• Four Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) Dodge Charger SRT Hellcats will battle for the Funny Car world championship in a final showdown of the 2020 National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Drag Racing season at the Dodge NHRA Finals Presented by Pennzoil
• DSR drivers Matt Hagan, Tommy Johnson Jr., Jack Beckman and Ron Capps look to put exclamation mark on the team’s Funny Car domination by driving a Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat into the winner’s circle for an undefeated season record and extend their 13 consecutive national events win streak
• Leah Pruett looking to drive her Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Redeye Top Fuel dragster to the winner’s circle and a secure a top-three finish in the championship at the Dodge NHRA Finals at The Strip at Las Vegas Speedway
• Mark Pawuk eyeing a win and a runner-up finish in the Factory Stock Showdown championship with his DSR Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak to close out the 2020 season. 

October 29, 2020, Auburn Hills, Mich. – A Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat from the Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) stable will be crowned the 2020 National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Drag Racing Series Funny Car World Champion this weekend at the Dodge Finals Presented by Pennzoil. While that is a certainty, there is still heightened anticipation and drama heading into the season finale with much left to be determined on the track at The Strip at Las Vegas Speedway.

First and foremost, intrigue remains heading into the Dodge NHRA Finals regarding which of the four DSR drivers will be crowned Funny Car World Champion as Matt Hagan (842 points), Tommy Johnson Jr. (800 points), Jack Beckman (799 points) and Ron Capps (679 points) sit 1-2-3-4 respectively atop the standings where they jostled for position all season long while dominating the category. With the adoption of a format awarding points-and-a-half for the final event of the season, all four are still mathematically in contention with 183 points up for grabs. However, the focus is sharply on the three-way battle between Hagan, Johnson, and Beckman, as just 43 points separates them.

“I have a lot of confidence in our team, and our car, and what we’re doing,” says Hagan who will run the sinister looking Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Redeye paint scheme for the final time this season in tribute to the most powerful and fastest mass-produced sedan in the world. “We’ve made up a lot of ground in a little bit of time. We’ve done what we needed to do to put ourselves in this position to have the points lead.”

Having won the Funny Car title in 2011 and 2014, Hagan takes nothing for granted even if he comes into the weekend as the defending winner of the event and with the points advantage.

“I just want to go out there this weekend at the Dodge NHRA Finals Presented by Pennzoil and treat it like a regular race,” adds Hagan. “We want to qualify well and take it one round at a time, and if we can do that, we’ll be successful. We’re 43 points ahead, but with the points-and-a-half deal things can really turn quickly, but I’d rather be leading than following, and that’s where we’re at right now. We’ve got to keep digging, stay focused, and go rounds in Vegas, and if all goes according to plan, I’m looking forward to partying hard Sunday night and celebrating with my team.”

The possibility of an undefeated season looms large for the DSR foursome. They will stage their HEMI®-powered Funny Cars for this weekend’s Dodge NHRA finals having won every national event this year leading up to the season finale with Beckman and Johnson both having earned three Wally trophies, while Hagan and Capps have a pair each. While the season schedule was shortened to 11 national events due to the pandemic, the feat is still worthy of note as it is merely an extension of a streak that began in October of 2019 and has already set the NHRA record for most consecutive wins by a team at 13 national titles, surpassing the previous mark of 10 set by the same lineup of DSR drivers in 2017.

Of this season’s 10 national event wins to date, the DSR teammates have battled head-to-head in the final round on six occasions. Johnson has been involved in four of those six Hellcat versus Hellcat finals, the latest of which was last weekend in Houston at the Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals, which resulted in his third win and a chance to vie for the Funny Car title at the season finale for the first time in his career.

“I’m excited to come into Vegas with a shot at this championship and the team has had a great season,” says Johnson who has finished top-three in points on four occasions, including a runner-up finish in the 2016. “It’s a track where I have had some success and do pretty well at. I’m a round-and-a-half behind Matt (Hagan), and Jack (Beckman) is right on our heels. To see the dominance that the Don Schumacher Funny Cars have had all season is really exciting. I think we are all excited to see if we can’t close out the season and sweep all the races with the DSR Funny Cars.”

Funny Car World Champion in 2012, Beckman finished runner-up last year and came back strong again this season with a category-leading five final round appearances, winning three Wally trophies, two of them against DSR teammates. He hopes to collect some hardware on Sunday as well.

“It’s probably going to be one of the most thrilling conclusions ever and I fully expect the Funny Car championship is probably going to go down to the final round of the final race on the final day of the season,” says Beckman. “For a fan that’s amazing and from a driver’s perspective that’s the deal you want; to be in it going into the last race of the season.

“As long as we win the race and Matt (Hagan)’s car is not in the other lane for the final round, I would consider that as perfect a year to a season as I’ve ever had, so I’m very much looking forward to this.”

Capps first climbed into a Funny Car in 1997 and captured his world championship in 2016. At the conclusion of the 2020 NHRA season he will have finished Top 10 in points for 16 consecutive seasons and earned a Wally from every NHRA drag strip he has raced in his illustrious career. Should he finish out the year in fourth place or better, this year will mark the 14^th time he will have a wrapped up a season in the Top 5.  

After battling atop the Top Fuel standings all season long, Leah Pruett saw her championship hopes put on hold until next year after a quarterfinal holeshot loss at last weekend’s Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals at Houston Raceway Park. However, Pruett will still be pursuing a win in the finale in order to put her “Demon-possessed” Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Redeye-themed dragster firmly in the top-three in the Top Fuel standings to improve upon the pair of career-best fourth place finishes posted the last two seasons. 

Pruett will also close out the season by also taking the wheel of her Dodge Challenger Mopar Drag Pak in Factory Stock Showdown (FSS) competition alongside her teammate Mark Pawuk.

For Pawuk, while the winner of the FSS championship was determined last weekend at Houston after his semifinal matchup and loss to points leader Aaron Stanfield, he’ll work to secure a runner-up finish in the standings for the Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak with four more rounds of racing left on Sunday.

The 2020 NHRA season will conclude this weekend at the Dodge NHRA Finals in Las Vegas with FS1 television coverage airing on Sunday, Nov. 1, from 4- 7 p.m. ET and featuring live coverage of the final rounds.

NASCAR CUP SERIESTEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY AUTOTRADER ECHOPARK AUTOMOTIVE 500 TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES OCTOBER 28, 2020

 TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:POS.   DRIVER5th      ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 ACRONIS CAMARO ZL1 1LE7th      KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 1LE11th    AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 DOW SULLAIR CAMARO ZL1 1LE12th    RICKY STENHOUSE JR., NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL1 1LE13th    WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1 1LE TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS: POS.  DRIVER1st      Kyle Busch (Toyota)2nd     Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota)3rd      Christopher Bell (Toyota)4th      Ryan Blaney (Ford)5th      Alex Bowman (Chevrolet)UNOFFICIAL CURRENT PLAYOFF RANK (Following Race 8 of 10)POS.   DRIVER (* = Chevy Contender)                      1. Joey Logano (Ford) 1 Win2. Kevin Harvick (Ford) + 413. Denny Hamlin (Toyota) + 274. Brad Keselowski (Ford) + 255. * Alex Bowman (Chevrolet) – 256. * Chase Elliott (Chevrolet) – 267. Martin Truex (Toyota) – 368. * Kurt Busch (Chevrolet) – 81
The NASCAR Cup Series seasons continues at the Martinsville Speedway with the Xfinity 500 on Sunday, November 1st,^, at 2:00 p.m. ET, the elimination race for the Round of Eight. Live coverage can be found on NBC, the NBC Sports Gold app, MRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
TEAM CHEVY NOTES AND QUOTES:ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 ACRONIS CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 5th“Not the day we really wanted. Had a really fast car, but pit strategy didn’t completely go our way. Some restarts were painful. When the sun came out, it was really fast. Some guys were really trimmed out and as cold as it was it seemed to really help them. Bummed out with fifth. I feel like we probably had the best handling race car and just came up a little short. Overall a good day and proud of everybody. So proud of everyone at Hendrick Motorsports for bringing really great driving cars to the track every week. Proud of everyone at Chevrolet and a big thanks to Acronis for being on board.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 DOW SULLAIR CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 11th“What a week in Texas in the Dow Sullair Chevrolet. We came into this race with high expectations and the goal of backing up RCR’s 1-2 finish that we earned in July. We were thrown a few curve balls by Mother Nature. We started too the race too free, but still managed to position ourselves solidly in the top-10 before the race was postponed for weather. There were a lot of varying strategies going on tonight, but as always Justin Alexander made some great calls. We were so close to a top-10 finish tonight, but it’s just so hard to pass. If we would have had more front turn at the end of the race, I think we could have passed a couple of more cars, but we were just too tight at the end. Everyone on this Dow Sullair team did a great job this weekend, and I am proud of them for hanging in there through our three day rain delay. We’re off to Martinsville Speedway to try and grab another win before the end of the season.” RICKY STENHOUSE JR., NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 12th“I can’t thank the team enough for sticking out this rain delay and give us a solid night in our Kroger Chevrolet. We really worked on the handling and just got it better and better throughout the night and were able to run some really strong lap times. Traffic gave us a little bit of a challenge during the long run at the end, but once we made it through that it was all focus forward and we were able to keep gaining on it to the end. This is a quick turnaround to Martinsville, but I’m really happy with our momentum going into the final two races of the season.” WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1 1L3 – Finished 13th“We finished 13th tonight. We had just really one bad run during the race and that buried us in traffic in mid-pack. We were just way too loose but once we got the handling better we were good. That last run we just couldn’t really pass even though the track was fast. Overall, I’m pretty happy with the way our No. 24 Liberty University Chevy drove for the majority of the race and hopefully we have a good run in Martinsville.”
TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 CLARK PIPELINE SERVICES CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 15th“That was a much longer race weekend at Texas Motor Speedway than anyone expected, but I’m glad we were able to leave with a 15^th -place finish with our No. 8 Clark Pipeline Services Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE. It’s weird starting a race and then having such a long break before you’re able to finish it, but everyone managed the best they could. We had to fight a lot of changing track conditions today, and it was tough to nail down the right balance for our car. I started off on Sunday just way too loose, but after our first adjustment today it was like we had a completely different car. From then on, I was too tight in traffic and needed more help with entry into the turns. My spotter, Derek Kneeland, and crew chief, Randall Burnett, helped a lot with relaying information on what I could try to help my entry and get around the track better, which helped us capitalize on a top-15 finish on a day that we really had to fight for it. We’ll continue to push to get every spot we can during these last two races to finish the year on a high note.” RYAN PREECE, NO. 37 SCOTT BRAND CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 18th“Enduring the rain delay was definitely a new challenge, especially after starting the race on Sunday and thinking about what changes we could make when we got restarted again tonight. Trent Owens did an awesome job adjusting the handling throughout the race to give us something we could compete with at the end. Unfortunately, we had a bad pit stop and got trapped a lap down to only gain so much track position, but we were able to make some of that ground up at the end. I’m really proud of everyone that stuck with us and kept working on this Scott Brand Chevrolet and I’m excited to get to one of my favorite tracks, Martinsville Speedway, next weekend.”
CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 HOOTERS GIVE A HOOT CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 20th“I thought we were decent throughout the first part of the race and trying to kind of settle in there. I thought we settled into a decent spot. We certainly weren’t fantastic, but I thought we were better than we typically are out here. So, that was good. Kind of got going through the mid-portion of the race there. Was trying to gain some track position to get some stage points there in that second stage and had a tire come apart that I didn’t realize was coming apart. So, I had to come back down pit road and fix that. And then we settled into where we typically do out here and finished in the back.” BUBBA WALLACE, NO. 43 DOOR DASH CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Sidelined by accident on lap 61; Finished 38th“I just hate it for my guys for sitting around for four days to have the race taken away from us like that. We’ll wait, sit on the plane and wait to go home. I got two races left. It’s just unfortunate. The funny thing is, the only thing I could think about is ‘damn, I didn’t grab my hat – my mom’s going to be mad my hair looks bad’. Onto Martinsville.”

Austin Dillon and the No. 3 Dow Sullair Chevrolet Team Earn 11th-Place Finish at Texas Motor Speedway

11th   12th

“What a week in Texas in the Dow Sullair Chevrolet. We came into this race with high expectations and the goal of backing up RCR’s 1-2 finish that we earned in July. We were thrown a few curve balls by Mother Nature. We started the race too free but still managed to position ourselves solidly in the top 10 before the race was postponed for weather. There were a lot of varying strategies going on tonight, but as always, Justin Alexander made some great calls. We were so close to a top-10 finish tonight, but it’s just so hard to pass. If we would have had more front turn at the end of the race, I think we could have passed a couple of more cars, but we were just too tight at the end. Everyone on this Dow Sullair team did a great job this weekend, and I am proud of them for hanging in there through our three day rain delay. We’re off to Martinsville Speedway to try and grab another win before the end of the season.”-Austin Dillon

Tyler Reddick and the Clark Pipeline Services Team Capitalize on Top-15 Finish at Texas Motor Speedway

15th   19th

“That was a much longer race weekend at Texas Motor Speedway than anyone expected, but I’m glad we were able to leave with a 15th-place finish with our No. 8 Clark Pipeline Services Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE. It’s weird starting a race and then having such a long break before you’re able to finish it, but everyone managed the best they could. We had to fight a lot of changing track conditions today, and it was tough to nail down the right balance for our car. I started off on Sunday way too loose, but after our first adjustment today it was like we had a completely different car. From then on, I was too tight in traffic and needed more help with entry into the turns. My spotter, Derek Kneeland, and crew chief, Randall Burnett, helped a lot with relaying information on what I could try to help my entry and get around the track better, which helped us capitalize on a top-15 finish on a day that we really had to fight for it. We’ll continue to push to get every spot we can during these last two races to finish the year on a high note.”-Tyler Reddick

CHEVROLET AT LAS VEGAS What: Dodge NHRA Finals presented by Pennzoil When: Friday, Oct. 30-Sunday, Nov. 1 Where: The Strip at Las Vegas Motor SpeedwayTV: FS1 will telecast eliminations live at 4 p.m. ET Nov. 1                                                                                                     Chevrolet drivers take title chase drama to Las Vegas season finaleCamaro contenders have combined for 11 Pro Stock championships
DETROIT (Oct. 28, 2020) – Entering the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) season finale with the Pro Stock championship on the line isn’t foreign territory for Jeg Coughlin Jr., Erica Enders or Jason Line.
The three Chevrolet drivers, who have combined for 11 Pro Stock world titles, will seek to add to their trophy cases this weekend in the Dodge NHRA Finals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Enders, the 2019 series champion, takes a 55-point lead over both Coughlin and Line into the last of 10 events in the season abbreviated because of effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The finale will include a points-and-a-half structure, with a maximum value of 183.
Enders, driver of the Melling Performance/Elite Motorsports Camaro SS, is a three-time winner this season. Both Coughlin, her teammate, and Line have one win and a pair of runner-up finishes. 
“We have to capitalize on our opportunity that’s in front of us,” said Enders, who seeks to become the first female to claim four NHRA professional category titles. “Having it come down to the wire is definitely exciting for the fans and keeps it exciting for us. We just have to do the best that we can and not get ahead of ourselves. 
“Our team has been in this position before, and we all know what’s at stake and what we have to accomplish. But when the pressure is on, we perform. We’re up for the challenge and we’re going to give it everything we’ve got.”
Pro Stock leader, closest pursuer entering final race the past five years2019 – Erica Enders 92 points over Jeg Coughlin Jr. … Enders won title2018 – Tanner Gray 140 points over Jeg Coughlin Jr. … Gray won title2017 – Greg Anderson 40 points over Bo Butner … Butner won title2016 – Jason Line 19 points over Greg Anderson … Line won title2015 – Erica Enders 222 points over Greg Anderson … Enders won title
Line and Coughlin, driver of the JEGS.com/Elite Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro, are seeking to end their full-time racing careers on a high note. Both announced their plans before the start of the season. Line and Coughlin will remain integral members of their respective teams and racing-related businesses.
“We didn’t do a lot to help ourselves in the championship chase last week, but there’s definitely still a chance to win it with the silver Summit Racing Chevy Camaro,” said Line, a three-time Pro Stock champion. “I would really like that for all of us, for (team owner) Ken Black and for Summit Racing. It would be a nice going away present.”
Added Coughlin, a five-time Pro Stock champion who won the 2019 season finale and wound up runner-up to Enders: “Having two horses in the race is a real credit to everyone at Elite. Obviously, if you talk to me, I want to be the champ, and if you talk to Erica, she’s anxious to win it as well, but we also root for each other.
“I have tremendous faith in the team, and I know we’ll be holding nothing back. We’ve got nothing to lose. We’ll need a lucky break along the way, but we definitely have a decent chance to get it done if we do our jobs.”
Aaron Stanfield, who last week at Houston joined Pat Austin (’92 Phoenix) as the only drivers in NHRA history to score pro-sportsman wins in the same event, will seek his fifth SAM Tech.edu NHRA Factory Stock Showdown victory of the season. He locked up the title in the Janac Bros. Chevrolet COPO Camaro at Houston.
Stanfield, 25, of Bossier City, Louisiana, will also aim for his second Pro Stock victory. He defeated Coughlin in the Houston final round. 
FS1 will telecast eliminations at 4 p.m. ET Nov. 1.
CHEVROLET FROM THE COCKPIT
PRO STOCK:
ERICA ENDERS, ELITE MOTORSPORTS, MELLING PERFORMANCE/ELITE MOTORSPORTS CHEVROLET CAMARO SS (points leader; three-time winner this season): “In years past, when our backs have been against the wall and the pressure is on, that when we seem to preform our best. I hope that trend continues. It’s kind of crazy that the season was so short, but I’m definitely glad to be back in the swing of things. It’s really nice to be back behind the wheel consecutive weeks. I’d rather be on the road going racing instead of sitting home thinking about it and wondering what’s going to happen.” 
JEG COUGHLIN JR., ELITE MOTORSPORTS, JEGS.COM/ELITE PERFORMANCE CHEVROLET CAMARO SS (tied for second in points; runner-up at Houston; five-time winner at the track): “This is a final hurrah in many respects. There are three of us in the hunt for this championship, two from Elite Motorsports with Erica (Enders) and myself, and I know how much we’d all love to close out with a bang.”
JASON LINE, KB RACING, SUMMIT RACING EQUIPMENT CHEVROLET CAMARO SS (tied for second in points; has two wins in six final rounds at Las Vegas; has 51 Pro Stock victories in 105 final rounds): “It’s hard to believe this is it, the final race. I’ve been looking forward to it, but I’ve also been enjoying each of these last few races. It’s been an interesting season, without a doubt, and I’m thankful to have had my family with me so much this year. The circumstances that made that possible weren’t great, but having my family with me out here was special. It’s been a short season, but it hasn’t been an easy season, not by any means. But we’ve had some high points – seeing Matt Hartford win was one, for sure. We didn’t do a lot to help ourselves in the championship chase last week, but there’s definitely still a chance to win it with the silver Summit Racing Chevy Camaro. I would really like that for all of us, for Ken Black and for Summit Racing. It would be a nice going away present.”
GREG ANDERSON, KB RACING, SUMMIT RACING EQUIPMENT CHEVROLET CAMARO SS (No. 2 qualifier at Houston; has mathematical chance to win fifth Pro Stock championship): “I’ve been through many of those chases, like Jason Line is in right now, where it comes down to the last race. No lead is safe, and anything can happen. We know that anybody in the class can beat anyone in any round, so there’s no telling how this race is going to go. We’re still very much alive, and we’re going to give it all we’ve got to make sure we find a way for Jason to close the gap and win the championship. That’s the goal.”
BO BUTNER, JIM BUTNER AUTO, STRUTMASTERS.COM CHEVROLET CAMARO SS (2017 Pro Stock champion): “We’ve really tried to make the most out of this year, between bracket racing and doing as much racing as we can at NHRA events. We’ve had some success, but not as much as we’d like to. It would be nice to go to this race in Vegas and come away with a win or two. It’s always a good time racing in Vegas, and I’ve done pretty well there in the past. My first Comp win was there in 2001. We’ve got some good memories, but it’s time to make more.”

