Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Friday Practice in Montreal brought plenty of action and drama with wet conditions lingering around the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve. 

Lando Norris topped the first session that saw limited running due to heavy rain and standing water on the track, before Fernando Alonso set the pace in a dry-to-wet second practice session.

Read what the drivers had to say following an action packed Friday ahead of the 2024 Canadian Grand Prix.

Fernando Alonso — Aston Martin Armaco F1 Team — FP1: 15th, FP2: 1st

“It was a tricky Friday for the entire field due to the weather with not many laps recorded, particularly in FP1. The conditions meant the track was never fully wet or fully dry but it could be like this in Qualifying and the race so today could provide very useful information for the rest of the weekend.

The fifth and final stage of the Desafío Ruta 40 provided both clarity and complexities in the World Rally-Raid Championship. While some classes like Quad have been decided, the points battle has only tightened elsewhere.

The latter was especially the case in Ultimate, where Yazeed Al-Rajhi entered leading Nasser Al-Attiyah for the FIA overall by just thirteen seconds. Although Al-Attiyah was the fastest car for much of Friday’s stage, Al-Rajhi found just enough juice in the final fifty kilometres to seal the stage victory by twenty-seven seconds. Forty seconds separated Al-Rajhi from Al-Attiyah, the latter still the points leader.

Likewise, Rokas Baciuška‘s dominance of Challenger en route to the category’s overall victory was still not enough to clinch him the title. After racing conservatively on Friday to protect his car, Baciuška ended the DR 40 with three stage wins but was unable to put away Nicolás Cavigliasso, who still has a mathematical shot.

Sebastián Guayasamín, the highest-ranking SSV driver entered in the race, ended the race with the Stage #5 victory. Although not enough to beat Ricardo Ramilo and thus failing to fully capitalise on points leader Yasir Seaidan‘s early exit, he edged out Rebecca Busi for second overall by five seconds to take the championship lead by six points.

Likewise, Tosha Schareina won the fifth leg on bikes by 1:12 on Ricky Brabec; however, he needed to make up 1:27 to beat his Honda team-mate for the outright victory. A similar development befell Bradley Cox in Rally2, edging out Edgar Canet for the stage win by sixteen seconds and Romain Dumontier by twenty-nine but finishing 6:31 back of the latter.

Fernando Alonso topped the second practice session ahead of the 2024 Canadian Grand Prix, ahead of George Russell and home favourite Lance Stroll.

The session started quickly with a number of drivers queuing up at the end of the pitlane, waiting for some dry running after a rain soaked Free Practice One, but most drivers were back in the box after believing the track was too wet for slick tyres. Charles Leclerc came out on intermediate tyres, being noted by race control for incorrect tyre usage. Pierre Gasly was the only driver out on track for multiple minutes, putting his BWT Alpine F1 Team challenger through it’s paces as they the track got quicker.

With around 10 minutes gone in the session, drivers started to come back out on dry tyres to get some crucial running under their belts, with more tricky conditions expected over the weekend. Daniel Ricciardo replaced Gasly at the top of the timesheets momentorially, before being replaced by Fernando Alonso. Kevin Magnussen had a sketchy moment, having to take to the off road in sector 2. A number of cars then went wide at the Turn 10 hurpin, with a few drivers complaining about track conditions.

Home hero Stroll then went top of the timesheets, before being replaced by Alonso a few minutes later. Despite more rain falling, a number of drivers started to go quicker, including Logan Sargeant, who went fourth on the timesheets, before Alex Albon pushed him down to fifth. Verstappen pulled into the pitlane with 37 minutes to go, as he smelled smoke coming from his RB20.

As the track kept evolving, everyone kept getting quicker. As Max Verstappen pulled into the pits, Leclerc was top of the timesheets on the medium tyre, ahead of Alonso. Hamilton was on a quick flying lap, before being impeded by Leclerc at the final corner – the seven-time world champion wasn’t pleased on the team radio. It wasn’t just impeding causing Lewis Hamilton issues, Ricciardo reported to his race engineer that no one was getting out of the way on his flying lap, that put him fifth.

The Dubai International Baja will once again be the final race of the 2024 FIM World Bajas Cup and the FIA World and Middle East Baja Cups after swapping dates with the Jordan Baja. Jordan will now take place on 15–17 November followed by Dubai on 28–30 November.

Originally, Dubai was slated to be the penultimate round for all three championships on 15–17 November with Jordan following two weeks later. The FIM confirmed the switch for its World Cup on Friday.

