Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Off Piste Adventure‘s trio of riders for the Sonora Rally on 24–28 April might not be the most decorated group, with two being new faces to the world of rally raid, but they certainly pack a punch in the name department as Jordan Dukes and Luke Stalker join the returning Matthew Ransom.

Ransom boasts the most experience at Sonora by virtue of being the only one to even race there. In his début in 2020, he finished eighth overall and third in the Road to Dakar subcategory for riders aspiring to compete in the Dakar Rally. His second attempt in 2022 ended with retirement after three stages.

Dukes mainly competed in hare scrambles, a form of off-road bike racing on closed circuits, before beginning a transition to rally raid.

Stalker is even newer to the discipline as Sonora will be his rally raid début. Having rode bikes since he was three, he has also raced in hare scrambles as well as enduro. In early April, he entered the AMA US Hard Enduro Series’ Snake Bite event in Texas, finishing twenty-eighth overall and seventeenth in the Pro class.

All three are eligible for the Road to Dakar, with the winner of the class earning free admission into the 2024 Dakar Rally.

In an ideal scenario, January 2024 would have seen Ashley Thixton and his younger brother Cameron Thixton race at the Dakar Rally for the first time. Unfortunately for Cameron, he will have to shelve those plans for now as a result of struggles to acquire the financial backing for the effort. In the meantime, Ashley will press on with his goals by competing at the Sonora Rally on 24–28 April.

“Not the news we want to be bringing you right now but due to lack of funding it’s a pause from me for now,” said Cameron. “I have decided to put my goal of Dakar on hold to make place for my brother Ash to attack this dream now.”

The brothers hail from Harare, Zimbabwe, and hoped to race at Dakar in 2023 before pushing their plans to 2024. The run comes under the “Dakar 263” banner, a project consisting of the two and Graeme Sharp, the latter becoming the first Zimbabwean to race at the Dakar Rally when he finished seventy-fourth in 2020.

Ash, who is three years older than his brother, and Cam grew up in motocross before launching Dakar 263. With Cam out of the picture, Ash will tackle the Sonora Rally with the hope of qualifying for the 2024 Dakar Rally through the Road to Dakar programme.

He will race with support from Freedom Rally Racing.

It was a risky decision by Cliff Daniels, but it worked out in the best way possible. During what would be the final pit stop of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Martinsville Speedway, Daniels elected to change just right-side tyres on Kyle Larson‘s car as the others took four.

Despite having an older pair of tyres on the left, Larson restarted fifth and took the lead with thirty laps remaining. The rest of the field led by Joey Logano had no answer for Larson as he took off to score his second win of the year by over four seconds. Larson even described Logano as not being much of “a factor all day. I was never around him at all throughout the race, but he’s a very good short track racer.”

The victory is the first at Martinsville for the #5 since 1984 with Geoff Bodine in what was Hendrick Motorsports‘ maiden triumph.

“Earlier in the race when a couple of guys stayed out on older tyres and survived for twenty to thirty laps, which was twenty to thirty laps longer than I thought they would have, that was a tell sign,” Daniels commented. “A couple of data points last year of guys on higher lap tires still maintaining track position. So still a little bit of a gamble, but we knew there were some data points where it had worked. So that’s the way we went.”

Stewart-Haas Racing was the top team throughout the day, but it ultimately ended in disappointment. Ryan Preece won the pole and led a race-high 135 laps with the Stage #1 win, the latter coming with team-mate Aric Almirola running second, while Kevin Harvick and Chase Briscoe placed 1–2 in Stage #2. However, Preece was busted for speeding on pit road between the second and third stages, forcing him to make up lost ground in the latter and finishing fifteenth. Harvick struggled to a twentieth-place finish.

Matt Brabham entered the Stadium Super Trucks‘ Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach weekend with three wins at the street circuit. He left tied for the most there with five.

After Brabham claimed Race #1 on Saturday, he spoiled Myles Cheek‘s hopes of scoring his maiden victory by passing him on the penultimate lap of Sunday’s Race #2 to complete the weekend sweep. It is Brabham’s twenty-sixth win in SST and fifth at Long Beach, the latter tying him with Robby Gordon.

Cheek looked like the top driver for the day when he passed pole-sitter Bill Hynes on lap two and led nearly the entire race through both competition cautions. He successfully held off a charge from Gavin Harlien, whose move into turn one following the second yellow flag backfired and allowed Brabham to move into second.

However, Brabham found an opening with two laps to go and overtook him on the inside of turn seven.

“Not a great start to the weekend but those things happen. The way the points is structured, it doesn’t really matter. You can still go for the overall,” said Brabham, who was plagued by mechanical problems in qualifying on Friday. “I just knew I had to get both wins and the Continental truck was just unbelievably fast.

