Velocity Issue 8

velocity

Issue 8 - may 2015

motorsport magazine

senna? is max the next

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE

roger penske why the captain will win in v8 supercars kerry madsen aussie hero beating the yanks howden ganley the great grand prix robbery

Image: Sutton’s

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is max the next senna?

captain my captain

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Having won just about everything that matters in world motorsport, Roger Penske has little left to prove. Now the American billionaire has turned his attention to V8 Supercars, a move which all but guarantees success.

the great gp robbery

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Remembered for so many things, the 1973 Canadian Grand Prix has a special memory for Howden Ganley. It was a race the New Zealander might have won one, went sent Iwan Jones across the ditch to find out how.

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king kerry He’s one of Australia’s fastest men on dirt. Racing in the United States he takes on the fastest men on the planet, and wins. We sat down with Kerry to find out more about what makes the 2014 Kings Royale winner tick.

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The regulars

Editorial

mat coch

The rise of the World Endurance Championship has left Mat Coch wondering whether it could take over from Formula One at the top of the motorsport heap.

Mike Lawrence

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The invention of the microchip changed the way teams, and drivers went racing. Mike Lawrence looks at how its introduction made teammates rivals.

nuts & bolts v8 Supercars 50 Barbagallo formula one 58 Bahrain Grand Prix Chinese Grand Prix motogp 70 Grand Prix of Spain Grand Prix of Argentina Grand Prix of Circuit of the Americas world endurance championship 76 6Hrs of Spa-Francorchamps 6Hrs of Silverstone world rally championship 84 Rally Argentina indycar 86 Barber Motorsport Park Grand Prix of Long Beach NOTA Motorsport Park nascar 92 Monthly Wrap world superbikes 94 state racing 100 Bathurst Motor Festival NSW State Championship Victorian State Championship

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Editor Mat Coch Photographer John Morris Editorial Contacts Telephone 0414 197 588 Website www.velocityemag.com Email editor@velocityemag.com Production Publisher Grand Prix Media Social Media

@VelocityEmag

facebook.com/ velocitymagazine Acknowledgements Tim Cindric, Howden Ganley, Dick Johnson, Dewi Jones, Iwan Jones, Christian Klien, Mike Lawrence, Kerry Madsen, Lachlan Mansell, John Morris, Shaun Paine, Daniel Pauperis, Roger Penske, Dean Perkins, Caroline Reid, Dale Rodgers, Keith Sutton, Christian Sylt.

Copyright All rights are reserved to Grand Prix Media and associated entities.

Reproduction in whole or in part of any photograph, text or illustration without written permission from the publisher is prohibited.

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Mat Coch

ormula One is under threat. I say that as a fan, and a journalist who has spent the better part of the last decade covering the sport in minute detail. Politically there is unrest, financially it is not the powerhouse it once was and in terms of the sporting spectacle… Well, it’s hardly been a classic season has it?

Thankfully there’s a little intrigue to keep things interesting for us - will Lewis and Nico bash heads mid-race or will Mercedes do it after the race? - but that has only served to underscore public opinion. Viewers are turning off in their droves. That’s good news for other series like V8 Supercars, but the real sleeping giant is the World Endurance Championship.

Now with a good television package into Australia - our thanks to Mr Webber - we Aussie’s have lucked into one of the best racing series currently on the planet. Three of the top 6

crystal ball gazin manufacturers in the world are battling one another for supremecy with a ruleset that has made for some of the most entertaining racing I’ve ever seen. The duel between Porsche and Audi for the lead in Silverstone was simply glorious - if you’ve not seen it jump on our

website and check it out, it’s worth the effort.

For mine, the WEC is what Formula One is claiming to be. It is the absolute cutting edge of automotive development. It is road relevant.

And it is absolutely the right platform to showcase the brilliance of automotive engineers.

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ng Sportscars have better links to our everyday runabouts too whereas Formula One is meant to be the thing of dreams. That it claims to be the pinnacle of technology and motorsport is just spin.

The WEC could, in years to come, challenge F1 for its mantle VELOCITY

as the top of the sport.

It has the manufacturer interest to ensure strong investment, it has some fine looking cars producing incredible racing and the depth of the field is ever improving as more and more talented drivers who can’t find the budget to race an open wheeler turn to

sportscars.

The best part about it all is there’s more to come. Nissan will join the party at Le Mans with its own LMP1 car to make it a four-way tussle at the top.

All the while Formula One closes itself away from the world, believing nothing else exists.

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mike lawrence

t has become a given among commentators that a driver’s main rival is his teammate. This is probably true since it is assumed that they are given, as near as possible, identical equipment.

This has not always been the case, but it has become possible due to the microchip. Time was when machine tools had to be manually re-set at intervals so there was a difference between individual components.

Brazilian FF1600 drivers used to queue outside the local Ford factory early in the morning to buy components, like camshafts, fresh from machine tools which had been re-set overnight. I have been told that components #5 to #7 were favourite, though superstition may have played its part.

Manufacturers make their cars to what they regarded as acceptable tolerances. A pal of mine had one of the last Ford Capris, he thought that there was a problem with the handling and took a tape 8

measure to his car. One side had a slightly different wheelbase to the other so he contacted Ford to be told that the difference was within the tolerance for the model.

The chief thing that the tuner of a Formula Ford engine did was to ‘blueprint’ the unit. In other words, he assembled the engine to its ideal state as laid down by the original design. A builder weighed every component and shaved metal here and there so that every piston, conrod, valve, etc. weighed exactly the same. Ports were polished.

What the customer received was a Ford Kent engine as the designers intended it to be before its components were mass produced.

David Minister made some engines which became legendary in FF1600. Here is the secret, he used old engine blocks. The best thing you can do with a cast iron engine block is to leave it in the open for a few years so that internal stresses are relieved. This is not practical with a massproduced engine.

When BMW entered F1 in the Turbo Era, it bought customer cars which had covered at

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least 100,000 miles, so the engine blocks had matured, like some wine needs time in a barrel.

Because of the microchip, the engine of the cheapest import is now made to standards that, once, only Rolls-Royce achieved and achieved only by employing a lot of craftsmen.

The same has become true of motor racing.

When individual components were made by hand, there were differences. When Stirling VELOCITY

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Moss signed for Vanwall, he was allowed to drive all team cars in practice sessions and choose the chassis, engine and gearbox that he preferred.

Lotus wanted to sign Derek Warwick in 1986, but the move was vetoed by Ayrton Senna. Senna did not fear Warwick’s speed, but he knew Lotus was not capable of preparing two cars to an equal standard. At the time, few teams were.

When Fangio drove VELOCITY

for Maserati, the team provided him with what they thought was the best of everything. They knew that the work of the guy making the wishbones was variable, as it is with every object made from scratch by hand. There was also the question of how Luigi performed before lunch and afterwards.

When John Barnard joined Ferrari as Chief Designer in 1986, one of his conditions was that wine was no longer served at lunchtime.

That created waves, but then Barnard’s first design for the Scuderia won on its debut so objections were forgotten.

The microchip is neutral, it is programmed to do a job. It has revolutionised the making of everything, including racing cars. Teams can now give each of their drivers a car which is as close to being identical as can be.

That is why, these days, a driver’s team-mate is his main rival.

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is max the next

senna? from karting to formula one in just 18 months, mat coch asks how good is max verstappen?

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hen it was announced that Toro Rosso had signed Max Verstappen the sport reacted by changing the rules. He was just 16 when he was confirmed at the team and hadn’t even been out of karting for a year. Yet this pimple ridden kid, who isn’t even old enough to drink, was good enough to race in Formula One? Rubbish.

From next season a driver must be at least 14

18 before they can make their debut. Verstappen doesn’t reach that mark until September, meaning if he finishes on the podium before then it’ll be apple juice he sprays in celebration.

More than his inexperience, it was Verstappen’s age that was the concern; he’s still a kid, how can he possibly be mature enough to handle everything that goes with driving a Formula One car? Can the sport now be so easy

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a teenager can jump in and be competitive?

Before he’d even made his debut Verstappen had shaken the sport from its very roots.

In Australia that was all quickly forgotten because somehow this kid was capable.

More than that; this kid had real potential.

Then came the Malaysian Grand Prix where, thanks to a Toro Rosso that was on the pace, he went wheel to wheel with some of the best in VELOCITY

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the business. He carved Daniel Ricciardo up with a brutal move which left it up to the Australian to decide whether to have an accident or not. It was a move which had all the hallmarks of another driver who burst onto the scenes and shook the establishment.

At the end of 1983 Ayrton Senna tested for a number of leading teams. He sampled Keke Rosberg’s championship winning Williams, he VELOCITY

tested a McLaren while Brabham boss Bernie Ecclestone was keen to sign him to a long term deal. But Senna wasn’t having any of that and instead decided to keep his future in his own hands by signing with the unfancied Toleman team. He retired in his first grand prix before finishing sixth at the next two but the ah-ha moment came in Monaco where he chased down Alain Prost and very nearly

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beat him to the flag. It was a supreme drive, one which exuded confidence despite his inexperience and one which began building a legend.

Senna’s Toleman was not a terrible car. It wasn’t a front runner but the team had a history of points paying results. At the end of 1983 Derek Warwick had strung together four consecutive points paying finshes so to see Senna in the points 15

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should have come as no great surprise. What Warwick hadn’t done thoug was challenge for race wins, which suggested while the Brit was a very handy driver Senna had something else a little bit special.

All the greats have a way of identifying themselves almost immediately. Senna did so on that rainy day in Monaco, Michael Schumacher put a Jordan in the top ten at Spa-Francorchamps - a circuit he’d never driven in a car he’d never sat in. Verstappen has done it with a string of solid, mature performances against a similarly highly rated teammate.

In any other year it would be Carlos Sainz who was the start debutant. That he’s stood in the Verstappen’s shade speaks volumes.

Verstappen comes from a family of racing drivers. His father, Jos, was Schumacher’s teammate at Benetton and was a highly rated himself but never reached his full potential. His mother too raced successfully, winning a number of karting titles against the likes of Jarno Trulli. Racing, as they say, is in his blood.

Born in Belgium, where he still lives, Verstappen considers himself 16

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Dutch. Throughout his childhood he spent most weekends with his father at a kart track, and reasons that having been surrounded

by Dutchmen he’s more Dutch than Belgian. He holds a Belgian passport but races under a Dutch license - he has claims to being the first Belgian to score points in Formula One since Thierry Boutsen at the 1992 Australian Grand Prix, and the first Dutchman since Christijan Albers at the 2005 US Grand Prix.

Verstappen began karting before his fifth birthday and only stepped into a racing car for the first time at the end of 2013 when he tested a Formula Renault at the Pembrey Circuit. He then jumped straight into Formula 3 for 2014 and won in just his sixth start, going on to claim another nine victories to take third in the championship.

Early on he was snapped up by the Red Bull development programme, though on the condition that his path to Formula One be guaranteed. With such promise and strong family name he had no need for Red Bull’s support, but what it did was fast track his arrival in Formula One. VELOCITY

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At the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix, just three days after his 16th birthday, he drove the first practice session for Toro Rosso. Two more outings followed before the end of the season, doing enough earn himself a full time drive this year.

