Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Snow and ice have always been perfect for Ott Tänak, as he and his co-driver Martin Järveoja are looking to chase down a first podium of the 2022 campaign in Rally Sweden this weekend.

Driving for Hyundai Motorsport, the Estonian have record with three back-to-back podium finishes on snow over the last couple of seasons, Tänak is looking strong as they are heading to the new rally in Umeå, Sweden, having previously won the rally back in 2019 and a second place finish in 2020, and also winning the Arctic Lapland Rally which replaced the round last year – he will be the one to look out for.

The season-opener did not start in the right way he hoped for, after picking up two punctures on the Saturday afternoon leg and only bringing one spare wheel with him, he had to retire from the event.

Now with a terrain he has been successful on many times, Tänak hopes to replicate the result from previous outtings on snow and get his rhythm turned around for the season remainder: “Rally Sweden will be an all-new event as we are moving more north than we have in previous years. I really don’t know what to expect but snow is always something I’ve really enjoyed competing on. Sweden was the location of our first podium with Hyundai Motorsport, and it would mean a lot to be able to replicate that result next weekend.”

“We have the inner drive to come back fighting from our difficult first round of the season; we want to turn that into positive momentum that will carry us throughout the year ahead. Last season we were victorious in the snow in Arctic Rally Finland, so we know we are fast and competitive on this surface. The target will be to hit the ground running and find a good rhythm with the Hyundai i20 N Rally1.”

Local talent Oliver Solberg will fly the Swedish flag on the home soil in Rally Sweden this weekend as the fan favourite alongside co-driver Elliott Edmondson will be looking to claim their maiden FIA World Rally Championship podium after a difficult start to the 2022 campaign.

Making a successful WRC debut in a Hyundai i20 WRC last year in the Arctic Lapland Rally in Finland, Solberg will be one of the drivers that could potentially win the rally this weekend but don’t count out the non-Scandinavians which have also been fast on the snow – It will be a hard new rally and a challenge to take on for the son of the 2003 champion Petter Solberg.

For 2022 Solberg have become a full manufacturer driver in the Hyundai Motorsport outfit, last season he did a couple of outtings for the Hyundai backed 2C Compétition team in WRC, where he made his debut in the top category, as well as campaigned a WRC2 program for Hyundai Motorsport team with a Hyundai i20 N Rally2.

As he was forced to retire after an error in Rallye Monte-Carlo, the young Swede have completed some pre-event tests in Finland and is now prepared for the upcoming four-days rally in Umeå, which have been moved from Solberg’s hometown of Torsby.

Solberg admits he is emotional to drive for the first time on home soil in the new Rally1 category – a dream which have become true: First of all, it is going to be very emotional to compete in my first home event as a factory driver. It is something I have dreamed about my whole life. I think the new location is an important step, as it is what the rally needs to secure fantastic conditions, even if it is sad to move away from my hometown. Snow and ice is also my favourite surface as well so it will be a very special rally.”

After a promising but difficult start to the 2022 FIA World Rally Championship at the season-opener Rallye Monte-Carlo, the Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT will be aiming for a more successful second round at the Rally Sweden this weekend in the new Rally1 hybrid era.

The new Toyota GR Yaris Rally1 car showed a lot of potential with great results in Monte-Carlo, as they were denied the win the rally on the penultimate stage, where M-Sport’s Sébastien Loeb won over his compatriot Sébastien Ogier with just a small margin, as Ogier received a time penalty.

Heading to the new rally will be the regular driver line-up of Elfyn Evans and Kalle Rovanperä, as Rally Sweden is not part of Ogier’s part-time program, the returning Esapekka Lappi will take his seat – driving for the team for first time since 2018, albeit renting a Toyota Yaris WRC with support from the team last year in Rally Finland.

Toyota have previously had success on snow and ice, the current Toyota team principal Jari-Matti Latvala claimed the first win for the team on it’s WRC comeback in 2017, in 2019 the Estonian Ott Tänak won the rally and last time out in Sweden in 2020 it was Evans who won.

For this year and onwards the rally have changed its location more north to the city of Umeå to secure more snow as the old location of Torsby have lacked snow over the past. The Toyota team have run some pre-event tests on similar conditions in Finland and are now fully prepared to tackle the new stages.

With just under four weeks until the five red lights drop at the Bahrain International Circuit for the start of the new season, the full list for who will be competing for glory in the 2022 FIA Formula 2 season is complete.

The reigning double champions, PREMA Racing, will be looking to defend their titles for the second consecutive year while there is a new team on the grid in Van Amersfoort Racing.

There are some new graduates from FIA Formula 3 who will be making their debut in Formula 2 machinery as well as experienced young drivers who have seen their fair share of checkered flag’s in the category.

