Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake is set to enter the Australian Grand Prix with four points on the board, and will be looking to increase that count after a disappointing result at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. 

Zhou Guanyu crossed the line in thirteenth last round, while team-mate Valtteri Bottas found himself at the back of the pack in eighteenth. Alfa Romeo Team Representative Alessandro Alunni Bravi remains optimistic about the team’s ability to re-enter the top ten, with extensive work done in the off-week to learn more about the car and how to improve its performance. 

“We approach the race in Melbourne with confidence, knowing we have all it takes to fight for points again. We used the time since Jeddah to understand how we can extract more performance from our current package.”

Bravi noted that Alfa Romeo will be bringing some updates to test out in Australia with the goal of maximising the pace and performance of their car. 

“On top of that, we will also have some new parts on the car, which we are eager to evaluate, as the team back home keeps pushing to bring more performance to the C43.”

Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake’s Valtteri Bottas is ready to hit the track for the third round of the 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship, the ever-eventful Australian Grand Prix, and is motivated to add to his points tally in Albert Park. 

With his love for the land down under, Bottas said that the event feels like a home race to him, and that he looks forward to tackling this round after an exciting weekend at the Adelaide Motorsport Festival. 

“I don’t think it’s a surprise that I love it here in Australia – everyone knows that by now! I consider this almost a home race: I was at the Adelaide Motorsport Festival last weekend, where I drove an Aussie V8 and a classic Alfa Romeo touring car – so I’m already in the mood for racing.”

With the field as tight and competitive as it is, Bottas is confident in the team’s ability to make a turn around in Albert Park after finishing in eighteenth place, in part due to damage he took, at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. 

Coming off being the last classified driver in Jeddah, Bottas hopes for a “strong” weekend off the onset in order to get back into points contention. 

After Kove Moto‘s successful Dakar Rally début in which all three of their riders completed the race, the Chinese bike manufacturer has signed their first foreign factory rider. On Tuesday, Neels Theric announced he has gained factory backing from Kove for 2023, with plans of contesting three rallies before entering the 2024 Dakar Rally with them.

The Frenchman will enter two of the three remaining World Rally-Raid Championship rounds on a Kove 450 Rally Factory, the Sonora Rally on 22–28 April and season-ending Rallye du Maroc on 12–18 October, as well as the Baja España Aragón on 20–23 July. While the latter is not on the W2RC calendar, it is part of the FIM Bajas World Cup; his father Daniel Theric won the race’s Bikes overall in 1986.

All of these will culminate in his second Dakar in 2024.

“The project is to develop the bike to make it the highest performance possible in direct relation to the factory,” explained Theric.

Theric previously raced with GasGas, enjoying a strong maiden Dakar Rally in January as he finished fifth overall in Rally2 with top-ten runs in all but two stages and a podium in Stage #9.

The Nissan Formula E Team certainly endured a weekend to forget at the inaugural São Paulo E-Prix, after both Norman Nato and Sacha Fenestraz retired early on in the sixth round of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

After showing such sublime pace in Cape Town, Nissan “believed we could have had a strong race” in São Paulo, something which certainly didn’t happen. Nato retired on the opening lap at Turn Three after launching into the air following contact with Jake Hughes, before his Nissan slammed back onto the ground, causing substantial damage. Fenestraz’s race was over just a handful of laps later after he clipped a barrier whilst trying to avoid an incident, damaging his wishbone and radiator.

It was certainly frustrating for Team Principal Tommaso Volpe, who admitted after the race that São Paulo “showed some of our weaknesses”. Due to their point-less result, Nissan remain in ninth in the Constructors’ Championship, with work to do ahead of Berlin next month.

“We’re frustrated with the result this weekend as we believed we could have had a strong race,” said Volpe. “Our pace looked good in practice, unfortunately we missed out on the Duels in qualifying in a really tight session, before the incidents and subsequent retirements for both Norman and Sacha meant our day finished early. Now we have to analyze the work we’ve done over the last six races to prepare for the double header in Berlin.

