Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

The Baja 1000 on 15–20 November will see an all-Japanese team try to tame the desert of Baja California as Team JAOS makes their SCORE International début. The team will field a new Lexus LX600 for Tomonori Noto in the Stock Full class, and the vehicle was revealed in early July before shakedowns formally began a month later.

Team JAOS (“Japan Australia Offroad Service”) was founded in 2015 to celebrate the thirty-year anniversary of their namesake and parent company, an SUV parts producer. The operation began competing in the Asia Cross Country Rally that year with Ikuo Hanawa driving a Toyota FJ Cruiser before Noto, a mechanic for JAOS, took over as permanent driver beginning 2016. Hanawa and Noto ran the 2015 Baja 1000 together, racing a Nissan HBR-6 in Class 7 but failing to finish.

Besides a new driver in 2016, the team switched to the Toyota Hilux, which was imported from Thailand (where the AXCR is held) as the Japanese market would not receive it until 2017. KYB Corporation engineer Kazuhiro Tanaka became Noto’s co-driver in 2017. Two years later, the duo won the AXCR’s T1G class.

“The AXCR is a cross-country rally, so there were daily breaks. On the other hand, the Baja 1000 is an off-road race, so once it starts, it is non-stop until the finish with refuelling, tyre changing, and repair work for damaged parts,” Noto told Motor-Fan.jp in late July. “Therefore, if you have big trouble, you will not be able to recover within the time limit, and it is a tough competition that you will retire at that point. The driving stage is also very different: the AXCR is mainly muddy terrain and jungle, but the Baja 100 is mainly in rocky areas and deserts, so the way of running and building the vehicle are completely different.”

JAOS allied with Toyo Tire Corporation in 2020, and Noto was named Toyo’s “Open Country” off-road tyre brand ambassador a year later. When COVID-19 resulted in the AXCR’s cancellation, the team continued developing their programme domestically before heading to North America to compete in Best in the Desert‘s Vegas to Reno in 2021, where they fielded a Polaris UTV for Noto. However, he retired from the race while fellow Japanese driver Akira Miura won his class. Noto returns to the Vegas to Reno next week in the UTV Turbo Pro category.

Mario Isola says fans around the world can rejoice after three teams fought for victory in last Sunday’s Hungarian Grand Prix, the first time this season where this occurred.

Before the race at the Hungaroring, it had been a clear fight for race wins between Oracle Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Ferrari, but the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team were also involved in the battle in Hungary having been only the third best outfit up until then.

George Russell took his maiden FIA Formula 1 World Championship pole position on Saturday and looked settled in the lead, and although Red Bull and Max Verstappen would go onto take the victory on Sunday, Russell and his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton joined him on the podium, ahead of both Ferraris of Carlos Sainz Jr. and Charles Leclerc, and the second Red Bull of Sergio Pérez.

Isola, the Motorsport Director at Pirelli, was pleased to see Mercedes join the battle at the front for the first time in 2022, while he was also happy to see all three available compounds used to good effect throughout Sunday’s race in Hungary.

“I’m very happy for the hundreds of thousands of spectators who came to the track and all the other fans around the world who saw three teams in a close fight for victory for the first time this season,” said Isola.

Otmar Szafnauer admitted it was a tricky Hungarian Grand Prix for the BWT Alpine F1 Team after they were forced to attempt a one-stop strategy due to their remaining tyre allocations on Sunday.

Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon ended the race eighth and ninth at the Hungaroring despite the strategy call, which required them to run the medium compound at the start before switching to the unfavoured hard compound until the end.

The pace on the hard tyre was not strong, and it meant the team came under attack in the closing laps from those on fresher tyres, particularly from Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team’s Sebastian Vettel, although Ocon was able to hold the position ahead of the German.

Szafnauer, the Team Principal at Alpine, says it was a good achievement for the team to score six points in Hungary, and it gives them a four-point advantage over the McLaren F1 Team heading into the summer break.

“After scoring six points from today’s Hungarian Grand Prix, the team remains in fourth place in the Constructors’ Championship as we head into the summer break,” said Szafnauer.  “That in itself is a great achievement and gives us a real focus to push on and attack the remainder of the year when we head to Belgium next month.

The Stadium Super Trucks return to Nashville for the second annual Music City Grand Prix this weekend, and with them comes a grid of ten. While not the loaded thirteen from 2021, full-timers are joined by two returning names from the Long Beach season opener and a driver who has not driven a stadium truck in three years.