The entry list is as follows:

PREMA Racing

#1 – Dennis Hauger

Hot off of their first-place finish both overall and in the DPi class at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, Meyer Shank Racing has announced that Stoffel Vandoorne with be racing for them at the 12 Hours of Sebring alongside MSR’s full-season IMSA drivers Tom Blomqvist and Oliver Jarvis.

Helio Castroneves, who would typically be driving, will instead race at the Texas Motor Speedway for the IndyCar race weekend. Vandoorne, who currently races full time for Mercedes-EQ in Formula E, will be piloting the number 60 Acura ARX-05 for the first time since testing.

The replacement marks several other firsts for the Belgian, including his first-ever IMSA start and his first start at Sebring International Raceway.

Vandoorne does have a good deal of endurance racing experience from his time in the WEC, including with his fellow drivers. He and Blomqvist finished second in LMP2 in 2021 with five podiums. His experience also includes two 24 Hours of Le Mans starts, one of which resulted in a third-place LMP1 finish in 2019.

Vandoorne had this to say about the opportunity, “For me it will be the first time racing in Sebring, and the first time racing in IMSA competition which I am excited for because the racing in America is very close. I feel lucky to also be joining the team that just won the Daytona 24 Hours, so it’s going to be a really great experience.”

Oracle Red Bull Racing continued their pre-season running in Barcelona today with Sergio Perez behind the wheel, who put in a best time of 1:21.430. Perez’s final lap tally for the day was 78 laps, as he was interrupted by a gearbox issue which prompted the week’s first red flag. 

“We took some good learnings from today and I’m pleased with that. We are trying some very different things and we have a lot of information to work through, so I think in the meetings it is important to go in-depth and give the engineers as much feedback as possible. The issue with the gearbox took a little bit longer to fix than we expected, but it is fine, it’s expected that these things happen at testing. I’ll be back in the car tomorrow and I hope the weather stays dry,” Perez said. 

Head of Race Engineering Guillaume Rocquelin said Perez’s reports mirrored that of teammate Max Verstappen, who completed the most laps of any driver yesterday at 147. With concurring driver feedback, Rocquelin is optimistic about the team’s direction as the set-up continues to be fine-tuned.

“Checo got up to speed pretty quickly this morning and his feedback is pretty much the same as Max’s, which means we know where we are going and everything is fairly settled. Every time the car comes back to the garage we’re making changes and fine-tuning the direction so, all in all, I’m happy.” 

Rocquelin said the gearbox problem was not cause for alarm for Red Bull, which isn’t expected to have any bearing on the team’s work moving forward. 

Elfyn Evans and co-driver Scott Martin started their third year driving for Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT no in a way as Evans wished, now he hopes to capitalise from that as the second round of FIA World Rally Championship is being held this weekend in Sweden.

On the season-opener of Rallye Monte-Carlo, Evans was part of the lead battle during most part of the rally before a small but costly mistake ended his chances of a strong result.

Last time WRC visited Rally Sweden in 2020, the Welshman won the rally and for this year he is hoping to repeat that result as he will be starting the Friday stages with a great road position but will also face new challenges as all of the stages are brand-new for the year when the rally have been moved to Umeå.

Evans is feeling comfortable for the rally as he has analysed the new stages from video footage provided by the rally organiser: “We didn’t start the year how we wanted to on the first rally, but the one small benefit is that our road position should be a bit better for Sweden. We want to capitalise on that as best as we can and, like always, do as well as possible.”

“With everything being so new there have been a lot of different things to try during our testing on snow and ice, but overall I’m feeling comfortable – although it is always hard to tell exactly how fast you are on this surface because things like traction vary depending on the conditions. We’ve also been looking through the videos of the stages provided by the organiser, and they look very fast in places but also with some very narrow and technical sections.”

Kalle Rovanperä and co-driver Jonne Halttunen will open the road in Rally Sweden on Friday, as the second round of the 2022 FIA World Rally Championship takes place this weekend.

Rovanperä will be the highest-placed driver in the standings (outside of the two-Seb’s), in third position after a great start in Rallye Monte-Carlo last month. His fourth place finish and Power Stage win means Rovanperä will be the first driver to feel the new stages as the rally moves north to unfamiliar territories in Umeå.

Starting his third season for Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT, the youngest ever WRC winner has a lot of experience on snow, on his first outting in a Toyota Yaris WRC on snow in 2020, he claimed his maiden WRC podium by finishing third in Sweden and now he will be chasing to become the fourth Toyota driver to win in Sweden since the comeback in 2017.

With the new Toyota GR Yaris Rally1, he now hopes to take home some valuable points and he knows he will face a hard challenge being the one to clean up the stages: “Overall I was really happy with our weekend in Monte Carlo. We started out in a difficult place but we did a lot of work together with the team to improve my feeling in the car. Of course, taking the extra points in the Power Stage means we start first on the road in Sweden and will have some road cleaning to do there on the first day.”

