Alex Palou dominates the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey to win for Honda and Chip Ganassi Racing
NTT INDYCAR SERIES completed its 2022 season today at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca
Christian Lundgaard finishes fifth to claim series Rookie of the Year honors

MONTEREY, Calif. (Sept. 11, 2022) – Alex Palou closed off the 2022 NTT INDYCAR SERIES in dominating style Sunday at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, with the Honda driver leading 67 laps to win the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey. The outgoing series champion started 11th, but used a strong second stint work his way into the lead, then built that advantage throughout the second half of 95-lap contest, holding an impressive 30-second margin of victory at the finish.

Seeking his seventh INDYCAR drivers’ title, Scott Dixon was unable to make the progress he needed in heavy traffic to finish 12th in today’s race, and third in the championship points standings.

In the tight battle for series Rookie of the Year honors between two Honda drivers, Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s Christian Lundgaard recovered from a disappointing qualifying effort yesterday to finish fifth today to claim the title. Rival David Malukas finished 13th in his Dale Coyne Racing with HMD Honda to complete an otherwise excellent debut season, highlighted by a second-place finish at World Wide Technology Raceway in August.

Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey Honda Race Results
1st Alex Palou Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
5th Christian Lundgaard-R Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
7th Romain Grosjean Andretti Autosport Honda
9th Marcus Ericsson Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
10th Alexander Rossi Andretti Autosport Honda
11th Colton Herta Andretti Autosport Honda
12th Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
13th David Malukas-R Dale Coyne Racing with HMD Honda
15th Devlin DeFrancesco-R Andretti Autosport Honda
16th Jimmie Johnson Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
17th Simon Pagenaud Meyer Shank Racing Honda
18th Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
19th Helio Castroneves Meyer Shank Racing Honda
20th Jack Harvey Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
23rd Takuma Sato Dale Coyne Racing with RWR Honda

R – Rookie

Quotes
Alex Palou (#10 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda) race winner, outgoing series champion finished fifth in the final points standings: “It was an amazing day! Conditions were extremely tough, we knew they would be going into it, but we felt really good in warm up and were looking forward to the race. Everything went super smooth during the race, pit stops, strategy, tire, engine. We got some really good fuel milage out of our Honda engine that allowed us to do the race in three stops. That made our day a bit easier! I can’t wait to get the off-season ended and start again and hopefully start it like we finished this year.”

Christian Lundgaard (#30 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda) finished fifth, won series Rookie of the Year honors: “The Rookie of the Year title is just a big reward for all the hard work we’ve done this year as a team. At this point, I’m just so happy we’ve managed to move up through the field. For much of this season, we’ve executed in qualifying, but then either stayed there or gone backwards during the race. This weekend, we really didn’t have a decent car, and qualified near the back. But this time we were able to gain positions in the race. It’s just rewarding to move forward – and to get the rookie championship done. And now there’s another championship to go win next year!”

Scott Dixon (#9 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda) finished 12th, six-time series champion finished the season third in the points standings: “We tried a bit of everything today. We ultimately just didn’t have the pace, to be honest. The tire deg [falloff in grip] was really high, especially in traffic. And we just kept coming out of the pits in a train of cars, and used the tires too much trying to move forward. After the last stop, we finally had a clear track and then our pace was good. Like a lot of us here, I’m looking forward to the track being repaved this winter. Currently, it doesn’t really suit my style very well. Everyone on the team did a hell of a job all season long. We made the most of what we had at every race, and finished every race lap this year, which is definitely a huge milestone in itself. With our partners Honda and HPD, the effort they make every race weekend is a feat in itself. We’ll keep after it, we know exactly what we need to do in the off-season, so hopefully we can make some gains in those areas. We’ll be fighting for [championship] number seven next year.”

David Salters (President and Technical Director, Honda Performance Development) on today’s race and the 2022 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season: “I’d just like to thank and congratulate all the hard working, smart men and women of Honda Performance Development. It was nice to finish off the season with a victory today, especially such a dominant one from Alex Palou. That was a champion’s drive. I also would like to thank our great teams, but particularly Chip Ganassi Racing, who just consistently deliver race-in and race-out. So well done Alex, well done Chip Ganassi Racing, well done HPD. In some ways, this was another good year for us. We won the Indianapolis 500 for the third consecutive year, and set a new pole qualifying record. That does not suck. However, compared to the last couple of years, this season wasn’t quite up to our usual standards. We’ve got work to do during the off-season, so we’ll go away and do some work. That’s how racing operates. Racing also helps us develop our people and entertain our fans. Honda enables us to do this. So, finally, thank you to Honda for allowing us to participate in this great sport.”