While the FIA has not released a statement on the change, the Baja Cups generally align with the FIM side. Dubai had its date changed multiple times in 2023, moving from December to November before bumping up to March, then back to November. It ultimately served as the final race after the Jordan Baja was cancelled due to the war in Gaza.

Jordan and Dubai are the seventh and eighth rounds of the FIM and FIA World Cups, respectively, and the third and fourth for the FIA Middle East Baja Cup. All three series’ seasons began with the Saudi Baja in February. While the Middle East Cup’s next race is not until October in Qatar, the World Cups are two races down after racing in Spain (FIM) and Greece (FIA) in May.

Mohammed Al-Balooshi (FIM) and Saleh Al-Saif (FIA) are the most recent Jordan Baja overall winners in 2022, while Al-Balooshi and Nasser Al-Attiyah topped the 2023 Dubai International Baja.

Revised schedules

FIM Bajas World Cup

FIA World Baja Cup

FIA Middle East Baja Cup

Lando Norris finished on top of the timesheets during a disrupted first practice sessions that only saw dry running in the last few minutes.

The session started as planned at 15:30 local time, but the pitlane was closed, meaning there was no chance of any action on track around Circuit Gilles Villeneuve until the light went green. The pitman finally opened with 35 minutes left of the session – Lewis Hamilton was the first of the twenty drivers to get on track. Guanyu Zhou stopped on track in sector two, bringing out the red flag after just 11 minutes of running. The Chinese driver span going into turn 5, hitting the left hand side of the car, damaging the rear in particular. 

Following the second delay, the cars got back onto the circuit with 23 minutes to go. The track started to ramp up as the conditions got better and the grip improved. With 15 minutes to go, Carlos Sainz Jr. led Charles Leclerc with the two Visa Cash App RB drivers third and fourth – Daniel Ricciardo ahead of Yuki Tsunoda.

Sergio Pérez put his RB20 up into third before Valtteri Bottas went quicker, but with the track drying most of the drivers went back to the pits to avoid damaging their one practice set of intermediate tyres.

With six minutes to go, Leclerc took the track on the soft compound tyre – the first to go out on a dry compound. Most drivers followed Leclerc, with the times improving slightly but too much due to some drivers not wanting to push the limits and risk a collision with the barriers on a drying and newly resurfaced track.

Nasser Al-Attiyah won Stage #4 of the Desafío Ruta 40 over Yazeed Al-Rajhi, but a slight error the previous day could come back to haunt him.

He beat Al-Rajhi by three minutes to claim Thursday’s stage, which ordinarily would have put him ahead by thirty-seven seconds in the overall entering the fifth and final leg on Friday. However, the FIA a one-minute time penalty later in the day after reviewing video from Stage #3 that found his navigator Édouard Boulanger had not fully fastened his seatbelt and HANS device while their Prodrive Hunter was in motion.

Al-Attiyah had stopped after smelling smoke in the cockpit, and Boulanger exited to inspect the matter. Once cleared, he returned to his seat and fastened his belts and HANS device before telling Al-Attiyah to resume driving; however, he spent twenty-seven seconds still tightening his gear when he signalled to continue. Boulanger received a suspended €1,000 fine.

The penalty sank him from second to third for Stage #3, two seconds behind Al-Rajhi. Since it was not finalised until after Stage #4, the unassuming Al-Attiyah proceeded as usual and dominated the 391-kilometre stage, finishing ahead of Al-Rajhi by 3:08; Al-Rajhi also had ten seconds added to his time for speeding. Going into the fifth day, he trails Al-Rajhi by thirteen seconds.

While not a matter of seconds, the battle for the FIM overall victory will also come down to the narrowest of margins. After trading blows throughout the stage, including a one-second split through the final checkpoint with twenty kilometres to go, defending DR 40 bike winner Tosha Schareina barely edged out Honda team-mate Ricky Brabec for the stage win by seven seconds.

The Truck category will be a bit slower for the 2025 Dakar Rally as the Amaury Sport Organisation has reduced their top speed from 140 km/h to 135 km/h on safety grounds. Needless to say, defending class winner Martin Macík Jr. is not too happy with this development.

Speaking with TV Nova during the 2025 Dakar Rally presentation in Prague, Macík stressed the rule change “bothers me, period. We have to do something about it. Whether it’s the speed or the starting position or so on, it’s not pleasant when you just throw us backwards.”

Despite their massive size, trucks currently go up to 140 km/h, third fastest behind the 170 km/h of the Ultimate and Stock categories. On the other hand, Challenger is slightly slower at 135 km/h while SSV is capped at 125 km/h. The T5.2 subcategory for assistance trucks can only go 125 km/h since they are not intended to be competing.