“But we will do our best to take as many points as we can at the end of the weekend and hopefully we can still have a really good rally. In testing we were starting from zero with the snow setup for the new car and it felt a bit tricky to drive in the beginning, but together with our team-mates I think we have made some good steps in the right direction during the two tests.”

For Rally Sweden this weekend, the Finnish duo of Esapekka Lappi and Janne Ferm will be returning to the top category of the FIA World Rally Championship after one year hiatus from the championship.

As Rally Sweden is not part of the reigning world champion Sébastien Ogier‘s part-time program, the Finn will be sharing the seat with the Frenchman this year, with Sweden marking Lappi’s return to Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT.

Having previously driving for the team in 2018 with one WRC win to his name, Lappi moved over to M-Sport Ford World Rally Team for two seasons and last year he took part in the WRC2 category where he won some rounds, in particular his home rally of Arctic Lapland Rally which replaced Rally Sweden.

He also rented a Toyota Yaris WRC for his second home rally of Rally Finland in August, where he received support by the Toyota squad. After the success there, the rumours start to spread about Lappi was offered a seat in 2022 for the team which got confirmed some weeks later.

With a new car and a new rally location of Umeå, Lappi is excited to start his 2022 campaign and believes the pace will be there: “I am very excited about this moment. To be competing at the highest level once more is something I have been looking forward to for a long time. It has felt very natural to be working with the team again over the last few weeks and through testing.”

Daniel Ricciardo had his first taste of the MCL36 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on Thursday, with the Australian leading the way in the morning session before dropping to third overall in the afternoon.

The McLaren F1 Team driver was delighted with the reliability of the new car and praised the team for the hard work in preparing it in short order, so it was ready for testing.

Both Ricciardo and team-mate Lando Norris have been able to break the one-hundred lap barrier so far in testing, and the Australian says that whilst the car has some good strengths, there are some areas of weakness they still need to work on.

“A good day from many angles,” admitted Ricciardo.  “I think reliability was great. That’s on the team and everyone who’s worked hard to put this car together, so massive thank you to them.

“They’re pretty awesome to build a whole new car, put it on track and have it run so smoothly, so big thanks to them again. Both days have been over 100 laps, which for me and Lando gives us more opportunity to learn the car and push ourselves, so really pleased with that.

Richard Verschoor has become the final piece in the 2022 FIA Formula 2 puzzle as Trident have announced him as Calan Williams’ team-mate for the upcoming season.

The move comes after turbulent rookie season last year for the Dutch driver, where he won his first race in F2 machinery at Silverstone with MP Motorsport, but then had to drop out of the series at the penultimate round in Jeddah due to funding issues.

He then returned for the final round in Abu Dhabi with Charouz Racing System following the withdrawal of Enzo Fittipaldi from injuries sustained in Jeddah. Verschoor finished the season eleventh in the standings, ahead of MP Motorsport team-mate Lirim Zendeli.

“I’m extremely proud and motivated to join a highly-professional and winning team like Trident Motorsport for the 2022 FIA Formula 2 Championship. I think we have all conditions needed to achieve important goals and experience a positive season,” Verschoor told Formula 2. “I cannot wait to get on track. I will give my best to take full advantage of this great opportunity.”

Verschoor started his single-seater career with very high hopes, winning both the SMP and Spanish F4 championships in 2016 with former team MP Motorsport. He furthered his experience in Italian F4, Formula Renault Eurocup and a championship challenge in consecutive Toyota Racing Series campaigns.

After ending day one second fastest on Wednesday, Charles Leclerc went to the top of the timing screens on Thursday at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, and the Monegasque racer was delighted to get significant mileage on his F1-75.

The Scuderia Ferrari driver set a best lap of 1:19.689 in the afternoon session and completed seventy-nine laps of the Spanish track, although he acknowledges ending fastest means very little at this stage of testing.  He did suffer a small spin but was able to keep the car going and did not lose any track time.

Leclerc has one more session in the car in Spain on Friday morning, and he hopes the form the team has shown so far continues.

“A pretty good afternoon here in Barcelona!” reflected Leclerc.  “We completed a lot of laps again, which is what counts the most at testing. Our aim is to drive as many kilometres as we can, to complete as many different tests as possible and that’s exactly what we did.

“Again, we should not get ahead of ourselves, because P1 doesn’t mean anything at this stage. We have to keep working extremely hard. Tomorrow is our final day at Barcelona and we have to make the most of it before we turn our attention to Bahrain.”