Ahead of next Monday’s Formula E Rookie Test, the Nissan Formula E Team have announced that Formula 2 driver and reigning Formula 3 World Champion Victor Martins will be driving for the Japanese manufacturer at the Tempelhof Street Circuit, Berlin.

The test will take place the day after the eighth round of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship, with next weekend’s Berlin E-Prix being a double-header. Also completing the Rookie Test for Nissan is F2 race winner Luca Ghiotto, who left the junior category last season.

Martins is, of course, a member of the Alpine Driver Academy and is certainly a real star of the future. The Frenchman has made an electric start to his debut season in F2, with the ART Grand Prix driver having already claimed a pole position and two podiums.

The Rookie Test will offer Martins a great opportunity to experience a different series and learn a “different style of driving”, with the young Frenchman viewing Formula E as a “very attractive series”.

“It’s a huge honor to be selected for the Rookie Test with Nissan Formula E. The team has a close relationship with the Alpine Academy, which I’m a part of, and it’s a great chance for me to experience a Formula E car for the first time. I’ve already been in the simulator and found it really interesting, there’s a lot to learn and I have to use a different style of driving.

John Hunter Nemechek put on a Martinsville Speedway masterclass on Saturday as he led 198 of 250 laps to win the NASCAR Xfinity Series‘ Call 811 Before You Dig 250, though he probably would have needed to call 911 for the blaze that followed as his victory burnout caused the rear of his #20 car to ignite.

“This car wasn’t very good in practice yesterday. I thought we were like a tenth-to-twelfth place car,” said Nemechek. “Everyone went to work on this #20 team for qualifying and this race today.

“Thank you to (sponsor) Pye Barker Fire & Safety – they actually carry Pye Barker fire extinguishers here in Martinsville. It was fitting: after we caught on fire, they put it out.”

Nemechek started second alongside Cole Custer, but the pole winner was a virtual non-factor after leading the first five laps before Nemechek took control. He won two stages and only briefly lost the lead to Justin Allgaier following Jeremy Clements‘ lap 218 crash before holding the top spot from the ensuing restart onwards.

Custer would settle for third behind Nemechek and Sammy Smith, who made it a Joe Gibbs Racing 1–2 finish. The victory was Nemechek’s second of 2023 after Fontana in February.

Regardless of whether one is a professional wrestling fan, they are likely familiar with “Stone Cold” Steve Austin as one of the most iconic names in WWF/WWE history and even for his work outside of the ring. He added another chapter to the latter on Saturday when he made his desert racing début in the Valley Off Road Racing Association‘s Prospector 250 in Yerington, Nevada.

Racing a Kawasaki Teryx KRX 1000 appropriately numbered #316 with Shane Kisman as co-driver, Austin finished seventh in the eight-car Sportsman UTV class with a total time of four hour, forty-eight minutes, fifty-four seconds. Class winner Bennett Thuener was slightly over an hour ahead at 3:47:15.

Austin was the last in his category to complete all four laps (the professional classes did six versus two fewer for Sportsman entries), overcoming an early rollover in which he flipped onto the driver’s side just eight miles into the race before support crews got him back on his wheels.

“About a couple laps in, I was thinking to myself, ‘I’m just trying to finish the race. Don’t beat yourself.’ That was what I was thinking,” said Austin after the race. “I got to thank Shane and the guys for putting me in the car. They did a heck of a job. It’s my first ever race I’ve ever run and I had an absolute blast.”

The effort was prepared by Kisman and Class 1 Motorsports run by Daniel Keyes; Kisman’s son Zachary won in the Pro UTV Normally Aspirated class. While Austin has driven a UTV recreationally, the race marked his first time doing so in a competitive environment.

It might be the start of a new year, but some things never change as Matt Brabham, Robby Gordon, and Gavin Harlien, all Stadium Super Trucks champions with a combined six titles of nine given out, swept the podium for Race #1 at the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Brabham, holder of the most titles in series history with three, started midpack in sixth after a difficult qualifying on Friday but reached the podium after just two laps. After passing Ryan Beat later on the third lap, he ran behind pole-sitter Bill Hynes through the first competition caution. Hynes lost the lead shortly after the restart when he nearly slid into the turn seven tyre barrier, but saved the truck from contact.

Beat was not as fortunate a circuit earlier when he drifted into said tyres, causing him to lose third to Robert Stout and Gordon. Gordon cleared Stout for second on lap six. He could not catch Brabham after a strong restart by the latter on the second competition yellow.

The win is Brabham’s twenty-fourth in SST and fourth at Long Beach, with previous triumphs from 2017 to 2019. All three podium finishers have won at the California street circuit before, with Gordon being the reigning victor and Fastest Qualifier.

Stout was unable to hold off Harlien as the reigning champion passed him on the outside in turn nine with two laps remaining.