His rise has been nothing short of meteoric - from karting to driving a Formula One car in less than a year, and just 18 months between sitting in a racing car for the first time and starting his maiden grand prix. And you can’t say he’s looked out of place 18

in the car either, even if he cuts are slightly awkward looking driver in the paddock.

Speak with him though and one is quickly struck by his maturity, his confidence, and how easily he’s taken the step into the high pressure world of Formula One. If he showed potential on debut in Australia it was in Malaysia he demonstrated his ability. In a wet qualifying that caught out a number of drivers Verstappen did enough to get through a tricky Q2 session to guarantee himself a top ten start

- an impressive feat in itself but there was more to follow.

Conditions only worsened as the session went on, giving drivers just a single lap at the start of Q3 to decide the grid. It was a gamble for every driver with track conditions changing from one corner to the next. The highly rated Valtteri Bottas, a man Frank Williams believes will someday be world champion, was only capable of ninth, his veteran team-mate Felipe Massa was just seventh.

Ahead of them both was Verstappen, whose VELOCITY

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pace in the wet saw him less than a tenth of a second slower than Daniil Kvyat’s Red Bull.

With just a single grand prix to his name, with a car nobody particularly fancied in conditions more suitable to yachting than Formula One, Verstappen was among the very best in the business. It all sounded eerily familiar.

The following day he went on to become the youngest driver to score in a grand prix. He also beat both Red Bull’s and two world champions to finish as the first driver behind the two Ferraris, VELOCITY

McLarens and Williams’ - which were easily the class of the field.

“I don’t think we could have done a better job,” he said after the race.

“I had a good fight with Daniel at one point for position. We were able to finish ahead of them, which is a big achievement.”

His fight with Ricciardo was fascinating.

Regarded as the best overtaker in Formula One, Ricciardo is not an easy man to pass.

He scraps hard but fair and wins more than he loses. But in Malaysia he was humbled by the

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teenage Verstappen.

Wounded with brake issues and a damaged front wing he was dispatched with force in a was brash move but without the sort of clumsiness one might attribute a driver fresh out of Formula 3. It was polished. Hard but fair, a move Ricciardo himself would have been proud of.

Verstappen also showed himself to be strong under brakes, coming from impossibly far back to pass, leaving observers to wonder whether he’d meant to overtake or had simply 19

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left his braking too late but somehow turned it to his advantage. When he repeated the feat in China at the end of the back straight to sail through on Felipe Nasr’s Sauber it did more than suggest the move was deliberate while demonstrating again the raw talent he posseses.

But Verstappen’s future is anything but assured.

He may be the most exciting youngster to hit the sport since Lewis Hamilton but his career development is now out of his control.

Whereas Senna refused to tie himself into long term contracts early on in his career, Verstappen has jumped into bed with Red Bull.

Now part of the driver development programme he is at the whim of Helmut Marko, 20

a man who has shown himself far more brutal than anyone else in the pitlane. In his wake lie a host of talented youngsters, cast aside without a second thought. Such is Marko’s brutality that all no driver fired from Toro Rosso has remained in Formula One. To succeed Verstappen not only has to show the ability and development of a future world champion but he must do enough to embarrass either Ricciardo or Kvyat, and preferably both. It’s the only way to progress beyond Toro Rosso, a team which has only two exits; Red Bull or the Formula One knackery.

Red Bull refugees fill the ranks of Formula E, Indycar and the World Endurance

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Championship. Failure to impress Marko will signal the end of Verstappen’s F1 career.

“When you get an opening in Formula One you have to take it,” I was once told by Christian Klien, one of the first off the Red Bull driver conveyor belt. “When you get the opportunity you have to grab it.”

Verstappen has so far had a promising debut.

The challenge now is to continue building on his promise and delivering the sort of results that make life uncomfortable for Marko, Ricciardo and Kvyat.

His future is therefore very much in the hands of Red Bull and that has the potential to rob us of one of the most exciting prospects in a generation.

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expanding the empire Image: Steve Swope

Roger Penske doesn’t do things by halves. Mat coch found at why the american has decided to go racing down under

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here are few empires in motorsport. There’s Ferrari and perhaps Porsche but otherwise each series has a collection of comparatively small outfits plying their trade. Even McLaren, for all its enormity, can hardly be called an empire; a Patriarchy perhaps, under the guidance of Ron Dennis, but it can’t really boast the sort of diversity in its programme Ferrari or Porsche has.

Then there’s Penske, whose collection of racing organisations is the very definition of an empire in motorsport parlance.

From NASCAR and Indycar to sports cars, the Captain even tasted success in Formula One in the 1970s. In racing his interets spans most every class imaginable while in business his reach is global.

Penske made his name as a car dealer in the late 1960s, building his empire to now include automotive distribution and aftersales support across the globe, most notably in North America and Western Europe.

He’s recently expanded his presence in Australia too, buying up Detroit Diesel to go along with the MAN truck distribution business he already 24

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owned. Down the track he’s eying a step into the retail automotive space too.

“We use it as a customer entertainment, I’ll be honest with you,” Penske says of his racing activities. “Racing has been a way to bring people to see us from the inside out.

“We can use it for our sales people, our mechanic that’s done a great job, he can come to the races as our guest. It really ties the whole business together.”

Despite heading a business that employs nearly 50,000 people, Penske prides himself on running a flat organisation and likes to make himself as approachable as possible. “The guy driving the truck, the one cleaning out the garage, he’s welcome in my home or my office any day,” he declares.

“We work from the ground up.”

It’s that philosophy that has seen Penske enter V8 Supercars; a public relations and team building exercise for his business interests in Australia, the tie up with Dick Johnson Racing is an extension of Penske’s own lifelong passion for motorsport.

“My dad took me to Indianapolis in 1951, I VELOCITY

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went there as a kid,” he recalls.

“I raced for a while myself but had the opportunity to become a dealer, in fact a Chevrolet dealer in Philadelphia, in 1965. They said we’d love you to be a dealer but if you’re a race driver you can’t race anymore.

“So I made a decision at that point to get out of the seat and started our business,” 26

he continues. “Following on that we began our TransAm team with a Camaro. We’ve just used it as a common thread. It’s my fishing trip or golf game on the weekend. I’m not a very good golfer and I’m not a fisherman!”

In true business mogul fashion, his racing teams must also make business sense. It’s why the deal with Dick Johnson took so long to

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nail down, and why the team is running just a single car in a championship geared towards two car teams.

“If you go back and you look at our entrance in to NASCAR early on, we only had one car,” he explains. “Before we can run two cars we need to understand the magnitude of the challenge of the competitive landscape here in V8 Supercars and to me VELOCITY

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we could focus more on one driver and one team.

“We didn’t come here with a steamroller; we came here with a car and a driver to compete fairly and squarely. Our reputation is on the line.

That’s what I like about it. Nobody gives you these wins.”

Penske’s plans took an unexpected turn when Marcos Ambrose, the knight in Penske’s VELOCITY

shining armour in V8 Supercars, decided to step out of the car following the nonchampionship round at the Australian Grand Prix. Ambrose’s decision was made in the best interests of the team and was one which ultimately proved beneficial as the team found issues in Tasmania that it had not otherwise picked up. It’s those sort of lessons Penske is

keen to learn early.

“It’s going to take leadership, it’s going to take commitment, it’s going to take time,” reasons Tim Cindric, Penske’s go-to man when it comes to all things racing. “It’s going to be a bit of a building year but we’re not here to run mid pack forever.”

“With the commitment that these other teams have, and then these drivers are so 27

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competitive, you can’t just walk in,” agrees Penske.

“But we are going to be competitive and we want to be a first class team here to compete. I can tell you we’re going to put the tools and the people together to try to be a winner here 28

over the next couple of years.”

In time the squad has plans to expand to a two car team, potentially via a wildcard during the enduro series before a full time expansion, potentially for 2016.

“The reason we’re

here to run one car is to get it right or at least have the foundation right and then it’s a natural transition to us to move into a two car operation,” Penske explains while claiming the team will only begin seriously looking at whether it will run a VELOCITY

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second car towards the end of the 2015 season - it’s not looking beyond the immediate future for the moment. That includes plans beyond the current set of regulation and just what car it chooses to run down the line.

“If there are other VELOCITY

opportunities I’d say we’ll definitely take a look,” Penske reveals.

“Ford has made a decision, at least for the moment, to withdraw support,” he adds. “We are here as a Ford team because Dick was with Ford and we’ve raced Fords in the US. We’re

going to look at the landscape as we get towards the end.”

Part of the consideration will be maximising the teams chances of being competitive once the Gen2 regulations come into affect. Though Cindric claims the team has spent little effort 29

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looking at the white paper, Penske believes the proposed ruleset is a step forward for the category - even though Dick Johnson doesn’t agree.

“What it will do is open it up for other manufacturers and only make the sport stronger,” Penske believes.

“Manufacturer support obviously would be a big factor for us but once we understand the landscape and the roles we’ll be prepared to have cars and drivers that can compete at any level.

“We don’t have manufacturer support other than the fact we are partners with Ford, they’re doing a great job supporting us on the NASCAR side. We’re not obligated but I think as a partner, Dick having the history with Ford that he’s had and the success, for this first year we’re in a great [position].

“I think the new rules are coming out in ‘17.

That’s going to level the field for everyone.

“I don’t know the extent of the rule changes, you’ve got overhead camshaft engines, you’ve got pushrod engines, you’ve got 2 doors, you’ve got 4 doors. At the end of the day it’s going to be VELOCITY

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a combination. It’s the same way in NASCAR today. We have three brands, three different engines, three different cars but you can see a field of 42 cars qualifying within 4 or 5 tenths of a second.

They seem to be able to get it [right] when they put their head into it. I assume this organisation knows why they’re going in that direction and I would applaud it.”

Johnson is less enthusiastic.

“I think we’re revisiting something that didn’t work,” he warns. “When you have a look here on Saturday and Sunday at the number of people who sit up in those stands, the day that [the cars] don’t sound like they sound today will be a sad day.”

Johnson’s role within the team is that of a brand ambassador under the new regime.

He remains a senior figure providing advice to management though the key decisions are made by Cindric and Penske, Johnson the public face of the team, and a link between it and the fans.

“They’re the people who keep us going,” Johnson volunteers.

“I’m just an ex-driver but with a little bit of knowledge of where 31

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the sport’s come from and hopefully where it’s going to,” he continues. “That’s about my role and dealing with the most important part which is the sponsors and those people who’ve paid to come in.”

It’s clear that Penske will run the team his way as he chases success. Early on that will mean taking some pain, 32

such as the decision by Ambrose to step out of the car as it continues to grow.

But with a pedigree and history in the sport like Penske has, and the resources his empire commands, there’s little doubt that in time his team will be among the front runners. Whether it will be with a Ford badge

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or even with Ambrose remains to be seen, but somehow that hardly seems important in the grand scheme of things.