Macík pointed out that the ASO was likely dissatisfied with seeing the faster trucks catch up with the side-by-side vehicles of Challenger and SSV. But one thing that really annoyed him about the change is that “the organiser didn’t discuss this with us.”

To further make the race safer for different classes in 2025, the ASO will have the trucks take a different route from cars and bikes (each also going their own way) for one of the stages.

Team Land Cruiser Toyota Auto Body brought both of their Toyota Land Cruisers to the 2024 Dakar Rally finish en route to their eleventh straight Stock category win, but their vehicles took quite a beating. With the 2025 route expected to be even harder, the team intends to focus on improving the Land Cruiser’s durability when they begin testing in Morocco for two weeks in mid-June.

After both Akira Miura and Ronald Basso suffered stage retirements in 2023, the former claimed seven stage wins while the latter won five in 2024. Miura enjoyed his fourth Dakar win in the Stock class, finishing nearly two full days ahead of Basso due to a rash of mechanical issues that punished Basso’s Land Cruiser 300 GR Sport.

The Dakar came on the heels of Basso winning the Rallye du Maroc in Morocco, where Miura won three stages to Basso’s two but did not finish after the drive system failed on the final day. Morocco is often used as a dress rehearsal for teams competing at Dakar, and Toyota Auto Body conducts their desert rally tests annually in the North African country.

“The difficulty of the Dakar Rally is increasing year by year, and the 2025 event is expected to be even more difficult and tough,” reads a team statement. “Based on the experience of the previous event, we will continue to improve the suspension and tyres jointly developed by Toyo Tire Co., Ltd. and TLC in order to further improve the running performance.

“In addition, we will evaluate the measures against the troubles that occurred in the previous event on various road surfaces in Morocco, which are similar to the environment of the Dakar Rally, and aim to improve reliability and durability. By working to further improve the running performance, reliability, and durability of the Land Cruiser, we will strengthen the rally vehicle and lead to the creation of an even better Land Cruiser.”

Ahead of its competition début at the Rallye du Maroc in October and the 2025 Dakar Rally, the Dacia Sandrider launched its initial testing phase in May. All three riders for the factory team—Nasser Al-Attiyah, Cristina Gutiérrez, and Sébastien Loeb—each split time driving and developing the new car at various instances throughout the month.

The Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire hosted systems checks before the first test commenced on 6–9 May at the Sweet Lamb testing complex in Wales with Gutiérrez and Loeb. Al-Attiyah got his first taste of the Sandrider on 27–31 May at Châteaux de Lastours in France alongside Loeb. Its first desert test will be in Morocco from 28 June to 5 July.

“So far everything has gone astonishingly smoothly with no serious problems,” began technical director Philip Dunabin. “We’ve managed to sign off all the basic things in terms of the engine, we’ve done quite a lot more work than we expected to do on the suspension setup and the transmission settings have been reviewed in terms of the differentials.

“The suspension had a real good going over not just during the test at Sweet Lamb but very much so in the test at Châteaux de Lastours. Now, we’ve got a lot of work cleaning up a lot of the details putting the car into a state that is ready to go on a rally. We managed to highlight one or two problems in terms of the crew’s installation inside the car that we want to make some improvements and they should also be in place before we do the tests in Morocco. Everything is looking really positive, only a couple of very minor things that we were able to work on quite quickly. Now everybody is working flat out preparing everything for Morocco and we are very much looking forward to continuing our Dakar preparations there.”

The team marks Renault Group‘s return to rally raid after fielding factory efforts under the eponymous marque in the 1980s and 1990s. The Sandrider, which is based on the Dacia Manifesto concept car, was unveiled in late January. Prodrive is overseeing the programme after previously developing the Hunter, with which Al-Attiyah currently leads the World Rally-Raid Championship.

Formula 1 returns this weekend for the 2024 Canadian Grand Prix after a thrilling few weeks that has seen Max Verstappen and Oracle Red Bull Racing’s grip on both Championships fall away slightly. 

The Canadian Grand Prix is known for it’s exciting races and has thrilled fans for decades. Held on the historic Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, the track unique layout – part street circuit, part permanent facility – pushes drivers and their cars to the limit. The tight corners and long straights create plenty of opportunity for overtakes, while the notorious “Wall of Champions” will be a section to look out for as the drivers look for speed coming out of the slow speed chicane. The circuit has a combination of high-speed sections and technical challenges that make the Canadian Grand Prix a favourite amongst drivers and fans, producing dramatic moments and outcomes.

The teams have been giving their thoughts ahead of the Grand Prix, have a read below, starting with the leading constructor, Red Bull!

