Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Zach Sizelove will remain involved with the Honda factory-backed Talon desert racing programme for 2023 and beyond. On Tuesday, Honda Factory Off-Road Racing announced Sizelove as the Talon factory driver on a multi-year extension. The team also intends to unveil a new Talon for the Baja 500 on 31 May – 4 June.

Sizelove joined the Honda team in 2021 after growing up on Honda dirt bikes and 1600 off-road cars with his family. He finished sixth in the Pro UTV Normally Aspirated class in his first SCORE International event, the San Felipe 250, but retired from his maiden Baja 1000 later that year due following a crash.

2022 was a breakout year for Sizelove as he won his class at the Mint 400 and Baja 500; the former came in a Talon 1–2 finish ahead of Ethan Ebert. He finished runner-up in both the California 300 and Baja 1000, the latter in a joint effort with Ebert.

“We are proud to announce that we have resigned Zach Sizelove to a multi year deal for the Honda Talon Factory Team for this season and beyond! We look forward to Sizelove backing up his domination in the Pro UTV NA class with wins at the Mint 400 and Baja 500 this season,” posted the team on social media. “We also looking forward to the debut of an all NEW Factory Honda Talon Race Car at the Baja 500 in May!”

Honda Factory Off-Road Racing is undergoing a period of change in 2023, most notably the retirement of team owner Jeff Proctor from driving due to concussions. Ebert replaced him in the team’s Ridgeline division, which recently unveiled a new “Gen 2” Trophy Truck at King of the Hammers with Ebert as driver. Honda also started selling crate engines for the Talon to customers in November.

Travis Pastrana‘s Daytona 500 début will also be a bit of a family affair for him as his #67 23XI Racing Toyota Camry will have his younger cousin Greg Powell on the pit crew as tyre carrier. Powell has also starred alongside Pastrana on the latter’s extreme sports series Nitro Circus.

The two, separated by a year in age, grew up together in Annapolis, Maryland. Nicknamed “Special” Greg, Powell was a BMX rider on Nitro Circus from its inception in 2009 until his departure for NASCAR. In 2011, he landed a backflip dubbed the “Special Flip” that he had created years prior but was rarely able to achieve until doing so as part of a Nitro Circus live show.

A former college football player for the University of Maryland, Powell eventually embarked on a similar route to his fellow athletes into NASCAR when he joined Michael Waltrip Racing as a development pit crewman. He became a tyre carrier on Pastrana’s #99 in what is now the ARCA Menards Series East and West in 2011.

In a 2012 interview with Pittalks, Powell explained, “A couple years ago Trav and I had just finished a workout in his basement gym. We were eating some lunch and he mentioned the idea of racing NASCAR. I could see that he had the serious look going on so I told him I was pumped for him and told him that I’d be great for his pit crew should he need anybody. A couple weeks later he asked me if I was still interested and if I was willing to seriously commit to it. I was all in.”

The following year, while mainly employed by Truck Series team Eddie Sharp Racing as Cale Gale’s tyre carrier, he continued to work with Pastrana in his part-time Xfinity Series schedule for RAB Racing as well as doing his first Daytona 500 with Michael McDowell. Pastrana had a separate crew at now-RFK Racing when he contested the full 2013 Xfinity season; he departed NASCAR afterwards, only returning for sporadic Truck starts over the next decade.

No, you’re not seeing double.

Friday’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season opener at Daytona International Speedway is expected to have a very unique quirk as there are two drivers with the same name: Jason White in the #1 Toyota of TRICON Garage, and Jason White in the #34 Ford of Reaume Brothers Racing. Despite their shared names, they both hail from different backgrounds and have never competed against each other.

The White in the #1 is a 43-year-old American who was a Truck Series regular in the late 2000s and early 2010s, including running the full seasons from 2008 to 2012 for multiple teams most notably with GunBroker sponsorship. His best season came in 2010 when he finished tenth in points with a pole at Daytona and six top tens. He also made starts in the Cup and Xfinity Series before his NASCAR career appeared to end after 2014.