LAS VEGAS (Oct. 28) — Poker players in Las Vegas like to say all they need to win is a chip and chair. Less than two rounds off the championship lead entering a race that awards points and a half, five-time Pro Stock champion Jeg Coughlin Jr. has more than a single chip to throw in the pot, but in true Glitter Gulch style he still wouldn’t mind a visit from Lady Luck at this weekend’s 20th annual Dodge NHRA Finals. “This is a final hurrah in many respects,” said Coughlin, who will retire from full-time competition after this event. “There are three of us in the hunt for this championship, two from Elite Motorsports with Erica (Enders) and myself, and I know how much we’d all love to close out with a bang. “Having two horses in the race is a real credit to everyone at Elite. Richard Freeman (team owner) has put together an incredible group of the very best mechanics, crew chiefs and engine builders in the sport. Hopefully we can finish 1-2 again. Obviously, if you talk to me, I want to be the champ, and if you talk to Erica, she’s anxious to win it as well, but we also root for each other. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”

Both Coughlin and Line find themselves 55 points in arrears to Enders, the reigning and three-time series champion. NHRA officials decided to up the drama by awarding points and a half in Vegas, so there are multiple scenarios where Coughlin can regain the points lead he held earlier this season.  “I’m very excited,” Coughlin said. “I have tremendous faith in the team and I know we’ll be holding nothing back. We’ve got nothing to lose. We’ll need a lucky break along the way but we definitely have a decent chance to get it done if we do our jobs.” Coughlin is a five-time winner at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, having driven to the winner’s circle there in 2000, 2001, 2002, 2008 and 2009.  “I’ve reflected back on my 20-plus years in this class a lot in the last 8-9 months, ever since I committed to the decision to step away,” Coughlin said. “I’ve tried to use those collective memories to fuel my drive, and it’s worked out for the most part. We aren’t closing the book for good. We’ll still race occasionally; but at the same time I’m excited about spending a lot more time with my family and at JEGS. “The thing I’ll miss the most is the fans. Going back to the start of my career when I was racing in the sportsman ranks, they’ve always been so supportive of JEGS and our racing endeavors. There are even half a dozen kids out there named Jeg in our honor, which is just unreal. It shows the true passion of drag racing fans. No matter what happens moving forward, I will always be ready to help the sport grow.”

Acting as a wild card, Coughlin’s teammate and nephew Troy Coughlin Jr. has designs on blocking for his decorated uncle as he concludes his rookie year in the class. Troy Jr. has shown he can handle the job, having raced to the final round of the third Indy race this summer in his JEGS.com Elite Motorsports Ford Mustang. “If there’s any way I can help Uncle Jeg win the championship I’ll be there,” Troy Jr. said. “Rick (Jones) made some changes after qualifying in Houston and the car responded really well on race day. I know we have the capability to win rounds in Vegas and if we can knock out anyone going against Uncle Jeg, all the better.”

Coming off back-to-back regional championships in the Top Alcohol Dragster class, Troy Jr. has adapted well to the factory hot rod class. In just seven races, he’s climbed to 13th place overall. Ever the perfectionist, Troy Jr. says that while he’s learned a lot, he still has a long way to go in a category he describes as the toughest in the sport. “There’s a lot going on inside a Pro Stock car,” Troy Jr. said. “There’s a lot to do to get it down the track with a good run. You need an incredible amount of patience, focus and self-control. I’m trying to soak up as much as I can and learn the mechanics of what makes these cars run. You definitely need more than seven races to learn it all. “I’m excited about the future, even though we’re not sure what it holds. I know JEGS has a tremendous legacy in racing and I’ll do all I can to carry it forward. It’s a great way to relate to our customers because so many of them race.”

NHRA^® Team Report

Dodge^® NHRA Finals – Las Vegas

Pre-Race Report

Cruz Pedregon and team are looking ahead to the upcoming Dodge^® NHRA Finals in Las Vegas with the fortitude brought on by the tragic loss of a team member and co-crew chief in wanting to honor his memory. Eric Lane was killed in an off-track accident last week and the team has been fighting through the emotions to do what they say he would have wanted them to do in the last race of the season.

“It still hasn’t fully settled in with us, so we’re pressing on to implement so many of the things ‘Hop’ helped us with in doing away with the things that weren’t working on the car, keeping the good, and trying several new things,” Cruz says. “His impact during his short time with the team is already paying off in the success we had last weekend — making the best pass of our 2020 season and coming so close to a semi’s win only to be denied it by a one-second hole shot.”

In memory of Lane, Cruz Pedregon Racing has established a GoFundMe that will help support Hop’s wife and the young daughter he left behind. The fund has really taken off through the generous contributions of the NHRA family and fans and those who knew the long-time drag racing professional.

Cruz notes that the focus of this race will be a continuation of the team’s efforts to remember their co-crew chief while making the final runs in this year’s Pink Fund tribute paint scheme in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Snap-on, the team’s primary sponsor, has dedicated a portion of sales to The Pink Fund over the past six years totaling $475,000 to meet non-medical expenses of individuals undergoing breast cancer treatment. For more information, check out ThePinkFund.org.

NASCAR CUP SERIES TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY AUTOTRADER ECHO PARK AUTOMOTIVE 500 TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT OCTOBER 27, 2020  ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 ACRONIS CAMARO ZL1 1LE, met with media via teleconference to discuss how he’s staying prepared to race during the rain delays, how the track conditions will change once racing gets back underway at Texas Motor Speedway, and more. Transcript:  WE JUST GOT OFF WITH JOEY LOGANO – HE WAS SAYING THAT HE’S EXTREMELY BORED RIGHT NOW. HE SAID HE’S WILLING TO DRIVE THE JET DRYER. I’M WONDERING WHERE YOU’RE AT RIGHT NOW, WHAT YOU’VE BEEN DOING DURING THIS DOWNTIME? ALSO, HOW ARE YOUR NERVES?“Yeah, should we just race the jet dryers? Are there enough of them for everybody? We could race the rental cars – there’s all kinds of stuff we could race here. Maybe just count points on that and send us home (laughs). It’s definitely boring – painful for everybody. Obviously, everybody is working hard to try to dry the race track and the weather just isn’t cooperating. So, bummed for everybody here. It’s the same for all of us – we’re all just sitting around, whether it’s NASCAR officials, track officials, or drivers. We’re all kind of in the same boat together.” “Nerves – I’m all good. I’m just hanging out. I haven’t really done much of anything. Just been on my computer. I went over to the gym underneath the suites and ran a little bit on a treadmill. But, yeah, feeling good. The car’s really fast – just want to get back to racing.” HAVE YOU EVER BEEN IN A SITUATION WHERE YOU’VE HAD TO WAIT THIS LONG? “No, not that I can think of. I’m trying to think – maybe quarter-midget racing as a kid, just because you don’t have jet dryers and stuff, and it takes pretty long to dry. I’ve been completely rained out and cancelled, but I’ve never sat somewhere this long. I don’t think we’ve ever had a forecast look this bad. It’s definitely a bummer.” NO MATTER WHEN THIS RACE GETS IN, WILL YOU FEEL BEHIND FOR MARTINSVILLE?“I’ll let you know when I find out if I’m going to get my sim time back that I was supposed to have this afternoon. That’s really the only thing that I feel behind on that I’m bummed out about missing. I feel like I can do all my normal prep work here. So, as far as being prepared, I’m not really missing anything, aside from the time I was going to spend in the simulator this afternoon. Hopefully we get home and I can get back in it somehow, but those schedules are hard to get and put out way in advance. So, I doubt that I’ll get back in it. That’s definitely a bummer.” HOW LONG IS A TYPICAL SESSION IN THERE?“I feel like I was going to be in there from like 2:30 to 4:30 p.m., so probably just two hours. Typically, I’m in there for either two- or three-hours sessions.” WHEN YOU DON’T KNOW IF YOU’RE GOING TO RACE IN TWO HOURS, TOMORROW OR WHENEVER, HOW DO YOU STAY SORT OF PREPARED, PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY, AS FAR AS I ASSUME YOU CAN’T JUST EAT A BUNCH OF CANDY AND COOKIES. NOT THAT JOSH WISE WOULD LET YOU ANYWAY, BUT HOW DO YOU SORT OF STAY READY TO GO AT ANYTIME?“Well, I had In-N-Out for dinner and pizza for lunch. So, the diet is out the window. I’m out of food, out of clothes, out of everything. I don’t know – it’s hard to feel like we’re going to race anytime soon, just with how wet it is. At times, I feel like ‘man, the track’s got to be getting dry because I can’t see it misting or raining from the bus’. But then I think Bob (Pockrass) tweeted the link of the track camera – maybe that was you or somebody tweeted the link to the track camera. I clicked on that and I’m like ‘oh no, it’s still wet’. I don’t know – I’ve really just been sitting around. I ran a little bit earlier and I feel like that helped kind of clear my head up a little bit. But it’s been pretty dang boring.” INAUDIBLE“For me, I think it doesn’t grow. I’m really confident in our race car for when we get back going. Obviously, we got the lead there and drove away from the field a little bit, so I know we have a really fast car. So, I’m really looking forward to that. Obviously, we’re buried a little bit on the track position now, but I’m just ready to go. I don’t know – I really haven’t done anything abnormal or different, besides kind of sit around and just work from my computer and work from inside the bus. Just trying to control the things I can control and the weather is not one of them, unfortunately.” JUST WONDERING – I ASKED JOEY LOGANO ABOUT THE CONDITIONS TO EXPECT ONCE THIS THING GETS DRY. HE SAID THE PJ1 TYPICALLY NEEDS HEAT TO BE EFFECTIVE. WHAT KIND OF A CURVEBALL IS THAT GOING TO THROW ONCE THIS THING GETS GOING?“Definitely a big one. It needs heat to get going, but the biggest problem is how treacherous it is at this race track before it gets going. And the way they laid it all the way to the wall, the first guy that gets up in it is probably going to crash. So, it’s going to be really treacherous and eventually, as it comes in, it will be the place to be again. It kind of got that way as we got rolling. But it’s going to be treacherous. I feel like out of the PJ1 was just a little freer than in the PJ1. So, probably everybody will be a little looser trying to run the bottom. Hopefully it gets moved up quick, but yeah, it’s going to be treacherous. Hard to navigate that because obviously it’s not a visual thing, it’s a feel thing, and you kind of just have to work it in. You want to wait for other people to do it. It’s pretty tough. Hopefully we’re on the good side of it.” TAKE ME BACK TO 2014 WHEN YOU SIGNED WITH BK RACING. YOU HAD THE FAST SEASON IN XFINITY IN 2013, HAD SOME SUCCESS. BUT IF I REMEMBER RIGHT, I DON’T THINK THAT WAS REALLY MUCH OF AN OPPORTUNITY. CAN YOU TAKE ME THROUGH HOW YOU ENDED UP AT BK RACING AND HOW DO YOU FEEL THAT OPPORTUNITY HELPED LEAD YOU ALONG IN THIS PATH THAT HAS WOUND IT’S WAY TO ENDING UP IN THIS RIDE AND, NEXT YEAR, THE NO. 48 CAR?“Yeah, honestly, one team called and didn’t ask for money. A lot of teams called and only one didn’t ask for money. And I didn’t have any money. That’s where I ended up and it was do that or sit on a couch. There wasn’t an opportunity to return to the Xfinity ride that I had in 2013. I feel like we really did a lot with a little in 2013 and outperformed where we should have been and did a really good job. We had a really good group of people and outperformed what we had financially.” “Going into the next year, I didn’t want to go Cup racing. I wasn’t ready to go Cup racing. I wanted to try to win races. Unfortunately, I needed to make a living at the same time and the only opportunity to do that was to go Cup racing. I did all that I could – I learned a lot, I got to make a lot of mistakes with nobody watching. I didn’t have much fun. I put a lot of pressure on myself and the pressure became trying to run top-25, and just trying to do better than the car was supposed to. And we did every now and then. But, obviously, yeah – a crazy set of circumstances to go from that to driving the No. 48 for Hendrick Motorsports. Driving for Tommy Baldwin the following year, that deal falling apart. Then, driving the simulator and getting called to fill in for Dale (Earnhardt Jr.) – it was a pretty wild couple of years there and definitely a lot of very uncertain times and stressful times. But to answer your question, one team killed and didn’t ask for money and that’s where I went.” ALSO, AS YOU SAID, YOU HAD SOME RESULTS THAT WERE BETTER THAN THE EQUIPMENT IN THAT FIRST YEAR. AS YOU NOTED, YOU WEREN’T READY FOR CUP. IN ONE SENSE, HOW DID YOU NOT WASH OUT? THOSE ARE PRETTY HIGH-STACKED ODDS AGAINST ANY YOUNG DRIVER WITH MINIMAL EXPERIENCE. WAS THERE SOMEBODY IN THE GARAGE THAT HELPED YOU OR WAS IT JUST A MATTER OF SCRATCHING AND CLAWING YOUR WAY AND JUST SURVIVING THAT YEAR SO PEOPLE RECOGNIZED YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID?“I feel like there were definitely a few guys that offered advice. I was pretty down early in the season and Jimmie Johnson was the first guy to come and talk to me. Just be like ‘man, you’re doing a really good job with that car’ just out of nowhere. I still have no clue why he did that. I talked to him about it a couple weeks ago and he was like ‘man, I just came up to lap you and you were completely sideways, driving the wheels off of it, and I felt like I needed to say something and tell you that you were doing a good job’. He was really supportive.” “Kurt Busch, I remember I think we were at Indy or somewhere like that, he just came up and started giving me advice. So, guys like that, their advice was really appreciated. I think the ‘how’ is just that I didn’t give up. I refused to give up. I didn’t have a backup plan, so I couldn’t give up. I wasn’t like ‘oh, I can go do this and I’ll be fine’. It was like, ‘you’ve got to keep doing this or you’re going to have to find another job and another way to pay for food’. So, yeah I didn’t give up and I refused to let it beat me. I felt pretty dang beat in the beginning of 2016 when I lost my ride. Obviously, had some races lined up with JR Motorsports to try to go and do that and try to win. And we ran really well in all those races, but obviously the opportunity to fill in for Dale (Earnhardt Jr.) is what got me here and it was a crazy set of circumstances. A lot of luck and really just never giving up.” YOU’VE BEEN TEASING US WITH PICTURES OF A WINGED-SPRINT CAR AND TAKING LAPS AROUND THE DIRT TRACK. WHAT’S THE LATEST?“Arizona in January. I’m not driving it – that’s the first question I get. I’m not driving it. Just quarantine boredom and decided to build a winged-sprint car. It’s been a lot of fun. We went and tested on Friday and CJ (Leary) was really fast right off the bat – as fast as anybody that’s tested during the day there. We were going pretty good. The track was right through the middle, not real worked in, so I was like ‘man, if there was ever a time to make some laps in one of these things, that would be now’. So, I went and made some laps. I think I ran like 7 or 8-laps and had a ton of fun. We’re going to start racing it here soon and have lot of fun doing it. That’s why I do that deal – to really just have fun and no expectations. I have a really, really good group of people that help me on those cars. We’ve never lost a party when we go dirt racing, so that’s what we’re going to go do this winter.” IS CJ LEARY GOING TO BE YOUR FULL-TIME DRIVER?“Yeah, I mean full-time when the car runs. I’m sure he’s still going to try and chase the USAC deal and do the non-wing stuff like normal. So, yeah we’ll run when we can. I have no clue – I mean we’ve pointed out three races that we’re going to run so far and they’re all in January. So, haven’t looked at any schedules any further out than that. Maybe go to Volusia in February and hit all those. But, yeah as far as I know, just going to race when we can.” DID YOU HAVE TO GET PERMISSION FROM THE BOSS TO RUN LAPS OVER AT THE DIRT TRACK?“Well, it was going to be one of those like ‘don’t tell anybody’ things. And then I posted a video on the internet and I was like ‘oh man, that probably wasn’t smart’. Nothing went wrong and I ran like 7 laps. I sent a video to Jeff Gordon and he said ‘that looks awesome’. So, yeah – I’ll ask for forgiveness (laughs).” DO YOU PLAN ON RUNNING CHILI BOWL WITH YOU AND CJ LEARY THIS YEAR?“No. So, CJ (Leary) will be there in my car and Jake Swanson is driving the car that I normally drive. Last year got pretty difficult between running the Race of Champions with CJ and me running, not having a crew chief, me crew chiefing CJ – it was just a lot of work for me to drive one of the cars and crew chief the other car. So, I decided honestly, I don’t have much business at Chili Bowl, just with only racing those cars once a year and a big lack of experience. The program kind of needed two driver that could help each other, instead of CJ trying to describe to me everything that I’m doing wrong every time I’m on the race track. Jake Swanson is going to drive and I think the two of them can really help each other, and try to put two cars in the show instead of just one.” A COUPLE OF THE OTHER DRIVERS SAID THEY WERE PLAYING VIDEO GAMES DURING THE DELAY. I KNOW YOU SAID THAT YOU’VE BEEN WORKING DURING ALL THIS. DO YOU HAVE ANYTHING LIKE A NINTENDO SWITCH OR PLAYSTATION ON HAND IN CASE THAT’S WHAT YOU WANT TO DO?“I sure wish I did because I wouldn’t be working right now if I did (laughs). I don’t have anything. I have my laptop, my cell phone and cable TV. That’s about it, which has become expensive because I’ve just been ordering race car parts. Yeah, I don’t have anything, but I sure wish I did.” YOU GOT UP FRONT AND TOOK ADVANCE OF THE 4 (KEVIN HARVICK)’S MISFORTUNE. GOT UP FRONT, LED SOME LAPS, SO WHAT GIVES YOU THE CONFIDENCE THAT YOU CAN MAINTAIN THAT MOMENTUM GOING INTO TONIGHT, TOMORROW OR WHENEVER WE RACE AGAIN? WHAT GIVES YOU THE CONFIDENCE THAT THE NO. 88 WILL REMAIN CONSISTENT OUT THERE?“Just how good the car was. I was so happy with the race car. I was nervous going in, just because this is a place we’ve really struggled at in the past. We’ve really only had one really strong race here. Was really just looking forward to getting here and seeing how the car was going to be, and it was just really good off the bat. So, that gives me a lot of confidence. We were a little free, so I feel like the race track kind of gripping up will help us and we’ll just have to go from there. Obviously, the temperatures dropped tremendously. We’re now 18th instead of leading, so that’s something we’re going to have to overcome. Just looking forward to getting going.” I THINK THAT ONE RUN YOU MENTIONED WAS AT THIS EVENT LAST SEASON. IT WAS A FIFTH-PLACE RUN FOR YOU GUYS. DID YOU TAKE ANY LESSONS FROM THAT CAR? DID YOU TAKE ANY LESSONS FROM THAT SETUP GOING INTO THIS WEEKEND?“Yeah, I don’t know where we ended up exactly on setup. You would have thought that we could have taken lessons from that and been strong here earlier this year. That race, we were flat in the way – that was really rough. That was one of our worst mile-and-a-half that we’ve run in a long time. It was a cooler night that night, I believe, and I feel like we probably used some of that information. But our mile-and-a-half program has been really strong lately and I feel like we run pretty similar stuff most places we go on mile-and-a-halves. Different tire than then as well, so there’s a lot of variables that go into it. But it’s definitely good to have those notes in our notebook.” LOOKING AT YOUR SEASON SO FAR, HOW WOULD YOU GRADE WHERE YOU GUYS ARE RIGHT NOW?“Right now, I think we’re running great. The last two months or so have been really, really good for us. The summer was really rough and the beginning of the year was amazing. So, we’ve definitely had our fair share of ups and downs. But I would give our team a B+ or A-, just based on how well they’ve worked together. I think that’s a huge positive. Obviously, kind of falling off through the summer was painful for us all. But to see the guys buckle down and continue to work together in such a good way is really positive. I think how it’s improved lately- that’s been great. We still need to get a little better. Last week, we were right there, but not quite good enough. We need a little bit more to try to win these things. But the guys are doing a great job and we’re continuing to improve each and every week.” HAVE YOU BEEN WATCHING OR HAVE  ANY SUGGESTIONS ON ANY SHOWS OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT?“Yeah, I feel like the problem is I’ve already watched all the good Netflix stuff. So, I haven’t been watching anything. I’ve watched some YouTube videos, but honestly, I’ve been texting back and forth with my team on GroupMe quite a bit. I went and worked out a little bit. I haven’t watched like any TV shows or anything yet. I’m sure that’s going to come because I’m out of things to do. I’m out of parts to order. I got everything for a sprint car on the way and I’m definitely probably going to regret some of my financial choices here. I’m building so many race cars. But yeah, I haven’t watched anything. I wish I had something for you.”