“There’s been a lot of positives this season, but this race showed some of our weaknesses, so it’s clear where we have to focus. Our target is still to be competitive and challenge at the front and we’ll look to bounce back next month.”

In any context, a party breaking away from another tends to be nasty and filled with drama. Motorsport is no exception, with the most infamous example being the CART/IRL split in the 1990s for which American open-wheel racing is still trying to recover from today.

While the formation of the International Off-Road Drivers Association is at a regional level in Wisconsin, its leadership was formerly heavily involved with the Short-course Off-road Drivers Association before rifts sparked their departure.

The Checkered Flag got to speak with IODA president Kelly Kuether a month before the nascent series’ season opener, during which he gave his side of what prompted the split, his goals for IODA, and the impact he hopes it will have on sportsman short course off-road racing in the region.

A Messy Divorce

SODA was founded in 2021 by Willie Freshour as a revival of the original Short-course Off-road Drivers Association, which was the discipline’s preeminent championship from the 1970s through 1990s. Freshour spoke with TCF in May 2022, during which he expressed plans of expanding the series across the country for grassroots racers. In September of that year, Kuether was named SODA Vice President.

However, despite Freshour’s optimism in May, various elements of SODA’s executive board including Kuether took issue with how the series was being run, and they left to form IODA two months later. Among the founding members were Jay and Paul Billmeyer, Missi Buechel, Rob DeGreef, Foyd Hartl, Kimberly Kuether, Alexander Mackowski, Milan Mazanec, and Mike “Moogie” Morgan.

Norman Nato‘s São Paulo E-Prix was incredibly short lived, as the Frenchman retired at the end of the opening lap after a big collison at Turn Three.

The sixth round of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship is certainly one that Nato won’t be remembering anytime soon, despite the fact he showed solid pace all weekend ahead of the race. Nato narrowly missed out on the duels but started the race from eighth following grid penalties for a couple drivers ahead of him; however, it meant he was “on the dirty side of the grid”.

This resulted in Nato having a bad start, something which saw him sucked into the midfield pack. Moments later and his race was over, after hitting the right rear of Jake Hughes, launching his car into the air before slapping back onto the ground. He retired instantly as a result of the damage from the heavy impact.

Nato was understandably disappointed to have retired from the race so early, given that he was “feeling good in the car all weekend”.

“I was feeling good in the car all weekend, we were quick during practice and came really close to making it through to the Duels. Lining up in P8, I was on the dirty side of the grid, so didn’t make a great start and was immediately involved in a really tight battle. Heading into Turn 3, the driver ahead of me had to stop sharply to avoid contact and I had nowhere to go.

Overtake!, an upcoming anime produced by Kadokawa Corporation and animated by TROYCA, released a new visual on Friday adding more characters to the cast, particularly a rival team, and their respective voice actors.

The anime is a fictionalised take on the F4 Japanese Championship, with its organiser GT Association lending formal backing for the project. GT Association’s other series Super GT will also appear in the show, serving as Super GT the backdrop for advancing the plot while F4 is the primary focus.

Friday’s reveal introduces Bersoliso, a red-wearing rival team to Komaki Motors and protagonist Haruka Asahina (voiced by Anan Furuya). Bersoliso’s drivers Satsuki Harunaga and Toshiki Tokumaru are respectively voiced by Kengo Kawanishi and Taku Yashiro.

Kawanishi is perhaps best known for portraying the main character of Mobile Suit Gundam IRON-BLOODED ORPHANS, while also playing major roles in shows like Dr. Stone and appearing in the acclaimed Demon Slayer. Yashiro starred in Darwin’s Game, Domestic Girlfriend, and Tiger Mask W, while supporting positions include Kaguya-sama: Love is War and Sword Art Online: Alicization. The duo have also crossed paths prior in projects like Aldnoah.Zero, Chainsaw Man, and THE iDOLM@STER SideM.

“I had never heard of the name F4 before getting in this, so it is new to me,” said Kawanishi. “At first glance, Harunaga-kun gives the impression that he’s a flirtatious person, but he’s actually capable enough to serve as the team’s first driver, and he also has a shrewd side. We hope you will enjoy the world of F4 with us.”