Seven years later, he made his return to racing by running the Xfinity superspeedway races, notching a tenth at Daytona in his first start with RSS Racing.

On the other hand, the White set to pilot the #34 is six years older and comes from Canada, where he is a regular in the NASCAR Pinty’s Series with over 100 starts, the first driver from the western part of the country to reach the milestone. While he has yet to win a Pinty’s race, he placed as high as eighth in points in 2011 and 2013.

Even sportsman short course off-road racing isn’t safe from splits. Disagreements in the Short-course Off-road Drivers Association (SODA) leadership resulted in some leaving to start their own series, the International Off-Road Drivers Association (IODA), which will run five rounds in 2023 all at Gravity Park USA.

IODA was formed in November by Kelly Kuether, Alexander Mackowski, and Milan Mazanec, all of whom were involved with the fledgling SODA series. Kuether had been named SODA’s Vice President just two months prior to the breakaway while Mazanec had been the technical inspection director since the inaugural SODA season in 2021. Mackowski passed away in early February in a truck accident last Wednesday.

Citing unhappiness with SODA, Kuether elected to form his own championship. Various drivers from SODA have also committed to IODA.

“Many of us learned that SODA was not what it was advertised to be,” Kuether explained in a Race-DeZert post. “It was not a driver’s association at all. The board was nothing but a smoke and mirror show. All decisions were made by the owner regardless of the board or driver’s. So we as a group decided to move forward with this venture. It is set up so no one individual will profit from the series, and the driver’s voice can and will be heard. It WILL be a driver’s association.”

Such rows are not too uncommon in motorsport, most infamously showcased by the CART/IndyCar split in the 1990s that effectively knocked American open-wheel racing from its pedestal as the top form of racing in the United States. Short course has also seen a rather tumultuous history even at the national level when series like the original SODA fell as drivers went elsewhere.

After the reveal of Scuderia Ferrari’s 2023 car, SF-23, Carlos Sainz said that he was excited to be a part of the team’s first in-person launch since his joining the team. The Fiorano event featured a full audience of fans and gave both Sainz and Charles Leclerc the opportunity to run a few laps in the newly-launched car. 

“Having the chance to unveil the car in front of our tifosi has been great as this is my first launch event in front of an audience since I joined the Scuderia. I would like to thank everyone who has joined us on such a special day, both here and online around the world.”

After lots of hard work put in by the team to develop SF-23, Sainz sees this year’s car as a potential “step forward” from last year’s contender, which brought them up to second place in the championship standings. 

“This car is the result of the passion and hard work of everyone in the team during the past months and it certainly looks like another step forward.”

Sainz, who achieved one win in 2022 at the British Grand Prix, said that the team has set their sights on more wins and a push for the championship titles. With twelve pole positions and four wins between both Ferrari drivers in 2022, they will certainly be looking to work on converting on a Sunday as part of their effort to keep moving forward as a team. 

Scuderia Ferrari unveiled their latest contender, SF-23, with an exciting on-track launch ahead of the 2023 season. Charles Leclerc described the excitement of launching the new car after all the effort put in by the team in development. 

“Our whole team has put a lot of work into this new car and seeing it in front of us for the first time just feels amazing. It means that the start of the season is very close, which is always an exciting moment.”

The Monegasque driver had the opportunity to drive laps around Ferrari’s Fiorano circuit in the brand-new SF-23, and was excited to debut the car on track with hundreds of fans and partners in attendance. 

“It felt great to drive it here at Fiorano today, sharing the experience with our tifosi and partners. We still have to wait for the first real laps at testing to make any real assessments though.”

Leclerc said that Ferrari’s goal for this year is to improve results-wise and become more consistent. Though the team had strong pace at many venues in 2022, they lost out on potential wins and podiums to their nearest rivals– Red Bull Racing and Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team— on account of strategy and other inconsistencies.

Scuderia Ferrari revealed their 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship contender, SF-23, in the company of five-hundred devoted fans at the outfit’s Fiorano track. Both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz took to the track in the newly unveiled SF-23, marking the first time since 2017 that the car would be driven on launch day. 