·        Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) driver Tommy Johnson Jr. drove his MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car to his third win of the 2020 season at the Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil near Houston

·        Johnson’s victory puts him second in the standings and in contention for the Funny Car world championship for the first time in his career with just one race left in the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Drag Racing Series season

·        DSR Funny Car drivers Matt Hagan, Johnson and Jack Beckman will battle for the crown next weekend at the Dodge NHRA finals in Las Vegas

·        DSR remains undefeated this season in Funny Car competition and extends the Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat win streak to a record 13 consecutive national events since October 2019

·        Leah Pruett takes her Pennzoil Top Fuel dragster to a quarterfinal appearance 

·        No. 2 qualifier Mark Pawuk takes his Mopar Drag Pak to a second consecutive semifinal appearance in Factory Stock Showdown

October 25, 2020, Baytown, Texas – A clutch performance by Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) driver Tommy Johnson Jr. at the Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil not only gave the MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat driver his third Wally trophy of the year, but it kept him firmly in contention and fighting for his first Funny Car world championship with just one race left in the 2020 National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Drag Racing Series season. 

From his sixth place seeding, Johnson began his run through eliminations with a first round win over Jim Campbell, followed by a close battle with J.R. Todd in the quarterfinals that advanced him into the semifinals to meet top-ranked Matt Hagan and his No. 2 seeded Pennzoil Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat for a match-up with critical championship implications. Johnson’s 3.941-second run to beat Hagan’s 3.981-second lap lessen the points margin between them in the standings and sent the MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat driver to his fourth final of the year.

Johnson continued to show his mettle against Ron Capps in a head-to-head battle for a Wally, marking the sixth time this season that DSR teammates would meet in a final elimination. 

Johnson double-bulbed his opponent, then by posted a 3.929-second pass at 321.04 mph to beat Capps’ 3.9520-second run at 325.14 mph for a three-thousandths-of-a-second margin of victory at the finish line. 

“It was a must-win,” said Johnson who moved up into the second place in the standings just 42 points behind Hagan and one point ahead of Jack Beckman heading into the Dodge NHRA Finals next weekend in Las Vegas. 

“I think we’ve been a thorn in their side a little bit because we just keep coming back every time. It’s like a heavyweight battle. We get back up and here we come again and keep swinging. Just really proud of these guys. They don’t quit. You can’t quit. It’s been a weird year and it’s been a good year for us. Three wins this year. Just super happy to see the fight in these guys.”

While Johnson finished third in the championship on three occasions (2014, 2015 and 2018) and runner-up in the 2016, this is the first time he has had a viable chance to win a championship with just one race remaining.

“This has got drama written all over it when we go to Vegas,” said Johnson of the three-way battle with his teammates thanks to a points-and-a half format that will likely only see a winner determined in the final round. “It’s probably our best shot. In the years past we have been third three times and been second once and we weren’t expected to be. We’re kind of like, ‘oh where they come from’ and this time we’re there and wanting to go.”

The victory at Houston Raceway Park has also kept DSR’s quad of Funny Cars undefeated this season, extending the Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat win streak to 13 national events that dates back to October 2019. The DSR Dodge foursome continue to dominate the Funny Car championship rankings, occupying the top four spots with Hagan, Johnson, Beckman and Capps respectively heading into the season finale.

Capps for his part came into the penultimate race weekend fourth in the standings, and the Pennzoil/NAPA AUTO PARTS Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat driver did everything he could to do to remain in the fight. He upset the No. 1 qualifier Jack Beckman in the opening round, dropping his teammate to third in the standings with the loss. He then used a holeshot win to defeat Cruz Pedregon and advance to the semis where he crossed the finish line ahead of Alexis DeJoria but on fire after the engine expired, necessitating a swap to the backup car for the final against Johnson. While finishing runner-up doesn’t completely mathematically eliminate Capps from the battle for the crown, the Vegas odds are not on his side. 

From her third place spot in the Top Fuel standings, Leah Pruett was looking to keep championship hopes alive for her black and yellow Pennzoil dragster after qualifying in the top half of the eliminations ladder. A win over Lee Callaway meant a second round pairing with Billy Torrence with important points on the line. Both posted identical 3.708 second elapsed time runs, but her opponent’s quicker start brought Pruett’s day and championship hopes to end as it allowed category leader Steve Torrence to further his lead to an insurmountable 198-point margin.

The Factory Stock Showdown (FSS) championship was determined by a semifinal match-up that pitted the top-ranked competitors in the category. No. 2 qualifier Mark Pawuk and his Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak lined-up against points leader Aaron Stanfield but unfortunately saw a quick end to his race and title chase with a rare red-light start, thus handing Stanfield the round win and allowing him to also claim the FSS championship. While the title chase might be over for Pawuk, he will work to secure his No. 2 ranking with four more rounds of racing left to contest in Las Vegas.

Meanwhile Pawuk’s teammate Pruett qualified her Mopar Dodge Challenger Drag Pak 11th in a quest to post a win this season, but unfortunately saw an early end to her day after hitting the throttle in the opening round only to lose traction and watch her opponent turn on the win lights.

The 2020 NHRA season will conclude next weekend at the Dodge NHRA Finals in Las Vegas with television coverage to be broadcast on FS1 on Sunday, Nov. 1, from 4- 7 p.m. ET featuring live coverage of the final rounds.

ADDITIONAL NOTES and QUOTES: 

Jack Beckman, Infinite Hero Foundation Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 1 Qualifier – 3.884 seconds at 328.14 mph)
Round 1: (0.086-second reaction time, 5.012 seconds at 207.88 mph) lost to No. 16 Ron Capps (0.055/4.158/320.51)

“A lot of cars struggled out there and we just didn’t capitalize on it. And you can say (Matt) Hagan was fortunate, but you can also say he did a good job catching the car and getting it to the finish line. This is the back breaker about drag racing. There’s no do-overs. You don’t to go back out for the rest of the race and earn some points. It’s sudden death and that’s a bitter pill. To have such a good car and come out here and qualify No. 1, our fate is not in our hands right now. We’re going to have to win (Las) Vegas and what Hagan does here and at Vegas will determine if he’s catchable. That’s the nature of our sport.”

“I’ve never been a fan of points-and-a-half. No round should be worth more than any other round and I’m consistent whether I’m leading or trailer. That’s the way they’re going to award the points, so in essence there’s the equivalent of six rounds worth of points up for grabs in Vegas. We’re going to have to hope Matt doesn’t go deep here or in Vegas. Ideally, we’d match up with him first round in Vegas and we could make up lot of rounds.”

“I’m back to being a dad tomorrow. I’m not going to dwell on this. All that does it sends failure programming and negative thoughts. I got that out of the way here at the track. I still love what I do for a living. We’re still got a great car and a great team and if Vegas is my last race, I want to go out holding a Wally trophy in my hands.”

Matt Hagan, Pennzoil Mopar Express Lane Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car  
(No. 2 Qualifier – 3.907 seconds at 327.74  mph)
Round 1: (0.073-second reaction time, 4.286 seconds at 301.00 mph) defeated No. 15 Dave Richards (0.180/4.421/212.86

Round 2: (0.092/3.914/328.78) defeated No. 10 Blake Alexander (0.077/13.014/54.58)

Round 3: (0.040/3.981/321.12) lost to No. 6 Tommy Johnson Jr. (0.058/3.941/321.96)

“A really good weekend here in Houston with the Pennzoil colors again. We’d have liked to been in the final round, but we picked up some points this weekend. It was a close race with TJ (Tommy Johnson) in the semis and I have all the confidence in the world in my crew and Dickie Venables rolling into Vegas. I’m confident we’re going to do what we need to do and win this thing. I’ve been on both sides of it. I’ve led and chased and I’d rather lead than be chasing going into Vegas. It’s a hard task trying to make up points. I’m proud of my guys to put ourselves in the position to make some ground this weekend and extend the lead.”

Tommy Johnson Jr., MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 6 Qualifier – 3.973 seconds at  317.94 mph)

Round 1: (0.089 second reaction time, 6.373 seconds at 110.91 mph) defeated No. 11 Jim Campbell (-0.104/7.324/86.96)

Round 2: (0.057/3.934/327.51) defeated No. 3 J.R. Todd (0.078/3.979/326.00)

Round 3: (0.058/3.941/321.96) defeated No. 2 Matt Hagan (0.040/3.981/321.12)

Round 4: (0.065/3.929/321.04) defeated No. 16 Ron Capps (0.045/3.952/325.14)

“We’ve learned from our mistakes. We’ve been out here and won a race, then stumbled on the next one, so we can’t do that this time. We’ve got to go out there, go to Vegas where it’s points-and-a half (format) and it’s going to be a really interesting race. I’m just so proud of these guys. They just don’t quit. They keep fighting. To win in MD Anderson Cancer Center’s home town is just so special and happy to do it for Mopar and Pennzoil who are sponsoring this race. The Dodge Charger Hellcat is a pretty bad boy and I was pumped up for that final. I just said ‘We got to win this, we’ll just go do it.’ I’m happy we did it.”

“This Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat was running good all day. We didn’t qualify like we wanted to I mean, we qualified sixth and we weren’t quite on. Tricky track conditions in the first round, we shook (the tires) but got lucky with Jim Campbell red lighted first round. But (Crew Chief) John (Collins) and Rip (Reynolds) figured out the tune up after that and we come back out in the second round and made a nice run and had a big victory over J.R. Todd who ran really good first round so I knew we had to step it up. Big semifinal match against Matt Hagan with the championship coming down to just one more race to go. We had fallen back to third (in the standings) and little ways behind after we had a tough race in Dallas, but these guys never quit. We had to come in here and see it is a must-win and when you can do that and win, that shows you what caliber of a team you have behind you. I did my job and they did their job. Every time they think we’re out of it, we’re like a thorn in their side. We just keep coming. Just one race to go. You’ve got Hagan, me, and (Jack) Beckman in the points. All Dodge Hellcats. May the best man win.”

 
Ron Capps, Pennzoil NAPA Auto Parts Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 16 Qualifier – 5.295 seconds at 136.44 mph)
Round 1: (0.055-second reaction time, 4.158 seconds at 320.51 mph) defeated No. 1 Jack Beckman (0.086/5.012/207.88)

Round 2: (0.073/3.962/326.87) defeated No. 8 Cruz Pedregon (0.077/3.961/324.36)

Round 3: (0.103/4.160/247.38) defeated No. 5 Alexis DeJoria (0.087/5.175/142.10)

Round 4: (0.045/3.952/325.14) lost to No. 6 Tommy Johnson Jr. (0.065/3.929/321.04)

“We were trying to implement some new parts and do some testing and that’s hard to do with only two qualifying runs and you definitely don’t want to do that on Sunday. That put us behind. But I say it time and time again, coming in Sunday morning I’ve never not thought we had a chance at winning the race no matter what position we start from. We sure had the FOX Sports TV people scrambling to see when the last time someone won from the 16th spot. You hate to knock out a teammate in the championship, but it’s mano-a-mano up there and Sunday morning you have one of the leading cars in the points race, but we knew we were capable. It’s just one of those grind ‘em out days. These are those weekends where you look back at the end of the season and you sort of circle them and you remember that this is where most teams would have gone out early and we gutted out a lot of big round wins and 20 points here and there. When you’re running great and things don’t go wrong it seems a little easier. Today was one of those knock-down drag-out fights. The semifinals I stayed in the throttle and I didn’t see Alexis (DeJoria). In a nitro Funny Car, when you stay in the throttle bad things can happen when you stay in it and unfortunately we hurt the beautiful Pennzoil body. But fortunately, we have great sponsors with Pennzoil and NAPA Auto Parts and we have plenty of parts at DSR and we have four days to get to (Las) Vegas and do it again.”

Leah Pruett, Pennzoil Top Fuel Dragster  
(No. 6 Qualifier – 3.767 seconds at 324.20 mph)

Round 1: (0.069-second reaction time, 3.745 seconds at 321.65 mph) defeated No. 11 Lee Callaway (0.073/6.22/96.74)  

Round 2: (0.079/3.708/322.58) lost to No. 3 Billy Torrence (0.063/3.708/331.61)

“The highlight of this weekend is that we solved a lot of problems with the car after really starting over after St. Louis. That put us behind and we feel we’re now in front of it. We have a race car that is performing very well. We had some additional software problems and we’ve been on the good side of these holeshot wins, but sometimes you’re going to find yourself on the other side of it. The most exciting thing about it is that we have one of the top, fastest hot rods going into Vegas. We have done very well in Vegas. I think points-wise we’re out of the championship, but we still have our eyes on moving forward on a high note.”

Mark Pawuk, Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak– Factory Stock Shootout
(No. 2 Qualifier – 7.814 seconds at 175.48 mph)

Round 1: (0.071-second reaction time, 7.900 seconds at 173.38 mph) defeated No. 13 Lindsay Wheelock (0.000/8.157/167.36)

Round 2: (0.006/7.901/173.09) defeated No. 8 Steven Bell (0.022/7.905/173.45)

Round 3: (-0.012/7.904/173.70) lost to No. 3 Aaron Stanfield (0.026/7.894/173.87)

“Another great weekend for the Don Schumacher Racing Empaco Equipment/Ohio CAT/Mr. Heater Dodge Drag Pak. Driver did his job second round, and unfortunately left a little bit early in the semis and the red light got us this weekend. But hey, another semifinal finish keeps us in the points. Unfortunately, we don’t have a shot at No. 1 anymore, but I think we are pretty solid at No. 2, and hopefully we can go to Vegas and carry this momentum for one more race. My last race I won as a professional, when I ran Pro Stock, was in Vegas in 2001. Would love to go back and win that race!”
 
Leah Pruett, Mopar Dodge Challenger Mopar Drag Pak – Factory Stock Shootout 
(No. 11 Qualifier – 7.955 seconds at 172.32 mph)
Round 1: (0.025-second reaction time, 8.611 seconds at 171.08 mph) lost to No. 4 John Cerbone (0.029/7.903/170.77)

“We’re glad our qualifier from St. Louis held to carry us over. We were really running out of options with our program so we decided to make a setup change during the week and no thanks to a delivery company, we didn’t get the parts we needed until late Saturday evening. We ran first round of eliminations rolling the dice with a setup we’ve never tested before and we had to go for it. We’re not in a position to test and it was the power we were looking for, but definitely too much. That’s given us good insight into Las Vegas. It’s a different mindset when you’re not chasing a championship and you’re chasing progression, that’s what I’ve seen. We have something to work from for Vegas. Mark is carrying the Mopar flag. We figured out some things with El Bandito (nickname for Pruett’s Drag Pak) and we’re feeling pumped.”