That Penske, a serious player in both motorsport and business, has seen V8 Supercars as a viable series to become involved with is a ringing endorsement. The Captain doesn’t do things by halves.

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the great gp robbery

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in 1973 Howden Ganley almost snared a most unlikely Grand Prix win. Iwan Jones caught up with the New Zealander to find out what happened.

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oining Frank Williams was probably not the greatest move Howden Ganley made in his grand prix career, but it nearly snared him an unlikely win.

The New Zealander had been racing in Formula One for two years by the time he joined Frank Williams Racing Cars in 1973. Making his debut with BRM, he’d recorded a career best fourth but at Williams he’d managed no better than seventh by the time of the Canadian Grand Prix.

Held at Mosport Park, the penultimate race of the season featured a 26-car-field and is remembered for a number of reasons, the most important being the first to have a safety car used - a concept that wouldn’t reappear in an official role until the 1993 Brazilian Grand Prix.

“We had been talking about it [safety car] for quite a few races, if such an occasion arose as to how Formula One should progress to having a safety car,” Ganley began. “It was the first time in Formula One, but it was common in Indy racing and other categories at the time.”

Despite the race beginning in very wet 36

conditions and amidst intermittent rain, the race ran without incident until a young South African Jody Scheckter (who was the first person to run a car with the number 0 in that race) collided with Frenchman Francois Cevert at turn two on the thirty-second lap.

Though not serious, it ended Cevert’s race and the Frenchman’s racing career; he was killed in a qualifying session at Watkins Glen just two weeks later.

The incident sparked the introduction of the safety car for the first time in Formula One history; brought out to allow rescue vehicles an opportunity to clear the stricken cars.

“So it was decided to deploy the safety car,” Ganley recalls. “To this day, we don’t know if the safety car picked up the right place or not.”

Before the days of electronic timing loops and transponders in cars, lap charts were kept by members of the team – often drivers girlfriends or wives. As a car passed the pits its number was recorded in columns, the first placed car always at the top. But with constant pit stops because of the changing those charts soon became a

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muddled mess, leading to confusion over exactly who was leading the race.

Much of the problem came about because the sport had only recently moved to slick tyres.

“Earlier when it rained it didn’t matter because they had the same tyres, wet or dry,” Ganley explains. “Now that we had gone to the big, wide, slick tyres now we had to have rain tyres, so that changed the racing.”

Confusion reigned after Cevert and Scheckter collided, compounded by the bungled pace car interlude which served only to further complicate matters as it failed to pick up the leader and allowed those ahead to gain almost a lap.

“All the cars coming into the pits and going out, as well as the cars coming in and not being able to stop because there wasn’t enough room in the pits and having to go out and did another lap and come back, ended up causing the confusion surrounding the official lap charts,” Ganley recalls.

“The pits were so small that I decided that I wouldn’t come in until the pits were clear,” he adds. “I wasn’t going to come in too early VELOCITY

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and I also wanted our mechanics to have a practice, as it had never been practiced before.

“My Australian team mate, Tim Schenken, was in the other car, so I wanted to wait until he had made his stop and the mechanics practiced on his car, then I would come in. I did a few laps waiting for the signal, because I could 40

see there were too many cars - there wasn’t enough room, the pits were so small. When I did [stop] I drove straight to my pit and then I was gone.

“When Jackie Stewart came in, there was no room so he went and did another lap came back in and stopped, his crew jacked his car but then it fell off the jack

so he lost a bit of time, yet he was classified in front of me.”

At the end of the race Ganley received the chequered flag for what would have been his maiden Formula One race win. To his dismay however McLaren driver Peter Revson was awarded the win, with Ganley classified just sixth.

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Image: Sutton’s

Image: Sutton’s

“Obviously I had been leading because I was one of the last to stop, but the question was, was my stop fast enough for me to keep the lead or not and that we don’t really know. I believed I should have finished either first or third.”

That belief is backed by a host of lap charts up and down the pit VELOCITY

lane, including Ganley’s own which was kept by his girlfriend (and later wife), Judy who went so far as to argue the case with race control, armed with her lap chart.

“Judy was a fantastic lap charter and she had her chart, but they didn’t want to look at my wife’s chart, so anyway never mind that.

I’ve always maintained

this is that if you look at the official lap chart, they have me making a pit stop when I did not make the pit stop, it was in the wrong place during the race.”

Ganley smiled as he recalled of his fateful pit stop strategy, which now serves as a neverending reminder of what could have been.

41

K

ING ERRY

he’s leading the charge on america’s dirt tracks. mat coch spoke with kerry madsen - australia’s very own king of sprintcars.

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W

hile some are inspired by the thrill of winning, for Kerry Madsen it’s the fear of losing which drives him forward. The Australian is one of the worlds leading sprintcar drivers, competing both at home and the United States, he’s the key stone in the Keneric racing team and has delivered some of the biggest sprintcar wins around.

Growing up in St Marys, towards the outskirts of Sydney, Madsen’s youth was spent around dirt tracks where his father raced.

It had an immediate and lasting impression on young Kerry and inspired him into a racing career.

“I got hooked to sprintcars at a really young age because Dad used to race,” he recalls.

“That’s all I ever wanted to do.

“I’m a huge motorsport fan. I follow everything from F1 to V8 Supercars, NASCAR… I follow it all.

“You’d have maybe liked to try some of that but I’ve always been hooked on sprintcars and wanted to succeed at a high level at sprintcar racing.”

That quest for competition is what has 44

speedway

driven the 43-year-olds career. From the early days in western Sydney he upped sticks and headed stateside in the early 1990s in order to race against the best in the business.

“All I ever wanted to do was race the best,” he explains. “In America at that time they had Steve Kinser, I could go through a list of names, Sammy Swindell, the tracks over there, they’ve got a lot higher speed tracks. I was just hooked to that.”

Though he’s been racing in the States for more than two decades it was only last season that he truly began to show his potential.

“Guess I’m a late bloomer,” he laughs.

“There was a slow start because trying to get established in America, so you gave a lot of time away just trying to kind of get established.”

His manner changes when talking about his journey to the top end of the sport. While relaxed and easy going generally he tenses up when recalling the trials and tribulations he experienced early on.

“You’re an eternal optimist, so you think it’s right around the corner,” he says.

“There’s no shortcuts in motorsports.

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“Four years ago I hooked up with Bob Gavranich, Pete Gavranich [and] we put this team together,” he continues. “Once we’ve got everything right; great personnel, great owners, great sponsors, everyone doing their job, suddenly bang, everything’s running good and [we acheived] great results.”

Madsen has been a front runner in the 46

World of Outlaws ever since, knotching up countless wins en route to establishing himself as one of the most successful Australian sprintcar drivers around. The biggest accomplishment was victory at Eldora Speedway last year where he became the first Aussie to take out the Kings Royale.

“It’s one of our majors in the sport,” Madsen

speedway

tells. “That’s the second biggest sprintcar race there is, preceeded by the Knoxville Nationals.

“To win it is just a fantastic dream come true for a sprint car team based in Australia.”

Madsen’s racing schedule is brutal and sees him in action most weekends both in the US and even taking in a few races back at home during the American off-season.

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“The World of Outlaws schedule is 90 races over 30 or 40 states [in] ten months.

“Then whatever the schedule works out to be here, whether it’s three or four races, or a 10 or 15 race schedule, then [I] come back down here and live in motels!”

Success for Madsen sits uncomfortably.

While he’s become one of the biggest VELOCITY

names in sprintcar racing he remains driven by the fear of failure.

Even after success at the Kings Royale, and strong showings at the Knoxville Nationals, there is almost a lack of confidence in his own ability.

“I’d say more releif,” Madsen responds when asked if there’s a sense of accomplishment in winning with a small Australian team. “You

speedway

sell a product, get everyone involved and you want to deliver.

“Winning, yeah, it’s fantasic to win but there’s nothing more miserable after a bad night. It’s a miserable feeling.

“It takes a lot of funding to get these teams out there,” he continues.

“Obviously with funding and sposnors and big owners comes pressure.

“It’s a lot of pressure 47

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to maximise and get a good result every night, and when you race 90 times a year you’re going to have a few bad nights. They’re tough.

Bad nights are tough.

“To deliver with some big wins and some great results and what we’ve done over there with the Kenerick brand, that’s probably been a huge releif.”

The hunger to succeed and race the best in the business remains as strong as it ever has.

“Steve Kinser’s still going at 60 and I have no intentions of doing 48

that but I feel like I’m driving as good as ever,” he reasons. “I’d probably never go backwards but as long as I can compete at a high level, and I know I’m driving at the highest level and as hard as I can, easy five to six.

“That just depends on the team.”

Before his career comes to an end though there remains one outstanding piece of business; the Knoxville Nationals.

“We’ve got a Royale, we definitely want a Nationals. We podiumed

speedway

this year with third. We think we know how to do it...

“It’s got such a unique format and then the atmosphere at the track is incredible,” he adds.

“There is just no feeling like going to a Knoxville Nationals, even as a spectator.

“You get 100 cars or 120 cars trying to qualify… Just getting in the main race is a feat in itself to be honest.

“Absoultely we want to win a Knoxville Nationals, with a great team I don’t see why we can’t.”

VELOCITY

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v8 supercars

perth supersprint

tyres, tyres, tyres

C

laiming three pole positions and two wins proved the new Ford Falcon FG X is a strong car. That it faded on Sunday afternoon did nothing to hide that fact as the race became one dictated by tyre quality more than car or driver performance.

Between them, Mark Winterbottom and Chaz Mostert claimed everything that really mattered in Barbagallo, if one excuses the small 50

point of Sunday afternoon’s race, and they seemed to do it with ease. The opening two races were a Prodrive Procession as the race was effectively over by the time the field had raced the 270 metres to the first corner. Two near perfect starts from Winterbottom gave him the upper hand in both instances, leaving Mostert to trail his team leader to record a near perfect Saturday for the blue oval.

What’s more it came on a rare off weekend for Red Bull or, to be more accurate, Jamie Whincup. The reigning champ looked a shadow of himself; off the pace and seemingly without an answer. There were mistakes too which hurt him and he finished a lap down on team-mate Craig Lowndes on Sunday afternoon, just to rub salt into the wound.

He’d been downbeat following his podium on Saturday afternoon, VELOCITY

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realising the performance was lucky. At best he perhaps should have acheived something in the top five, to stand on the podium was undeserved if one is being brutally honest.

There’s been a strange shift in the Red Bull camp since Clipsal.

Where Whincup was previously the clear cut number one driver, over the last two rounds it has been Lowndes who has been faster. The Kid leads the championship VELOCITY

by some 50 points over James Courtney as the circus heads to Winton, and nearly 90 over Whincup. It’s quite a turnaround given Winterbottom had headed the points standings on Saturday night in Perth.

He now sits just third, 70 points off the back of Lowndes. That owes to the somewhat farcical tyre regulations employed by the sport.