Ferrari Team Principal Frédéric Vasseur said that he is happy with the appearance of SF-23’s livery, especially with the team’s classic red and the “long-F” logo featured on the car’s rear wing. 

“Today we launch our 2023 contender together with our partners and tifosi, and I am very pleased with how the car looks. I love the red colour and the ‘Effe Lunga’ that spans across the rear wing, reminding us of our heritage.” 

Now that aesthetics are covered, Vasseur said that “speed and performance” are top priority, with the team aiming to take their first constructor’s championship title since 2008. 

Ferrari had been in the championship mix at the beginning of last season, but as the year went on it became clear that Red Bull Racing would take the title. They would ultimately secure the victory by a decisive margin of 205 points ahead of the Scuderia.

In late January, Reaume Brothers Racing‘s shop in Mooresville, North Carolina, suffered a fire that resulted in three crewmen being treated for injuries. Despite the predicament, the team will press forward with contesting the full 2023 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season. One of their two trucks, the #34 piloted by Jason White, will sport a tribute to the Mooresville Fire-Rescue department for their work in extinguishing the blaze by way of a fire-based livery at Friday’s season opener at Daytona International Speedway.

White, not to be confused with another Jason White also competing in the Daytona Truck race, has raced sporadically in the Truck Series for RBR since 2018 including the last four races at Daytona. Despite failing to qualify in his first try in 2019, he scored the team’s third and most recent top ten to date at the 2020 edition. Outside of Daytona, he has also attempted the three most recent rounds at Talladega, where he missed the 2022 race, as well as Phoenix and Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. The latter effectively serves as White’s home race as a Canadian, though his hometown is on the other side of the country.

For 2023, White will also continue competing in the ARCA Menards Series opener at Daytona, this time for Jeff McClure after spending the last four years with Fast Track Racing. He recorded top twenties in all four tries to date including a sixth in 2020.

The #34 is technically one of two fire-themed liveries at Daytona as FDNY Racing is entered with Bryan Dauzat. FDNY, consisting of volunteers from the Fire Department of New York, features a fire truck-like appearance on their #28.

“I am really happy to have Jason back for a fifth straight year,” said team owner Josh Reaume. “We have a great relationship and it is always great to see how much he has improved each year when he runs here at Daytona.

Matthew Stevenson, a regular at the Dakar Rally in the late 1990s and 2000s who helped develop Volkswagen‘s factory programme for the legendary race, passed away Monday at the age of 53. He reportedly collapsed at his home in France after suffering a brain aneurysm the week prior.

Stevenson began his career working for an automobile company owned by current FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem before becoming a mechanic with Marlboro Rally Team in the FIA Middle East Rally Championship. He eventually became a cross-country rally co-driver, teaming up Jutta Kleinschmidt in 1997 and notching a pair of podiums before débuting at the Dakar Rally the following year, where the duo won the final stage and placed twenty-fourth overall.

With Stevenson calling the shots, Saeed Al-Hajri finished sixth overall in 2002 as part of Mitsubishi’s factory effort. The following year, he switched to BMW and worked with former ski champion Luc Alphand and placed ninth. The Stevenson/Alphand tandem also enjoyed success outside Dakar by winning the 2003 Baja Germany.

The Briton migrated to Volkswagen in 2004 where he helped the fledgling team and WRC alumnus Bruno Saby score a sixth in a Touareg. Stevenson remained involved with the team through 2006. In 2007, he and Michael Peterson finished twenty-third at Dakar, and they continued to work together at the 2008 Central Europe Rally (the replacement for Dakar after its cancellation), finishing nineteenth in the general ranking.

Stevenson eventually settled down after ending his racing career and lived a private life in France.

Conner Jones is so young that he was born just three days after Jimmie Johnson won his first Daytona 500 in 2006. In April, he will make his NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series début on a nine-race schedule, driving the #66 Ford F-150 for ThorSport Racing starting at Martinsville Speedway on 14 April.

Additional starts are planned at North Wilkesboro Speedway (20 May), World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway (3 June), Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course (8 July), Richmond Raceway (29 July), Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park (11 August), Milwaukee Mile (27 August), Bristol Motor Speedway (14 September), and Phoenix Raceway (3 November).