NHRA Championship Points Standings:

(Following the Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil)

FUNNY CAR (season wins in parentheses)

1. Matt Hagan (Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat) – 842 (2)

2. Tommy Johnson Jr. (Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat) – 800 (3)

3. Jack Beckman (Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat) – 799 (3)

4. Ron Capps (Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat) – 679 (2)

5. Bob Tasca III – 595

6. J.R. Todd – 584

7. Tim Wilkerson – 570 

8. Alexis DeJoria – 489

9. Cruz Pedregon – 388 

10. Paul Lee – 382

TOP FUEL (season wins in parentheses)

1. Steve Torrance – 868 (4)

2. Doug Kalitta – 767 (1)

3. Billy Torrence – 675 (1)

4. Leah Pruett (Mopar Dodge//SRT) – 670 

5. Shawn Langdon – 544 (1) 

6. Antron Brown – 534

7. Justin Ashley – 485 (1)

8. Terry McMillen – 436

9. Tony Schumacher – 415 (1)

10. Clay Millican – 414

, Dixon His Sixth Drivers’ Championship at St. Petersburg Season Finale
Scott Dixon secures his sixth INDYCAR Drivers’ Title with third-place finish in Florida
Honda wins ninth Manufacturers’ Championship, and third consecutive title, with seven race wins and 15 additional podium finishes in 14-race season

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (Oct. 25, 2020) – Honda today claimed its ninth INDYCAR Manufacturers’ Championship – and third consecutive title – as Scott Dixon scored the 15th podium finish for the company this season and succeeded in earning his sixth Drivers’ title, highest among all active drivers and trailing only the legendary A.J. Foyt in career championships won.

For Honda and Honda Performance Development, the company’s North American racing division, today’s result marks the first championship “three-peat” of titles in the 27-year history of HPD. Entering Indy car competition in 1994, Honda won its first manufacturers’ title in 1996. Additional championships followed in 1998-99, 2001, 2004-05, and 2018-19.

Dixon’s championship is the 17th for a Honda-powered Indy car driver, and the 11th with multi-manufacturer competition. Now a Honda Indy car team owner, Jimmy Vasser won Honda’s first drivers’ title in 1996. Other Honda-powered Indy car champions include Alex Zanardi (1997-98); Juan Pablo Montoya (1999); Gil de Ferran (2000-01); Tony Kanaan (2004); Dan Wheldon (2005); Sam Hornish Jr. (2006); Dario Franchitti (2007, 2009-11); and Dixon (2008, 2013, 2018, 2020).

Today’s 100-lap season finale took place in hot and very humid conditions, resulting in a brief, light rain shower with approximately 20 laps remaining. Pole qualifier Will Power led the opening five laps, but was soon passed by Andretti Autosport’s Alexander Rossi, who went on to lead a race-high 61 laps before ending his day with wall contact on Lap 74.

Other Honda-powered race leaders included Colton Herta, Graham Rahal, James Hinchcliffe and Alex Palou. But shortly after Rossi’s crash, Herta also slid off course, leading to an 11th-place finish. Just moments later, Hinchcliffe was the next to fall victim to the tricky conditions, spinning in the final turn and then colliding with fellow Honda driver Jack Harvey as he attempted to rejoin the circuit. Both would have to pit for repairs, dropping them out of the lead pack. Palou’s fuel gamble came up this a few laps shy of a podium finish, as his late stop for a splash dropped him to 13th at the checkers.

Meanwhile, after starting 11th – and needing only a top-10 finish to clinch the title – Dixon methodically worked his way to the front, moving into third on Lap 80. Combined with four wins during the 14-race season, the podium result was more than enough for Dixon to claim the title.

Next
Sunday’s race concludes Honda’s championship-winning 2020 NTT IndyCar Series. The 2021 season gets underway March 7, with a return to the Florida Gulf Coast for the next running of the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

Honda Racing social media content and videos from the season-ending Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg are available on Instagram (www.instagram.com/hondaracing_hpd), Facebook (www.facebook.com/HondaRacingHPD) and Twitter (www.twitter.com/HondaRacing_HPD).  

Quotes
Scott Dixon (Chip Ganassi Racing Honda) Started 11th, finished third; has won his sixth INDYCAR Drivers’ Championship: “It’s all the team. I can’t thank everybody on this team enough. Obviously, [team owner] Chip [Ganassi], [race directors] Mike [Hull] and Barry [Wanser]; and everybody involved – Honda. I’m proud to be powered by Honda and what they’ve been able to pull out this year. They nailed it. Big thanks to everybody. My family – I’m glad my [daughters] and [spouse] Emma are here. I can’t thank everybody enough. PNC Bank, two out of three years (as champion) – that’s pretty good going.”
 
“It’s never just one thing or one person. For me, it’s about the team effort. We had a lot of [internal] changes in the offseason. And we know next year is going to be the same, but huge thanks again to everyone on the team. Now we’re going to have a beer.”
 
Ted Klaus (President, Honda Performance Development) on today’s season-ending race, Honda’s ninth – and third consecutive – Manufacturers’ Championship and Scott Dixon’s sixth Drivers’ Title: “Thank you ‘Team HPD’. Every one of you played an important role in this historic achievement, throughout the off-season and all through this year. You executed against adversity, and never lifted off the throttle. We dominated the Indianapolis 500 and brought home the drivers’ and manufacturers’ championships, and that is an enormous accomplishment. To our partner teams, INDYCAR and our competitors: job well done in 2020, thank you all. We will celebrate tonight, but our next goal is to bring even more Honda power to the NTT INDYCAR SERIES in 2021.”

CHEVROLET RACING IN THE NTT INDYCAR SERIES FIRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF ST. PETERSBURG STREETS OF ST. PETERSBURG, FLORIDA JOSEF NEWGARDEN AND RINUS VEEKAY TEAM CHEVY POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPTS OCT. 25, 2020

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JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 1 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET – RACE WINNER, AND RINUS VEEKAY, NO. 21 SONAX ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET – INDYCAR ROOKIE-OF-THE-YEAR POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT: THE MODERATOR: We’ve been joined by our new 2020 Rookie of the Year, Rinus VeeKay. Lots of news for you today. It was announced you have a new deal for next year staying where you are. And with taking the green flag, you became the Rookie of the Year. Talk to us about your day today.RINUS VEEKAY: Yeah, first of all, very happy with my achievements for getting the Rookie of the Year. Also very happy to stay with ECR next year. Great team, really a team that helps me to get better and better, prepare throughout all the season.Yeah, today was tough. We started with really good speed at the start. Yellow kind of threw me, the first one. Got into the pack, yeah, tangled up early, unavoidable. It happens. It’s a street course. I’m not the only one that had a rough day.We had the speed. I know we will be good at the season opener next year.  THE MODERATOR: We’ll go ahead and take questions from the media for Rinus.Q. Do you think you could have won? At one point you had the undercut on Josef towards the start of the race. If things had gone your way, do you think you had the pace to win that today and that was a lost victory or would it have been tough coming with the undercut towards the end of the race?RINUS VEEKAY: It’s never easy. Everything has to go into your favor. The way it looked pace-wise, I was kind of saving a little bit of tires. It was looking very good.Then, yeah, after that first caution, went downhill pretty quick anyway. If that didn’t happen, I think the podium was still possible, even having to go through the pack. We really had the speed.It was tough, but I think, yeah, my second podium could have been a fact today. Going to have to wait a few months until I can do it over. Q. The news this morning that you’ll be returning to Ed Carpenter. Have you spoken to any other teams? Could you give us a little bit of background about the decision you made to stay with Ed?RINUS VEEKAY: Yes, I’m very happy to stay with ECR. Everyone kind of agrees that the way we work together was great this year. Everyone agreed to keep going for another season. Everyone was happy with how we’re doing. I think I have a really good team of guys surrounding me. I’m very happy about this year. I think we can, yeah, go for even more podiums and hopefully win this next season. THE MODERATOR: We’ve been joined by our race winner, Josef Newgarden, and second place finisher in the championship. A few fun facts about Josef before we get started. It is his fourth win of 2020. He also became the third straight back-to-back winner at St. Pete, having won last year’s race as well. Sebastien Bourdais did that in ’17 and ’18. Juan Pablo Montoya did that in ’15 and ’16.Tell us about your day, Josef, the mixed emotions you must be feeling.JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it’s very bittersweet the way this all wrapped up. I was a little bit somber coming into this weekend, to be honest with you, I think just because of the fact that we knew we didn’t control our own destiny. We knew going into the weekend that we didn’t have control over it. The only thing we could do was to take care of what we could control and try to win the race. If you win the race, it gives you the best opportunity to maybe win the championship.It’s tough. It’s tough to get to this point, to look at the year, some of the things we’ve come back from, certainly how close we got, then to fall short. At the end of the day we did. We fell short. Just wasn’t good enough.I think all we can do is shake our competitor’s hand, tell Scott great job, tell his team great job, and come back next year and hit him harder. That’s all we can really focus on at this point. That’s what I’m going to focus on.Proud of what we did today. It was a really hard race. Tough to get right at the end with all the cautions. The tires were very tricky to drive after the warmup and the caution laps. Happy to get a win out of here. So proud of my team. They were just on it all year. I don’t think I would change one thing that we did. I don’t see how we could change one thing that we did. They were perfect all season in my eyes. Just short.I guess a decent way to go into the off-season with another victory and to hold our head up high. THE MODERATOR: Rinus, we’ll let you go before we continue with questions for Josef. Congratulations on your Rookie of the Year.RINUS VEEKAY: Thank you very much. THE MODERATOR: We’ll continue with questions for Josef.Q. Lap 79, pass for the lead. You pick off two guys on the restart. How cool was that? What do you recall of that? How much did you realize once you were in the lead, all of a sudden you looked in your rearview mirror and there’s Scott in third, you go, Man, that ain’t going to be enough?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I wasn’t really looking back most of the race, to be honest with you. I did see him there at the end. I could see he was in the mirrors and lurking. I knew they were pitting when we would pit, which is the smart thing to do. They just shadowed us all day, which is really the smart play.We couldn’t control them. We knew that. We knew that going into the weekend. It’s the most disheartening thing, you can’t control the outcome. All you can control is winning the race, hoping that something falls your way. We didn’t have a lot fall our way this year. I was hoping today may be the day.Like I said, I was looking forward most of the day. All we could do was control what we were doing, where our car was, trying to win the race. That’s all I focused on. Once we got to the lead and made the pass, I was pretty happy. Just hoping things shook out for us, just trying to finish off and keep in the lead till the end. Q. From your viewpoint, the pass for the lead on the restart, take us through that.JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It was really tricky today. I mean, I would be surprised if it wasn’t noticeable on TV how difficult it was on those restarts. There was a lot of pickup. The tires were extremely cold. We were struggling with the pace car to go quick enough was part of the problem. We couldn’t keep temperature in the tires and brakes. Trying to get going again with all the pickup on the tires was really tough.I knew on that restart Herta was one of the worst to get going with tire warmup. He seemed to struggle the most of anybody almost. I saw Palou kind of go for a pass on him. I knew on the inside it was going to be really tough to pull that off.I tried to position my car in the middle of them, just wait for an opportunity for them to open the door slightly. That door just kind of half opened. I kept my line very tight to try to squeeze both of them, try to be a bit smoother on throttle, try to get the most out of it on cold tires. It wall really all I could do. It was just enough to get around those guys on the outside. After that I was just trying to hold everybody back. Q. You end the season with four victories. That’s tied for the most of any driver this year. How important is that to you?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I’m really proud of it, for sure. I’m glad to get another win. I hate to harp on the past. I don’t want to be in the business of making excuses. I think we could have won six or seven races this year, to be honest with you. On one hand I’m really proud. I think we’ve had phenomenal racecars. Team Chevy has given us pretty much everything you can ask for. Great engine performance, great partnerships as always. I’ve always had good races with Hitachi on the car. I don’t know why that is. They seem to be a good luck charm specifically for us this year.I’m disappointed. We could have won six or seven. I don’t know that I would change much about what we did this year. I don’t know that I’d ask our team to do much different. We sit down and analyze everything, I don’t know that we missed steps very often. We got bit a couple times being in the wrong place, wrong time. As far as our decision making, I was really proud of pretty much what we did all year. Q. I know you mentioned about specific points in your race. I was curious to know if at any point was the team telling you where Scott was? How did you wrap your head around that? How did you maintain focus on the race?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: No, didn’t get much info. Wasn’t important, to be honest with you. Again, we couldn’t control that. We just had to focus on winning the race. That’s all I worked on.I just looked forward, sort of knew the situation around me. Was more intimate with what was going on in front, directly in front of me. That’s all I focused on. I wasn’t really told where Scott was, what they were doing. I could see them setting up in the pits every time I came in. I noticed that. Figured they would do that. If it was on the flip side, we would do the same thing. If we were behind them in the race, we pretty much would mirror them if we were in their shoes.I honestly wasn’t focused on them because it didn’t matter. Anything I was doing compared to them just didn’t matter. We had to win. Scott wasn’t the guy we were racing. We were focused on the other competitors. Q. At any point were you worried about the competitors at all because that pass you made for the lead on Alex, it was pretty tight?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it was very tight. I mean, I can’t express enough how difficult it was on the restarts. It was like being on ice for like two laps. Let alone just the first corner, it was like that the entire two laps just to get going.We were tiptoeing it. I was trying to be a little bit more ginger than those guys on the throttle, keep the car pinched on the apex in turn one as they pushed two-wide. I was on the clean stuff a little bit better. Gave me a better drive on the outside.Even then I was wide myself in the next corner and about went into the wall. It was just tough, tight corners. I knew for us, we had to go for the win. It was our only chance to win the championship. I wasn’t trying to be overly aggressive but I was being aggressive as I possibly could to win the race. Q. Do you attribute any of the incidents today from what you could tell to tough racing in a season finale with guys going all out? What contributed most to all the on-track incidents we saw today?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Just hard racing. St. Pete, end of the year, first street course of the year. I think everyone was trying to make the most of it. That’s part of it.The other part of it was just the difficulty on restarts. The tires were so cold, they were susceptible to pickup in a really bad way this year for whatever reason. I think it made it hard for us. In some ways it made it exciting for all the racing.That whole combination of being the only street course of the year, last race of the season, people were going for it. It was in tough conditions that they were doing it. Q. You mentioned this felt bittersweet for you. How would you characterize what the last 10, 15 laps felt like knowing you were leading the race, have a good chance to win, also knowing that Dixon was right there?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I was just pushing. I was hustling the car, driving as hard as I could, trying to enjoy myself. I really enjoyed the race conditions, love driving a full race. It’s my favorite part of the weekend.I was pushing as hard as possible, trying to go as fast as I could, enjoying that process. I love that. It’s my last chance at it for this year until we get back going again next year.Just doing what we always do, keeping the rhythm, try to finish the race. I’ll let the team tell me what happened when we’re done. Q. Your mindset going into the off-season now, is it easier for you knowing you couldn’t have really done anything different this year or does that make it more difficult for you from a mental aspect?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I’m torn. I’m so torn with this season. On one hand, like I said, I take pride in the fact that I don’t think we did much wrong this year. I really don’t. If you look back at it, the one thing that I could nitpick is maybe we should have been on it a little better in a couple qualifying sessions. Yesterday would have been a key example of that where we may have miss stepped in quallie trim or didn’t capitalize.As far as race day, the decision making we did for a complete season, we finished every lap. We had the potential to win six or seven races on merit, in my opinion. It just didn’t pan out.A lot of the days where we should have been on the podium or should have won a race, they didn’t fall our way. I’m extremely proud of that fact, that I don’t think we would have done much different. When we analyze the whole year, we’re not going to point to this mistake or that mistake. There just was not a lot of them, really any at all. It almost makes it that much harder.You look at the gap that we were at five races to go, 117 back. You look at how much we clawed back for the season finale, to be beat by so little, that’s what makes it bittersweet.On the one hand I’m happy about a hard performance, but sad about the way the whole thing turned out. Q. Was it important for you to go down swinging, to do everything you could do?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Hell, yeah. Yeah. Look, I show up to win every race, like any of these guys. If you don’t have that mindset, I don’t know what you’re doing here. I’ll always preach that.We went for the win today. Yeah, maybe there’s some days you’ll say we don’t be as risky on strategy, we might pull back a bit on that approach. We gave it everything we had. We tried to win the race. That was our only focus.Whether we win the championship or not, we want to have a great race day, we want to represent our partners and win the race. That’s what we did. We showcased Chevrolet, showed we had the best engine this weekend. Showed off Hitachi, our beautiful car. At the end of the day we won the race but it wasn’t enough for the championship. That’s okay. You’re going to get that.We shook our competitor’s hand, told them good job, will come back next year. Q. Is it fair to say or categorize this victory, the big bold move for the lead, would it be fair to categorize those as characteristics of you, who you are as a person and race car driver?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I don’t know. I definitely put my heart out there today. I think people saw that I’ll do everything I can to put us in a position to win races or win championships. I’ve done that ever since I’ve started driving an INDYCAR. I think if there’s anything to say about our performance today, you can definitely draw that.I’ve tended to be more measured I think over the last couple years of my career. Specifically at Team Penske I think my approach has been more letting things come to us using our inherent speed and skill sets of our people to maximize the race better than other people.Whereas today, you know, the only way to win this race was to just win it. You couldn’t rest on just letting it come to you. I mean, you had to go and take it. The only way we’re going to win this championship was to go and take the win. I certainly took that approach from my driving style today. I put it all out there. I knew we had to take a victory.Once you get to that point and you’re in the lead trying to win the race, fate wasn’t in our hand. We just had to wait for something to come our way. Unfortunately it just didn’t today. THE MODERATOR: We’ll let Josef go. Thank you, Josef, for joining us. I know it’s tough with the situation. Congratulations on your win and we’ll see you here again in March. Maybe you can make it three back-to-back-to-back wins.JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Cheers. Thank you, everyone, for covering our series. I know it’s been a hard year. Appreciate all the effort even with the difficulty. We’ll see you guys back here next year. Hopefully it’s a little bit more normal. Enjoy your off-season.