Fast Fact
Today’s dominant win by Alex Palou is the third consecutive INDYCAR SERIES victory for a Honda driver at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca. Andrettti Autosport’s Colton Herta won in both 2019 and 2021. No race was held here in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Next
Today’s race concludes the 2022 NTT INDYCAR SERIES. The 2023 season gets underway March 5, with a return to the Florida Gulf Coast for the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

September 11, 2022

Harrison Burton and the No. 21 Menards/Masterforce team had a short day on Sunday in the Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway.

Burton was collected in a multi-car crash at Lap 115, and his Ford Mustang was too damaged to continue. He was credited with a 32^nd-place finish.

Burton started Sunday’s race from 18^th place and finished the first 80-lap Stage in 26^th place but on the lead lap.

In the early laps of the second Stage he moved back into 18^th place just before the restart that went awry and took him out of the race.

Burton and the No. 21 team now head to Bristol Motor Speedway for Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race.  
 

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES GRAND PRIX OF MONTEREY WEATHERTECH RACEWAY LAGUNA SECA MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA TEAM CHEVY POST RACE QUOTES SEPTEMBER 11, 2022 JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 2 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 2ND:HOW DO YOU PROCESS THIS ON A DAY WHERE YOU FOUGHT SO HARD AND DID EVERYTHING IN YOUR POWER ALMOST TO GET IT DONE AND STILL FALL SHORT IN THE CHAMPIONSHIP?“You know, I hate to say it but in a lot of ways this has been a really tough year. So its going to be a welcome offseason. It has been a taxing, taxing season. We have had a lot of highs, but a lot of lows. And just riding the roller coaster this year has brought me to a breaking point a couple of points in the year. But I am ultimately just proud in the team because this is a big day for everybody to win the championship. Huge congrats to Will (Power) and the entire team because this is an effort by everybody. Whether it was the two car, or the 12 or the three, we all take a lot of pride in it. All these crew members, they work on every single car. The ultimate goal is to win a championship for Team Penske. We did that, so there is a ton to be proud of and for a personal stand point I am really proud of the two car team because they stuck with it day after day. Even yesterday, with the heartache there, we fought back and we nearly got there. So I am just proud of the effort and proud to be supported by Hitachi and Team Chevy. We are going to come back stronger next year and we have to be in a better position and I know we can do better than we did this year.” HOW OPTOMISTIC ARE YOU TO BEING OVER THERE NEXT YEAR INSTEAD OF YOUR TEAMMATE?“I am very optimistic. I am going to go back and recharge and come back and hit all these people harder. Believe me, I will be ready to go by the time we get to St. Pete, and I will look forward to it.”  WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON 5G TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINSHED 3RD AND CHAMPIONSHIP WINNER: COULD YOU HAVE PLANNED A MORE PERFECT WEEKEND?“No. It’s so surreal. In the offseason my wife said to me I believe you’re going to beat Mario’s record and you’re going to win the championship. It actually gave me confidence that I could do it. That’s how much confidence I have in her gut feel. I just couldn’t believe that they came true.” YOU PLAYED THE LONG GAME BY STAYING CALM. WHAT WERE YOU THIKING WHEN YOU SAW JOSEF NEWGARDEN GO PAST YOU?“I just knew I had to get the most out of those stints and not lose any more positions. I had to drive the thing today. It was on the edge, very loose. What a relief to get that done. I can’t thank Verizon enough. They’ve been with me for close to 12 years now and without them I would never have had this career and obviously Roger Penske and the whole team and Chevrolet.” HOW MUCH OF YOUR OFFSEASON MENTAL ADJUSTMENT HAS LED TO THIS MOMENT?“From the beginning it was just playing the long game, not necessarily going for the big wins and all that. As I’ve gotten older, I have a lot more gratitude for my life and what I get to do. Not everyone gets to do this and I’m lucky and I appreciate it a lot.” HOW MUCH DID YOU RELY ON EXPERIENCE THIS WEEKEND?“That’s exactly it; you’ve accumulated so much experience, you understand how races go and you understand that you can never give up no matter what it seems like, so you just keep digging and it just kept unfolding. A solid day.” FELIX ROSENQIST, NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, FINISHED 4TH:We raced it today. We started on the black Firestones. It was a bit hard to fend off the guys on the reds at the beginning. After that long first stint, we kind of got back in the game, and it was really strong on that stint. A really good job by the team to have the guts to stick it out that late, longer than anyone else, and I think from there on we were really good in the race. We were good on fuel; we were good on tires. After that yellow flag, we should have been more aggressive. It maybe lost us the podium, but it was a strong car. A few cars were a bit stronger, like Josef (Newgarden) was phenomenal. A big congrats to Will (Power). Hopefully next year we can give him a run for his money SCOTT MCLAUGHLIN, NO. 3 XPEL TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 6TH:“We were doing our best for the team there and just covering Dixon. Covering