Nobody on Sunday afternoon had any tyres, with the exception of a

v8 supercars

set of soft compound Dunlop’s which the rules stated could only be used in the final race. It meant drivers were tiptoeing around a circuit notoriously hungry on tyres in an attempt to preserve what little they had.

To their credit the Prodrive team appeared to have done that to perfection. It’s easy to save rubber when one can dictate the pace and pick their line, without the need to defend. A 51

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poorly timed safety car interfered with their strategy though and left them with a long run home on used soft compound tyres. How a racing series, and one that is supposedly the pinnacle of racing in Australia, is expected to go racing without tyres is anyone’s guess.

It meant that the result on Sunday afternoon was partly a result of strategy and partly good fortune. Craig Lowndes and Will Davison happened to be on the 52

right strategy - choosing to run used hard compound tyres in their first two stints before switching to the softs for the 30 lap run to the finish - but there is no way they would have caught the Ford’s had it been a straight fight to the finish. The result was therefore artificially influenced both by the ludicrous tyre regulations and the deployment of the safety car, though that point at least can’t be argued.

v8 supercars

To his credit Davison did what he needed to do. He lucked into the right strategy but that alone didn’t guarantee him the race. He had to pass the likes of Mostert and Lowndes to reach the front, all the while measuring his performance so as to extract only what was necessary from the precious soft rubber. There is no doubt the Red Bull was faster, but there’s no doubt the Falcon’s had them all beaten if the race had been a straight VELOCITY

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fight.

It emphasises what we saw in Tasmania in that Ford and Holden look set to arm wrestle their way through the season as one track favours one or the other. Hitting the sweet spot and capitalising on it, like Mostert did, is important. Managing the weekend when you don’t have the pace is even more important, and Whincup certainly failed on that front in Perth. So too did Winterbottom to an extent, falling well down VELOCITY

the order on Sunday afternoon taking some of the shine off his Saturday performances.

He may have won two races but he was sharing the same piece of track with Mostert for much of the weekend and yet last year’s Bathurst winner was fourth on Sunday afternoon, a long way up the road.

Mostert isn’t yet a factor in the championship fight, but if the pace in the Ford’s remains for the season it’s likely he

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will become a key protagonist as the season wears on. Winterbottom needs consistency, which he didn’t show in Perth, while Red Bull will hope it re-finds its Tasmanian mojo to counter-act the Prodrive threat.

Speaking of mojo, somebody send some to GRM as its dismal 2015 continues; the less said about it the better.

Check out the full reports on the Velocity website.

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development series

perfection

N

ot only is he fast, but Cam Waters is also gentle on his tyres. Around the abrasive Barbagallo circuit the Falcon driver showed not only was he the quickest man on track but was able to do so across the weekend, managing his tyres better than anyone else while still generating good pace.

It was a perfect trio of 54

races for the Prodrive backed driver, an important point as his championship rivals all struck trouble.

Privateer Aaren Russell had a strong opening race following a disappointing start to the weekend but all his effort came undone in the second as he had contact which punctured his left rear tyre. It was hardly Russell’s fault,

the Novacastrian had been struggling for pace and dropping back as the race wore on before he was forced to stop.

As a result he lined up for the final race on the back row of the grid, but that was no better; a flat right front tyre forcing him in early ending a weekend that had promised so much.

Dumbrell also drifted back in the second race VELOCITY

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but had renewed vigour in the final. Much of that was a result of simply having better tyres, the Red Bull endurance driver clearly having saved tyres in the second race ahead of a final push.

Up and down the field tyre management was critical, far more important than the ability to race. Those moving forward late in the VELOCITY

weekend had looked after their tyres early; Chris Pither faded as the final race went on while those who’d struggled early - like Andrew Jones who had engine problems in the opening two races - were able to charge through on fresher rubber to end the weekend with one strong result at least.

In championship terms it handed the advantage

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to Waters. He and Dumbrell had enetered the weekend equal on points, Dumbrell ahead on countback, but three wins for Waters saw him move into a clear championship lead with a perfect score from the weekend. Jack LeBrocq battled his way into second for the weekend having squabbled with Pither while third for the round went to Dumbrell.

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v8 utes

chaos theory

T

hree different drivers claimed the spoils when the V8 Utes hit Barbagallo Raceway; Kim Jane, Rhys McNally and Ryal Harris all tasing champagne over the weekend.

Starting from pole in the opening race, Jane moved into an early lead over David 56

Sieders at the head of what became a top four battle.

The pace was relentless, Tony Longhurst’s 2013 lap record falling during the course of the race to Siders as he chased down Jane. He would come up short however, finishing second ahead of Ryan Hansford and Grant

Johnson in fourth.

If the opening race was frenetic the second race was chaotic with three separate opening lap incidents triggering the safety car.

The reverse grid top ten saw rookie Mason Barbera on pole, though his race soon ended when he moved over on George Miedecke in the VELOCITY

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run to the first turn, the contact puncturing the left rear forcing him into the pits and relegating him to 20th at the finish.

There was also contact between Danny Buzadzic, Cam Wilson and Kris Walton in the opening turn while just three corners later Buzadzic was again in the thick of things when he was VELOCITY

involved in a clash that ended the race for Andrew Skinner and Peter Burnitt.

His part in proceedings saw Buzadzic excluded from the race, which was eventually won

by McNally over Harris with Gerard McLeod securing a career best third place.

A more sedate finale

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saw Harris improve his position to win, converting a strong start into the lead before the field reached the first turn.

Adam Marjoram pushed hard in the latter part of the race but was unable to find a way through, securing second place and his maiden V8 Utes podium with McLeod once again in third.

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O

ne of the most encouraging things about the Bahrain Grand Prix was seeing a number of teams flying by the seat of their pants. In Daniel Ricciardo’s case that was more by luck than judgement with his Renault expiring as he rolled across the line, but that race winner Lewis Hamilton and team-mate Nico Rosberg had to manage brake issues in the final laps harked back to the glory days of Formula One. Cars built and raced to the very edge is what Formula One is about if they finish with more than nothing they’ve not been pushed hard enough. In an era where drivers are saving tyres and fuel and engines, to see the Mercedes limping in the final two laps is a positive. The German cars, built in England, clearly ran to the very limit of their capability.

They were made to by a Ferrari team which has found good pace.

Throughout 2014 neither Lewis Hamilton nor Nico Rosberg needed worry about anyone but each other, but this year the Brackley squad has had to keep more than a careful eye on the Italian team as it begins to 58

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bahrain grand prix

fine margins

Image: Sutton’s

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make strides forward.

In Malaysia Mercedes made strategic mistakes which allowed Ferrari through to win and that has given it the confidence to keep pushing. It also rattled the confidence of those at Mercedes into the 60

realisation that they can’t simply treat their races independantly of the rest of the field as they’d done last season.

It’s why, when Sebastian Vettel pitted for his first stop in Bahrain, Mercedes immediately responded by bringing

Rosberg in. Typically Mercedes will pit whichever of its drivers is ahead in order to give them the advantage of the undercut but with Vettel threatening there was no option but to stop Rosberg in order to keep him in VELOCITY

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the race. Hamilton too was stopped soon after, emerging with the battle for second and third not far behind, highlighting just how slim the margin at the front was.

Vettel used the undercut to get by Rosberg, but the slightly better VELOCITY

car speed in the Mercedes meant that order was soon reversed.

That pattern was repeated at the second round of stops, but with the top three rather closer Mercedes stopped Hamilton first to cover off Vettel.

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Robserg dropped to third when he rejoined and pressured Vettel into a mistake at the final turn, a mistake which was rather more costly that first appeared.

There had been a number of uncharacteristic 61

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mistakes from Vettel up to that point. He’d run wide at turn one having missed his braking marker early and then left the track entirely mid race, saved only by the paved run off areas.

His third error however saw him bounce over the kerbing, damage his front wing and forced another stop.

At the time Vettel had 62

been among the Mercedes’ with a clear run to the finish. Team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, on a different strategy, was making up time lost in the first part of the race and by the end would be just three seconds off Hamilton. If Vettel had not damaged his front wing it is entirely probable that he would have been much closer to the

lead Mercedes, a fact that would likely have antagonised the brake issues which beset Hamilton and Rosberg in the final laps.

As it was they opened the door for Raikkonen.

Rosberg’s problems saw him sail by the apex at the first corner, giving Raikkonen the advantage out of the turn and with it second place.

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Image: Sutton’s

Image: Sutton’s

Hamilton was well up the road but forced to slow in the final lap to finish just three seconds ahead of the 2007 world champion. But what could have been for Ferrari.

Vettel’s problems were compounded by his inability to pass Valtteri Bottas. After his unscheduled stop, Vettel dropped to fifth and VELOCITY

while he caught Bottas in quick time found his progress halted; able to run in the wheel tracks of the Williams but toothless when it came to finding a way by.

His earlier mistake probably cost him the win, and gave Mercedes the breathing space it needed to not push its cars the the absolute ragged edge. Had they

been pushed the problems they suffered in the final two laps would have appeared earlier, and that could have resulted in a much better result than second place for Raikkonen and fifth for Vettel. It could have been Ferrari’s first 1-2 since Germany 2010.

Read the full race and qualifying reports on the Velocity webpage.

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chinese grand prix

unfulfilled promise Image: Sutton’s

I

n the build up to the Chinese Grand Prix it looked as though we would be in for a tense struggle between Ferrari and Mercedes. Instead we witnessed a paranoid display of control from the German team as Ferrari got under its skin.

64

Throughout practice the two teams had seemed closely matched. The silver cars had a clear pace advantage over a single lap but their speed over long stints was within Ferrari’s grasp. Both Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg chewed

their tyres faster, with Ferrari able to maintain a consistent pace for longer. The thought was that, come the race, Mercedes could streak off only to fall into the clutches of Ferrari later on.

For the opening stint of that’s what looked to VELOCITY

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be happening. The two Mercedes headed the race trailed by Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen. The Ferrari’s had a sniff, but little more than that. Even still Mercedes was worried, pitting Rosberg to cover Vettel for fear of losing out through the VELOCITY

undercut. It was predictable, but following Malaysia it was the second demonstration that Mercedes has begun to realise the stranglehold it had over the sport is beginning to wane.

Had Vettel got ahead of Rosberg he could have threatened second place

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for the remainder of the race, though Hamilton clearly demonstrated he had speed in reserve should he have been challenged. Indeed it was that point which spurred a heated debate between the Mercedes drivers post-race as Rosberg accused his 65

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team-mate of driving unecessarily slowly during the middle phase of the race.

Having switched their strategy to run the softer compound tyres in the middle stint, Hamilton out front was managing his rubber.

That allowed Rosberg and Vettel to close up, and while neither ever posed a threat to the car ahead it aggreived Rosberg who saw the situation as a challenge to his second place. More Mercedes paranoia.

When Vettel pitted so too did Rosberg, while Hamilton put the hammer down to open a margin and protect his lead. All three maintained position while a late race charge suggested Kimi Raikkonen shouldn’t be ruled out as the season goes on.

