Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Dave Robson admits it was disappointing for the Williams Racing team to fall behind Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda during Sunday’s British Grand Prix, particularly as they had the beating of them during Friday and Saturday at Silverstone.

George Russell had finished ninth during Saturday’s Sprint Qualifying race at Silverstone but started the full-length British Grand Prix from twelfth after a three-place penalty was applied for causing a collision with Carlos Sainz Jr. on Saturday. 

He dropped to fourteenth at the start and although he was able to move up a couple of places, he was never again in contention for points as the two AlphaTauri drivers, Pierre Gasly and Yuki Tsunoda plus Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team’s Lance Stroll all moved forward.

Team-mate Nicholas Latifi started seventeenth and ended fourteenth, but Robson admits it was difficult to fight with those battling for the top ten even though tyre management was made easier by the early red flag at Silverstone to clear up Max Verstappen’s wrecked Red Bull Racing RB16B.

“We enjoyed a good fight with the midfield teams today and we raced hard in difficult and hot conditions,” said Robson, the Head of Vehicle Performance at Williams.  “The early safety car and race suspension made the one-stop race easier than it might otherwise have been, and the race became one of balancing attack and tyre management.

Mahindra Racing’s Alex Lynn took pole position for the opening race of the London E-Prix on Saturday around a drying track at the Exhibition Centre London (ExCeL) circuit.

The rain that affected the practice session earlier in the day had stopped, but the outside part of the track was still wet throughout, with some areas much wetter than others.

And Lynn took his second career ABB FIA Formula E World Championship pole position in a British driver one-two ahead of BMW i Andretti Motorsport’s Jake Dennis.

Group 1

The top six in the championship were in group 1, and it was Edoardo Mortara was quickest for ROKiT Venturi Racing with a lap of 1:25.198, 0.081 seconds ahead of DS Techeetah’s António Félix da Costa, with championship leader Sam Bird third for Jaguar Racing. 

Nick Cassidy was the best of the Envision Virgin Racing drivers in fourth, just ahead of team-mate Robin Frijns, while Jean-Éric Vergne was the slowest of everyone after being the first driver to set a time.

George Russell reckons twelfth was the best result he could have achieved at the British Grand Prix, particularly after losing a couple of places at the race start on Sunday afternoon.

The Williams Racing driver had started the weekend at Silverstone with a top ten appearance in Qualifying and then a ninth-place finish in the first-ever Sprint Qualifying race, but a three-place grid penalty for contact with Carlos Sainz Jr. on Saturday left him starting twelfth on the grid for Sunday’s Grand Prix.

Russell lost a couple of places at the start and was left fighting against drivers in much stronger cars than he had, so he was pleased to finish as close to the top ten as he did.

“P12 was the maximum today for us,” said Russell.  “We made a poor getaway initially on the first start but a really good one on the second.

“Sadly, we had already lost a few positions. When you have 50 or 60 laps in a race the true pace of the car comes out and realistically, we are still slightly slower than Alpha Tauri, Alpine and Aston Martin right now.

Jody Egginton admits the British Grand Prix weekend was a lot more difficult than expected for the Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda team, and it was disappointing to leave Silverstone with only a solitary point to their name.

Pierre Gasly was on course for a top ten finish only to pick up a puncture with five laps remaining, but his pit stop promoted Yuki Tsunoda into tenth to take home the final point on offer.

Egginton, the Technical Director at AlphaTauri, believes the team should have been fighting for around eighth place at Silverstone, but the pace of the car was not as strong as they had hoped it would be, particularly in Qualifying on Friday evening and during Saturday’s first-ever Sprint Qualifying race.

“The pace of the car hasn’t been where we expected it to be leading up to the race,” said Egginton.  “Our Qualifying was below our expectation and then in the Sprint Qualifying there was a lot of traffic, so we couldn’t make any progress.

“Today in the race, we managed to use the strategy to extend our first stint on the Mediums, which worked out quite well and allowed us to jump some competitors with both cars. This allowed us to be in a good position to fight for the points with Pierre and then get close to that with Yuki.