The carousel of Championship Off-Road Pro 2 class drivers now places Ryan Beat in the #51. He was the very first driver for Continental Tire’s SST programme, having débuted the truck at the 2019 Circuit of the Americas season opener with a podium in Race #1. With COR on an off-week between Dirt City and Bark River, he decided to make his return to SST after a three-year absence. Following his one-off at COTA, he scored the 2019 Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series Pro Lite championship, his second in a row.

Beat will hope his SST run goes better than last weekend’s COR Dirt City outing as his Race #2 ended after being turned in the first corner of the opening lap. He is currently seventh in the Pro 2 standings with a pair of runner-up finishes at Antigo and Crandon. Jerett Brooks and Cory Winner, who are respectively first and second in Pro 2 points, have also raced stadium trucks in 2022.

After making his first start at Mid-Ohio, Ben Maier returns in the #67. The thirteen-year-old overcame spins to score fourth in both races and appear on the overall podium in third.

Coming back after last racing in Long Beach are Matt Brabham and Cleetus McFarland. Although Brabham told The Checkered Flag he doubted he could do SST on the same weekend as Indy Lights, the Nashville schedule accommodated both as IndyCar is sandwiched between them. The three-time SST champion notched fourth and second at Long Beach while he was second and third in the 2021 Nashville event en route to the title. Brabham will ride some cross-discipline momentum after nearly winning but still bitching a podium in Indy Lights at Iowa a fortnight ago and sits fourth in points.

The current FIA World Rally Championship points leader Kalle Rovanperä edged his fellow countryman and Toyota Gazoo Racing teammate Esapekka Lappi on Thursday morning’s light rainy shakedown at Secto Rally Finland.

Rovanperä who has taken five of seven victories so far this season and leads the championship with a great margin, was fastest through the Rannankylä shakedown on his final attempt with a time of 1:56.1 and was five-tenths of a second quicker than Lappi and followed up by the two-time rally winner Ott Tänak in the Hyundai i20 N Rally1.

The two local Toyota GR Yaris Rally1 drivers were sharing the fastest times throughout the three to four passes they went, Rovanperä started with the fastest time on the first run, Lappi took the fastest time on the second and third attempts before Rovanperä managed to move back up on the fourth attempt.

Takamoto Katsuta finished in fourth with 1.3 seconds behind Rovanperä and Elfyn Evans jumped up to fifth on the last run, putting four Toyotas within the top five meanwhile Hyundai´s Oliver Solberg who had an early spin on the stage on the first run was passed by Evans and went down to sixth.

M-Sport who is the only team that hasn´t conducted any tests ahead of Finland was lower down the standings with Craig Breen being the leading M-Sport driver in seventh, Hyundai´s Thierry Neuville took a disappointed eight fastest time and rounding up the top ten were the two French M-Sport drivers of Pierre-Louis Loubet and Adrien Fourmaux.

DTM Series Manager Frederic Elsner believes that the 2022 season so far has exceeded expectations.

Speaking at the halfway stage of the season, Elsner, the director for the event and operations said, “Looking at the development, the way in which things were going this year in terms of quality and quantity of the drivers, teams, and manufacturers, a high level of internationality, it was clear already that it was going to look really good for the upcoming season.

“But expectations were absolutely exceeded in the first half of the season. Everyone is a full-blown professional in his or her own field, be it a driver, engineer, mechanic, that is clear to notice, and this huge respect and the fair interaction have fascinated me”.

This year’s Norisring round did open up the series to renewed criticism, however. Race one on the small 1.4-mile track was littered with incidents, causing 16 cars to retire. As a result, driving standards were a hot topic of discussion following the event.

Elsner had this to say on that particular afternoon, “Saturday at Norisring had its own rules. The morning after, there was a very clear statement by race control in which these issues were addressed. There, it was made really clear how one has to behave at the track and from which perspective race control will be dealing with these issues in future.

After a point-less display for the Haas F1 Team at the Hungarian Grand Prix, team principal Guenther Steiner has spoken out on what he feels was a harsh decision by the FIA to award Kevin Magnussen with the black and orange flag in the early stages of the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Contact at turn 1 with Daniel Ricciardo saw Magnussen’s front wing sustain damage, with the FIA opting to show the Haas driver the black and orange flag, forcing Magnussen into an early pitstop. With Magnussen pitting for the hard compound tyre, the Danish driver was left with it all to do and was only able to bring home his Haas VF-22 in sixteenth place.