our bases just so we wouldn’t get jumped by Ganssi and stuff. Once we got clear of him for the last stop it was just all about passing cars and using our speed. The XPEL car was so good, and the Chevy power was awesome. Great car — fantastic and we just picked them up one at a time and got to fourth in the points on the last lap. Really awesome! PATO O’WARD, MO.5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, FINISHED 8TH:I thought we had a great start. It was a great first stint. For some reason, everything went south from there. We have to look into it and really see why. I don’t have the answer for it right now. It was just extremely hard out there. We’ll look toward 2023.” RINIS VEEKAY, NO, 21 BITCOIN RACING TEAM WITH BITNILE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET, FINISH 14TH:“I am sad the season is over! We had a pretty good last race of the year. We were really fast, but the tire deg was just a bit too much in the last few laps of a stint. I am proud of the BitNile team! We made the right calls, had good pit stops and fought hard. 14th was the best we could do today. I am 12th in the championship, just like last year, but I am proud. We had many ups and many downs, but we learned a lot. For next year, we can definitely get higher in the championship and filter out those little mistakes and have more ups! I am also proud of Chevy for winning the manufacturer championship this year and finishing 1-2 in the driver championship!” KYLE KIRKWOOD, NO.14 SEXTON PROPERTIES AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 21ST: “So last race done here in Laguna Seca, not the race that we that we really wanted. We were actually on for a pretty decent finish — it seemed like probably I think p 14 or p 15. And then I drove off going down the pit lane exit and then ultimately, we got a drive through [penalty] so that’s super unfortunate, but we didn’t have the pace to do what Alex Palou and Power did on a similar strategy to me, so that wasn’t absolutely perfect. But overall, it’s been a huge learning curve for me throughout the season. We’ve had a ton of fun. The team’s learned a lot. I’ve learned a lot. So hopefully we can just take everything that we’ve done this season and even this race weekend and transfer it into something for next year even though I won’t be part of the team. The team will be able to do it and I’ll be able to do it as well.” CONOR DALY, NO. 20 BITNILE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET,FINISHED 24TH: “We had a really great start and a great first stint. I really enjoyed battling with Marcus Ericsson, Scott Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist. I am not entirely sure what happened after that, we have some research to do because it felt like there was something that was affecting the way the car drove the rest of the race. I just kind of had to hold on to get to the finish. It’s a real shame, these last three races were really tough and it’s hard to end the year this way. There are a lot of great things to look back on though, we had some great moments. Just not the way we wanted to finish it! Super clean year, didn’t hit anything, ever. The BitNile guys did a great job. We’ll be back and be better next year.” SIMONA DE SILVESTRO, NO. 16 TURNONGREEN PARETTA AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, FINISHED 22ND: “The race was not too bad. We did three stops, which I think four might have been a bit better in the long run. I felt we had really good pace and were able to pass people, which was positive. For the whole weekend, we had good pace. For today’s race we had a few things happen in the pits, so if we cleaned a couple little things, and even myself with the few mistakes here and there, we can be really competitive.We had a new sponsor with TurnOnGreen, and it was cool to have all the sponsors and guests of Paretta Autosport here this weekend. I feel like our team is growing from that point of view so that’s really positive and hope to do more of it.” DALTON KELLETT, NO. 4 K-LINE AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 25TH:“Not exactly how we wanted to wrap up the 2022 IndyCar season, a tough day out there for the No. 4 crew. I got spun early after a good start where we made some good positions. But I don’t feel like we really had the pace to hang on to those gains on the reds, we just seemed to really struggle there. So I was driving pretty defensively. And Jimmie got into the back of me, and when I looped around and just lit the tires up trying to get it turned back the right way and just roasted the rear tire. That was like lap three or four. So for the remainder of that red stint, the rears were just gone. And that pretty much put us a lap down right away. And then there was kind of no recovering from that. We were okay on blacks. I thought our pace was acceptable. But just on reds we really were lacking. And yeah, I think a big factor was just cooking the rears on that spin. In just lost track position which took us out of contention for any possible gain. So not how we wanted it to end but just I can thank AJ Foyt crew enough for this year. You know, it was up and down. We definitely had some great highlights and lots of stuff that we would have liked to have gone better and done better. Like from my side and the team side, just a little bit of a lack of consistency. I think overall we’re probably not satisfied with how things ended up this year. But definitely lots to learn and lots of information for everyone to digest and use to improve going forward.” CALLUM ILOTT, NO. 77 JUNCOS HOLLINGER RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 26TH:

Austin Dillon and the No. 3 Get Bioethanol Chevrolet Team Rally to Top-15 Finish at Kansas Speedway

14th

11th

14th

“We fought with the balance on our No. 3 Get Bioethanol Camaro ZL1 all day. It’s the same thing we’ve fought all year, really. We had high hopes because we qualified pretty decent. I’m proud of our guys. We fought hard. We kept ourselves in it and we have a shot at Bristol Motor Speedway. Bristol is going to be wild and anything can happen. We’ve given ourselves a good shot at advancing into the next round of the NASCAR Playoffs. Nobody knows what to expect when we get there, but it’s a long race. If you’re there at the end of the day, you’ve got a good shot to make it.” -Austin Dillon

Cut Tire Sidelines Tyler Reddick and the No. 8 Guaranteed Rate Chevrolet Team Early at Kansas Speedway

35th

1st

11th

“The Guaranteed Rate Chevrolet was really strong today and everyone did a great job all weekend. Unfortunately, we didn’t get any warning with the tire. That’s tough. We haven’t had a tire problem in a while. We ran 30-plus laps in practice and everything looked fine. We had an odd vibration in our tire that first run but everything checked out okay. We didn’t have a vibration with that set of tires. It kind of started to get free off of Turn 4, but not anything that would indicate to me that we were going to have an issue. At Auto Club Speedway, I was able to save it, but here, it snapped at the worst possible point and we just killed the wall. It broke the control arm on the right-front and so our day was over. We didn’t get a lot of points today so we’ll have to fight hard at Bristol.”  -Tyler Reddick