Another poor qualifying from the Finn hurt him in the race. With a car easily capable of the second row of the grid he only managed sixth fastest behind the two Williams. Though he cleared them at the start it only restored him to the position he should have been in to begin with. His challenge was blunted as a result.

So too was Daniel Ricciardo’s, who went into anti-stall at the start and 66

dropped like a stone through the field. He lost ten places on the opening lap and spent the rest of the race trying to recover. It was a clumsy race from the Australian, demonstrated by a needlessly protracted dice with Marcus Ericsson which saw the Red Bull slide wide of apexes and lock brakes in a decidedly uncomposed performance. He scored points but was certainly not at his best.

By contrast, Max Verstappen failed to put a foot wrong. The young Dutchman ultimately retired from the race in the final laps, his Toro Rosso crying enough on the front straight and prompting the race to finish behind the safety car, but that did nothing to take the lustre off his efforts. Incredibly strong under brakes, Verstappen raced with maturity and vigour belying his youth and inexperience.

After just three races he is absolutely a cadidate for the Red Bull senior team next season.

The question is which of its current drivers will he replace; Ricciardo or Daniil Kvyat. While Ricciardo hasn’t thus far reproduced the form he demonstrated in 2014 the same can also be said for the Russian. He

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Image: Sutton’s

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retired early in China (another Renault engine failure) but had again qualified poorly. Kvyat is under pressure.

So too is Williams.

The team most thought would be second best has absolutely dropped to third best. It was another lonely race in China for Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas as they filled the void 68

between Ferrari and the rest, showing as a team that it’s better than the midfield but not yet fast enough to be a race winner. It will leave some head scratching at Grove as it looks to move forward, coming to terms with the resurgent Ferrari a prime concern.

At the other end of the field McLaren is

making progess. Both cars made it to the finish while it has clearly stepped up from a dismal opening race in Australia to now be hanging onto the coat tails of the midfield pack. The Honda engine is still not good enough, there are serious reliability concerns, but the fact Jenson Button was able to race with Pastor VELOCITY

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Image: Sutton’s

Maldonado in the closing stages showed what progress the team had made.

True, Maldonado was recovering having had a busy afternoon of throwing his Lotus at the scenery but that he wasn’t simply able to drive by the McLarens was encouraging.

Less encouraging will be the fact it’s only a VELOCITY

matter of time before Fernando Alonso and Button take engine penalties courtesy of their power unit’s propensity to go bang, though one gets the feeling that doesn’t overly bother the Woking team which is working its way through a laundry list of improvements on its journey towards the front of the grid.

The benchmark remains Mercedes of course, which is increasingly looking over its shoulder where two red cars lie in wait.

Momentum, one feels, is shifting away from Bavaria rather rapidly.

Read the full race and qualifying reports on the Velocity webpage.

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motogp

grand prix of spain

lorenzo joins the party I

t was hardly an exciting race, if you’re anyone but Jorge Lorenzo that is as the Spaniard cruised to the simplest MotoGP race of the season so far.

Taking the race aside, the fact Lorenzo is a race winner again is a positive as the championship moves back into Europe. While Valentino Rossi has been in fine form his 70

team-mate had looked rather less that certain in comparison. Perhaps it was confirmation that Yamaha would retain him for 2016 that gave him the shot in the arm he needed but from the moment he rolled out on track in Jerez he looked a decidedly different rider to that which had started the season.

Yamaha has shown

itself to be a genuine championship contender, now a double threat courtesy of its Spanish rider. In Spain there was nothing that could stick with the R1, though Marc Marquez did manage to get himself between the two factory riders.

It must be remembered that Marquez was carrying an injury. In the opening stages he was VELOCITY

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y able to stay in the wheel tracks of Lorenzo but faded after half a dozen laps, perhaps as his broken finger began causing issues. Post race he admitted to having pain in his right arm as he rode to compensate for the injury. That hurt his ability to use the front brake effectively and allow Rossi to close in, but any threat the Italian great posed VELOCITY

was soon extinguished as Marquez increased his pace once more.

The race, as a spectacle, was uninteresting.

After the opneing laps Lorenzo cleared out leaving Marquez in a lonely second with Rossi a distant third but well clear of Cal Crutchlow - more than 10 seconds at the flag.

In championship terms it shows Marquez’s task

of reclaiming the points lost in Argentina will be made more difficult as he’ll have to battle both Yamaha riders. Ducati is still in the hunt, even if it wasn’t in Spain, making it an open four-way battle for the championship between Marquez, Rossi, Lorenzo and Andrea Dovizioso.

Check out the full race report on the Velocity website.

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grand prix of argentina

all or nothing J

ust how much the Argentinian Grand Prix will matter come the end of the season isn’t clear at this point, but should Marc Marquez miss the championship by a hanful of points it will be a race he should look back on with regret.

One has to admire his all or nothing approach.

Having set off like a rabbit early in the race 72

he was reeled in as his tyres fell away. When Valentino Rossi edged into the lead a lap and a half from home, Marquez’s desperation to win was evident.

Though considerably slower, and having lost the corner, the young Spaniard refused to give up.

It was Marquez’s choice of tyre that let him down in Argentina. On

the grid he swapped from the extra hard rear to the hard, a tyre which gave marginally more grip in the early laps but which fell away as the race went on. Everyone else fitted the extra hard tyre and, when Marquez began to fade, reeled him back in - slowly at first before taking chunks out of the lead in the final few laps.

The crash which ended VELOCITY

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his race was entirely avoidable. The contact the corner before was too. For lap after lap in the closing stages the comfortable lead Marquez had held was eroded, a fact he would have been aware of from his pit board, and yet he elected to fight.

It’s commendable but was foolhardy.

From a championship perspective the VELOCITY

Honda rider let valuable points slide down the road with his bike. He allowed Rossi to extend his championship lead and made his own job more difficult than it needed to be.

For a time it looked as though Ducati would again be in the fight for victory, though Andrea Dovizioso faded like Marquez in the final laps. Still he was second

at the finish, which would probably have been third had Marquez stayed upright; that would have made it three different manufacturers in the top three.

It is only early in the championship and nothing is certain besides the fact Rossi and Marquez will meet on track again.

Read the full race report on the website.

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Marquez’s marker grand prix of the americas

W

e always knew Qatar was an anomoly.

The mighty Marc Marquez was only a distant fourth in the season opener but the Spaniard showed us all he means business when the series hit the Circuit of the Americas.

The opening round was soon a thing of distant memories as Marquez leapt from the pack to dominate. Not even a delayed start nor a difficult qualifying that saw 74

him switch bikes in the final moments was able to rattle him. His performance was serene, controlled and fast. Very, very fast.

For a moment it looked as though the race might develop into the sort of tussle we’d seen in the opening round with Andrea Dovizisio leading, and even opening a small gap. But that was soon reeled in

by Marquez who had Valentino Rossi and an impressive Bradley

Smith for company.

There was a brief squabble for top spot.

Marquez had a go under brakes heading onto the long back straight only for Dovizioso’s Ducati to motor back passed. It was short lived though as Marquez made the rear of his bike dance under brakes at the end of the straight, taking a lead from which he would never be troubled.

That in itself is troubling. In Qatar it looked VELOCITY

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video: cota best crashes

as tough Ducati, Yamaha and Honda were all relatively evenly matched but it turns out Marquez had simply taken too much out of his tyres in the opening laps as he recovered from a first corner mistake.

The true test will be when there is a second competitive Honda rider onboard, Dani Pedrosa missing the round following surgery on an injured arm. It made Marquez our only yardstick for Honda and on VELOCITY

his performance it’s fair to suggest he again looks strong for the championship.

The good news is that Rossi looks up for the fight. He was at his combative best in Qatar and was again on form in the US. He headed the championship as it left Austin, by a point over Divizioso, but more importantly he had shown himself competitive and consistent. Indeed, one has to go back to Germany last

year for the last time the Italian great finished off the podium (he crashed out of Aragon) and with a solid second place in the championship last season he looks to be building momentum.

It could be then that 2015 gives us a battle between the old a new as Rossi looks to show Marquez how it’s done.

The Italian has the hunger but the question that lingers after two rounds is whether he has the pace.

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playing the long game six hours of spa-francorchamps

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n the evidence shown in Belgium, if Porsche is capable of keepings its car running the distance it looks to start the Le Mans 24 Hours as favourite.

The 6 Hours of SpaFrancorchamps has become an extended test for the French classic, both Audi and Porsche entering third cars with Audi bringing low downforce bodywork for two of its R18s.

At the opening round of the season in Silverstone it became evident that while Audi was very fast through the twisty sections it was the Porsche’s which had the legs down the straights courtesy of its battery power. The Le Mans circuit is a mixture of the two, but dominated by a series of long straights (only the Porsche curves requiring any serious downforce) teams have typically developed low drag versions of their typical cars specifically for the race.

In Belgium that saw Audi close the gap between itself and Porsche compared with Silverstone but there was still a world of difference between the top end speed of the two German cars. Strangely Audi was still dynamite through the twisty VELOCITY

middle section of the circuit, showing it had kept strong grip despite trimming out the wings, though it was no match in a head to head battle with the Porsche 919 in terms of lap time around Spa. Toyota was a distant third. Both cars were a lap down on the leader by mid distance and could do nothing but watch as the recovering Mark Webber drove by them. There was nothing obviously wrong with the Toyota, they ran nose to tail for much of the race suggesting there was little more to be extracted from the TS 040.

Toyota, like Porsche, had not followed the Audi lead and debuted their Le Mans spec aero kit but whatever difference that makes for will likely not make the difference needed to see it competitive at the French classic while for Porsche it will likely see its current rocket ship go supersonic down the Mulsanne Straight.

The key for the Porsche team will be eliminating silly on track mistakes.

Brendon Hartley ran off the circuit and saw him handed a 15-second penalty when he rejoined the track through a marshals post. There were suspension issues 77

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at the rear of the car too which saw it disappear into the garage for two laps.

Audi’s advantage remains its ability on the pit wall. Though in Belgium it didn’t have the ultimate pace of the Porsche’s, certainly not in a straight-line, the 78

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team’s experience and ability to read the race saw it jump to the lead when it mattered. Just how much it’s ‘Le Mans’ spec bodywork gave the R18 remains unclear.

The car was certainly faster in a straight line but still easily faster than anything else in

the twisty bits, which suggests what all is not what it seems at Audi who were perhaps trying to mislead their opposition.

In the LMP2 category former Australian Formula 3 driver, and GP3 champion, Mitch Evans made his debut, putting VELOCITY

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in a strong stint to drag his team’s car into the lead during the middle third of the race before jumping back in for the final stint to bring it to the line as class winners.

In an increasingly competitive LMP2 category it was a strong VELOCITY

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debut, showing the class the young Kiwi, Mark Webber’s protégé, possesses.

At the very front the race again went to the wire as even going into the final stops, with 20 minutes left to run, the result was unclear.

For the second time in

as many WEC events the race had a grandstand finish. The days of endurance races being tales of attrition and conservation are a thing of the past.

Read our in-depth report from the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps on the Velocity website.