Steiner spoke post-race on how the FIA’s decision had hindered any possible progress for Magnussen at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

“It was a difficult race today for us. Kevin with apparent front wing damage which actually in our opinion was a mistake by the FIA to call us out on. The front wing was clearly safe to continue so we lost half a lap and that means our race was over and then obviously to get the tires to work was difficult once we ended up in all the blue flags.”

On the other side of the Haas F1 Team garage, Mick Schumacher also endured a tough day out on track at the Hungaroring. Despite a strong start from the young German driver, a tough spell on the hard tyres saw Schumacher cross the finish line in fourteenth position.

The Hungarian Grand Prix saw a second consecutive point-less finish for the Haas F1 Team. The weekend saw the Haas F1 team debut their long-awaited first upgrade package of the season, but it proved to be a result to forget for the team.

Starting from thirteenth, Kevin Magnussen’s race was undone at turn one as contact with Daniel Ricciardo saw the black and orange flag brought out for the Dane due to the damage sustained on his front wing.

“Our race was compromised massively by having to pit for the black and orange flag. I had slight contact at the start with one of the McLaren’s – I couldn’t avoid it – and it wasn’t that bad, so I was surprised to get the flag.”

Pitting for the hard tyres, Magnussen like the rest of the field who opted for the C2 compound, struggled to find any pace in the tyre. Magnussen would go on to bring his Haas car home for a sixteenth-placed finish.

“Then later we couldn’t really switch the hard tire on, so it was good to get off that and do some laps on the medium compound.”

Magnussen was debuting the new upgrade package for the Haas F1 Team and the 29-year-old leaves Budapest hopeful that the upgrade package will come good in the races ahead.

The Hungarian Grand Prix was certainly one to forget for Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN, with Guanyu Zhou finishing thirteenth, and Valtteri Bottas retiring a handful of laps before the end of the race.

After the race, Zhou explained that a bad start and an attempted one-stop strategy didn’t work out for the Italian/Swiss team, which they also attempted with Bottas.

“Conditions today weren’t a threat per se, they were a bit mixed, especially a little more slippery on the last few laps, but overall okay,” said the Chinese driver. “I think our plan today didn’t really pay off, we struggled on lap one and on the first few laps losing ground to other cars, and as going for one stop didn’t work out, we had to do an extra one which put me on the back of the field. It was quite frustrating, as it compromised my chances.“

The #24 driver then compared the pace of the C42 to the time of the British Grand Prix a month ago.

“Besides this, I think we had a strong pace today, and we deserved a little more, as in terms of performances we seemed to be back to where we were around Silverstone.

Jody Egginton, Technical Director at Scuderia AlphaTauri believes that, despite not getting into the points, the race pace shown in Pierre Gasly‘s race was promising, following his pitlane start on Sunday.

Gasly was set to start the race from nineteenth on the grid after getting a lap time deleted, but instead used the opportunity to tactically add some extra Power Unit components to his car, dropping him back just one place. The Frenchman would start the race at the Hungaroring from the pit-lane, then recover to twelfth place in the race. Meanwhile, Yuki Tsunoda started the race from sixteenth after also being knocked out of Qualifying One; but after suffering with balance and grip (as well as a mid-race spin), the Japanese driver placed nineteenth overall in the race.

Regardless of the result, Egginton believes there are takeaways from the weekend:

“We had mixed fortunes as a team today. Pierre drove a very strong race, from a pitlane start, making good use of the soft and medium compounds to come home 12th. Unfortunately, Yuki had a far more difficult race, struggling with grip and balance in every stint and generally not being happy with his car.

“Although no issue was evident from the telemetry, we need to conduct an investigation to get to the bottom of this.”

Having started the Hungarian Grand Prix from the pitlane, Pierre Gasly did a good job to recover to twelfth place in what was a chaotic race on strategy. In a year where Scuderia AlphaTauri have been struggling, recovering to a position near the points is certainly a good result.

“I must say I’m happy with today. Starting from the pitlane is never easy and we managed to recover to twelfth position. There were some changes made to the set-up of the car for the pitlane start, which showed a bit more pace and allowed us to make some good moves,” the Frenchman explained.

“The most important thing is that we use the upcoming three weeks to extract more from our package and finish inside the points consistently.

“I know the team and what we are capable of achieving, and with these new cars being difficult, we need time to understand how to get the best out of it,” the number ten driver concluded.

“It didn’t feel like I had much of a race,” says Tsunoda after mid-race spin

Yuki Tsunoda started the race around the Hungaroring, Budapest from sixteenth place, but suffered a spin during the race that dropped him down to the back of the pack. The Japanese driver claims that it was “so difficult to keep [the car] on the track”, despite running the Soft tyre for the majority of the race. The cool track conditions did, however, make it tricky to get temperature into the tyres; which may explain the reasoning behind Tsunoda’s lack of pace.