Yuki Tsunoda was pleased to come away from the British Grand Prix with a point, despite the whole Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda team having a below-par weekend at Silverstone.

The Japanese racer had started well down the field after being eliminated in Q1 on Friday evening and making up only one spot during Saturday’s first-ever Sprint Qualifying race.  Tsunoda says the change from the regular weekend format did not help him as a rookie.

But Tsunoda kept his focus on race day and was able to find his way into the top ten when it mattered for his fourth top-ten finish of the season.

“I’m quite happy to have come away with a point today,” said Tsunoda.  “I tried to stick to the plan, really focus on tyre management, and I think I achieved that well.

“I’ve struggled a bit throughout the weekend and the different format has made things slightly more difficult for me as a rookie, so I’m pleased to have come away with an all-important point for the team.”

Maximilian Günther was quickest in the second practice session for the London E-Prix as the forecasted rain hit the Exhibition Centre London (ExCeL) circuit on Saturday morning.

Günther led a BMW i Andretti Motorsport one-two ahead of British racer Jake Dennis in a difficult and challenging session for all twenty-four drivers.

The unique nature of the indoor/outdoor ExCeL track meant the first part of the lap was in the dry, the middle in the wet and the end again in the dry.  It made conditions difficult for the drivers, particularly in the early laps of the session.

Stoffel Vandoorne’s session was over early after he crashed after aquaplaning into the wall on the back straight.  The Belgian appeared to lose control on the wet track crossing some painted lines of a zebra crossing before hitting the wall hard and damaging his front-left corner of his Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team machine.

Envision Virgin Racing’s Robin Frijns was lucky to escape with just a brush against the wall as he spun heading down the ramp after exiting the indoor session, while moments later, Dragon/Penske Autosport’s Sérgio Sette Câmara also ended in the run-off zone at the same place.

Jean-Éric Vergne ended fastest in the first practice session at Exhibition Centre London (ExCeL) on Friday afternoon as the drivers acclimatised themselves to the unique London E-Prix circuit.

The top five drivers were all within one-tenth of a second, while less than a second split the top twenty-three in a tightly contested session in London Docklands around a track that is partly indoors and partly outside.

DS Techeetah’s Vergne used his 250kw lap to good effect to hit the top with a time of 1:21.650, with the two-time champion ending 0.004 seconds clear of Envision Virgin Racing’s Robin Frijns, while current championship leader Sam Bird was 0.038 seconds back for Jaguar Racing.

Reigning champion António Félix da Costa made it two Techeetah’s inside the top four, 0.065 seconds behind his team-mate, while Mitch Evans also got to within one-tenth of Vergne’s best time in the second Jaguar in fifth.

Mahindra Racing’s Alex Lynn ended sixth fastest, 0.144 seconds off the pace but 0.021 seconds clear of Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team’s Stoffel Vandoorne, while Pascal Wehrlein was the best placed of the Tag Heuer Porsche FE Team drivers in eighth.

Bart Horsten took his first pole positions in the BRDC British Formula 3 Championship as the season visits the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps this weekend (23-25 July).

The Hitech GP driver found a buffer of four hundredths back to Championship leader Zak O’Sullivan, whose Carlin team-mate, and Horsten’s compatriot, Christian Mansell sat just under two tenths behind in third.

To date, only Mansell, Frederick Lubin (Arden Motorsport) and Oliver Bearman (Fortec Motorsports) have finished every race they’ve started so far this season.

Of those three, only Mansell’s season has been uninterrupted thus far, with Lubin ruled out of Donington Park and Spa on medical grounds, while Bearman splits his time across Italian F4 and ADAC F4, currently leading both championships.

O’Sullivan had topped the times for most of the 25-minute session, before Horsten snatched it at the death by less than half a tenth around the longest lap of the season.

There will be a third Fortec Motorsport car on the grid as the 2021 BRDC British Formula 3 Championship arrives at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps for the fourth round of the season (23-25 July).