“It’s always been my dream to enter into the NASCAR Truck Series,” said Jones. “I’m thrilled to be signing a multi-year contract with ThorSport Racing. They have a rich history within the Truck Series, along with being proven champions. This will be a great year for me to learn and gain more experience behind the wheel of a NASCAR Truck. I know I have a strong team and organisation surrounding me.”

The 16-year-old Jones mainly competes in late models and short track racing. In 2021, he appeared in the ARCA Menards Series as well as its Eastern counterpart for the first time, scoring a top ten at Bristol in a combination race that year. In six ARCA East starts for GMS Racing and eventually Venturini Motorsports, he has top tens in all but two including a third at Dover in 2022.

While much of his racing is on short ovals, he also finished tenth in his first ARCA road course start at Watkins Glen in 2022. Mid-Ohio is the lone such track on his Truck calendar.

The 2023 King of the Hammers in Johnson Valley, California, saw a blend of new and more of the same. The latter camp included Raul Gomez claiming the Race of Kings that closed out the two-week event for the second year in a row, while the former ranged from the débuts of Great American Shortcourse to the tumultuous racing introduction for SPEED UTV.

King of the Hammers served as the season opener for multiple championships including Ultra4 USA, AMA US Hard Enduro, and GAS for the first time. Hard Enduro kicked off KOH with the King of Motos, won by Trystan Hart for the second time after he held off five-time victor Cody Webb. Kylee Sweeten won in the Moto women’s category.

GAS, now in its third year of operation, competed on a special track prepared by Nor Cal Rock Racing, with Championship Off-Road regular Ryan Beat winning the premier Pro 2 class. Extreme E driver Sara Price competed in the Class 11 race, independent from the Class 11 Showdown that took place two days prior on the main desert course, and finished sixth.

The Class 11 Showdown, which began with a 37-wide land rush start, was claimed by former SCORE International champion Alex Gonzales. Gonzales was racing a new Volkswagen Beetle, nicknamed Francie, that he intends to use throughout his 2023 races in the United States.

Robby Gordon underwent an up-and-down week. He and son Max entered the Can-Am UTV Hammers Championship under his SPEED UTV brand, a relative newcomer to racing competition after being developed over the past three years, where Max struggled with transmission problems while Robby retired after losing a continuous variable transmission belt and elected to pull out to preserve the car for the Mint 400 in March.

The inaugural Hyderabad E-Prix turned out to be a successful one for the TAG Heuer Porsche Formula E Team, despite the fourth round of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship having started in worrying fashion.

A huge crash for championship leader Pascal Wehrlein in Free Practice One saw the German go to hospital for a check-up, whilst the remaining three Porsche-powered cars remained in the pits due to concerns over what caused the crash. It was later discovered that Wehrlein’s crash was due to a fault with the VCU, which effectively resulted in a jammed throttle. As a result, Wehrlein and António Félix da Costa struggled in qualifying, after losing so much running.

The duo started the race twelfth and thirteenth, yet made stellar progress. The pair capitalised on a plethora of incidents which took place ahead of them, meaning that by the end of the race Da Costa finished fourth, with Wehrlein in fifth. However, there was late drama, as Sébastian Buemi was awarded a seventeen-second time penalty, promoting Da Costa to third and Wehrlein to fourth.

It marked a dream result for Da Costa in his one-hundredth Formula E race, whilst Wehrlein extended his championship lead to eighteen points despite his horrible start to the weekend. To make things even better, the team moved to the top of the Constructors’ Championship, which they now lead by twenty-three points.

Team Principal Florian Modlinger was incredibly pleased with the team’s “very strong performance” considering how tough the weekend started. He also shared his “thanks” to the mechanics for repairing Wehrlein’s car so well.

António Félix da Costa‘s one-hundredth race in the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship was certainly one to remember, with the Portuguese driver having claimed his first podium for the TAG Heuer Porsche Formula E Team at the inaugural Hyderabad E-Prix.