Front Row Motorsports has decided against appealing the 100-point penalty imposed upon the #34 driven by Michael McDowell, the team announced Tuesday.

After finishing sixth at Pocono on Sunday two weeks ago, the #34 car was found to have modified a part supplied from a Next Gen car vendor. Such components cannot be tampered with, and offenders would receive an L2 penalty that includes docking 100 points, ten playoff points, and fining the crew chief $100,000 and suspending them for four races. Extreme violations can result in being barred from the playoffs altogether.

Brad Keselowski from fellow Ford team RFK Racing was the first to suffer an L2 penalty after Atlanta in March.

With FRM dropping the appeal, crew chief Blake Harris‘ four-race ban begins Sunday at Michigan International Speedway, and he will not erturn until the regular season finale at Daytona International Speedway. Chris Yerges, who serves as FRM’s lead engineer and IT support, will take over as interim crew chief.

“After further assessing penalties levied against its #34 NASCAR Cup Series team, Front Row Motorsports has notified NASCAR that it will drop its appeal and accept the penalty,” reads a team statement. “The team has made internal changes in its build practices to ensure the issues leading to the penalties will not happen again in the future.

Aksel Lund Svindal is well known for his skiing exploits, having won two gold medals in the Winter Olympics and five FIS Alpine World Ski Championships. Since retiring from the sport, he turned his eyes towards auto racing, and on 13/14 August will showcase his driving ability in his home country as he enters the FIA RX2e Championship round in Hell, Norway. It will be his maiden foray into rallycross.

“I have big respect for rallycross drivers because its a sport that is just action-packed,” said Svindal. “There is so much happening, and when you go out in the car for the first time, it’s certainly a handful but it handles really well. As Norwegians, we are familiar with the acceleration of electric cars, and both the acceleration and handling of the RX2e car on such rough surfaces is very impressive.

“Even if I’m only an amateur and this is just for fun, to go to Hell and see everything up close and join the action is something I’m really looking forward to. It’s no secret that I’m a big advocate of sustainability and innovation, and with the increasing electrification of motorsport and the incredible performance that will bring, I’m super excited to see what the future has in store.”

The Hell round, held at Lånkebanen, is the second of the 2022 RX2e season. To prepare for the start, he test drove an RX2e car at Circuit de Calafat in Catalonia with Klara Andersson and the unrelated Nils Andersson as mentors.

Although he escalated his driving career following his exit from skiing in 2018, Svindal already possessed prior competitive motorsport experience when he competed in the Audi Sport TT Cup‘s 2015 Red Bull Ring round. Among his opponents in the event were fellow skiers Felix Neureuther and Marcel Hirscher, while Svindal’s #96 was also piloted by ski veterans Jon Olsson and Sven Hannawald during the season.

It was a mixed weekend fo Nissan E.DAMS‘ Maximilian Günther, who finished in the points at one of the two races at the London E-Prix.

Günther qualified for the Quarter-Final section of the qualifying duels across both Saturday and Sunday; however, the twenty-five year-old made it no further.

He finished eighth in Race One, but could’ve finished slightly higher had it not been for energy problems late on. In Race Two the German driver finished outside the points, after being hit into a wall and forced into the pits for a nose change.

Had this not happened, then the Nissan driver would’ve most likely have finished in the top ten once again, but had to settle for points in just Saturday’s race.

Despite the unfortunate events that took place in Race Two for Günther, the German was “extremely happy” with his London E-Prix performance.

Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team’s Sebastian Vettel made it into the points with a tenth place finish at the Hungarian Grand Prix, as team-mate Lance Stroll fell just short in eleventh after a late-race team order to switch the drivers in pursuit of a ninth place finish for the team. 

Principal Mike Krack said that he was pleased with the team’s efforts in Hungary, having calculated their strategy well for the conditions and ending up with a point to add to the tally. 

“This afternoon was anything but straightforward: we managed our tyre life throughout the entire race, judged the strategy very well, and managed both drivers to obtain a good result for the team. 

“Lance drove a strong race – he managed his tyres well, pulled off some great overtaking moves when it really mattered, and did a great job to close on [Valtteri] Bottas and move into the points. 

Krack shared the reasoning behind switching the drivers to move Vettel ahead, as he said that Vettel had better pace on his tyres compared to Stroll, so they made the order in an effort to try and increase their chance of overtaking Esteban Ocon for ninth place.