Reigning US Formula 4 champion Hunter Yeany will partner Roberto Faria and Mikkel Grundtvig, both of whom took podiums at Donington Park last time out, including a maiden F3 win for Grundtvig.

He will take the place of Oliver Bearman, who is on course to become the first-ever driver to win the Italian F4 and ADAC F4 Championships in the same season. Bearman made his British F3 debut at Brands Hatch in May, taking second-place finishes in the first two races.

The 16-year-old took the US F4 title in 2020 with seven wins and 13 total podiums, before moving to a joint campaign in Formula Regional Americas and Indy Pro 2000, the latter being on INDYCAR‘s ‘Road to Indy’ feeder programme.

Incumbent British F3 champion Kaylen Frederick took four podiums and two pole positions in the 2018 Cooper Tires USF2000 series, a step below Indy Pro 2000.

The NASCAR Cup Series might be off for two weeks, but Hendrick Motorsports team-mates Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman are still having their positions in the championship impacted. On Thursday, NASCAR announced the #9 and #48 teams have received L1-level penalties due to an error in the team’s engine allocations for last Sunday’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

In particular, the violation broke Section 20.6.1e of the rulebook regarding engine assembly. Much of the rule focuses on impounding the winning car’s engine if sealed, and unsealed engines may either be impounded by NASCAR prior to the next race or have its long block sealed and inspection following the next race. If the long block is sealed, the engine cannot be moved to a different car. Sealed engines, which differ from their unsealed counterparts as components such as the engine block and pistons are frozen and cannot be changed, must be run for sixteen points races in a season.

A clerical mistake accidentally resulted in one of Elliott’s sealed engines being assigned to Bowman’s team for New Hampshire. Bowman finished the race in ninth and Elliott eighteenth.

“Due to an administrative error, one of our sealed engines assigned to the No. 9 car was unintentionally allocated to our No. 48 team at New Hampshire Motor Speedway,” read a statement from Hendrick Motorsports. “Although the engine passed technical inspection and absolutely no competitive advantage was gained, we acknowledge NASCAR’s process was not followed correctly in this instance. The rules regarding the assignment of sealed engines are clear, and we understand and respect their decision to issue a penalty. We apologize for the mistake and have taken steps to ensure it will not be repeated.”

An L1 penalty means both teams lose twenty-five points apiece in the owner and driver standings, which drops Elliott from fifth to sixth while Bowman is still eleventh. Crew chiefs Alan Gustafson (Elliott) and Greg Ives (Bowman) each received $50,000 fines, while Hendrick general manager Jeff Andrews and engine support director Scott Maxim are suspended for the upcoming race at Watkins Glen on 8 August.

Hélio Castroneves will not only get a shot at a record-breaking fifth Indianapolis 500 win in 2022, but he will have another chance to chase an NTT IndyCar Series championship. On Thursday, Meyer Shank Racing announced the defending Indy 500 winner will run the full 2022 season in the #06 Honda, making it his first full-time campaign since 2017. Meanwhile, Jack Harvey will depart the team which leaves the #60 without a 2022 driver at the moment.

From 2002 to 2017, Castroneves was a regular on the IndyCar circuit for Team Penske, with whom he won three Indy 500s and finished runner-up in points on four occasions. His final full season saw him place fourth in the standings with one win. Over the next four years, he shifted his focus to IMSA—where he won the 2020 DPi class championship and 2021 Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona overall—but sporadically continued his IndyCar involvement at Indianapolis. His 500 victory in May, which marked MSR’s first IndyCar triumph, tied him with A.J. Foyt, Rick Mears, and Al Unser for the most in the race’s history at four.

For the past two months, his racing action has come in the upstart Superstar Racing Experience, where he finished fifth in points with a podium at Eldora and two heat wins.

“I am thrilled to get the chance to go for a fifth Indianapolis 500 win, and so excited to fight for the IndyCar championship again with a full season of races next year with Meyer Shank Racing,” said Castroneves. “Mike (Shank) and Jim (Meyer) have developed some incredible sponsorships with AutoNation and SiriusXM, and having that support is critical.

