putnamville. Less than 48 hours later and 45 miles to the east, Larson hopped into Arrow McLaren’s #6 IndyCar entry, ready to attempt the rookie orientation program (ROP) required to participate in the Indy 500. The 2021 Cup Series champion completed the program with relative efficiency, clearing all three phases and posting a fastest lap of 217.898 miles per hour.

“Yeah, just going to feel what an INDYCAR feels like, be low to the ground, feel the acceleration through the gears was pretty crazy,” said Larson. “All of that was eye-opening and an experience that I know for sure I’ll never forget. I look forward to kind of getting around cars, feeling how the dirty air affects things.”

Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports in the Cup Series and sponsor of Larson’s attempt at completing the Indy 500 and NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600 in the same day, was on site as well, showing his support for “Yung Money”.

“This is very, very important to us, no different than Garage 56. When we said we were going to do it, we spent a year, whatever it took, to do it. Although we don’t have as much to do in this situation as we did in that one, but still we want to look the part, be the part, and put our best efforts into it.”

Larson and recent Chip Ganassi Racing signee Kyffin Simpson are the only drivers set to race in next year’s 500 with no previous IndyCar Series starts. The former is the latest driver to participate in IndyCar in any capacity with no prior open-wheel experience, joining drivers like Scott McLaughlin, Agustin Canapino, and Tom Blomqvist.

Kevin Benavides‘ 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship has not gone the way he hoped, and thus will turn his attention towards defending his Dakar Rally crown. As the W2RC season prepares to come to an end at the Rallye du Maroc, Benavides confirmed Thursday that he will skip the event to focus on the 2024 Dakar Rally.

Benavides broke his wrist in late July while testing in the United States, forcing him to miss the Desafío Ruta 40. Although he clarified that his recovery has gone well and he can “withstand the pain that racing would present,” he added “there is a lot of risk and I prefer to play my cards smart” and would rather be at 100 percent for Dakar.

He was not mentioned on the 136-rider entry list, but travelled to Morocco anyway to gauge his post-injury riding and support his younger brother Luciano Benavides. Luciano currently leads the W2RC RallyGP standings with a nine-point edge over Toby Price entering the season finale.

By skipping Morocco, he will have only run two races in 2023. Benavides began the year on a dream note when he won the Dakar Rally for the second time, mounting a dramatic run in the final two stages to to beat Price and Skyler Howes. However, his campaign was eventually derailed when he broke his femur in a shakedown crash just days before the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.

Benavides returned for the Sonora Rally in April, where he rode conservatively to ensure he was back in shape and finished twelfth in class. His Dakar win means he is still top five in points, though skipping Morocco will obviously drop him down the final order.

Joaquim Rodrigues‘ return to racing will have to wait a little longer after crashing during the final day of shakedowns on Thursday, hurting his shoulder and keeping him on the sideline for the Rallye du Maroc.

The injury marks his second straight year of misfortune in Morocco, having crashed on the very first stage of the 2022 edition before officially retiring the next day.

“While on a final shakedown test at Agadir, JRod suffered an awful crash – injuring his shoulder plate,” reads a statement from Hero MotoSports. “Unfortunately, he will not be able to continue the race. We wish our hero a speedy recovery, and hope to see him back in action soon – stronger than ever.”

Morocco was due to be his first race after breaking a left femur bone when he crashed ninety kilometres into Stage #4 of the Dakar Rally in January. He had been coming off a ninth-place stage finish the day prior. Rodrigues returned to riding in June to prepare for Morocco, the final race of the 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship.

The Dakar injury prevented him from racing the rest of the W2RC calendar after finishing eleventh in the 2022 standings. With Rodrigues out again, Hero MotoSports will remain a two-bike operation with Ross Branch and Sebastian Bühler. Branch is currently fourth in the RallyGP standings while Bühler is eleventh.