CHEVROLET RACING IN THE NTT INDYCAR SERIES FIRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF ST. PETERSBURG STREETS OF ST. PETERSBURG, FLORIDA JOSEF NEWGARDEN WINS TEAM CHEVY RACE RECAP WITH DRIVER QU0TES OCT. 25, 2020

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ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (Oct. 25, 2020) – Joseph Newgarden did what he needed to win the NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship, but so did Scott Dixon. Newgarden, driving the No. 1 Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet, won the Firestone Indy Grand Prix to lead a 1-2 Chevrolet finish in the 14-race season finale. But Newgarden had to settle for the runner-up position in the final standings.  Pato O’Ward, driving the No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet, earned his fourth podium of the season with a second-place finish. Sebastien Bourdais finished fourth in the No. 14 AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet. Simon Pagenaud, No. 22 Menards Team Penske Chevrolet, finished sixth, and Charlie Kimbal, No. 4 Tresiba AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet finished eighth to give Chevrolet five of the top-eight finishers.  Dixon finished third to wrap up his sixth championship.  Newgarden, who also won the 100-lap race on the 1.8-mile, 14-turn St. Petersburg temporary street circuit on the way to winning his second NTT INDYCAR SERIES title in 2019, earned four race victories this season. This was his 18th career INDYCAR victory – all behind the wheel of a race car powered by 2.2 liter, twin turbocharged, direct injected V6 Chevrolet engine. The 2021 NTT INDYCAR Series season will return to the Streets of St. Petersburg for the season opener on March 7, 2021.  TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS:POS.   DRIVER1st      JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 1 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET2ND    PATO O’WARD, NO. 5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET4TH     SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 14 AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET6TH     SIMON PAGENAUD NO. 22 MENARDS TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET8TH     CHARLIE KIMBALL, NO. 4 TRESIBA AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET12TH   MAX CHILTON, NO. 59 GALLAGHER CHEVROLET15TH   RINUS VEEKAY, NO. 21 SONAC ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET16TH   OLIVER ASKEW, NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET17TH    CONOR DALY, NO. 59 GALLAGHER CARLIN CHEVROLET 22ND  SCOTT MCLAUGHLIN, NO. 3 SHELLV-POWER NITRO+ CHEVROLET24TH   WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET           TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS: POS.  DRIVER                                                       1st      Josef Newgarden (Chevrolet)2nd     Pato O’Ward (Chevrolet)3rd      Scott Dixon (Honda)4th      Sebastien Bourdais (Chevrolet)5th      Ryan Hunter-Reay (Honda)  TEAM CHEVY NOTES AND QUOTES: JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 1 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET – RACE WINNER:“Congrats to Scott (Dixon) and his guys on his crew. It’s big time to win six championship so I’m sure they’re thrilled. They were great competitors. It’s bittersweet. On one hand, I really don’t know what I’d do different this year and I don’t know what I’d ask my guys to do different. They were flawless – fastest in the pits all year long and they were rewarded for it earlier this weekend by Firestone. I’m extremely proud to drive for my team – not just my car but all the Team Penske cars combined, all the engineers, all the mechanics. They’re an incredible crew that puts in a lot of work. We just came up short and that’s all it is. We just weren’t able to get it done but we’ll reset and we’ll hit ‘em harder next year and I promise you we’ll be in the fight. Thank you to Hitachi and Team Chevy. You know Team Chevy was the engine to beat today and I think all year long so big credit to them. We were just a little short on points but we’ll come back harder next year.” PATO O’WARD, NO. 5 ARROWMCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, FINISHED 2ND:“I’m so proud of Arrow McLaren SP and myself for what we accomplished this year. Our win will have to wait. We came in second place in the season finale, just five points short of third place in the championship. We have lots to be proud of. I’m really grateful for the opportunity that I got. I think we showcased that we are a force to be reckoned with and we are going to be pushing next year to give these veterans a harder time. Hopefully, bring it to the last race and win this championship.” SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 14 SEXTON AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET – Finished 4TH:“Well, what a race. I’m super happy for the 14 team AJ Foyt Racing and Chevrolet. Those guys were on the cusp the whole time and we were fighting for a million dollars today. We had things under control and then it seemed to slip away and finishing fourth in some pretty incredible situations there at the end with a car that was legitimately fast so really happy that we could finish the season on a high like that and looking forward to 2021.” SIMON PAGENAUD, NO. 22 MENARDS TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET – Finished 6TH: “That was a good finish for the Menards Chevrolet. It was survival of the fittest out there today. At one point, I said on the radio that there could be many, many more cautions and there was. We just couldn’t get in a race rhythm. But we were able take advantage of all those other people’s mistakes and put ourselves in position to have a good finish. All weekend, the car was really good – I think it was better than even sixth where we finished. But I’m pretty excited to build upon this for next year. All-in-all, good weekend. It was also good to see the fans back at the track. We finished St. Pete, just a few months after the fact.” CHARLIE KIMBALL, NO. 4 TRESIBA AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET – Finished – 8TH: “Well today the Grand Prix of St Petersburg was a success for A.J. Foyt Racing. For us the No 4 Tresiba Chevrolet coming from a not optimum qualifying in 20th all the way through to eighth, so much credit goes to the guys in pitlane—great pit stops. They’ve had great pit stops all year—they’re in the top 10 as far as the pit stop championship among all the teams in pitlane. So much credit to them, credit to the engineers here and at home working to make the car better and better. Just had to put the laps in at the end. Got a little tight a couple of times, banged off a few people but that’s street racing in INDYCAR. It’s nice to have a double top-10 to finish out 2020 which has been tough, strange and challenging in so many ways.” MAX  CHILTON, NO. 59 GALLAGHER AJ FOYT CHEVROLET, FINISHED 12TH “That felt like the longest INDYCAR race I’ve ever done apart from the 500. It was just unbelievably long and challenging. The tires were the hardest we’ve ever used and I don’t think I was the only one struggling with them. There were multiple good drivers spinning out and crashing during the race. We didn’t have the pace all day, but then we sort of lucked in to a good bit of strategy. I was fired up, but we just couldn’t get the tire temps up. Every time I exited the last corner I got eaten alive. Apart from that I held my position, so I kind of feel like we had a top-10 taken away from us. I can honestly say that I gave it 100% and did my best and the guys did a great job in the pits. It’s disappointing to not get a top 10 here this weekend, because that was our target but we were able to come from the back and make up 12 spots so we’ll take that as a massive positive into the offseason.” RINUS VEEKAY, NO. 21 SONAX ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET – Finished 15TH:“I am officially Rookie of the Year! I am very happy with that. Everything we didn’t want to have happen in the race happened, though. We were super quick, but the first yellow kind of screwed us. I was in the pack after that. Scott McLaughlin spun to the inside and I was there, I couldn’t go anywhere. After that, it was just about bringing the car home without and damage and getting the points. I think another podium was a possibility, we had such a fast car! We have to wait a few months until we come back, but we’ll give it another shot! I am looking forward to being back – not as a rookie!” OLIVER ASKEW, NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET – Finished 16TH: “We had a really strong weekend up until the second half of the race. We were heading for a top 10 finish until I got taken out. It’s a bummer we couldn’t get a positive result in our final race with Arrow McLaren SP but I think I showed the rest of the series what I can do. I want to thank the entire team for all the hard work they have put in this year and support they have given me.” CONOR DALY, NO. 20 U.S. AIR FORCE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET – Finished 17th: “I am definitely guilty of making a big mistake under yellow. Rinus came out of the pits quite quick right in front of us and everyone just stopped all of a sudden around the next corner. When the tires were cold, they were like ice. As soon as they locked up, I had nowhere to go. The U.S. Air Force Chevrolet was really fast, which was good. We made some great progress on the race set up. Even after the contact, the car was still fast so that was really encouraging.” SCOTT MCLAUGHLIN, NO.3 SHELL V-POWER NITRO+ TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET – Finished 22nd:“Best day of my life except for my wedding. The Shell V-Power Nitro+ INDYCAR was going really well then I just made a move trying to block Marco. Then I felt like I made a half of a rear lock, but I’m not exactly sure. Cold tires caught me out a little bit. But I had a lot of fun today,” WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET – Finished 24th:“I just lost it. Just lost it. My rear bottomed, and had a moment. Earlier it didn’t downshift for some reason. It did it a couple of times. Then I started downshifting really early. I don’t know what happened. I have a feeling I made a mistake by putting that vent on the top. That loses performance and downforce. I should have run it in warm-up. It wasn’t bad out there with the vent obEn so I wouldn’t have had those issues. The downshift, I don’t know what that was. Very strange. It just didn’t go down gears on that corner to fourth or third and that is how Rossi got me, and then Herta attacked all for position. Just frustrated with me making a mistake and hitting the wall. The car got loose and very frustrating. I shouldn’t be the only one crashing. My bad for putting us out of the race. Bad situation.”

HOUSTON (Oct. 25) — A strong runner-up result at Sunday’s 33rd annual Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals presented by Pennzoil lifted five-time Pro Stock world champion Jeg Coughlin Jr. into a tie for second place with Jason Line, just 55 markers behind leader Erica Enders. There is only one race left, but since it awards points and a half, Coughlin is still very much alive in the title chase. “We’re definitely giving it a go in these late stages of the season,” Coughlin said. “We made up some good ground today and, of course, we wanted to capitalize a little more there in the final but we had some mechanical issues that prevented us from turning on a fourth win light.”

Five-time Pro Stock world champion Jeg Coughlin Jr.

The points could have been even better for Coughlin if he had pulled off his 66th career victory but his JEGS.com Elite Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro stalled a few times as he warmed up for a tense final-round race against Aaron Stanfield. Nevertheless, Coughlin left first on his young rival but ultimately didn’t have enough for Stanfield’s 6.535 at 211.03 mph, crossing himself in 6.611 at 207.53 mph. “For some reason the car didn’t want to start when we were in the waterbox before the final,” Coughlin said. “Fuel injection is a little different but we finally got it to fire and I did a short burnout to at least give us a chance. I let the clutch out on time but it shutoff right away, and even though it picked back up, it kept doing that all the way down the track. Just some sort of gremlin in there we need to find.” Coughlin’s three round wins on the day were very memorable, with miniscule holeshot victories over Greg Anderson in the semifinals and Matt Hartford in Round 1. Enders eliminated herself when she squared off with Coughlin in the quarterfinals with a -.006 red-light start. With each elimination round victory in Vegas worth 30 points, Coughlin now finds himself less than two rounds behind Enders, the reigning world champ who shares the Elite Motorsports pit with Coughlin. Entering the race he was more than four rounds back of Enders and three behind Line, who lost in Round 1 Sunday. Enders lost to Coughlin in Round 2.

Jeg Coughlin Jr.’s JEGS.com Elite Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro

“We didn’t have a moment to relax all day,” Coughlin said. “We got by with a holeshot win in Round 1 against last weekend’s winner, and then had to face Erica. I figured it would be a knock-down, drag-out affair because we always race straight-up and we go hard against one another. In the end, neither of us made great runs but she had gone just a little red so we got the ‘W.’ “The race against Greg was a true grudge match. Once again, I got a little head-start and we were glued together all the way down the track. I got the win by just a few thousands and I was actually chuckling under my helmet because Greg and I have had so many races like that in our careers. It was a relief to get by him.” The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway would seem to be the perfect place for Coughlin to rise to the occasion. He’s previously won five events at the famous facility, having earned Wally trophies there in 2000, 2001, 2002, 2008 and 2009.  “We’re gonna need a little help to win the championship, and certainly, I’m not wishing anything bad on Erica, or Jason, for that matter, but as witnessed today anything can happen,” Coughlin said. “If we have a repeat of this race we might be able to complete this dream scenario.”

Troy Coughlin Jr.

Troy Coughlin Jr., Jeg Jr.’s nephew who is competing in Pro Stock for the first time this year, registered a huge upset of the higher-qualified car of Deric Kramer by posting a 6.555 at 209.26 mph to Kramer’s 6.574 at 209.98 mph. He then experienced some trouble at the starting line in a Round 2 race against Stanfield when his JEGS.com/BENMIT Elite Motorsports Ford Mustang crept through the staging lights before the green light flashed, causing him to foul out.

CHEVROLET RACING IN THE NTT INDYCAR SERIES FIRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF ST. PETERSBURG STREETS OF ST. PETERSBURG, FLORIDA ROOKIE OF THE YEAR- RINUS VEEKAY FROM ED CARPENTER RACING OCT. 25, 2020

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Chevrolet powers VeeKay to Rookie of the Year awardEd Carpenter Racing driver impresses in first NTT INDYCAR SERIES season DETROIT (Oct. 25, 2020) – An eager 19-year-old driver impressed NTT INDYCAR SERIES owner/driver Ed Carpenter during auditions on a tight street circuit and a flowing road course in August and November 2019. Carpenter, an 18-year veteran, noted quick lap times but more importantly Rinus VeeKay’s adaptability in handling the 1,700-pound race car with Chevrolet’s powerful 2.2-liter, V-6 direct-injected, twin-turbocharged engine behind his back. Soon after the fall test at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, VeeKay was named the full-season driver of the No. 21 Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet, and his impressive first NTT INDYCAR SERIES season validated the team principal’s initial assessment. Highlighted by a pole start that led to a third-place finish in the INDYCAR Harvest GP on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course in early October and a fourth-place starting position for the Indianapolis 500, the native of Hoofddorp, Netherlands, has earned the 2020 INDYCAR Rookie of the Year Award. The award is based on points for the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Drivers’ Championship earned at each event. The winner receives a $50,000 bonus. “On behalf of Chevrolet, congratulations to Rinus VeeKay and Ed Carpenter Racing on winning the 2020 NTT INDYCAR Series Rookie of the Year title,” said Robert Buckner, INDYCAR program manager, Chevrolet. “It was a very challenging year to be a rookie driver in this series. “Rinus is a standout talent and everyone at Team Chevy has enjoyed watching his confidence grow along with his accomplishments. From being the top Chevrolet qualifier at the Indy 500 to a pole and podium in Race 1 of the INDYCAR Harvest GP weekend, we couldn’t be more proud. Thank you to Rinus, Ed Carpenter, Tim Broyles and everyone at Ed Carpenter Racing for this achievement and your continued partnership.” VeeKay is the third rookie of the year award winner in a Chevrolet-powered race car in Indy car competition, and first since Stefan Johansson (Bettenhausen) in 1992. Eddie Cheever (Ganassi) in 1990 also was a recipient.  “Rinus has really shown a ton of growth this season. His ability to learn on the fly and natural speed makes it clear that his future is bright. It’s only a matter of time before he climbs the top of the podium,” said Carpenter, who had his eye on the Dutch driver since 2017 when VeeKay started his U.S. racing career on the first step of the Road to Indy ladder. VeeKay claimed 16 wins and 36 podium finishes in 48 races in the three series, earning the 2018 Pro 2000 Championship Presented by Cooper Tires title and finishing as championship runner-up in the other two series. “To step up from USF2000 to the NTT INDYCAR SERIES in three years is really special,” VeeKay said. “It all pays off. Keep pushing and never give up. It’s not always easy, but if you give it everything you have, and if you have the talent, you will get there, in any way possible.” VeeKay continued to impress out of the gate this season. In his second race, he registered a fifth-place finish after starting 18th. Six weeks later, VeeKay became the fastest and highest-qualifying teenager in the 104-year history of the Indianapolis 500 with a four-lap average speed of 230.704 mph on the 2.5-mile oval. Arie Luyendyk, who 30 years earlier recorded the first of his two Indy 500 victories, was among the first to greet his countryman after his 20th-place finish in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.” “I noticed his talent a few years ago,” Luyendyk said. “Rinus has a natural speed, really impressive.” Less than a week later, VeeKay followed with sixth- and fourth-place finishes on the 1.25-mile World Wide Technology Raceway oval, advancing a combined 22 positions from his starting spots. Returning to the IMS road course in early October, VeeKay drove the No. 21 Chevrolet to the pole position – the first for Ed Carpenter Racing on a road/street course — for the INDYCAR Harvest GP and earned his first podium finish. “I get a car that goes around quickly, and that makes the job easier,” he said of giving the team its 21st podium. The Rookie of the Year award is “a very nice achievement,” said VeeKay, who will continue to drive the No. 21 Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet in the 2021 season. “I feel like an entirely different driver than I was at the beginning of the year,” he said. “The team has been so patient with me and given me every opportunity to learn as much as possible. I can’t wait to have that same amazing support next year. I am really looking forward to doubling my knowledge and not being a rookie.”

Beckman Takes Infinite Hero Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat to No.1 in Qualifying at “Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil” 

• Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) driver Jack Beckman drove his Infinite Hero Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car to his first No.1 qualifier position of the 2020 season at the Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil near Houston
• DSR Funny Car drivers are 1-2-3-4 in the standings and locked in a tight battle for the crown with just eight rounds of eliminations left in the 2020 season
• Opening round of Sunday’s Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals will have important championship implications for Beckman and DSR teammate Ron Capps as they will face-off against each other
• Funny Car points leader Matt Hagan heads into eliminations as No. 2 qualifier aboard his Pennzoil Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat at Houston Raceway Park
• Leah Pruett will start from No. 6 position in her black and yellow Pennzoil Top Fuel dragster
• Mopar Drag Pak of Mark Pawuk qualifies No.2 for Factory Stock Showdown

October 24, 2020, Baytown, Texas – Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) pilot Jack Beckman drove his Infinite Hero Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car to his first No. 1 qualifier position of the 2020 National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Drag Racing Series season at the Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil held at Houston Raceway Park.

Beckman dislodged teammate Matt Hagan and his Pennzoil Synthetics Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat from the provisional top spot on the Funny Car timing sheets with a 3.884-second elapsed time run at 328.14 mph to earn his 28^th career No.1 qualifier position. It also provided Beckman with bonus points to keep him within three markers of the championship lead in second place as they head into the penultimate national event elimination battle of the season.

With just eight rounds of eliminations left in the 2020 NHRA season, the DSR Funny Car drivers are 1-2-3-4 in the standings with Hagan, Beckman, Tommy Johnson Jr. and Ron Capps respectively locked in a savage battle for the championship title. Beckman and Hagan have been trading places atop the standings multiple times over the last two months with Johnson and Capps close behind. The DSR stable is also chasing a win to extend their record streak of 12 consecutive victories that began in October of last year.

The first round of Sunday’s Mopar Express Lane SpringNationals will have important championship implications for Beckman and Capps. The two will meet in the opening round after Capps had two unsuccessful attempts to put in a clean qualifying pass that left him 16th on the ladder. With Capps sitting fourth in the standings, upsetting the No. 1 qualifier could provide the driver of the Pennzoil/NAPA AUTO PARTS Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat the chance to advance and fight for his fifth win at the venue and remain in championship contention. A round win by Beckman would eliminate Capps and set him on course to add to his category-leading three wins in nine events.