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golden age arrives six hours of silverstone

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portscar fans rejoice, the golden age is upon us. If the opening round of the World Endurance Championship at Silverstone was any indication of what lies ahead, 2015 could well prove to be one for 80

the annals of history.

Three manufacturers, each having taken markedly different approaches in the design of their cars, so evenly matched the final result was in doubt even within the final minutes of a six hour race. Audi,

Toyota and Porsche all have strengths, but they all have weaknesses too. The relative parity between them makes for exciting racing, as was witnessed for large stretches of the Silverstone race.

Gone are the days of VELOCITY

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sportscar races being about nursing the car the full distance; reliability has come on to the point the races are now extended grands prix.

The cars are very nearly as quick as Formula One cars and have both far greater VELOCITY

world endurance championship

diversity and more innovative technology.

The WEC is everything Formula One aspires to be. The difference is that where its open-wheel cousin needs to dress it up in the premise of cutting edge technology and being the pinnacle

of motor racing, there is no pretence in the WEC, no apologies and nor do there need to be.

Porsche’s supped up 919 is blisteringly fast.

Solid around the twisty bits, as soon as the road straightens out even a little, and the drivers 81

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can engage its additional electric power, it has the power and torque to streak down the road. It certainly left the Audi red faced in Silverstone, much to the delight of everybody watching - including the drivers. For lap after lap, for the better part of an 82

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hour, the lead Porsche and Audi continually swapped the race lead among themselves. The Audi was fast through the complex at the start of the lap, capable of driving around the outside of the Porsche in the corners, only to tow a figurative caravan

down the straights by comparison to the 919.

Toyota is not far off the mark. Silverstone didn’t suit the Japanese team, it’s hybrid system harvesting under braking, of which there is little at Silverstone. That will change at Spa-Francorchamps where there VELOCITY

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world endurance championship

video: porsche vs audi

is heavy braking into the chicane at the end of the lap, and into Les Combes and La Source.

The long straights will be looked upon with glee by Mark Webber and his mates while Audi will be licking its lips at the thought of Blanchimont, Eau Rouge VELOCITY

and Pouhon. Such are the relative strengths of each that all three have a genuine chance of victory.

Of course there remain gremlins, Porsche has to do something about its overheating battery while it’ll hope its gearbox lasts more than an

hour in Webber’s car this time around, but all told the WEC looks poised for one of the most combative seasons in decades. For fans, that can only be good news.

Read the full report on the Velocity website.

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world rally championship

for colin rally argentina

Image: Sutton’s

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here won’t be a single person in the rally community who would begrudge Kris Meeke victory in Argentina.

It was an emotional win, the culmination of a decade worth of effort with the late Colin McRae the catalyst behind it all. McRae spotted Meeke as a youngster and bankrolled his career in the early days. The former world champion had seen promise all those 84

years ago. It took until Argentina for him to realise it.

His path had been eased thanks to an unusually poor rally for Volkswagen. It started early in the rally and didn’t stop throughout as first Sebastien Ogier had problems with the fuel supply on his car, eliminating him from serious contention early on day one, a problem which also halted teammate Jari-Matti Latavala. The misery was

completed on the final stage when Andreas Mikkelsen crashed heavily just metres into the stage, ending his rally on the spot. Ogier had been able to get going again and while he wasn’t a factor at the front of the rally was at least able to salvage three points courtesy of going fastest on the Power Stage.

It was VW’s worst rally since it joined the WRC. Latvala had been in third when he was beset VELOCITY

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world rally championship

Image: Sutton’s

Image: Sutton’s

with reliablity problems, the brutal Argentinian roads playing havoc with the Polos.

Following Ogier’s retirement it was Meeke who took the lead, extending a full minute advantage at the end of the first leg. That shrunk to be just over 18 seconds by the end of the rally to team-mate Mads Ostberg, Citroen recording a long awaited 1-2.

In championship terms little can be read into the Argentinian event.

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Meeke’s victory will hand him confidence heading into Portugal but how he builds on that will be key; it seems unlikely he’ll be in a position to challenge the domination of Volkswagen though.

For VW, Argentina was a blip on the radar - or a bump in the road, if you’re a fan of puns - which the team will review and understand.

Nothing serious should be read from the fact it failed to put in any sort

of showing; the fuel supply problems were, according to the team, unique to the event and never seen before while Mikkelsen’s crash could have happened anywhere to any of its drivers.

Meeke’s win is something to celebrate, and opportunity to welcome WRC’s newest winner while rememberring one of its greatest. It was a deserving result, but not one which will worry Volkswagen.

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ictory for Josef Newgarden may have stolen the headlines at Barber Motorsport Park, but it was the recovery from Will Power that could ultimately prove crucial later in the season.

Newgarden deserved to take his first Indycar win. He moved up through the field well at the start and had greater pace that Helio Castroneves throughout the race. Though the two switched positions through the pit strategies, and Castroneves emerged at the head of the pack for the final sprint to the line, Newgarden had the pace to not only catch but find a way through. Passing in Indycar is not trivial, far from it, so that Newgarden not only had the pace but the ability to use it meant his win was well earned.

The race was a great leveller in terms of the championship as JuanPablo Montoya was off colour all weekend. He was nowhere in practice and qualified down the order, coming home just 18th at the flag. He’d have lost the championship lead to Castroneves if the Brazilian hadn’t run out of fuel on the final lap.

With the leading two title protagonists out of 86

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newgarden clo the front battle it enabled Power to make strong inroads into the ground he’d lost last time out. Where Montoya had struggled at Barber, Power had struggled in Long Beach but at Barber the Aussie did it the hard way; losing out at the start when he dropped to third despite an aggressive sweep across the track heading into turn one - for which he was warned - only

to struggle for pace towards the end of his opening stint.

Worse was to follow when he emerged from his stop, spearing towards the apex of turn two and in doing so crowding out Takuma Sato. The Japanese driver spun while Power bounced through the gravel and was penalised with a drive through penalty. It left the reigning champ dead last a third of the VELOCITY

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indycar

oses as title opens way into the race.

His progress back to the front was quiet. He would pop up at the front of the order during the pit stop cycle though his exact position only became clear in the final laps once the final stops had been completed. Power had climbed from last to fourth, scoring good points on a day when the championship leaders scored few or none.

Scott Dixon was also a VELOCITY

big gainer. Though he dropped to third on the final lap when Graham Rahal found a way by he rocketed up the championship standings after a dismal start to the season in St Petersburg.

Though processional for the most part, the Barber race did at times provide some good racing. The Rahal-Dixon battle at the end of the race was entertaining though it was somewhat artificial since Rahal had

opted for a significantly different pit strategy.

Power made a couple of strong moves while down the order there was wheel banging and aggressive racing to be seen. It was by far the best race of the season, but it was by no means a classic for anyone but Josef Newgarden.

Check out the full race report from Barber Motorsport Park on the Velocity website.

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dixon’s day grand prix of long beach

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round the streets of Long Beach, Scott Dixon became the first man to really break the Penske stranglehold in Indycar this season. Though last time out it was James Hinchcliffe who won at NOTA, it was hardly a fair fight in a race dominated by yellow flag periods and time restrictions. Dixon’s win was earned, not inherited.

The crucial factor proved to be the start, 88

where the New Zealander moved into second place behind pole man Helio Castroneves. It set the Chip Ganassi team up during the first round of pit stops, and when Castroneves was delayed by congestion in the pit lane Dixon was able to roll through into the lead without fluster.

From there the race was all but over.

As has been the pattern throughout the season

so far, overtaking was at a premium. Indycar may have mandated the strengthening of the new aero kits, and removal of the pylons on the front of the Chevrolet powered cars, but they remain unable to run in close proximity to one another. Even down the long front straight out of the final turn and into the heavy braking zone of the first turn cars were struggling, even when using push VELOCITY

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to pass. It created a processional race which saw most action happen in the pit lane.

There was never any real challenge for positions that mattered making the biggest story of the race that of Will Power’s dismal day.

The reigning champ had started deep in the pack and was caught out at the first stops when he was baulked coming into pit lane.

Having stalled, by the VELOCITY

time he finally re-joined he was down a lap and never recovered.

He was the only Penske driver not to be on the pace, with Castroneves leading the first part of the race and Juan-Pablo Montoya making a nuisance of himself late in the day.

Simon Pagenaud was also among the action to leave Power the odd one out. At this early stage it’s hardly anything worth getting

indycar

concerned about, but consistently picking up strong points will be important as the season progresses.

More than anything that means qualifying well, especially with overtaking proving effectively impossible on track. The closer to the front one starts the easier the race will be.

Read the full report on the Velocity website.

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n the evidence of Indycar’s debut at NOLA Motorsports Park, the series has some rather serious issues to resolve.

After a less than spectacular season opener around the streets of St Petersburg rather more was hoped for when the series reached the first permanent facility of the year but instead what was offered up felt amateur. The circuit looked suitable for little more than club level events while the on track action was, if anything, worse than what had been produced in the opening round.

Things weren’t helped by the weather. Qualifying was cancelled and grid order sorted by team championship points. That put three Penske’s at the front and, by rights, that’s how it should have stayed. Juan-Pablo Montoya was the rabbit throughout the early part of the race, if that’s what one could call it.

Early on conditions were less than ideal.

There was standing water in parts and while a dry line soon emerged. It made strategy difficult with those gambling early, like Tony Kanaan, losing out as they rolled the dice too readily. Though 90

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conditions improved it remained treacherous offline; there remained deep, damp patches ready for the unwary.

The largest concern was a large puddle on the exit of the final turn which sat squarely in the middle of the acceleration zone.

There was a drying line but its location would play havoc as the race moved into its second half. Car after car was caught out as the race

returned to green following a yellow flag period, promptly bringing the race back under control of the safety car.

There was another puddle further up the road, which caught Stefano Coletti out as he aquaplaned across the track at one restart, wiping out the back end of his car.

Constant yellow flag periods dictated the second half of the race, which had quickly VELOCITY

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ndycar loses

become time certain with the intrusion of the first safety car and slower lap times courtesy of the wet conditions. Originally slated for 75 laps, teams quickly predicted just 61 laps would be run in the 105 minutes allowed for the race. Ultimately just 47 laps were compelted.

The result was, more than anything, down to luck. James Hinchcliffe took the flag but came to the lead by stopping VELOCITY

early and crossing his fingers he wouldn’t run out of fuel towards the end. When he’d stopped there was no way of knowing it would see him to the finish, nor did the leaders know when they stopped a handful of laps later that they’d be relegated to the midfield with precious little opportunity to reclaim their positions.

But more than that there is a fundamental

problem in Indycar in that drivers simply can’t pass. What little racing there was proved processional, certainly after the hubbub of the restarts, while the reinforced front wings seem to have done little if anything to improve their durability.

Indycar, as a spectacle, is currently as unattractive as their cars. There have been little in the way of positives in the season so far.

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nascar

all about the show nascar wrap

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he prayers of NASCAR’s marketing team have been answered; Dale Earnhardt Jnr is in the season ending Chase.