Andrea Stella insists the McLaren F1 Team remain determined to unlock as much performance from their MCL60 as possible as they bid to secure their first top ten finish of the season this weekend in Australia.

It has been a very disappointing start to the 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship season for the Woking-based team, with Oscar Piastri retiring from the Bahrain Grand Prix and finishing only fifteenth in Saudi Arabia, while Lando Norris ended seventeenth in both events after troubled Sundays.

At least one high for the team last time out was Piastri making it into Q3 during Saturday’s Qualifying session, the first time the former FIA Formula 3 and FIA Formula 2 champion made it into the top ten shootout.

For Piastri, it will be his first home Formula 1 Grand Prix this weekend at Albert Park, and Stella, the Team Principal of McLaren, hopes that he and Norris can be top ten contenders as they look to pull themselves off the bottom of the Constructors’ Championship.

“We are pleased to be returning to Melbourne and the Australian Grand Prix,” said Stella.  “This will be Oscar’s first home race in his Formula 1 career, and we look forward to getting back to the passionate Australian fans and scoring the first points of this 2023 season.

Armani Williams will make his NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series 2023 season début on 1 April at Texas Motor Speedway. On Tuesday, he announced he will enter Texas in the #46 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro for G2G Racing.

“Very excited to be teaming up with @g2g_racing for this weekends NASCAR Craftsman’s Truck series race @TXMotorSpeedway,” he posted on social media. “Let’s go!”

After dabbling in the regional divisions, Williams first appeared in the Truck Series in 2021 when he finished twenty-first at Gateway for Reaume Brothers Racing. He attempted three races for RBR the following year, failing to qualify at Texas before placing thirty-first and thirty-fifth at Pocono and Kansas, respectively.

Williams joined Young’s Motorsports for the 2022 season finale at Phoenix but was involved in an early wreck and classified thirty-fifth.

The 22-year-old will be the third black driver to run a national series race in 2023 alongside Bubba Wallace in the Cup Series and Truck rookie Rajah Caruth. Williams is also the first NASCAR driver openly diagnosed on the autism spectrum.

Oscar Piastri will race in front of his home fans in Melbourne this weekend for the first time as the young Australian competes in his first Australian Grand Prix weekend.

The McLaren F1 Team driver has not enjoyed the best of starts to his FIA Formula 1 World Championship career, with a retirement in Bahrain and a fifteenth-place finish in Saudi Arabia leaving him without a point.

However, he is leaving that all behind as he focuses on the race weekend at Albert Park, and he is looking forward to racing in front of his home fans and hopefully fighting for a points finish.

“It’s great to be heading to Melbourne for my home Grand Prix,” said Piastri.  “I grew up in the suburbs of the city and it is a special feeling to be returning as an F1 driver.

“It’s set to be a fantastic atmosphere and I can’t wait to get there and be a part of it. I’m really looking forward to seeing all of the home crowd and all of the papaya fans.

Fernando Alonso is eyeing up a third consecutive top three finish this weekend at Albert Park, with the Spaniard eager to build on the third place finishes he achieved in both the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

The Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula 1 Team has started the 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship season strongly and have proven themselves to be best of the rest behind the dominant Oracle Red Bull Racing team, particularly in the hands of two-time World Champion Alonso.

However, Alonso insists the team are keeping their feet firmly on the ground as they remain realistic about their chances, particularly with how close the battle is behind them between Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team and Scuderia Ferrari, and how far back from Red Bull they are.

“We head to Australia feeling good having scored back-to-back podiums and we hope to build on these results this weekend,” said Alonso.  “The car has performed quite well on two different circuits so far.

“However, our feet remain on the ground and we are realistic that in order to keep scoring strong results we need to deliver in all areas of the team.”

Gavin Harlien will get to sport the coveted #1 number plate in 2023 as the reigning Stadium Super Trucks champion. Well, provided he can find sponsorship to afford the season.