Bobby Labonte and Michael Waltrip will return to the Superstar Racing Experience for a second full season, but they are not the only NASCAR Cup Series alumni vying for the championship. On Thursday, The Athletic reported Labonte and Waltrip will be joined by Greg Biffle and Ryan Newman for all six races, which was corroborated by series CEO Don Hawk.

Biffle’s arrival comes days after running his first Cup race since 2016 when he finished thirty-sixth in the Daytona 500 for NY Racing Team. He was a longtime regular in the series, racing full-time for Roush Fenway Racing (now RFK Racing) from 2003 to 2016 with nineteen wins and a runner-up championship finish in 2005. Incidentally, the latter saw him lose the title to SRX founder and inaugural series winner Tony Stewart. He hopes to continue Cup racing part-time with NY in 2022.

Between his Cup exit after 2016 and the 2022 Daytona 500 entry, he focused on off-road racing as he owns a UTV shop and the Sand Outlaw Series. He also ran two Camping World Truck Series races, winning at Texas in 2019, and entered five Stadium Super Trucks weekends with four podium finishes. He also made two SRX starts in 2021, winning a heat and finishing second in the feature in the inaugural race at Stafford and eighth at Slinger (where he won another heat).

Newman comes to SRX as he prepares for post-Cup Series life. He had raced in the series since 2001, but declining performance in his last two seasons (including suffering injuries in the 2020 Daytona 500 that sidelined him for three races) led to his departure as Roush reformed into RFK with Brad Keselowski taking Newman’s #6. In two decades of racing, he is an eighteen-time race winner with a best points finish of second in 2014.

With no plans to race in Cup again in the near-future, he is focusing on grassroots short and dirt track racing like SRX.

A pair of NASCAR Xfinity Series teams made driver additions on Thursday, with Mike Harmon Racing signing Brennan Poole for Saturday’s race at Auto Club Speedway while Joe Gibbs Racing will have Ryan Truex at Las Vegas Motor Speedway (5 March), Martinsville Speedway (8 April), Darlington Raceway (7 May), and Texas Motor Speedway (21 May).

Poole last raced in the Xfinity Series from 2015 to 2017 for Chip Ganassi Racing, including full-time in the final two seasons. He finished in the top ten in points in both and contentiously lost a win at the 2016 Talladega event when NASCAR ruled Elliott Sadler had been the leader at the moment of a caution coming to the finish, despite Poole being the first to cross the line. Despite otherwise solid performances even without a victory, he was released by CGR after 2017, a matter that was marred by further controversy regarding the team moving his sponsor DC Solar to its Cup programme, resulting in a lawsuit that was eventually settled after the company was shut down following federal investigation.

After two seasons of sporadic Camping World Truck Series competition, he ran the full 2020 Cup schedule for Premium Motorsports. He finished thirty-second in points with a top ten at Talladega in the fall. Premium was bought out by Rick Ware Racing in 2021 and he did not remain with the team. He did not race much in NASCAR in 2021 after breaking his wrist in a snowboarding crash, but returned to the Trucks for a one-off at Texas for On Point Motorsports, finishing fourteenth.

He will drive the #47 Chevrolet Camaro for MHR. The car was piloted by Gray Gaulding at Daytona last week, but failed to qualify.

“I’m very thankful for the opportunity MHR has given me to get back on track this weekend @AutoClubSpdwy,” tweeted Poole. “I look forward to getting back behind the wheel and having my family at the track with me after the unexpected passing of my mom February 9th. She was the best mom.”

The 2022 NTT IndyCar Series season is finally upon us, and in less than six months since last season’s thrilling finale in Long Beach the grid looks completely different. Four rookies will be making their first starts in IndyCar, while two return for their first full seasons in the sport. On top of that, plenty of veteran drivers find themselves with new teams. All have their eyes on one prize, the Astor Cup.

But as they say, the more things change, the more they stay the same, and when it comes to starting the IndyCar Series season where better to do it than the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida. Here’s everything you need to know ahead of the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

WHAT HAPPENED LAST YEAR?

Colton Herta dominated last year’s event, taking the pole position and leading all but three laps of the race.

The young American cruised through the first two stints of the race, boasting a gap of over ten seconds to second-place Josef Newgarden. However, a caution with 27 laps to go changed that, as Jimmie Johnson spun in turn three. With the most push to pass boost left of any driver in the field and the faster option tyres, it seemed that this was Newgarden’s opportunity to steal the win, but Herta held strong.

Another caution a few laps later with 21 to go for contact between James Hinchcliffe and Ed Jones, and the restart with 17 laps to go gave Newgarden one more chance to pass Herta into turn one. He wasn’t able to make the move, and Herta sailed to his first win of the season and first career win on a street course. Newgarden finished second, with his Team Penske teammate Simon Pagenaud third.