It’s not official yet of course, the American’s have a knack of making things less than concrete until the very end, but it’s pretty well guaranteed Junior will be one of the 16 drivers vying for 92

the championship at the end of the season thanks to victory at Talladega.

That piece of positive news for NASCAR came at the end of a month which had seen a PR disaster at Bristol.

The 500 mile race, which ended up being a tad longer, took some ten hours to complete thanks to rain delays and NASCAR’s

insistence that the event finish under green flag conditions. By the end of the race, with darkness having long since fallen to turn the afternoon event into a race under lights, there were swathes of empty grandstands as fans gave up and went home, no doubt soaked to the bone.

In the end NASCAR got its wish and the race VELOCITY

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ended with a greenwhite-chequered run home, a 30 second flurry at the end of a long and frustrating day.

Matt Kenseth won over Jimmie Johnson, moving them into all but guaranteed Chase positions. Johnson’s place was already assured at Texas anyway where he won his second race of the season.

Two of the three VELOCITY

Stewart-Haas cars continue to show well, though team boss Tony Stewart’s woeful 2015 continues. In Talladega it looked as though he might snatch a win for the first time in two years, only to switch lanes in the final laps and drop like a rock when he got no help around the superspeedway. Kurt Busch and Kevin Harvick are

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at least holding up the team’s honour well.

Busch notched up a win at Richmond with Harvick second, Harvick still sitting atop the Chase grid.

Eight drivers have wins that should see them through to the season ending arm wrestle for the silverware but there remain a further eight up for grabs.

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world superbikes

world superbikes assen

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he management at Kawasaki must be quietly patting themselves on the back after hiring Jonathan Rea following another perfect weekend for the championship leader.

Coming just a week after the Aragon race it was hoped that there would be more competition at the front in Assen. That may have been the case in the second race of the 94

weekend, but in the opener Rea looked determined to stamp his authority back on the series after playing second fiddle to Chaz Davies in the second race in Spain.

For a time the leading group grew as large as seven riders, but as the race wore on it broke up. That process was aided by the desperation of some of those involved - Michael Van

Der Mark sitting up Tom Sykes, a move which effectively popped the Kawasaki rider out the back of the leading group.

Aragon winner Davies was also in strong form, pursuing Rea as the pair pulled away to make the it a two-way battle for the lead but Rea never looked challenged to take the victory.

Rea’s strategy of getting to the front and VELOCITY

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staying there paid dividends in the opening race, one which Sykes attempted to replicate in the second race. For a time it looked to have worked too until Rea, and others, finally found a way by.

Sykes simply didn’t have the pace of his team-mate throughout the weekend. Though he led in the second race he was never able to pull a lead, and never VELOCITY

looked as comfortable as Rea at the head of the race. As in the opening race he faded as Rea grew impatient before finally taking the lead at mid-distance.

Rea then raced clear of the pack to take an unrivalled victory when Sykes and Davies squablled, delaying the chasing pack and giving the chapionship leader the break he needed.

For Sykes the round all

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but ended his hopes of championship glory this season as Rea further extended his advantage. The new Kawasaki recruit has won all but two races this season, and even then he was on the second step of the podium to dominate the head of the championship rather convincingly.

Read the full race report on the Velocity website.

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world superbikes aragon

duke of aragon Q

uite where Chaz Davies found the pace he had in Aragon from is a mystery. In the opening two rounds of the World Superbike Championship his Ducati has been a makeweight, but there was something about the Spanish countryside that agreed with his Italian stallion.

To that point it had been a Kawasaki cake walk. Jonathan Rea won 96

in Phillip Island and did the double in Thailand at the following event.

He even won the opening race in Aragon after holding off a feisty Davies for the win.

Nearest to Rea in the championship has been Leon Haslam on the Aprilia, though the Brit openly acknowledged that the Aragon circuit wasn’t to the liking of his machinery. It was a round to

be endured, collecting as many points as he could before moving on to Assen where things should be rather better. That was the case in the opening race but in race two Haslam was suddenly far more competitive.

That fact was probably a contributing factor to Tom Sykes’ painful high side early in the second race. Looking fast for the first time all season VELOCITY

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the former champ was moving forward, dragging Haslam with him, before losing the back end and being bucked off as he accelerated onto the back straight.

By that stage Davies had already cleared out.

Rea in second place picked up perhaps a whiff of slipstream but for all intents and purposes the race was over.

Davies eased away the longer the race went VELOCITY

on, seemingly nobody able to lift their pace to respond. Not that Rea really needed to.

He’d scored the win in the opening race to increase his points lead over Haslam, who he was leading again in the second race. Chasing after the Ducati would have only put the points that were effectively in his pocket at risk.

Davies then won his first race since 2013,

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and Ducati’s first since the end of the 2012 season. It wasn’t the first time he’d won in Aragon either, he did the double in 2013 on a BMW, making him the winningest rider around the Spanish circuit. It was also a successful weekend for Rea who extended his points advantage.

Read the full reports of both race one and race two on the Velocity website.

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targa tasmania

white knuckled drive

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he record books will show Jason White won the 2015 Targa Tasmania, his fifth, by the seemingly comfortable margin of 26 seconds over Steve Glenney but the reality was rather different.

White had taken control of the rally on the opening day but a hard charging Nissan GTR in the hands of Glenney pursued him throughout the remaining five days. The GTR had gone 98

into limp mode partway through the third stage on the opening day before a suspected driveshaft problem robbed Glenney of more time. It meant he faced a deficit of 84 seconds after the opening day’s running.

Sabotage threatened the rally when oil was placed on one of the stages on the fourth day. Organisers cancelled the Mole Creek stage when the sweep

car reported an oil slick in one of the corners, a matter which failed to disrupt the rally and was passed on to police to investigate.

The driveshaft problem ultimately turned out to be a slipping clutch for Glenney, a problem quickly rectified once identified seeing him fastest throughout the third day. He’d closed the gap further still heading into the final day to trail White’s VELOCITY

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Lamborghini by 74 seconds. That narrowed to 42 seconds in just two stages to raise tensions as White began to struggle with a slipping clutch.

Glenney though ran out of time, eventually finishing 26 seconds off the back of White after six days and almost 500 kilometres of competitive stages.

Australian GT runner Tony Quinn won the Showroom competition VELOCITY

at the wheel of his McLaren 650S, beating a surprised Grant Denyer at the wheel of a somewhat more affordable Renault Megane.

Craig Haysman took out the Classic Outright class in his Triumph TR7 while Jeff Beable claimed the Sports Trophy in his 2000 Nissan Skyline GT-R. Mark Laucke’s Porsche Carrera RS won the Thoroughbred Trophy while the 4WD

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Showroom class went to Angus Kennard. The Early Classic Handicap was won by Peter Ullrich, the Late Classic Handicap to Leigh Achterberg and the Early Modern class to Liam Howarth.

Alan Gluyas claimed the Trophy class with his Toyota 86 GTS while Wayne Clarke’s 1938 Dodge Speedster Special was unrivalled in the Vintage class.

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production touring cars

thomas tames the moun

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commanding performance on Sunday saw Dylan Thomas claim victory in the Production Touring 1 Hour race, following on from a determined drive on Saturday afternoon which saw him finish third.

The opening race was 100

marred by a spectacular incident at The Chase on the opening lap that saw Zach Loscialpo roll his HSV six times after spinning into the sand trap. The driver was uninjured.

Thomas led a bulk of the early running on Saturday but dropped to 6th position at the pit

stops, some 45 seconds behind the leader and his nearest rival, Jim Pollicina.

Having stopped behind the safety car, Keven Herben assumed the lead in his HSV but was rapidly chased down by fellow HSV driver, Daniel Flanagan in the closing 20 minutes.

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ntain

Flanagan moved into the lead with 11 minutes to go as the track dried, though Herben maintained the pressure to cross the line second just 0.8 seconds behind. Thomas climbed back to third, comfortably setting the quickest lap in his pursuit of the leaders.

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Carrying on his strong pace, Thomas commanded Sunday’s race, leading from the outset to take a strong victory over Luke Searle and Barry Graham’s BMW M135.

Thomas led from the start and held a commanding lead following the completion of the pit

stops – Searle charging hard to close the margin in the closing stint, coming close to the lap record on his way to second place.

Matt Holt’s third place ensured there were three different brands represented inside the top three at the finish of one hour race.

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production sports cars

drama reigns at bathur

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tarting fifth, Neale Muston used pit strategy to jump the pack and win the opening Production Sports Car enduro in difficult wet conditions.

Muston dropped to tenth as he stopped but once back on track was comfortably fastest, surviving two safety car 102

periods including one that ended the race. Rod Salmon finished second in his Audi R8 LMS and Steven McLaughlin third in his Dodge Viper.

Greg Taylor led the race early in his Wall Racing Audi R8 but dropped to fifth behind Iain Pretty at the finish after stopping to hand the car over to co-driver Barton Mawer.

Andrew Macpherson and Brad Shiels’ race was over soon after it began as the pole sitting Porsche found the wall at the Cutting on the opening lap. Further back Aaron Seton, on debut at Bathurst, finished tenth in the opening race.

Salmon fought back in race two, an event VELOCITY

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dominated by two length safety car periods.

The first came thanks to an opening lap crash at Murray’s corner when Robert Smith lost his Ferrari under braking, skating across the gravel before colliding with the luckless Andrew Richmond’s Ginetta.

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Racing had barely resumed before the safety car was again on track, this time when Nick Marentis and Justin Hughes crashed at turn seven.

It left a final 10 minute sprint once green flag conditions returned, Salmon opening a nine second lead by the flag over Muston.

The Shiels and Macperhson car was third, an impressive fight back after started 47th, courtesy of a retirement in the opening race. The pair had charged up to 19th prior to the final safety car, moving up to third in the final four laps of the race.

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saloon cars & combined touring

lindorff leads

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ravis Lindorff proved unbeatable around the Mountain, the Commodore driver dominating the weekend to claim all three Australian Saloon Car race wins.

In the opening race Lindorff beat home both Garry Hills and Wayne King to top spot, Hill and King embroiled in a personal battle for second position which saw the order reversed in race two. Double national class champion Simon Tabinor finished fourth in both.

Lindorff backed up his Saturday performance 104

with a fine drive on Sunday to claim his third win of the weekend, taking out the round in the process. Hills was again second with King just half a second further back in third.

A post-race penalty for the Combined Sedans winner saw Shawn Jamieson take the flag in the opening race and a ten place grid drop courtesy of a Safety Car infringement during race one. Jamieson had finished ahead of Anthony Macready with Stephen Voight third.

Macready duly converted the inherited

pole position into victory but in unusual circumstances.

Classified the winner, Macready had actually ended the race when his car stopped on track. It forced the red flag, taking results back one lap meaning Macready claimed honours despite his Nissan 250ZX returning to the paddock on the back of a flat bed truck.

Matt Palmer then won the final race following a penultimate lap pass on Voight for the lead, making it three different winners from as many races.