“Looking for a sponsor for the 2023 @stadiumsupertrucks season,” Harlien posted on social media Tuesday. “Won the championship last year and want to go back to back.”

Harlien is the fifth different driver to claim an SST title after claiming the 2022 crown with wins at Mid-Ohio, Nashville, and Bristol. His successes revealed how quickly he regained his stride despite being rusty to start the year as he had been out of racing for the past two years to complete his business degree at the University of Arizona.

Since 2019, VP Racing Fuels had been his primary sponsor after winning the VP Racing Fuels Driver Challenge, a competition between him and Blade Hildebrand for the first three rounds of that year to earn the company’s backing. Harlien’s first win with VP came at Toronto, followed by three more triumphs en route to a third-place points finish. Prior to 2019, he raced with a multitude of sponsors including GoPro, Live, Roadpod, Royal Purple, Tonka, and United Fiber & Data.

The 23-year-old has competed in SST since 2014. He also has stock car experience, running three races in the ARCA Menards Series in 2019.

Toto Wolff believes the progress made by the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team during the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix was encouraging to see, and he hopes for more this weekend in Australia.

George Russell and Lewis Hamilton finished fourth and fifth at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit in a much-improved performance from the W14, the team having struggled more with it in the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix two weeks earlier.

Wolff, the Team Principal at Mercedes, says the battle behind Oracle Red Bull Racing is tight between a number of teams, and small margins could dictate who finishes on the podium at Albert Park.

“The progress we saw in Saudi Arabia was encouraging,” said Wolff.  “We maximised the package we had and scored some solid points.

“More importantly, we continued to learn and understand more about the W14 and our development direction. Everyone back at base has been hard at work to turn these learnings into performance.

Joey Logano typically does not race in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, but when he does, it’s to compete on dirt. On Tuesday, Logano announced he will return to the series for the Weather Guard Truck Race on Dirt at Bristol Motor Speedway on 8 April, driving for ThorSport Racing.

Logano’s 2022 Cup Series championship campaign featured a brief detour when he entered the Truck Series’ Bristol Dirt event for David Gilliland Racing, who opened a new #54 truck for him with which he finished sixth. It was his first Truck start since winning at Martinsville in 2015, and he only had six career Truck entries prior to the victory.

With DGR now a Toyota team known as TRICON Garage, ThorSport became the main Ford Truck team, ironically making their own switch from Toyota. ThorSport fields four full-time trucks while the #66 that Logano is expected to pilot only has nine other starts planned for NASCAR newcomer Conner Jones starting at Martinsville the week after Bristol.

Bristol is the only dirt race that the Cup Series will visit, meaning the Truck event has been used as extra practice. Consequently, a Cup driver (Martin Truex Jr.) won the inaugural edition in 2021 while the 2022 race saw Logano compete against Austin Dillon and Chase Elliott. Cup regular William Byron will race alongside Logano in 2023.

Meanwhile, Logano’s title defence has seen him win at Atlanta and record two more top tens across the first six races to sit third in points.

The tenth Rally Greece Offroad was originally set to take place on 17–20 May as the second round of the FIA European Cup for Cross-Country Bajas, but bigger developments for the country as a whole have forced it to be postponed for now. A new date was not immediately revealed.

On Tuesday, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced nationwide parliamentary elections will take place on Sunday, 21 May. Elections in the country are held every four years, though the 2023 edition will switch to a proportional representation system that removes bonus seats for the party that wins the majority. Should a party fail to secure a majority, a second election will take place later in the year.

While the rally’s original date was to end the previous day for the European Cup, the last day for National entries not competing for points was the 21st.

“The Greek Prime Minister called for general elections on May 21st 2023 and as such we are forced to announce that 10th Rally Greece Offroad will have to move in new dates,” reads a statement from race officials. “We are working closely with FIA and Greek ASN – OMAE so to announce the soonest possible the new dates.

“Organizers apologize for this inconvenient situation and they look forward to welcome you in Greece on the new dates that soon will be communicated.”