Hagan, for his part, also added three bonus points to his championship total with the quickest run of the first session posting a 3.907 sec./327.74 mph pass and heads into Sunday as No. 2 qualifier and points leader with two wins. He’ll line up his yellow and black Pennzoil and Mopar Express Lane paint-schemed Hellcat against Dave Richards in the first round.

Third in the Funny Car standings, Tommy Johnson Jr. earned a bonus point aboard his MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat for setting the third quickest lap of Q2 with a 3.973 sec./ 317.94 mph pass. He’ll be matched with Jim Campbell for the opening round.

From her third place spot in the Top Fuel standings, Leah Pruett is looking to keep her black and yellow Pennzoil dragster in championship contention after qualifying in the top half of the eliminations ladder. She posted the sixth quickest elapsed time run with a solid second lap of 3.767 seconds at 324.20 mph to give her lane choice over 11^th seed Lee Callaway to start the day.

Earlier this month at the Mopar Express Lane NHRA Midwest Nationals near St. Louis, weather conditions delayed and shortened Factory Stock Showdown (FSS) qualifying, then ultimately forced the cancelation of elimination rounds. The NHRA opted to carry-over the showdown to this weekend with the addition of two qualifying session at Houston Raceway Park. While Mark Pawuk and his Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak came into this event as the provisional No.1 qualifier, he just missed holding onto it but still put in two solid laps with 7.840 sec. and 7.865 sec. 

Pawuk, who currently sits second in the FSS championship behind Aaron Stanfield, will start from the No. 2 position on the eliminations ladder with the 7.814 se. /175.48 mph run posted in Q1 (St. Louis) and will face-off against Lindsay Wheelock.

Pawuk’s DSR Mopar Drag Pak teammate Pruett, will also take her place on the eliminations ladder based on the 7.955 sec./172.32 mph qualifying time set at St. Louis which put her No.11 with a first round match-up with John Cerbone.

NHRA elimination rounds at the Mopar Express Lane NHRA SpringNationals Presented by Pennzoil will begin at 10 a.m. local time on Sunday, Oct. 25, with the television broadcast on FS1 beginning at 2 p.m. Eastern featuring live coverage of the final rounds.

ADDITIONAL NOTES and QUOTES: 

Jack Beckman, Infinite Hero Foundation Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 1 Qualifier – 3.884 seconds at 328.14 mph)
Qualifying 1: 4.093 sec./ 242.58 mph

Qualifying 2: 3.884 sec./ 328.14 mph

“If we beat four people tomorrow, they’ll hand us another trophy. I didn’t ever think, with 17 cars here, that (Ron) Capps would be the No. 16 qualifier. I’m going to have to go talk to those guys and see if they’ll block for us tomorrow. I don’t think (Rahn) Tobler and Ron (Capps) will have anything to do with that. I’m happy. We knew we are going to have to earn this. I’d rather take it from the No. 1 spot because Matt (Hagan) had a four point lead coming in. He stretched that out Q1 and now we tighten that back up a little bit. The streak of the Don Schumacher (Racing) cars is awesome, but it’s also ulcer inducing because it’s always one of our cars next to us when we go to the late rounds. Four win lights tomorrow is what we need.”

Matt Hagan, Pennzoil Mopar Express Lane Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car  
(No. 2 Qualifier – 3.907 seconds at 327.74  mph)
Qualifying 1: 3.907 sec./327.74 mph 

Qualifying 2: 7.053 sec./92.91 mph

“We’re going to race our race tomorrow. It will be what it will be and the cards will fall the way they fall. We were still pressing to go out and run good in Q2. I think the left lane is a little worse than the right (lane) and you want to have lane choice tomorrow. I’ll try to be shallow and it seems like a lot of reaction times are off during qualifying and mine seem ok so I’ll try to continue that tomorrow on Sunday and keep lane choice and try to have a long day tomorrow. We’re here in Pennzoil country and we want to sell Pennzoil oil and Shell gas and do well for those who support us.”

Tommy Johnson Jr., MD Anderson Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 6 Qualifier – 3.973 seconds at  317.94 mph)

Qualifying 1: 3.973 sec./ 317.94 mph 

Qualifying 2: 3.986 sec./ 320.13 mph

“We’d like a bit more out of these qualifying runs, especially that second lap, but again at the same time we have good, solid, consistent car. It’s been very consistent making full runs in both lanes. Rarely do we see a track where lane choice may be critical, but I think tomorrow, when it’s going to be warmer, it might be critical. There’s definitely a favorite lane here. We have to keep the performance up, keep lane choice, put up four consistent runs and go to the winner’s circle and stay in this championship hunt.”
 
Ron Capps, Pennzoil NAPA Auto Parts Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car
(No. 16 Qualifier – 5.295 seconds at 136.44 mph)
Qualifying 1: 5.295 sec./ 136.44 mph

Qualifying 2: 8.463 sec./ 79.20 mph 

“I wasn’t aware that we were 16th until (FOX reporter) Amanda Busick told me at the end of the track. You know, it’s so difficult with just two qualifying runs. We need to try some things with some new parts we had built at our DSR shop and there’s really no time to do that on Sunday, so we have to try to implement those when we can during qualifying. I’m always confident we can win from any position. Unfortunately, we have to race a teammate first round in Jack Beckman. At this point, teammates don’t matter on Sunday morning as everybody is still fighting for a championship. I never would want to run our NAPA/Pennzoil car in the first place. Tonight, Rahn Tobler is going to work on getting the car back to what he’s comfortable with and we’ll go up there and run the best we think we can run down that lane and if they beat us, they beat us. Hopefully we’ll turn the win light on and try to do that a few more times on Sunday and try to get a win.”

Leah Pruett, Pennzoil Mopar Top Fuel Dragster  
(No. 6 Qualifier – 3.767 seconds at 324.20 mph)

Qualifying 1: 5.136 sec./ 132.78 mph 

Qualifying 2: 3.767 sec./ 324.20 mph

“I love living the truth and showing that the ‘Proof is in the Pennzoil’ and coming to the Pennzoil proving grounds and displaying the most intense, fastest accelerating vehicles in the world. We finished qualifying strong with a good Q2 lap. We had some software issues and driver issues on Q1. It’s always good when the car and team are on together. If they’re ever going to be off, it helps when they’re off together. We moved on and were first out in Q2 and laid down a very solid number at 3.76 to put us solidly in the field. We like what the outlook looks like for Sunday. But it is one run at a time and it’s so cool to see all the Shell employees that are here and it’s great for us to get to show off a great product. We feel good about eliminations. We felt like our momentum in Dallas got halted a little, but we were able to find and resolve the issue and that’s the key for this weekend and we’re very excited for our potential success.”

Mark Pawuk, Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak– Factory Stock Shootout
(No. 2 Qualifier – 7.814 seconds at 175.48 mph)

Qualifying 1 (in St. Louis):  7.814 seconds /175.48 mph 

Qualifying 2:  7.840 sec./174.41 mph 

Qualifying 3:  7.865 sec./173.03 mph

“There’s been a bunch of cars running in the low to mid (7.)80s this weekend. We lost the No. 1 spot from St. Louis by three thou (thousandth of-a-second), but we ended up No. 2. Not too bad going into tomorrow. We need to keep going rounds and stay No. 2 in the points. If the driver does his job and the car stays consistent, anything can happen. I set the Pro Stock record here in 1990 and won my first NHRA Pro Stock Wally here at Baytown in ’92. Let’s hope some of that good luck carries over to tomorrow.”
 
Leah Pruett, Mopar Dodge Challenger Mopar Drag Pak – Factory Stock Shootout 
(No. 11 Qualifier – 7.955 seconds at 172.32 mph)
Qualifying 1 (St. Louis):  7.955 seconds at 172.32 mph)

Qualifying 2:  7.960 sec./167.61 mph

Qualifying 3:  7.978 sec./170.19 mph

“There was a little bit of strategy going into this very eclectic race. Having a quick time of 7.95 that put us into the field and knowing the car count allowed us to try some things and we did that. Sometimes you find some beneficial things and other times you realize that wasn’t the right move. It’s very rare that you have availability to do that during qualifying and we were able to do that. There was one thing we missed during the week because of a shipping error that did not allow for a part to arrive and that was something else we wanted to try here at Houston. We got a good solid second lap and that sets us up for some hard eliminations tomorrow. We’re counting down the days of ‘El Bandito’ in the Factory Stock (Showdown) competition and I can’t wait to give it everything we got as we prepare for the next chapter of the Drag Pak in 2021.”

Anthony Alfredo and The No. 21 Maestro’s Classic Chevrolet Team Score Season Best Third-Place Finish at Texas Motor Speedway

3rd   18th  10th

“Our No. 21 Maestro’s Chevrolet fired off really well to start the race. We were able to quickly make our way inside the top-10 after starting in the 18th position. The biggest issue we fought throughout the race was just being a little too tight through the center and on exit of the corner. My crew chief, Andy Street, did a great job keeping up with the track and making adjustments throughout the race. One of the biggest things I’ve learned this year is just to be patient. Thankfully, we were able to put ourselves in position at the end and that is all you can really ask for. I’m just very thankful for everyone at Richard Childress Racing and ECR because they have no quit and it definitely showed today. It’s been a privilege to drive these fast RCR Chevrolets and an honor to work with this organization. To score my best career finish and the best finish for the entire No. 21 team this season in my last start is pretty special. I really wish we could have caught the No. 9 car, but we just kind of stalled out and the No. 20 car ended up passing both of us. Nevertheless, I am extremely proud of my team and thankful to be in this position.”   -Anthony Alfredo

STREETS OF ST. PETERSBURG, FLORIDA TEAM CHEVY QUALIFYING RECAP WITH QUOTES AND TRANSCRIPTS OCT. 24, 2020

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ST. PETERSBURG, FLA (OCT 24,2020) – Will Power did what Will Power does on the Streets of St. Petersburg—he won the NTT P1 Award. It is the ninth time for him on the 1.8-mile/14-turn temporary street course. Driving his familiar No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, Power posted a lap of a minute and 01.0369 seconds/106.165 MPH to capture his fifth pole of the season and 62nd of his career. Power now sits just five  behind all-time pole winner, Mario Andretti. Power’s pole is the 99th for Chevrolet in INDYCAR since the manufacturers return to competition in 2012. Pato O’Ward also power his Chevrolet into the Firestone Fast Six. The driver of the No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet will start six for th in tomorrow’s 100-lap race. Title contender Josef Newgarden qualified the No. 1 Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet in eight. His competition for a third title will start 11th. Remainder of the Firestone Fast Six are Alexander Rossi, Colton Herta, James Hinchcliffe and Jack Harvey. Schedule for tomorrow’s season finale is:  Sunday, Oct. 2510:40-11:10 a.m.: NTT INDYCAR SERIES warm-up, NBC Sports Gold2:27 p.m.: “Drivers, start your engines”2:30 p.m.: NBC on air2:32 p.m.: Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg (100 laps/180 miles), NBC (live) The NTT INDYCAR SERIES season finale will also broadcast live on Pennzoil INDYCAR Radio Network affiliates, Sirius 211, XM 205, IndyCar.com and on the INDYCAR Mobile app powered by NTT DATA. DRIVER QUOTES: WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, POLE WINNER:“It is so good to have Verizon back on the pole. Very, very good laps, both of the last two. The other guys had fre:sh tires so I thought okay we’ll see. We’ll see what they’ve got. I hustled the heck out of it. I was very very happy to get pole, I have the same approach everywhere I race, I lo7TH =ve my craft and try to get the max out of it. We are going to do our best to get a good race pace from the start and get Chevy in Victory Lane.” PATO O’WARD, NO. 5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 6TH: “The practice wasn’t great for us but we made our way back to the front part of the field during qualifying. The No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet is starting on the third row so we can try and win the race from there. It’s going to be tough to pass and pit stop wiST.ndows aren’t going to be as big as they used to be, because the race is ten laps shorter. I think if we have a good, consistent race and good pit stops, we should be in contention in the end.” SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 14 AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 7TH:  “A much better start to the weekend here in St. Petersburg compared to our starting positions obviously in Indy, so really proud of the group on the 14 car. It’s still touch and go, you never know what you’re going to get, but it all worked out today. We’ll get P7 out of qualifying and start there tomorrow so looking forward to it and thanks for everybody’s support.” JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 1 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 8TH: “I definitely had a lot of slides out there and just wasn’t clean. I think if we had put together one clean lap, it would have been enough to transfer. We just didn’t do the job. It makes out job for tomorrow a little harder, but we are still going to go for the win with the Hitachi Chevy boys! We can win from eighth, made it a little harder, but we can do it. I have full confidence that my Hitachi guys and Team Chevy have given us what we need.” RINUS VEEKAY, NO. 21 SONAX ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET QUALIFIED 9TH: “That was a little stressful between sessions! I had a really good lap to advance. In Round 2, I made a little correction in the las corner which cost me about a tenth of a second. I think I could have made it if that didn’t happen, but that’s racing! Starting 9th is still pretty good! I’m happy with the SONAX Chevy and I cannot wait to send it tomorrow.” OLIVER ASKEW,  NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 10TH: “I haven’t been in an Indy car in a bit over a month, so I was a bit rusty. But it was great to be back here at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. Big shoutout to everyone at INDYCAR and Green Savoree for making this event happen. To have it as a season finale is pretty incredible. It’s a home race for me, and I’ll have some family out here tomorrow that I hope to put on a good show for them and Arrow McLaren SP in my final race.” SIMON PAGENAUD, NO. 22 DXC TECHNOLOGY TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 12TH :“I’m sure happy. The Menards Chevrolet has been really good all day long. We’ve made some big improvement, which is encouraging for 2021. In that last session, Dixon was in front of me the whole run. So we were stuck behind him and I had to do my laps. I’ve just not been on the right side of the stick this year in qualifying. We had a car fast enough for the Fast Six no question, but Dixon was the slowest car on the track.” CONOR DALY, NO. 20 U.S. AIR FORCE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 14TH:  “Obviously an interesting qualifying session for us! We thought we were in, we didn’t know we were in, we didn’t know we were out and then we were out. We’re starting 14th which is okay. We need a little but more out of the car and I need to deliver the right information to help us get there. We can have a good day tomorrow, for sure. We just have to stay in the fight, move forward and use some good strategy. We have definitely made progress with the U.S. Air Force Chevrolet and I am looking forward to tomorrow!” CHARLIE KIMBALL, NO. 4 TRESIBA AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 20TH”: “It’s nice to be back with fans and nice to be back at St. Pete. It feels strange to be ending the season here and running our last qualifying of the year instead of our first qualifying of the year. It is nice to be back at a street circuit because that’s one of the places where INDYCAR really shines. Man, it’s really tight here at St. Pete. We were just within a couple tenths of advancing the No. 4 Tresiba Chevrolet into the top 12, I think it was something like .3 of a percent we were off – really small – but there is definitely room to improve the car and we’ll do that overnight and be ready to go racing tomorrow. There’s always a little bit of chaos that seems to happen here at St Pete and we’ll just be ready to take advantage of it.” SCOTT McLAUGHLIN, NO. 3 SHELL V-POWER NITRO+TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 21ST: “We were probably better than where we ended up. But I stuffed up my red tire lap – I just need to get used to the grip. It was nice in practice because I had a lot of black tire runs but only got one on the red and it was the same in qualifying. I’m not making any excuses, with a little more time we will be ok. I’m disappointed with myself, but it is what it is. It’s tough to learn on a road course and learning the space around you. I’m used to knocking mirrors off on a wall, not necessarily my tire. We are just pushing trying to find our limits in a fast forward motion. I just need to thank everyone with Shell V-Power Nitro, Team Penske and everyone. We will have a go at it tomorrow.” DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPTS:POLE WINNER WILL POWER TRANSCRIPTTHE MODERATOR: Will, it is your ninth pole at St. Pete, your 62nd pole overall in your career. You are now within five of tying Mario Andretti. It is your fifth pole of the year. Obviously a great day for you. Tell us about your run.WILL POWER: It was a typical very tough qualifying session, the first few rounds. Made some slight changes. The car wasn’t perfect at first. It does take a long time to turn on, so you could not do it like last year on your first lap. Your second and third lap are really the best laps on the tires. Kind of played around with that a little bit.Yeah, I mean, when I saw what Colton did on blacks in the first round, I saved some reds. I thought this is going to be really tough. But when I went out in the second round and made the car a bit better, made a mistake. I said, Okay, we’re kind of close. Then I went all out in the Fast Six to get the most out of the car. It was enough.Yeah, really, really happy with it. I thought we played it very well strategy-wise. Just very determined to win the race tomorrow, I really am. I really want to convert that pole into a win and finish on a high.I know we’re, what, whatever points away from Colton. It will be nice to be third in the championship, but for me it’s more about finishing with a win. I’ll be aggressive to do that. We’ll see how we go. Q. We heard from Alex Rossi, he talked about the physicality of what it was like out there doing several laps. Looking at tomorrow’s race, very hot, very physical, what do you have to do tonight to prepare yourself for that challenge tomorrow?WILL POWER: Yeah, I mean, you’ve got to hydrate very well. I think I would consider adding that scoop to the top of the roll. I think it’s actually a drag, a downforce loss. It does hurt the performance a bit, but it gets so hot in there, so physical, I just wonder if physically you’d be way better off with it. Maybe I’ll try that in warmup tomorrow.Q. I know you want to win the race. Of course you have a teammate that wants to win a championship. If for some reason Scott Dixon is way down in the line, Josef is only one position away from getting a championship, has that ever crossed your mind what you might do?WILL POWER: Yeah, it has. I mean, obviously if that’s the situation, I would let him go.Q. Next year you’re going to have a teammate from New Zealand, Scott McLaughlin. Being your two countries are close together, any rivalry?WILL POWER: I’m sure that he wants to come in and beat me and everyone else because he’s a tough competitor. But he’s a lot younger, he has a pretty good future ahead of him. He’s in the right team. I think he’ll do real well, I really do.Yeah, I mean, no different to the rivalry that I have with Scott Dixon. He’s a Kiwi, too, yeah.Q. You’re only five poles away from Mario Andretti. What would that mean to you if you were able to break that record? That’s stood for a long time.WILL POWER: That would mean a lot. That would be a great achievement for me personally, to be up there with a name like Mario Andretti. It’s something that I just love about racing, is when you get to absolutely get the most out of the car in one lap. That’s qualifying.To be at the top of the list for that would almost sum up my career, I guess, as far as being the speed that I have, maybe not the championships. Certainly a lot of race wins, as well.Q. You’re now back to a four-car team. How do you kind of look at that, how it’s going to play out with a new guy coming in?WILL POWER: Yeah, I mean, we’ve obviously been there before. It’s more information. Obviously Scott is going to be in a learning year, kind of understanding qualifying, how the races go. I think this will give him a good head start this weekend.Yeah, I feel like it’s four pretty strong drivers. I mean, yeah, I’ve been there before. I know how it is. Engineering office gets pretty busy. Yeah, should be good.Q. You’re going to get some old favorites back from a crew side coming from the IMSA side. How important will that be to have them back with an INDYCAR program?WILL POWER: Yeah, it’s actually a good influx of really good people. It will just help on the engineering side of things. Obviously you’ve got a bigger crew to pick from as far as crews.Yeah, all positives really when you add another car.Q. What is your karting schedule going to look like this season?WILL POWER: Karting? I was going to race a club race next weekend but then I realized I’m testing a couple days after, so probably shouldn’t risk it. Yeah, I love the karting. No Vegas this year, unfortunately. They called that off.Q. Where is your mindset in terms of this being the last race of the year with the circumstances of how this season has gone with COVID? What would it mean for you to finish on a strong note this weekend?WILL POWER: It would be amazing to win the last race of the season, it really would. It would really make this year worthwhile for me. I would feel very good about it. Get to go on vacation feeling good about the finish of the year.Super determined about converting the pole into a win. Obviously circumstances are going to play out. I’ll do the best job I can. That’s all I can do. See if we can get the car well so it lasts really well over a stint.Yeah, that’s the plan. It’s been a trying season, I’ll have to say, the beginning of it. We’re knocking on the door every weekend, so we have to, we have to come into next year with very solid pit stops and solid races and we have to get ourselves in a championship position so we’re not in a hole having to dig ourselves out the whole way. It’s just been too many years we’ve done that.That’s a huge focus of mine going into next year.THE MODERATOR: We’ll let Will Power go and focus for tomorrow’s race.CHAMPIONSHIP CONTENDER JOSEF NEWGARDEN TRANSCIPTTHE MODERATOR: Thank you for joining us. We are at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg post qualifying video conference. We are joined by Josef Newgarden.Josef, qualifying didn’t work out the way you wanted, but you’ll start eighth, three spaces ahead of Scott Dixon, who you’re chasing in the championship chase tomorrow. Tell us how your qualifying went and what your expectations are for tomorrow.JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Certainly not what we wanted on our side. I felt like we took a swing for Q2. Our Q1 run was pretty good. I was pretty happy with it for the most part. Felt like we chipped away on the next couple runs, a couple things to get us more competitive. Felt like we were there, but we just wanted to probably be aggressive and try to get even further up. I think we ended up probably going the wrong way with our adjustments.Kind of a scrappy qualifying in Q2. Unfortunately that puts us eighth. Not a terrible spot to start, but not where we wanted. We wanted to be closer to the front, top three, top five group.A little more work to do for tomorrow, but feel positive about our Hitachi car, think Team Chevy has done a good job this weekend. Good confidence that we have something to attack with.THE MODERATOR: We’ll take questions for Josef.Q. How happy are you to have Will Power up front? Being a bit of a rear gunner for you as you make your way to the front of the field.JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I don’t know that it’s really relevant for us. I mean, we needed to be up front on a day like today. He did a great job. I felt like we were capable of being up there, too. Not sure I feel really one way or the other about him being up there. It was more about we needed to be up there.I don’t think he can help us from that position, nothing like that. We just got to put our work in for tomorrow now.Q. Case of every man for himself tomorrow?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I don’t know that Will is going to be able to help us do anything when we’re sitting eighth. That’s just the way it goes.Q. In terms of the race tomorrow, is it going flat out, see what happens?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, we need to look at everything. I’m not sure yet what our plan will be. I think it will be a pretty aggressive race for most people as far as running pretty hard on fuel. I don’t think you’ll see a ton of fuel save. But there’s options there, big options. We’ll see what everyone decides to do at the end of the day.Q. How do you think Scott McLaughlin got on?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Really good. Obviously first qualifying session for him. Not a lot of track time. I thought he was really good in the first session, seemed to adapt quick. I don’t know, I haven’t seen his run. I don’t even know what happened in qualifying. Could have been a lot of different things that pushed him back.He’s going to be just fine. Just him getting going today.Q. In regards to what happened out there today, was it a direction that you went in with the team that went the wrong way or do you feel maybe a lack of running on Fridays may have contributed today?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: No, we had a really poor Q2 right from the jump of Q2. On the black tires I was half a second slower than I was in Q1. The adjustments that we did in between didn’t seem to really pan out.It’s disappointing. I think if we just had our form for Q1, we would have been okay. We took a swing at it and it was the wrong way to go. It’s one of those deals. You try sometimes, sometimes you try the wrong way.Q. In regards to the whole weekend, do you like the two-day weekend or would you want something longer?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I love the three-day weekends personally. I’ve always enjoyed that. For me, I do enjoy more days. Also for the process of how you work, your kind of workflow of sifting through information, the way you prepare to roll into a weekend, how you kind of manage an event, I’ve always liked the three-day format.If we don’t ever go back to that, it’s not a big deal. We’ll adapt, run this way. I think we’ve been okay on this format this year for the most part. If I had a preference, I like the three day, but we’ll see what ends up getting decided for the future.Q. I want to know what is the mindset that you will use now? You have to reset everything? How do you focus on your goal?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Same as always. If this was any other weekend, we’d be doing the same thing. It’s disappointing we qualified eighth, but it’s not the worst position. We have a little more work to do. We’re going to focus on what strategy we can implement, being good at the start, manage a really good race that hopefully can produce a win. It’s as simple as that. We’re going to treat the as any other.Q. Do you think it’s something about the yellow flags always happens in the race could help you?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It would be beautiful if it helped us for once. We have not had help from yellows this year. But it is possible. You can have a yellow ruin your race, you can a yellow really help your race. Tomorrow if a yellow flag decides to help us, I’m not going to complain about it. I think it would be good for some payback for the year.Q. Do you go in with an aggressive strategy? Do you expect Scott to go with a very conservative strategy?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Hard to say with Dixon what they’ll do. For us, I think we’ll treat it as normal when we’re trying to win a race. We try to win every race. I don’t know how to spin it differently. We do the same thing every time.We’re going to focus on what’s the best strategy for us with where we’re sitting in eighth. How can we manage the race better than the people around us with the fuel usage, all that. When is the right time to push and not push.I don’t think it will be more aggressive or less aggressive than what we normally are. We’re just going to try to charge the front. It would have been nice to be in the top three, top five. Top eight, we’re not too far back. It just makes it a little bit harder.Q. What were you thinking during the lengthy delay while they sorted out the scoring?JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It was painful. It was hard to understand what was going on. Yeah, we were just sitting there waiting. I still don’t know a lot of details. I know they were kind of working through yellow flags and penalties, all that stuff. It was a long wait, that’s all it was for everybody.