On 12 April, The Checkered Flag sat down with Rodrigo Ampudia to discuss his San Felipe 250 victory and plans for the 2023 SCORE International season and in general.

Below is the full transcript of the interview. Some text has been altered from the actual dialogue to improve readability and remove verbal pauses.

An article summarising the interview can be read here.

Transcript

TCF: How much confidence does starting the SCORE season with the win give you and your team going into the Baja 500?

RA: It’s definitely a confidence booster. It’s something that we’ve always felt sure that we could do. It was very exciting to be able to have a plan, execute it, and deliver overall win for Can-Am.

Étienne Gélinas is on a crash course of major off-road events, which he hopes to wrap up by competing at the Dakar Rally for the first time in 2024. To get there, he plans to use the upcoming Sonora Rally on 24–28 April by competing in the Road to Dakar subcategory.

An artist from Quebec, Canada, Gélinas made the decision to pursue the 2024 Dakar Rally by competing in various desert races over the next two years, which he revealed in November 2021 as part of a short film he produced titled My Road to Dakar.

He ran the 2022 Sonora Rally and was the eleventh and final competitor in the Road to Dakar to complete the race, placing twenty-sixth overall. A month later, he went from stage-based rally raid to point-to-point desert racing when he made his SCORE International début at the Baja 1000, competing in the Pro Moto Ironman class. Gélinas crashed early on, eventually reaching the finish though was not classified due to cutting much of the course.

In February, he took part in the Coast 2 Coast Rally. All three aforementioned races are held in Mexico, with the Sonora Rally being adjacent to Baja California where SCORE events are held while the Coast 2 Coast is on the opposite side of the country.

For the 2023 Sonora Rally, Gélinas will ride in the Pro Moto National class for those not vying for the FIM World Rally-Raid Championship. As he has yet to run the Dakar Rally, he is also eligible for the Road to Dakar programme which rewards outstanding entrants with earn free admission to Dakar; 2023 Dakar Rally rookies Morrison Hart, Ace Nilson, and David Pearson competed with Gélinas in the 2022 Sonora RtD. Gélinas will vie with the likes of Jatin Jain and Sebastián Olarte at the 2023 edition.

Rodrigo Ampudia‘s luck always seemed to run dry whenever the SCORE International season began at the San Felipe 250, but things finally turned in his favour in the 2023 edition as he won the Pro UTV Forced Induction and was the top-finishing UTV overall.

On Wednesday, Ampudia sat down with The Checkered Flag to talk about his race and plans for 2023 with Can-Am.

Race Recap

“It’s definitely a confidence booster. It’s something that we’ve always felt sure that we could do. It was very exciting to be able to have a plan, execute it, and deliver the overall win for Can-Am.”

Ampudia’s #2910 Can-Am Maverick X3 was the twenty-fourth entry in Pro UTV FI to start the race, with just two others rounding out the order excluding the quartet who willingly began at the back. Unlike the Trophy Trucks who had qualifying, the UTVs and all other categories were subject to a random draw to determine starting position.

Unlike in traditional pavement motorsport, starting further back in desert racing is generally advantageous as such competitors can follow the path laid down by those who went first. Such a method is so effective that in the global World Rally-Raid Championship, the FIM rewards the first three bike starters with time bonuses to compensate for time they might have lost from having to “pave” the route across untouched sand.

Kirsten Landman received a major health scare following the 2023 Dakar Rally when she was diagnosed with pulmonary embolism, a blood clot in an artery in the lungs that results in blood flow being blocked and could be fatal if left untreated. Fortunately for Landman, after three months of rehabilitation, she revealed on social media Friday that she has been cleared to return to riding and physical training.

According to blood testing during initial evaluations, she had been diagnosed with long COVID—or the long-term effects of COVID-19 that can surface well after one had been infected and recovered—stemming from having COVID-19 during the Dakar Rally, which she figured explained her severe fatigue during the middle stages. Landman had attributed her tiredness to a bout with the flu prior to doing her check-up.

“Please forgive my silence as I wasn’t able to update as I didn’t know where this was going. But now I have clarity,” began Landman’s post. “So the last 3 months since return from Dakar have been a medical rollercoaster.

“2 weeks after Dakar (beginning of Feb) I started training again – with an exceptionally high heart rate with low level exertion I knew something wasn’t right. Rushing off to a cardiologist and having bloods & ECG’s I was diagnosed with ‘Long COVID’ with my blood tests revealing I had COVID at Dakar (explains why I was so sick) – recovery going forward I was told not to exert my hr over 150bpm for an indefinite time. This didn’t sit well with me – as I wanted a proper diagnosis and understanding of what and why I had this and a understanding of what was to come on the road to recovery. I was referred to an amazing cardiologist Dr who deals with athletes with problems like this.