“I have been missing racing in IndyCar full time so much, I cannot wait to get a head start on next year with some strong races to finish this season.”

The Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team didn’t have the British Grand Prix they were hoping for, with only Lance Stroll finishing in the points at the team’s home race after Sebastian Vettel retired.

Lance Stroll had an excellent race after a terrible Saturday, the Canadian made up more places than anyone else on the grid after finishing the race in eighth, six places higher than where he started. It could have been seventh for Stroll had it not been for Fernando Alonso defending admirably.

Sebastian Vettel had a disappointing grand prix, the German retired late on with a cooling issue, however any hope of a points finish for Vettel was lost on the second lap after spinning out of Luffield.

Aston Martin Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer, was hoping for a better home race but is glad to at least be coming away with something.

“We had hoped to be coming away from our home Grand Prix with more than the four points we eventually scored, but those four points came our way as a result of a superb drive by Lance, who made up six places this afternoon to convert a P14 grid slot to a P8 finish. No driver made up more places.

After starting in a disappointing fourteenth place, Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team driver Lance Stroll more than made up for a poor Saturday, with an excellent race on Sunday to come away from Silverstone with four points after finishing eighth. Team-mate Sebastian Vettel didn’t finish.

The Canadian driver made the most of two race starts, after the race was red flagged on the opening lap after Max Verstappen’s huge impact with the Copse tyre wall. Stroll made up brilliant ground during the first and second race starts, elevating himself quickly into the points. Had it not been for some valiant defending by veteran Fernando Alonso, Stroll could have very easily finished seventh.

Nevertheless it was a superb drive by Stroll, who was the only Aston Martin driver to finish in the points at the team’s home race, Stroll was very happy with his race.

“I am really happy with my race because we were able to turn around a tricky start to the weekend by finishing in P8 and scoring four points. We have been working to find the right car balance and we had a breakthrough today, which is a great credit to the team and all the effort everyone has put in. The key to the race was making two strong starts either side of the red flag, where we gained several places each time.

“The strategies were quite similar for the whole grid, making overtaking more tricky, but those starts set us up for a good race. The new format has been a challenge for everyone this weekend, but I think there are positives and we can learn how to maximise the other events with Sprints.”

Jaguar Racing have signed a long-term commitment to race in the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship when the generation 3 era begins for the 2022/23 season.

The announcement comes just days before Jaguar participate in their first home E-Prix and their first major home event for seventeen years – the London E-Prix at the Exhibition Centre London (ExCeL).  And Jaguar’s Sam Bird goes into the event as the championship leader after his second victory of the season last time out in New York City.

Formula E will introduce its next generation car ahead of the 2022-23 season, and for a while there were doubts that Jaguar would remain in the series, particularly with both BMW and Audi already announcing their departures.

However, Jaguar say they are remaining in the series as they look to evolve into an all-electric car manufacturer across the globe.

“The Gen3 era of Formula E is an exciting new chapter for the all-electric World Championship,” said Thierry Bolloré, the Chief Executive Officer of Jaguar Land Rover.  “It is already proving to be the perfect environment to design, collaborate, test and develop new sustainable technologies at pace.

Jake Dennis will race in his first home ABB FIA Formula E World Championship event this weekend, with the BMW i Andretti Motorsport driver aiming to remain in contention for the title.

Dennis, who took his maiden Formula E victory in race two of the Valencia E-Prix in April, currently sits fifteenth in the standings heading into the final four races of the season, two of which will take place this weekend at the Exhibition Centre London (Excel) track in London.

He feels being a rookie should not be such a burden this weekend compared to others, with no one on the grid having previously experienced the ExCeL track, which will run partly indoors and partly outdoors, a first for Formula E.

“I am extremely excited about my home race in London,” said Dennis.  “Nobody knows the circuit, which suits me as a rookie.

“I hope we come out of the blocks quickly in the first practice session and qualify well. It looks as though it is going to be difficult to overtake, which makes it all the more important to secure a good grid position.”