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heritage & group n touring cars

skyline treble

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Nissan Skyline was again the car to beat around The Mountain as Terry Lawlor claimed all three Heritage Touring Car races across the weekend.

Lawlor eased to victory in the opening race by five seconds but was forced to work harder in the second as Brian Sala loomed. A strong attack in the final laps saw the pair seperated by less than a second with Mark Eddy third as he had been in the opening race. Chris Stilwell was fifth in his ex-Dick Johnson Ford Sierra while the best Australian V8 was Gary Collins, who was fourth in the opening race and sixth in race two.

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Sala stole the early running in the final race, leading the field on the opening lap before Lawlor found a way by. The Sierra then dropped back from the leader, handing Lawlor a comfortable victory.

Collins improved from his opening two races to take third place after a race long battle with Stilwell.

Brad Tilley starred at the head of a massive field of Group Nc and Nb cars. Holding out Daryl Hansen by just two tenths in the opening race, he then recovered from a slow start to carve his way to the front in race two.

A winner at Bathurst in Touring Car Masters competition in the past,

Tilley charged from third to first in just one lap. He stormed away from the pack in the closing two laps to win comfortably. Meanwhile pole man Dean Neville’s day ended early when his Camaro suffered mechanical problems on the opening lap of race two.

Tilley went on to clean sweep of the Group N races, holding off the Chevy Camaro of Vince Macri in the final six lap race. Hansen finished third in his Ford Mustang with Michael Anderson and Jason Foley (Falcon GTs) finishing fourth and fifth, respectively.

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NSW State Championship

mixed conditions, mixed

Image: Race Shots

A

weekend split in two saw three different winners at the head of the Production Touring Car field as the NSW State Championship hit Sydney Motorsport Park for its second round of the season.

Wet and windy conditions dominated running on Saturday afternoon which saw 106

Dylan Thomas narrowly hold out ahead of Luke Searle, the pair having run clear of third placed Daniel Oosthuizen.

Searle went one better on Sunday morning to win by almost 3.5 seconds over Oosthuizen with Thomas barely a second further back in third place.

The final race of the weekend was the most

competitive of the three, Oosthuizen ensuring he stood on every step of the podium with victory, holding off Searle by barely a car length with Thomas within a second in third.

Neale Muston claimed three Supersports wins as the series held a one-day meeting on Saturday, John Corbett taking second in all VELOCITY

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results

three races with Robert Baird third throughout the day.

Their place on the schedule was filled by Superkarts on Sunday with Anton Stevens beginning the day with victory over Matt Bass and Russell Jamieson.

Jamieson though was in no mood to play second fiddle and went on to win the next three races, VELOCITY

beating Bass in the second race with Gary Pegoraro third, the pair swapping positions for the third race. Bass was just half a second adrift of Jamieson at the end of the final race, Jordan Ford rounding out the podium.

Graeme Watts started the weekend with a second place finish behind Tim Miller in

the Improved Production Over 2 Litre class, Michael Posa third. Like Jamieson had done in Superkarts, Watts went on to dominate the remainder of the weekend with three wins, Michael Hazelton and Posa joining him on the podium for race two before Paul White took second in the final two races with Hazelton in 107

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Image: Race Shots

third.

The Under 2 Litre class was more competitive with Peter Pauling holding on ahead of Jordan Cox in the opening race with Daniel Burton a distant third. Cox though bounced back to win the second race with Burton following him home five seconds 108

later, with Matt Harris completing the top three. Burton went one better again in the third race to win over Cox with Justin McClintock third before Cox won the final race, crossing the line less than half a second over Burton with Bob Jowett 9.2 seconds further back.

Luis Leeds starred in a Formula Ford field packed with interstate drivers, the Victorian finishing third in the opener before winning both of Sunday’s races.

Thomas Maxwell had won race one ahead of Andrew Kahl, Leeds demoting the pair to second and third for VELOCITY

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Image: Race Shots

Image: Race Shots

the remainder of the weekend.

On double duty, Dylan Thomas dominated the opening Formula Vee race to win by more than five seconds over a tense battle between Ryan Reynolds and Craig Spake. Michael Kinsella then took the honours ahead of VELOCITY

Reynolds in race two with Simon Pace third, Kinsella repeating the effort in the finale to win by just 0.01s over Reynolds with Geoff Bennett rounding out the podium.

Warren Millet and Grant Doulman shared the Sports Sedans spoils, Steven Shiels

and Steven Lacey second and third in the opening race while Birol Cetin was second in both races two and three. Simon Copping clinched third in Sunday morning’s race with Anthony Macready taking the spot in the afternoon.

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F

ormula Ford rookie Andrew Kahl escaped uninjured from a spectacular rollover in the opening round of the NSW Formula Ford Championship at Wakefield Park.

In the third and final Formula Ford race, Kahl collided with the back of Luke King at turn eight and was launched spectacularly over the back of King’s car, barrel-rolling several times.

Kahl amazingly walked away unscathed, but his Spectrum Formula Ford sustained severe damage.

It was a disappointing end for Kahl, who had won the weekend’s second race, while King also retired. Chris Lazarevic took advantage to win the trophy race ahead of Lachlan Gibbons (who won race one) and Anthony Colombrita.

Jimmy Vernon was the best of the Kent Class Formula Fords, ahead of Will Powers and the improving Daniel Holihan.

After a successful campaign in the NSW Excel Racing Series in 2013 and ’14, Nick Filipetto made an impressive transition into openwheelers, winning three of the four Formula Race Car races in his 110

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kahl crashes o

Dallara F302. Aaron McClintock was the other race winner and finished second in the trophy race, with Greg Muddle rounding out the podium.

Ryan Reynolds claimed a clean sweep in Formula Vee, winning all three races, but the battle behind was intense with Michael Kinsella, Jason Cutts and Dylan Thomas swapping positions. Kinsella broke the lap record in race two, almost beating

Reynolds in a thrilling finish, but spun off the circuit in race three, allowing Thomas to claim second ahead of Simon Pace.

It was a solid recovery from Pace, who had been eliminated from race one in a collision with Daniel Stein.

The Improved Production Over 2 Litre races were a war of mechanical attrition; John McKenzie crossed the line first in race one but was relegated to second VELOCITY

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out

behind Peter Hennesey with a post-race penalty for jumping the start.

McKenzie bounced back to win race two, but retired from race three with mechanical problems, allowing Michael Posa to take victory. Posa also won race four ahead of Sam Maio and Michael King.

Jordan Cox won the first three Improved Production Under 2 Litre Races but was forced out of the final with gearbox problems; VELOCITY

Daniel Burton capitalised to take the win after a weekend-long battle with Justin McClintock.

Mathew Harris finished third.

The Supersports category ran on Saturday only and the first two races were highlighted by an intense battle between Nick Kelly and Darren Barlow. Kelly won races one and two, but race two was red-flagged when Kelly collided with the lapped West WR1000 of Paul

Palmer; the damage to Kelly’s Radical eliminated him from the final race, allowing Barlow to take a comfortable win from Kim Burke and Greg Smith.

The Superkarts also featured at the meeting with four races on Sunday; Aaron Cogger was victorious in all four.

Dalton Rowell and Mark Robin completed the podium.

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M

att Stubbs held off the chasing pack by the narrowest of margins to leave Phillip Island leading the Victorian Formula Vee Championship after its opening round.

A leading quartet developed for much of the weekend at the head of the Formula Vee pack with reigning champ Stubbs holding out Jake Rowe by just 0.04s in the opening race while Andrew Nethercote wasn’t much further back.

The long run to the line off the final corner always creates tight groups with timing critical to securing victory, a point proved in the second race as Mitch Quiddington won with Stubbs not even making the podium. James Dean was second with Rowe in third.

The final race of the weekend was the most hotly contested of all with Quiddington claiming third while Rowe and Stubbs went wheel to wheel across the line.

The final margin of victory was just 0.003 of a second - about 11cm - in Stubbs’ favour.

Damian Milano had an easier time of things in Improved Production, dominating the weekend to win all three 112

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stubbs starts

Image: Shaun Paine

races. Tony Graves was second in the first two, with Andrew RhodesAnderson third in the opening race and Wayne Twist taking the final podium spot in the second. Rhodes-Anderson improved to second in the final race of the weekend with David Bone completing the top three.

It was a family affair in the HQ’s with Bruce Heinrich winning the opening race ahead of Tony Moloney and Andrew McLeod only for Joel Heinrich to pick up the running in the second race. Rodney

Earsman was second ahead of Moloney but went one better in the final race to demote Heinrich to second with Moloney again third.

Two podium appearances for Leanne Tander weren’t enough to see her claim the Formula Ford round. Tander finished the opening race third behind Luis Leeds and Jayden Ojeda while Damon Strongman won race two over Leeds and Adrian Lazzaro. Tander climbed back to second in the final race behind Leeds with Lazzaro third once again.

A clean sweep for VELOCITY

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in style

Darren Collins saw him claim three wins in the Historic Touring Cars, withstanding pressure from Darren Smith throughout the weekend as the two locked out the top two spots.

Bill Trengrove was third in the opening two races with Mark Brewster climbing on the dias in the final race.

Steve McLaughlan won the first of three competitive Sports Car races over Jamie Augustine and Tony Defelice only for Augustine to claim the win in race two. Defelice followed him home with Nick VELOCITY

Karanos in third before Defelice gained the upper hand in the third race to demote Augustine to second with McLaughlan third.

Glen Wood took out all three MG races, chased home by Andrew Howell in the first two with Richard Milligan and Chris Gidney third respectively. Milligan climbed to second in the final race of the weekend, Howell rounding out the top three.

Brent Rose headed the 944 field in the opening race over Kane Rose and Chris Lewis-Williams, the trio seperated

by less than two tenths of a second. LewisWilliams got the better of things in race two to hold out Brent Rose and Lee Partridge only for Rose to regain top spot to win the final race by 10 seconds from LewisWilliams and Cameron Beller.

In the Saloon Cars it was Tim Rowse who claimed the opening race over Harley Phelan and Andrew Nowland, Phelan and Rowse swapping places in race two. The final race was a repeat of race one with Rowse beating Phelan and Nowland to the line.

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coming attractions May 7 - 10 Formula One Spanish Grand Prix

May 15 - 17 V8 Supercars Winton

May 9 Formula E Monaco ePrix

May 16 & 17 Victorian State Championship Sandown

Indycar Grand Prix of Indianapolis

May 16 NASCAR All-Star Race

NASCAR Kansas Speedway May 10 World Superbikes Italy May 15 world rx Belgium

May 17 MotoGP France May 20 - 24 Formula One Monaco

May 21 - 24 World Rally Championship Portugal May 22 world rx Great Britain May 23 & 24 Shannons Nationals Phillip Island South Australian State C’Ship Mallala May 23 Formula E Berlin ePrix May 24 INDYCAR Indianapolis 500

World Superbikes United Kingdom NASCAR Charlotte May 30 & 31 Indycar Duel in Detroit May 31 MotoGP Grand Prix of Italy NASCAR Dover