Max Verstappen — Oracle Red Bull Racing — WDC 1st

“Following a more difficult weekend in Monaco, this week I have been with the Team back at the factory and in the sim preparing for the Canadian Grand Prix. The track there is very unique, has some old school kerbs and there are plenty more opportunities for overtaking. 

Extreme E‘s five-month break will end on 13/14 July with the second Hydro X Prix, once again taking place at the former Glenmuckloch open-pit coal mine on Queensberry Estate in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland.

“Last year’s Hydro X Prix brought both social and economic benefits to our communities and regional and national economies, while providing a new and exciting platform to showcase the country’s offer to a global audience,” said Deputy First Minister of Scotland Kate Forbes. “Extreme E shares our ambition for sustainability, renewable energy, gender equality and local conservation and I am confident this this year’s event will once again demonstrate that Scotland can provide the perfect stage for major, innovative international events like the X Prix.”

Although Glenmuckloch used to be a coal mine, the race name originates from the site being converted into a Pumped Storage Hydropower plant. PSH is used to generate energy between reservoirs on differing elevations by passing through a turbine between them both up and downstream.

The inaugural edition took place in 2023, where each Grand Final was won by X44 and Veloce Racing, respectively. It was the first Extreme E race in Scotland and the second in the United Kingdom after the 2021 Jurassic X Prix in England. The series’ Legacy Programme for the weekend was a project to help restore the River Nith and preserve its Atlantic salmon population, in collaboration with the Nith District Salmon Fishery Board.

“Heading back to the UK and Scotland for the next event of the 2024 Extreme E season is an exciting prospect for our championship,” commented series head Alejandro Agag. “It was a hugely successful event last year and we cannot wait to return to such a dramatic location for our action-packed racing series, but also one which has sustainability values at its core. Scotland is a strong voice in the adoption of a clean energy future and renewable energy sources, and our Hydro X Prix marks a great opportunity to highlight these important issues that are happening so close to home.

Adam “Special” Peschel knows how to put on a show as one of the top motorcycle stunt riders in Europe, but can those skills translate to rally raid? During the 2025 Dakar Rally presentation in Prague, Peschel and Fesh Fesh Team announced he will aim to make his Dakar début next year, riding a Husqvarna 450 Rally in the Rally2 category.

His stunt riding career began as a fifteen-year old in 2005. After recording three consecutive runner-up finishes in the Czech stunt riding championship from 2012 to 2014, he decided to go full time in the profession in 2014 and oversees the Kaskadérská Moto Show, which has performed across Europe and in countries like CHina and Brazil. Peschel founded the first stunt school in the Czech Republic in 2012. He has also worked as a stuntman for television series like The Lazarus Project and Constellation.

Outside of stunt work, he is a motorcycle instructor who leads the Motofitness programme and a driving teacher at Brno Circuit.

Peschel is no stranger to Fesh Fesh Team or the Dakar. In 2023, he accompanied one of the team’s assistance vehicles supporting the Tatra Jamal of Tomáš Vrátný, who finished ninth in the Truck category.

“Stuntriding is about motivation and hard work. I’ve been doing it for twenty years and even though I spend most of my time on a road bike on roads or circuits, the off-road Dakar Rally in the motorcycle category has always fascinated me with its demands on riding, physical and mental endurance and I wanted to try it,” Peschel stated. “In 2023, I completed the Dakar together with Tomáš Vrátný as the driver of one of his support vehicles, to see how it actually works on the rally, and that convinced me that I should also try the Dakar Rally as a driver. I devoted 2023 to preparing the bike. This year, I am training; I plan to compete in rallies in Romania and Morocco, and I believe that I will be at the start of the prologue in Bisha, Saudi Arabia on 3 January 2025.”

Toyota Gazoo Racing and Monster Energy Honda Rally Team were happy campers upon wrapping up Stage #3 of the Desafío Ruta 40 on Wednesday. While the latter completed another podium sweep on the bike side, TGR scored their second consecutive stage win as Seth Quintero held off Nasser Al-Attiyah for his second career Ultimate victory.

TGR last claimed back-to-back stages at the 2023 World Rally-Raid Championship-ending Rallye du Maroc with Al-Attiyah. His departure for Prodrive ahead of the 2024 season prompted them to sign Quintero and Lucas Moraes, the latter winning Stage #2 on Tuesday.