It was a thrilling race, with Da Costa having meticulously worked his way through the field after starting thirteenth. All four Porsche-powered cars qualified poorly, largely due to effectively missing Free Practice One, following an issue for Da Costa’s team-mate. Despite this, Da Costa managed to work his way through the field and, most importantly, avoid all the carnage that was taking place.

Da Costa capitalised on a catalogue of incidents that took place ahead of him, something that saw him rise towards the top rapidly towards the end. Whilst he finished third, Da Costa actually crossed the line in fourth, but was promoted to the podium after Sébastian Buemi was awarded a seventeen-second time penalty after the race.

Regardless of how he claimed the podium, the most important thing is that he was in the right position to make the most of everything that unfolded, giving him a one-hundredth race in the series to celebrate for the former Champion.

“That was a typical Formula E race – exciting to the finish. I got off to a good start but lost a few positions in the pack. We kept our cool and our attack mode worked perfectly. Starting from P13 and finishing third is a terrific result – especially at my 100th Formula E race. I’m supported by a great team. We’ve worked hard and progressed from race to race. We’ll continue on this path.”

Despite not winning the 2023 Dakar Rally, the Prodrive Hunter had a dominant showing as Sébastien Loeb and Guerlain Chicherit combined to win seven of fourteen stages in the T1 class. X Rally Team is eager to try the vehicle out themselves as they formed a partnership with Prodrive to bring the Hunter to South American rally raid competition.

X Rally Team is a five-time champion of the Brazil-based Sertões Rally Championship, previously claiming the titles in the NWM Ford Ranger and Toyota Hilux Overdrive. While the Hilux is the top vehicle in rally raid today, X Rally uses the Hilux T1 rather than the T1+ model that won the last two Dakar Rallies and the 2022 World Rally-Raid Championship with Nasser Al-Attiyah. Hoping to keep pace with other competitors, X Rally Team elected to make the switch to Prodrive.

“We opted for a new technical package from Prodrive, out of all the ones we tested,” explained X Rally CEO Beco Andreotti. “We are going to work very closely in 2023 and 2024, and the upcoming season will be one of intense work and preparation both for the Sertões and also for other races outside the country.

“In the last Sertões, we could not compete on equal terms within the category due to the big difference between T1 and T1+, and our focus now is to compete on equal terms with our opponents.”

As part of their deal, X Rally will establish a base in Évora, Portugal, while two Hunters compete in the Sertões Championship with brothers Cristian and Marcos Baumgart. One of the Hunters was driven by Loeb at Dakar.

Nick Cassidy put in an immense performance at the inaugural Hyderabad E-Prix, to claim his first podium of the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship and his first of the Gen3 era, in what was so nearly a perfect day for Envision Racing.

Cassidy delivered one of the best drives of his Formula E career, with the New Zealander having pulled off some stunning moves at Turn Three on his way from ninth, to second. He made cracking progress early in the race despite having started on the fifth row, with the Envision driver having made the most of the incidents that occured in front of him.

Through excellent pace and mistakes by others, Cassidy found himself behind Jean-Éric Vergne in what was the fight for the win, with the New Zealander having boasted up to four-percent more energy than the Frenchman at one point. Despite his energy advantage, Cassidy failed to overtake Vergne for the lead, with the twenty-eight year-old having missed out on victory by just four-tenths of a second. Nevertheless second was an excellent result, in what initially looked like a double-podium for the team.

After starting third on the grid, Sébastian Buemi made an excellent start and briefly led some of the opening phase of the race, whilst the frontrunners all took their Attack Modes. The Swiss driver once again had strong pace but slipped to third late on behind his team-mate; however, Buemi looked safe to claim third. The former Formula E Champion did cross the line in third to the jubilation of the team, but late drama turned their smiles, into frowns.

Buemi was awarded a seventeen-second time penalty after the race, with him having been judged to have used too much power at a point in the E-Prix. He was understandably fuming, with the penalty having dropped him from third, to fifteenth. It also meant his run of finishing every race in the points ended, with him having also slipped to fourth in the Drivers’ Championship, one place above his team-mate.