Alexander Rossi qualifies second in St. Petersburg for final INDYCAR race of 2020
Honda’s Colton Herta, Jack Harvey and James Hinchcliffe also advance to the “Fast Six” final qualifying round
Championship leader Scott Dixon to start 11th

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (Oct. 24, 2020) – Alexander Rossi and Andretti Autosport led the way for Honda today in qualifying for Sunday’s Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, final race in the 14-round 2020 NTT INDYCAR Series season.

Rossi’s fast lap was just over a tenth of a second off the pole-winning time of Will Power, while his Andretti Autosport teammate, Colton Herta, will start third. Meyer Shank Racing’s Jack Harvey qualified fourth, with James Hinchcliffe making it four Hondas in the top five in his Andretti Autosport machine.

Championship leader Scott Dixon, who can clinch his sixth INDYCAR title tomorrow, will start 11th, as Honda also seeks its ninth, and third consecutive, Manufacturers’ Championship. Sunday’s championship-determining, 100-lap Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, starts at 2:30 p.m. EDT, with live network television coverage on NBC.

Alexander Rossi (Andretti Autosport Honda) second-fastest qualifier: “I think we got better in every round of qualifying. We started the weekend strong in practice, so I think that’s a huge difference maker on these weekends when you only have the one practice session. It’s a really good effort for the team to do the ‘off-line’ [pre-race setup] development – we haven’t been to a street course yet this year, so for Honda and Andretti Autosport to have three cars in the top six is a testament to that. I think we just have to keep chipping away at it and we’re in a good position to go and get that first win [of 2020] tomorrow.”

Steve ‘Baggsy’ Biagioni and the SB Motorsport team had the chance to

showcase drifting at the highest level.

Goodwood Motor Circuit set the stage last weekend for their 2020 stopgap
event from the Festival of Speed, named Goodwood Speedweek. Baggsy
coming back to Goodwood for his 5th consecutive year, he was ready to bring

the smoke show for the fans.

Speedweek brings the greatest elements of the Festival of
Speed and Revival, combined into one unmissable online event. Broadcast
over all 3 days live on YouTube and ITV/ITV4 television channels, reaching

millions at home.

Usually hosted at the Goodwood Estate, Festival Of Speed see’s over
300,000 visitors over the four day event. Plus the livestream reaches millions
of viewers worldwide, so the new Speedweek layout was set to be huge!
Wednesday the 14th, the team arrived early to Goodwood to create their set
for the 5th instalment of the Mission CTRL: Navara R Livestream, coming to
you live from the second floor of the Jackie Stewart Pavilion, inside the circuit.
With over 100,000 collective views already, we were stoked to be able to
bring you closer to the action before the Speedweek event even kicked off!
If you missed it, you can check out the livestream using the link below.
There was no question to what vehicle Baggsy should bring to the event.. it
had to be the fire breathing #LSXR35, fitted with the Liberty Walk V2
bodykit, LSXR V8 engine and Rotiform LHR wheels wrapped
with Accelera PHI 2 tyres, ready to be smoked.

Thursday 15th, Media day. All the Driftkhana drivers were asked to participate
in an on track media shoot, where the Goodwood media team created
awesome tracking content for their promotional intro video for the event. It
was cool to see the variety of machines all on track at once!
Over the duration of the weekend, three ‘Driftkhana’ sessions were
scheduled for drivers to showcase their skill on an all new
custom Drift and Gymkhana style circuit layout, split into two catagories –

RWD & AWD.

Drivers list below:

Rear Wheel Drive:
Steve ‘Baggsy’ Biagioni
Martin Richards
James Deane
Axel Hildebrand
George Barclay
Kevin Quinn
Paul Smith
All Wheel Drive:
Vaughn Gittin Jr
Rhys Yates
Manfred Stohl

For all the weekend highlights, check out the official Goodwood Road and
Racing Youtube, alternatively if you don’t feel like watching through all 8 hours
of livestream – you can watch the Driftkhana highlights below.
“The Driftkhana may appear to be the ultimate hooliganism, with lots of tyre
squeal and clouds of smoke, but the precision required for a winning score is

off the scale.”

Sunoco UK were also in attendance at Goodwood Speedweek, keeping us

fuelled and ready for the event ahead.

On the Sunday and straight after the track action, Baggsy was asked for an
interview by Goodwood themselves, at the Racecourse Members Club. This
was huge, considering the only other interview that day was Sir Jackie

Stewart.

Check out Baggsys YouTube for his Speedweek vlogs, and many more

videos.

“From 16 – 18 October 2020, we ran a new, one-time-only interactive
entertainment experience, behind-closed-doors. We may not have been able
to welcome the typical crowds of thousands to the Festival of Speed or the
Revival, but millions of fans still experienced the virtual thrills of SpeedWeek
by streaming the event from home. Dermot O’Leary, Rory Reid, Siân
Welby and Mark Webber presented the live stream, which was filled with
wheel-to-wheel racing in some of the world’s most valuable and historic cars,
fast-paced feats and extraordinary celebrations, with celebrities joining to host

special moments from around the world.”

Baggsy – “What a fantastic event! Massive thank you to all involved, the staff,
marshals, media and the amazing fans. It’s an honour to be back at

Goodwood putting on a show for you guys with the new custom Driftkhana

layout on the circuit “

⁣

“It’s been an awesome weekend drifting with my good friends, meeting new
drivers and teams, even being able to talk tech about vehicles i’d never even

dreamed of being around.”

“Hopefully we’ll be back next year on the hillclimb for 2021 Festival of Speed.

But for now, it’s been awesome!”
www. baggsyboy.com

TEAM CHEVY ADVANCE AUTO TRADER ECHO PARK AUTOMOTIVE 500 TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY OCTOBER 25, 2020

TEXAS: RACE #34With just two more chances for drivers to secure their spot in the Championship Four, the Playoff battle heightens as NASCAR’S three national series head to Texas Motor Speedway for race two of three of the Playoffs’ Round of Eight. The NASCAR Cup Series (NCS) 334-lap, 501-mile Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500 at the 1.5-mile Texas oval will be the second appearance by NASCAR’s premier series thus far this season and the 34th stop on the tour’s schedule. The weekend’s event will mark the NCS’s 40th race at Texas Motor Speedway, with Richard Childress Racing and Team Chevy’s, Austin Dillon, returning as the most recent NCS winner at the track’s July event earlier this season. 
It’s a jam-packed two-day event in the Lone Star State, with three NASCAR Playoff races over two days of action. The weekend gets started with an appearance by the NASCAR Xfinity Series with the O’Reilly Auto Parts 300 on Saturday, October 24th, at 4:30 p.m. ET. Day two of events consists of a rare NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series and NASCAR Cup Series doubleheader, starting with the SpeedyCash.com 400 for the NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series on Sunday, October 25th, at 12:00 p.m. ET. The day is capped off with the NASCAR Cup Series Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500 at 3:30 p.m. ET. 
Fans will have the opportunity to view Sunday’s Playoff doubleheader action in-person. The July NASCAR Cup Series event at the Texas Motor Speedway was the first major league sporting event in the state of Texas to be open to spectators since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. 
ROUND OF EIGHT: RACE TWO  Since the track’s addition into the Playoff schedule during the 2005 season, Texas Motor Speedway has been the host of the eighth race in the 10-race stretch. The 1.5-mile Texas oval is one of only two tracks that have been positioned as the eighth event, joining Phoenix Raceway (2004).  With three Team Chevy drivers in the Round of Eight fighting for a position in the Championship Four, here are where the Team Chevy drivers currently sit in the Playoff standings going into the second of three races, including key statistics at Texas Motor Speedway:  Chase Elliott, No. 9 Hooters Give a Hoot Camaro ZL1 1LE – 5th in Standings (4,074 points)Victories: 3 (Charlotte Motor Speedway, Daytona Road Course, Charlotte Road Course)Top-Fives: 13; Top-10’s: 20; Laps Led: 858; Average Finish: 12.1Stage Wins: 9At Texas: Top-Five’s: 2; Top-10’s: 5; Average Finish: 11.111 (fifth-best) Alex Bowman, No. 88 Acronis Camaro ZL1 1LE – 6th in Standings (4,055 points)Victories: 1 (Auto Club Speedway)Top-Fives: 5; Top-10’s: 13; Laps Led: 396; Average Finish: 15.2Stage Wins: 4 At Texas: Top-Five’s: 1; Top-10’s: 1; Average Finish: 25.6 Kurt Busch, No. 1 Monster Energy Camaro ZL1 1LE – 8th in Standings (4,009 points)Victories: 1 (Las Vegas Motor Speedway)Top-Fives: 6; Top-10’s: 17; Laps Led: 142; Average Finish: 13.9Stage Wins: 1 At Texas: Wins: 1; Top-Five’s: 3; Top-10’s: 22; Average Finish: 14.5.16 BOWTIE BULLETS:·       Victories by active Team Chevy drivers at Texas Motor Speedway include:Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Ally Designed by Noah Sweet Camaro ZL1 1LE, with 7 wins (2007, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 sweep and 2017)Matt Kenseth, No. 42 McDonald’s Camaro ZL1 1LE with 2 wins (2002 and 2011)Kurt Busch, No. 1 Monster Energy Camaro ZL1, with one win (2009)Austin Dillon, No. 3 DOW Sullair Camaro ZL1 1LE, with one win (2020)
·       Of the 173 drivers that have competed in a NASCAR Cup Series event at Texas Motor Speedway, Chip Ganassi Racing and Chevrolet Driver, Kurt Busch, leads the series in starts with 35 in his career. 
·       25 different NASCAR Cup Series drivers have sat on the pole at Texas Motor Speedway, with Chip Ganassi Racing and Chevrolet driver, Kurt Busch, leading the series with three (Spring 2015, Playoffs 2017, Spring 2018). His 2017 and 2018 NCS Busch Pole Awards make him just one of three drivers to win consecutive poles at the track. Of the four different manufacturers to win a pole at the 1.5-mile Texas oval, Chevrolet leads the way with 15. 
·       Chevrolet has made 14 trips to victory lane in NASCAR’s Premier Series at Texas Motor Speedway. Other statistics of note for the bowtie brand’s history at the 1.5-mile oval include 70 top-five’s, 165 top-10’s and 4,292 laps led.
·       Chevrolet team, Hendrick Motorsports, leads the NASCAR Cup Series pole award and win categories, with seven poles and nine trips to victory lane. 
·       Through the 10-race NASCAR Cup Series Playoff stretch thus far, Hendrick Motorsports Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman lead the way in top-10 finishes with five each. 
·       Heading into his final race in his full-time NASCAR Cup Series career at Texas Motor Speedway, Hendrick Motorsports and Chevrolet driver, Jimmie Johnson, tops the leaderboard in a variety of categories in his 34 career starts:o  Johnson leads the series in victories at Texas Motor Speedway with seven (2007, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 sweep, 2017). o  Johnson is one of just three NASCAR Cup Series drivers to score consecutive wins at the 1.5-mile Texas oval. o  Johnson leads the series in runner-up finishes at Texas Motor Speedway with five, top-five finishes with 16 and top-10 finishes with 22. o  Johnson leads the series in number of laps led at Texas Motor Speedway with 1,152, giving him a laps led percentage of 10.6% at the track throughout his NASCAR Cup Series career. 
LOOKING TO GO BACK-TO-BACKThe NASCAR Cup Series returns to the 1.5-mile Texas oval for the second time this season. Earlier this season, Team Chevy saw its fourteenth trip to victory lane at Texas Motor Speedway when Austin Dillon scored his first-career victory at the track in his No. 3 Camaro ZL1 1LE. The win was celebrated by his teammate, Tyler Reddick, No. 8 Camaro ZL1 1LE, who posted a Cup Series career-best second place finish in his series debut at the track. It was the first time since the 2011 Talladega event that Richard Childress Racing finished 1-2 in NASCAR’s premier series. 
STARTING LINE-UP:For the remainder of the 2020 NCS season, the starting lineups will be determined by a competition-based formula, combining the following metrics from the previous race event: 15% of a fastest lap time position, 25% of the driver’s final race finish position, 25% of the owner’s final race position and 35% of the Owner points position.  Here are Team Chevy’s top-20 starters for Sunday’s Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500: 4th      Chase Elliott, No. 9 Hooters Give a Hoot Camaro ZL1 1LE5th      Alex Bowman, No. 88 Acronis Camaro ZL1 1LE8th      Kurt Busch, No. 1 Monster Energy Camaro ZL1 1LE11th    William Byron, No. 24 Liberty University Camaro ZL1 1LE12th    Austin Dillon, No. 3 DOW Sullair Camaro ZL1 1LE18th    Bubba Wallace, No. 43 Door Dash Camaro ZL1 1LE19th    Tyler Reddick, No. 8 Clark Pipeline Services Camaro ZL1 1LE TUNE-IN:NBCSN will telecast the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 50 at Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday, October 25th, at 3:30 p.m. ET. Live coverage of the 501-mile, 334-lap event for race two of three for the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs Round of 8 can also be found on the NBC Sports Gold app, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90. 
QUOTABLE QUOTES:CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 HOOTERS GIVE A HOOT CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 5th IN STANDINGS“Texas is just a different animal since the repave and I feel like we had some great runs there. I love going to Texas before they repaved it and just felt like I had a nice feel of the racetrack and I knew what I wanted. It was a very, kind of natural thing for me for whatever reason. I kind of lucked into that I guess, but man after the repave it’s been a struggle. I feel like it’s one of our worst tracks as a team and Texas is a bad place to struggle because if you make it to the Round of 8 it’s a track that seems like it’s always right there at the tail end of the season. It’s an important track to have a good performance at that can propel you to a potential final four run. Those types of struggles at a track like that, where it falls in the playoffs is not ideal so I hope we can get a little better out there.” ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 ACRONIS CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 6th IN STANDINGS“We had a good run in Kansas last weekend and captured stage points which is what we needed to do. The points don’t look good in our situation, so we really need to go to Texas and have a strong car from the start. Hendrick Motorsports’ Intermediate program is definitely strong, and I know that this No. 88 team has been working hard on our Texas Camaro. Last time Acronis was on our car we ran really well in Dover, so hopefully we can get the job done for them this weekend.” AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 DOW SULLAIR CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 10th IN STANDINGSTELL US ABOUT RACING AT TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY AND HOW IT DIFFERS FROM OTHER 1.5-MILE TRACKS, SUCH AS KANSAS SPEEDWAY? “Texas Motor Speedway is a bit different from Kansas Speedway in that it has two different ends. You have one end that’s very banked and has high speeds, and then you have a hard end where you have to get turned and get back on the gas. Texas Motor Speedway just has so much grip now. It’s quite a bit different, and the banking has changed a lot from the old track to the new track. I really like Texas and am looking forward to getting there. Our cars have been strong on 1.5-mile tracks this year, and we will look to some of that speed to try and get the No. 3 DOW Sullair Chevy into Victory Lane.” YOU WON AT TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY IN JULY. HOW DOES THAT CHANGE YOUR MINDSET GOING INTO THE RACE THIS WEEKEND? “I think our team remains just as hungry as ever to get back to Victory Lane. My RCR team has been really strong on mile-and-a-half tracks this season, and I know that we have everything we need to try and back up our performance from July. We’re going to attack from the opening green flag.”
WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 12th IN STANDINGS“With both ends of Texas being different you have to find a compromise some on your handling instead of focusing on one set of turns over the other. I think in (turns) 3 and 4, speed makes the biggest difference through there. When you’re in (turns) 1 and 2 it’s more about the handling of your car but still having good speed out of 2 so you can get down the backstretch and set up your entry to turn 3 with a good pace. It’s a lot different of a race track than we’re used to and compared to how it was. Now it’s very unique and makes for an interesting challenge especially as the race progresses.” JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY DESIGNED BY NOAH SWEET CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 18th IN STANDINGS“The biggest change at Texas over the years is new reconfiguration. The new asphalt has made the racing more single file. I love how supportive the market is of the racing venue – I love the Dallas, Fort Worth area, we have really good friends there and usually our stay is extended. The best memory I have is when I was able to duel with Matt Kenseth. Matt and I had nothing to gain, I knew I had a good car and so I went after it knowing Matt would race me clean and he wouldn’t make a mistake. It was certainly an exciting finish and although Matt probably didn’t like the outcome, it was one of my most memorable battles for a win.” TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 CLARK PIPELINE SERVICES CAMARO ZL1 1LE – 19th IN STANDINGSWHAT IS THE BIGGEST LESSON YOU TOOK AWAY FROM TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY EARLIER THIS YEAR WHEN RCR FINISHED 1-2? “Well, the way we went about that race is now out in the open and everyone knows how we did it, so I’m not sure that strategy will work when we go back this weekend. We’ll have to come up with something a little different this time. Texas is going to be a little bit like Kansas in the way that you have to take all the track position you can get and not make mistakes. The people you pass once are going to then understand where you were better than they were, so if you have to pass them a second time around they’ll know how to defend against you. That’s what makes it so hard racing in the Cup Series. Everyone is so smart about it. We’re going to need a really solid race in our No. 8 Clark Pipeline Services Chevrolet to be able to grab a good finish this weeke