“After a heart MRI, lung and heart sonar Dr A diagnosed me with a pulmonary embolism. Explanation: A pulmonary embolism (PE) is a blood clot in the blood vessels of your lung. This happens when a clot in another part of your body (often your leg or arm) moves through the veins to your lung. A PE restricts blood flow to your lungs, lowers oxygen levels in your lungs and increases blood pressure in your pulmonary arteries. Without quick treatment, a pulmonary embolism can cause heart or lung damage and even death.

Red Bull GasGas Factory Racing went from having no riders at the second round of the World Rally-Raid Championship to full strength for the third. After missing the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge due to injuries, Daniel Sanders and Sam Sunderland will represent GasGas at the Sonora Rally on 25–28 April.

The reigning W2RC RallyGP champion, Sunderland has experienced a difficult title defence so far as he crashed just one stage into the Dakar Rally, breaking his shoulder and suffering a concussion. A month later, he broke his ankle during final practice just days before the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge, keeping him on the sidelines yet again.

With Sunderland out early, Sanders quickly picked up the torch and won Stage #3, but food poisoning and pain in his left arm severely hindered his performance to the point where three second-place stage finishes failed to move the needle in the overall and he finished seventh. The arm pain, which stemmed from when he broke his elbow and wrist in a crash at the 2022 Dakar Rally, lingered over the next month and forced him to sit out Abu Dhabi.

Sanders was able to resume riding in early March as his health improved. Later in the month, he teamed up with fellow Australian Red Bull members Daniel Ricciardo and current RallyGP points leader Toby Price for a Red Bull video promoting the Formula One Australian Grand Prix.

Both riders will have plenty of work to do if they want to disrupt the RallyGP points battle. Sanders sits ninth of twelve classified with fourteen points from Dakar, trailing Price by thirty-two. Sunderland’s early exit at Dakar compounded with his Abu Dhabi means he has yet to score a point. While a comeback is not mathematically impossible, they face a massive uphill battle.

In 1995 and 2021, Martinsville Speedway was the site of NASCAR‘s rain tyre oval tests as the sanctioning body looked for a way to get racing in during wet weather. On Friday, the Craftsman Truck Series got to put the damp weather package to action.

Unlike “true” rain racing, which is not possible at ovals due to banking placing too much burden on the tyres, the damp weather package is intended to allow races to take place on moderately wet surfaces without having to wait for the track drying process to finish. In the case of Friday’s Truck race, the trucks equipped with wet tyres ran single file during pace laps to expedite the drying process, though their impact on the racing was minimal as the rain quickly subsided. The race start had been delayed due to lightning.

With rain not playing a major chaos factor, the Truck Series—much maligned for its inexperienced drivers and high rate of accidents—proceeded to fill that gap as over half of the race was run under caution due to wrecks. While Stage #1 only saw a competition caution followed by the stage break, the second segment along saw four wrecks.

The final crash on lap 117 came when Carson Hocevar attempted to run three-wide while racing Taylor Gray and Matt DiBenedetto. Contact between Hocevar, who has started to accumulate some flack for his aggressive driving style, and Gray prompted a retaliatory strike by Hocevar as he clipped Gray, only to spin himself out. The rain returned during the ensuing yellow flag.

With the race well over its halfway point, NASCAR elected to end it after 124 of 200 laps. Corey Heim, who took the lead from former boss Kyle Busch on lap 43, was the leader at the time to secure his third career win and first for TRICON Garage.

Ahead of the first Formula E rookie test since 2020, NEOM McLaren Formula E Team have confirmed that endurance driver Charlie Eastwood and Formula 3 driver Luke Browning will complete the test for the Woking-based team, which takes place a day after the Berlin E-Prix.

Eastwood and Browning will get an incredible opportunity to test McLaren’s first Gen3 car at the Tempelhof Street Circuit in Berlin, a day after the eighth round of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

Getting to take part in the test will simply add to what has already been a great year for Eastwood, with the Irishman having won the Asian Le Mans Series at the start of the year for DKR Engineering‘s LMP2 set-up. Eastwood is also competing in the LMP2 class in the European Le Mans Series this year, whilst his campaign in the FIA World Endurance Championship has already started.

Eastwood is competing in the LMGTE Am for ORT by TF Sport, with his campaign in the WEC having started with a ninth-place finish at Sebring. With all of that in mind, it’s certainly been a busy start to the year for the Asian Le Mans Series Champion; however, he can’t wait to drive something “very different” in the form of McLaren’s Gen3 challenger.

“I’m really looking forward to be jumping into the NEOM McLaren Formula E car. I’m grateful for the opportunity to gain some experience in very different machinery than usual. I’ll be looking to pick up as much as I can from the successful and experienced team I will be surrounded by. It will be a different style of driving compared to what I’m used to – I don’t doubt I have a lot to learn, but I’m eager to pick it up as quickly as possible. Looking forward to the 24th!”