Al-Attiyah and Yazeed Al-Rajhi, respectively second and first overall entering Wednesday, battled for the lead throughout the first half of the stage before Quintero entered the picture. He quickly passed Al-Attiyah at the midway point before he started setting faster times than Al-Rajhi in the final 100 kilometres. Quintero quickly built a gap over Al-Rajhi before Al-Attiyah moved up to second behind him, ultimately taking the win by 1:09 over him while Al-Rajhi was 2:07 back.

He notched his maiden stage win in the Ultimate class at the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge in February. However, he remains a distant fifth in the overall and trailing Al-Rajhi by 28:06 after losing time in Stage #1 when he went off course to avoid spectators and went into a ditch.

On the bike side, Honda finished 1–2–3 again with Ricky Brabec, Skyler Howes, and Tosha Schareina. After a slow start due to the colder weather, Brabec hit his stride in the second half and overtook Howes for the lead; Howes beat Schareina by eleven seconds for the runner-up spot. With his second stage win, Brabec now leads Schareina outright by 1:34 with Honda allies Adrien Van Beveren and Howes behind.

Parnelli Jones, who enjoyed success in virtually everything he raced from pavement to off-road, has passed away at the of 90. His son P.J. Jones explained Tuesday that he had been battling Parkinson’s disease “for the last few years.”

Jones is most famous for winning the 1963 Indianapolis 500, his third of seven attempts from 1961 to 1967. He was an open-wheel regular in USAC during the 1960s which he balanced with select starts in the NASCAR Grand National Series (now Cup Series), where he won four times, and the Pacific Coast Late Model Series that has since become the ARCA Menards Series West.

Bill Stroppe, who built his USAC and NASCAR cars, also designed his Mercury with which he won the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb in 1963. At the turn of the decade, Stroppe challenged Jones to try out off-road racing, entering the NORRA Mexican 1000 in 1968. Stroppe later built a Ford Bronco nicknamed “Big Oly”, with which Jones won the Mexican 1000 in 1970, the Baja 500 in 1970 and 1973, and back-to-back Baja 1000s in 1971 and 1972. Jones and Stroppe also won the 1973 Mint 400. Fellow Indy 500 champion Rick Mears and off-road great Walker Evans also raced alongside Jones in the desert.

After ending his driving career, he remained involved as a team owner. Vel’s Parnelli Jones Racing won the Indy 500 with Al Unser in 1970 and 1971 and three consecutive USAC titles courtesy of Unser and Joe Leonard from 1970 to 1972, while the great Mario Andretti raced for Jones in Formula One from 1974 to 1976. The team’s Class 8 Chevrolet truck also claimed the 1976 SCORE International truck championship and class wins at the Baja 500 and 1000. Chevrolet also enlisted Jones with building the BFG Blazer, which went on to race with Scoop Vessels and Bob Gordon.

He has been inducted into over twenty halls of fame including the International Motorsports Hall of Fame, National Motorsports Hall of Fame, and Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame.

Adrien Van Beveren went fast to win Stage #2 of the Desafío Ruta 40, but he and many others perhaps went a bit too fast.

Van Beveren battled with Sebastian Bühler for much of Tuesday’s stage, being separated by as little as one second as they ran through the first 325 kilometres. The former’s Monster Energy Honda team-mates Skyler Howes and Pablo Quintanilla had monster runs (pun intended; both Honda and Bühler’s team Hero MotoSports are sponsored by the energy drink) in the final 100 that propelled them past Bühler while Van Beveren built plenty of distance to pull away.

By the end, however, Quintanilla and Van Beveren both received speeding penalties. Quintanilla had seven minutes tacked onto his time, relegating him from third to eighth while Van Beveren was penalised 1:20, which was trimmed down to a twenty-second penalty and allowed him to keep the win over Howes. Bühler’s Hero colleague Ross Branch was also busted for speeding and got a minute.

“We started off on fast pistes which were very slippery,” Bühler explained after finishing third. “Managing the tyre condition while riding extremely fast was dangerous, but also fun at the same time. After refuelling I lost a bit of time, but overall I’m happy with the result and enjoy a good starting position for tomorrow.”

Twenty speeding penalties were handed out amongst the FIM categories, the victims including all but four of the fifteen Quad riders. Manuel Andújar celebrated his 28th birthday on Tuesday with the category’s stage win, though among his presents was a two-minute penalty. His fellow podium finishers Juan Carlos Carignani and Kamil Wiśniewski respectively got one minute and twenty seconds for speeding, while Mariano Viel lost third place to a six-minute addition that dropped him to fifth. Viel’s brother Facundo Viel (fourth), Cooper Van Vliet (sixth), Leonardo Martinez Saucedo (tenth), and Wilson Fabian Cerón Ochoa (fifteenth) escaped the stage without punishment.