CHEVROLET RACING IN THE NTT INDYCAR SERIES FIRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF ST. PETERSBURG TREETS OF ST. PETERSBURG, FLORIDA TEAM CHEVY ADVANCE WITH QUOTES OCT. 24-25, 2020

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RACE 14 AND FINAL OF 2020 NTT INDYCAR SERIES: DETROIT (Oct. 23, 2020) — After almost a seven-and-a-half-month wait, the Chevrolet powered teams and drivers in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES face the challenges of the 1.8-mile, 14-turn St. Petersburg temporary street circuit for the final race of the 2020 season. Team Chevy driver and reigning series champion Josef Newgarden, No. 1 Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet, sits 32 points down to Scott Dixon in his pursuit of a third title. While Newgarden is facing a challenge to overcome the difference, it is not out of the realm of possibility for the Nashville native.  “Feeling good. Ready to go,” said Newgarden, who has recorded three victories. “I feel like we’re definitely prepped and ready to rock for the weekend. Just going there to try to win the race. That’s really all I can do. “I love on the fact sheet, I saw this put out, it was like 20,000 scenarios, 1% of the scenarios means we can win the championship. You’re saying there’s a chance and that’s all we need. It’s going to be an exciting weekend. We’ll see how it shakes out. We’re just going to go into our thing, see where everything lands at the end of it.” Newgarden has the history on the streets of St. Pete to back up his confidence. In 2019, he started second on the grid and won the race. In eight starts, he has stood on the podium twice. He has finished 86% of the possible laps, and led several times for 60 laps. Meanwhile, Rinus VeeKay, No. 21 Sonax Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet, will clinch the INDYCAR Rookie of the Year Award by taking the green flag for the 100-lap/180-mile race. The title is the first for Ed Carpenter Racing, and only the third for Chevrolet since the award began in 1979, the previous two coming in 1990 and 1992. A first-time addition to the Chevrolet team roster will be three-time Australian SuperCar Champion Scott McLaughlin, No. 3 Shell V-Power Nitro+ Chevrolet from the Team Penske stable. After testing at Circuit of the Americas in the spring, McLaughlin was ready to make his debut much earlier in the season. But the COVID-19 pandemic forced his schedule to be substantially altered. FAN VIEWING AND LISTENINGNBC Sports Gold livestreaming: Saturday’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice session at 10:55 a.m.ET and Firestone Fast Six qualifying at 3:05 p.m.ET will stream live on INDYCAR Pass on NBC Sports Gold, NBC Sports direct-to-consumer livestreaming product. Qualifying will also broadcast tape-delayed on NBCSN at 8:00 p.m. ET Sunday pre-race warm-up will stream live NBC Sports Gold starting at 10:40 a,m, ET. The race will broadcast live on NBC at 2:30 p.m. ET Sunday, Octoer 25. Pennzoil INDYCAR Radio Network broadcasts: All NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice, qualifying and races are broadcast live on Pennzoil INDYCAR Radio Network affiliates, Sirius 211, XM 205, IndyCar.com and on the INDYCAR Mobile app powered by NTT DATA.  AT-TRACK SCHEDULE (ALL TIMES LOCAL)Saturday, Oct. 2410:55 a.m.-12:55 p.m.: NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice #1, NBC Sports Gold3-4:20 p.m.: Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg qualifying (Three rounds of knockout qualifications), NBC Sports Gold (live); NBCSN (Tape delayed at 8 p.m.)4:25 p.m.: NTT P1 Award Presentation (pit lane)Sunday, Oct. 2510:40-11:10 a.m.: NTT INDYCAR SERIES warm-up, NBC Sports Gold2:27 p.m.: “Drivers, start your engines”2:30 p.m.: NBC on air2:32 p.m.: Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg (100 laps/180 miles), NBC (live) BOWTIE BULLETS: Chevrolet drivers have won six of the eight races held on the Streets of St. Petersburg since 2012 – Josef Newgarden won in 2019, and picked the win in tthe Indy Lights Series in 2011Josef Newgarden is second in points, 32 points behind leader; Will Power is fourth in the standings, Pato O’Ward is fifth in points, and Simon Pagenaud is eighth in the standingsOliver Askew will return to the No. 7 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet, Sebastien Bourdais will be in the No. 14 AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet and Scott McLaughlin in the No.3 Shell V-Power Nitro+ Team Penske Chevrolet Power is the second all-time INDYCAR pole winner with 61 (behind only Mario Andretti with 67).Rinus VeeKay won the St. Pete Indy Lights race 2019, and Pato O’Ward won the Indy Lights race in 2018Since returning to INDYCAR manufacturer competition in 2012, Chevrolet has amassed 88 wins in 148 races—59.4% along with six Manufacturer Championships and six driver championships. Bowtie drivers have earned 98 poles and started in the No. 1 position on the INDYCAR grid 103 times QUOTABLE QUOTES: ROB BUCKNER, CHEVROLET RACING ENGINEERING PROGRAM MANAGER FOR THE NTT INDYCAR SERIES:  “We made it to the finale. It has been an at times difficult season, but also have had some very rewarding results. We head to the Streets of St. Pete with Josef Newgarden fighting hard for another championship, and Rinus VeeKay ready to clinch the INDYCAR Rookie-of-the-Year title. I am so proud of the cooperative efforts from our technical partners and all of the Chevrolet powered teams to keep moving the ball forward through some trying moments, logistical difficulties and always following the strictest of protocols to keep everyone as safe as possible during this pandemic. We are all looking forward to the positive possibilities ahead in 2021.” FROM THE COCKPIT: JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 1 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET:  “It really all comes down to this weekend. It’s been a year where the No. 1 Hitachi Chevrolet and our team have been through a lot, from success to dealing with mistakes to just the victim of bad timing. But none of that matters headed into this weekend. We either win the championship or we don’t. My Hitachi Chevy team has put everything they have into this season, and they plan to keep working hard through the race weekend. It’s going to certainly be a tough battle with Scott Dixon this weekend because he has been so strong and consistent all year. We can’t afford to make mistakes, so strategy and execution will be critical. We feel really good with the momentum we have right now, but you can never count out a guy like Dixon. I’m also excited that Scott McLaughlin will be joining us this weekend for his first-ever INDYCAR race. He was so fast at the spring training test at COTA earlier this year, so it’s going to be really great to see how he does in the mix for a race.” SCOTT McLAUGHLIN, NO. 3 SHELL V-POWER NITRO+TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET: “I’m super pumped to finally get a crack at my first INDYCAR race. Feels like it’s been years since I was part of spring training, but due to COVID-19, we had to hold off. But hey, sometimes the best things are definitely worth the wait. It’s a dream come true to be running an INDYCAR race for Team Penske and Roger (Penske), especially coming off of such a successful Supercars season. I’ve been trying to get to know my team as well as possible virtually for a few months now, so it’s been great being able to see everyone in person and work with them. I spent some time last week running in the simulator as much as I could and spent some time at the race shop, as well, to prepare for this weekend. It was a quick turnaround from Bathurst since I flew to Charlotte immediately after, so I’ve definitely been moving at a fast but really exciting pace just to get to this weekend. The Shell V-Power Nitro+ Chevy team is such a talented group, so I feel like I’m going to be a quick study and learn a lot really fast.” CHARLIE KIMBALL, NO. 4 TRESIBA AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET: “I’m excited for the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg as we got some good preseason running at Sebring on the street circuit tire, so we have a baseline to evolve heading to Florida. To succeed, we are going to have to maximize that baseline and follow the track as it rubbers in during practice. It’s hard to pass and while qualifying is always important, it becomes critical on a street circuit. Having had experience with the car and me all year, the team at AJ Foyt Racing has been working hard to make sure we finish the year on a high note. Typically, as the first race of the year, St. Pete usually feels a bit like the first day of school, but this year it’s going to be where INDYCAR crowns a champion and be the last day of school!” PATO O’WARD, NO. 5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET: “I’ve been waiting for the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg for a while. It’s a venue that I really enjoy going to, not only because the track is cool but because the whole city is very enjoyable, as well. I’m really looking forward to closing out the season with a strong result. I want to thank everyone involved who made my first full season in INDYCAR an incredible one: everyone at the Arrow McLaren SP, Arrow Electronics, McLaren, INDYCAR, Chevrolet, all of our other amazing partners, and most importantly — the fans.” OLIVER ASKEW,  NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET:“I appreciate all the support Arrow McLaren SP has given me through this difficult time. I would like to thank Dr. Billows and the INDYCAR Medical Team, as well as Dr. Collins and the UPMC Sports Medicine Concussion Program, for their advice and care, which allowed me to take the time I needed to fully recover and prepare for the NTT INDYCAR SERIES finale. I’m looking forward to a strong finish to the season in St. Pete.”WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET:“Indianapolis was incredible. Winning the pole and the race just brought so much good energy to the Verizon Chevy team. It’s a shame we had so much bad luck and made some mistakes earlier this season, but we’ve been getting stronger since Mid-Ohio, and I think the team has really come together. We’ve been out of contention for the championship for a few races now, so we are fully focused on just getting more race wins. St. Pete is such a technical street course, so it can be really fun to race. Actually, it will end up being the only street race we raced on in 2020. We’ve had some races this year with fans, and I’m glad we’ll have a good number of fans back at St. Pete. I’m also looking forward to Scott McLaughlin joining us to race at St. Pete. He’s been working hard preparing for the weekend while also having just won another Supercars championship in Australia. He was really fast at the COTA test, so I think he will be really strong this weekend even though it’s his first INDYCAR race. It’s really going to be a fun weekend.” SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 14 AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET: “Quite excited for the Firestone GP here in St. Pete, as it’s always great to run in front of friends and family at home. It’s definitely a race that we’re quite a bit better prepared for than the Harvest Indy GP but still kind of keeping the expectations in check. You never know what comes around the corner. I hope what we learned about the No. 14 Chevrolet at Sebring will transfer well for the St. Pete track. We’re looking forward to a good weekend. The weather’s going to be nice, and we’ll keep learning and hope to have some good successes.” CONOR DALY, NO. 20 U.S. AIR FORCE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET: “It’s pretty hard to believe my first street course with Ed Carpenter Racing will be in October. It has been a decade since I last won in St. Pete in the Pro Mazda championship, which is wild to think about. Love the track, love the city, love the event. We obviously want to finish strong for the U.S. Air Force, Chevrolet and all of the incredible people that have worked so hard for us all year long. I’m very excited to get down there and get going.” RINUS VEEKAY, NO. 21 SONAX ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET: “It will be so nice to come back to St. Petersburg. We are finally returning after being there earlier this year, but we were not able to race. Hopefully, I can secure my Rookie of the Year title; it will be a very nice achievement. I am really looking forward to the race. First street course race of the season as the last race, that’s very cool. I’ve always had good races in St. Pete in the Road to Indy, and I cannot wait to hustle around there with an Indy car.” SIMON PAGENAUD, NO. 22 DXC TECHNOLOGY TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET:“I cannot wait for St. Petersburg. First off, we are ecstatic to host our fans back at the racetrack and continue to give them the best racing there is. We finished on a high note in Indianapolis GP with my No. 22 Menards Chevy crew being fastest on pit lane on day one and collecting the fastest lap of Race 2. The new weekend format has been very difficult, with less practice and less chances to get the right balance on the car. I’m ready to take on the challenge again with spirit. St. Petersburg is a street course that I really enjoy, as street courses are my specialty. We will give a 100 percent and attempt to execute on the last race weekend of 2020.” MAX CHILTON, NO. 59 GALLAGHER CARLIN CHEVROLET: “It’s crazy to think that we’re heading back to St. Pete, where it all started, to finish out the 2020 season. I love racing on the streets of St. Petersburg, and I’m so thankful that everyone at INDYCAR and the track could work together insuch a difficult situation to bring us back for the finale. It’s a really physical track and the race itself is so demanding, but then at the end of the day, the Firestone Grand Prix is always a great one, not only for us as drivers but also for the fans watching at home and in person. We’ve made some big strides forward as a team, and I’m really hoping we can close out this season with a top-10 finish.” Chevrolet INDYCAR Series Statistics Chevrolet has recorded six NTT IndyCar Series Manufacturer Championships since returning to manufacturer competition in 2012.Chevrolet earned six consecutive CART Manufacturers’ Cup championships from 1988-93.Chevrolet has recorded 12 driver championships, including four in the past five years and six total since returning to INDYCAR competition in 2012 with the2.2 liter V6 twin turbocharged direct injected engineChevrolet has recorded 198 wins in Indy-style racing, including USAC, CART, Indy Racing League and IndyCar Series since 1965. The first victory for Chevy power was Bobby Unser in the 1966 Pikes Peak Auto Hill Climb.Chevrolet has 88 wins in 148 races(59.4%) in IndyCar Series races since returning to manufacturer