Roger Diez
Echo Park Speedway (formerly Atlanta) is a mile-and-a-half track that races like a superspeedway. Unfortunately, it also wrecks like one, and the “big one” involving half the field took out more than a few contenders for the win in last Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Great American Getaway 400. Chase Elliott became the third Hendrick Motorsports driver to qualify for the playoffs with a win. He held off Brad Keselowski in the late going in a race that saw only 28 of the 40 starters running at the end. And in a blatant rip-off of March Madness, it was also the first race of the In-Season Challenge, NASCAR’s latest gimmick to keep fans awake. Notably, accidents took out many of the top seeds including eight of the top 10 in the season point standings. Personally, I think this gimmick is a ploy to boost business for the online betting sites. It will give them one more thing for folks to lose money on.
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This weekend will see the Xfinity and Cup cars on the streets of Chicago for the third time, with the Loop 110 and the Grant Park 165. Shane Van Gisbergen burst onto the NASCAR scene here two years ago, winning his first ever Cup race in his first try. Last year, top honors went to Alex Bowman in a Hendrick Chevy after polesitter Larson dropped out early following a spirited battle with Van Gisbergen, who was also a DNF.
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The Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix saw yet another McLaren 1-2 finish, this time with Lando Norris beating Oscar Piastri to the checkers by 2.695-second. The two put on quite a show, racing wheel to wheel in the early laps. Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari was a distant third, 17 seconds back, with teammate Lewis Hamilton a further nine seconds behind. And Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was out in a lap 1 crash, this time the victim of an overly optimistic passing attempt by Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli. McLaren now has almost double Ferrari’s constructors’ points total, 417 to 210 (and Mercedes’ 209). Piastri maintains a 15-point lead over Norris, 216 to 201, with Verstappen a distant third at 155. The series moves to Silverstone for the British Grand Prix this weekend. Hamilton boasts nine wins in his home GP dating from 2008 but based on Ferrari’s performance so far, he is questionable for another victory. Verstappen, Carlos Sainz, and Fernando Alonso are the only other active drivers with a win in this race, scoring one apiece.
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The NTT IndyCar series visits the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course this weekend. The track was the site of the first deployment of the hybrid system on the cars last year, with a few bugs still unsorted. Fully half of this weekend’s 27-car field has won here and Scott Dixon leads the pack with six victories. Josef Newgarden has won twice while last year’s winner Pato O’Ward, Alex Palou, Scott McLaughlin, Colton Herta, Will Power, Alexander Rossi, and Graham Rahal have each posted one victory. Honda-powered cars have won all nine races so far this season, but maybe this weekend will be Chevrolet’s.
MOTORSPORTS TV
SATURDAY
ESPN2: Formula 1 qualifying, 7 a.m.
FS1: IndyCar qualifying, 10:30 a.m.
CW: The Loop 110, 1:30 p.m.
SUNDAY
ESPN2: British Grand Prix, 7 a.m.
FS1: Grand Prix-Mid-Ohio, 7:30 a.m.
FOX: Indy 200-Mid-Ohio, 10 a.m.
TNT: Grant Park 165, 11 a.m.