NASCAR CUP SERIES KANSAS SPEEDWAY HOLLYWOOD CASINO 400 TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES & QUOTES SEPTEMBER 11, 2022 TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:POS.   DRIVER4th      ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL16th      WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL17th      ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 1 ADVENTHEALTH CAMARO ZL18th      KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM CAMARO ZL110th    DANIEL SUAREZ, NO. 99 COMMSCOPE CAMARO ZL1 TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS: POS.  DRIVER1st      Bubba Wallace (Toyota)2nd      Denny Hamlin (Toyota)3rd      Christopher Bell (Toyota)4th      Alex Bowman (Chevrolet)5th      Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota) The NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs Round of 16 elimination race will get underway next Saturday, September 17, at Bristol Motor Speedway with the Bass Pro Shops Night Race at 7:30 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on the USA Network, the NBCSports Gold App, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.                                                                                                               TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES:ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 1 ADVENTHEALTH CAMARO ZL1Finished: 7th “Our No. 1 AdventHealth Chevy was on either side of tight or loose all day. It was just really a fine line. We just never really settled into a nice run. Our best run was the second-to-last, with our second-to-best run being our last run. We put the chips where they needed to go at the very end, but all day it was just a handful.” YOU ENTERED THIS RACE WITH SEVEN FINISHES OUTSIDE OF THE TOP-10. HOW BIG IS IT TO GET A TOP-1O FOR YOU GUYS IN THE PLAYOFFS?“We all just high-fived. It feels good. It’s been a rough couple of months here. There were times today where I thought we were going to run 14th and I thought we were just going to keep this going. We had a really good day on pit road. Our No. 1 pit crew is just incredible. We cycled ourselves back up there and we were able to stay plugged in between the No. 48 (Alex Bowman) and the No. 5 (Kyle Larson). We were running with the guys we are supposed to be running with; and we finished around the guys we are supposed to finish by. It was a great day for our No. 1 AdventHealth Chevy team.” AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 GET BIOETHANOL CAMARO ZL1Finished: 14th “We just fought balance on our No. 3 Get Bioethanol Camaro ZL1 all day. The same thing we’ve fought all year, really. We had high hopes because we qualified pretty decent. I’m proud of our guys, we fought hard. We kept ourselves in it and we have a shot at Bristol (Motor Speedway). YOU’RE BELOW THE CUTLINE, BUT WITHIN STRIKING DISTANCE. DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU CAN BATTLE YOUR WAY INTO THE NEXT ROUND?“Yeah, for sure. Bristol is going to be wild and anything can happen. We’ve given ourselves a good shot. Nobody knows what to expect when we get there, but it’s a long race. If you’re there at the end of the day, you’ve got a good shot to make it.” KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM CAMARO ZL1Finished: 8th IT LOOKED LIKE ONE OF THOSE DAYS WHERE YOU GUYS JUST COULDN’T GET THE HANDLE OF THE CAR. “It was a little bit of that. For the restarts, I just didn’t have a good balance; but I also didn’t do a good job on the restarts. I think I only had two good ones. Gave up a lot of stage points early on because of that. Even when I thought I was in the right line, I was tight. There at the end, I finally got a good restart and was able to get to third. It was really loose; I tried to go for second and I got really sideways. After the green flag stop, I felt good but I was just a little bit on the tight side and couldn’t make enough ground in traffic to make a move and had to settle for eighth. Disappointed with that. I thought we had an opportunity to finish a lot better, but we’ll move onto Bristol.” TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 GUARANTEED RATE CAMARO ZL1, sidelined by damage sustained after losing a right-rear tire on lap 67. Finished: 35th “The right-rear tire just blew like we’ve had a few times. At Fontana (Auto Club Speedway), I was able to save it. But here, it snapped at the worst possible point and we just killed the wall. It broke the control arm on the right-front, so our day was over. We leave here with not a lot of points, so we’ll have to fight hard at Bristol (Motor Speedway).” CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1Finished: 11th “Probably just bad lane choice. I don’t think we were good enough to go win. Bubba (Wallace) was really good, congrats to him and his team. That’s a big win for him and a deserving one, too.  We just had a bad restart there and fell back a lot of spots. Our car wasn’t really driving any differently than it was earlier in the race when we were up front. You just kind of loose momentum, start going the other direction and it’s difficult to rebound from that sometimes” WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1Finished: 6th “For as far off as we started, we definitely made a really good rally. I just appreciate the adjustments and pit stops by everybody on the No. 24 Liberty University Chevrolet team. At the beginning, I thought if it was a long run, we would have gotten lapped. But we just got our car so much better through the middle part of the race. Towards the end, it was just really hard to know what we needed to be better.I’m happy with the finish and thankful for the effort. It looks like we’re plus 48-points going into Bristol, which is a tough track. It’s been a good two weeks in a row. We just need to put three weeks together and we’ll advance.” ERIK JONES, NO. 43 FOCUSFACTOR CAMARO ZL1Finished: 29th “Definitely not the day we were looking for at Kansas Speedway with our FOCUSfactor Chevy. We were off in practice yesterday and made some adjustments to help today, but just never had a good handle on our Chevy. We started the day too tight, adjusted to then be too free. Had contact with a couple of other cars racing three-wide in stage two, and then the handling was just never where it needed to be. Not sure if we broke something when we made contact, but struggled the rest of the race. We’ll go back to the shop, look over everything and refocus on Bristol next week.” ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 Finished: 4th“We had a good day for our No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1. Proud of all of my guys. We had a good weekend – Obviously, we didn’t want to throw those stage points away in stage one like we did, but we overcame that in a hurry. I’m just proud of Greg (Ives) and the guys. We had a great racecar. The last 15-laps of a run is where we would fall off and get beat, but I’m still proud of all of the guys. We ended up with a solid points day.” DANIEL SUAREZ, NO. 99 COMMSCOPE CAMARO ZL1Finished: 10th “Today was very inconsistent. It was a long day. At times, we were OK and then some other times, we weren’t good. We had a couple of situations there on pit road and then we had a tire going down. We had an eventful day. But for a day like that and to finish in the top-10, I’m quite happy. We have some work to do. We are not where we need to be. At times, I felt like we were a top-five car; and at times, we were a 20th-place car. We have to be a little bit more consistent. We don’t really understand why it was so inconsistent, but we’re going to find some answers and move onto Bristol.” TEAM CHEVY RACE QUICK NOTESStage One:·       For the second time this season, Tyler Reddick and the No. 8 Guaranteed Rate Camaro ZL1 led the field to the green from the pole position in Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway. Reddick led Team Chevy to five top-10 starting spots in race two of the NCS Playoffs Round of 16. ·       From the third starting spot, Alex Bowman powered his No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1 to the lead on lap three, continuing to pace the field until the competition caution at lap 25. Bowman gave up the lead to come down pit road for a four tire and fuel pit stop. ·       Running in the second position at the competition caution, Reddick came off pit road out front, with the No. 8 Guaranteed Rate Camaro ZL1 taking the lead on the restart. ·       While at the top of the leaderboard, Reddick blew a right-rear tire, forcing the No. 8 Camaro ZL1 into the wall to bring out the caution on lap 67. Sustaining too much damage to continue, Reddick brought his car to the garage to end his day. ·       Under caution, crew chief Justin Alexander brought Austin Dillon and the No. 3 Get Bioethanol Camaro ZL1 to pit road for a two-tire stop, with Dillon gaining 17 spots on pit road to come out first off pit road. ·       The conclusion of Stage One saw four Camaro ZL1’s in the top-10, led by Ricky Stenhouse Jr. in the fourth position after starting the race at the rear of the field due to repairs made following wall contact during yesterday’s practice session. ·       Stage One Team Chevy Top-10: 4th      Ricky Stenhouse Jr., No. 47 SunnyD Camaro ZL16th      Chase Elliott, No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Camaro ZL18th      Ross Chastain, No. 1 AdventHealth Camaro ZL110th     Austin Dillon, No. 3 Get Bioethanol Camaro Zl1 Stage Two: ·       Running in the second position, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. blew a right-rear tire, making contact with the wall to bring out the caution on lap 109. The No. 47 SunnyD Camaro ZL1 team was able to make repairs to replace the toe link and put Stenhouse Jr. back into competition. ·       Following a caution on lap 137, the leaders brought their cars down pit road for a round of pit stops. First in on pit road; the No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1 Crew Chief Greg Ives called for a four-tire stop for Bowman, with the team also winning the race off pit road for a front row restart position. ·       Bowman went on to take the Stage Two win, marking the No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1 team’s second stage win of 2022. ·       Stage Two Team Chevy Top-10:1st      Alex Bowman, No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL13rd      William Byron, No. 24 Liberty University Camaro ZL15th      Chase Elliott, No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Camaro ZL17th      Kyle Larson, No. 5 HendrickCars.com Camaro ZL110th     Ross Chastain, No. 1 AdventHealth Camaro ZL1 Final Stage / Post-Race Notes: ·       Chevrolet drivers took five of the top-10 finishing positions at Kansas, led by Alex Bowman and the No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1 team in fourth. ·       In 28 NASCAR Cup Series points-paying racing, Chevrolet continue to lead all manufacturers in NCS race wins (16), top-fives (66), top-10s (122), and stage wins (23).

Watkins Glen, NEW YORK – September 11, 2022 – The Franklin Road Classic at Watkins Glen served up an exciting race and contrasting fortunes for the Franklin Road Apparel Showtime Motorsports team on Saturday, September 10. Team debutant Austin Green scored a top ten finish in his first outing in the No. 4 Franklin Road Apparel Chevrolet Camaro while regular team pilot Cameron Lawrence had an early finish to his race due to mechanical failure on Lap 8. The sun was out Saturday morning at the legendary former home of the Formula One United States Grand Prix which made for very warm cabins for the drivers. Austin’s problems were further compounded by the loss of his power steering and the Concord, North Carolina youngster did exceptionally well in the circumstances to guide the muscle car home into P8 having begun the race in P13. As title partner for Round 10 of the 2022 Trans Am presented by Pirelli TA2  Championship season, Franklin Road Apparel supremo Ken Thwaits had plenty invested in the weekend’s events so it was great to see the popular Tennessee stalwart satisfied with how the race unfolded.  “Overall the race weekend went fantastic for us in TA2,” he said in the paddock post race. “Derek Jennings has turned a corner for our team and these cars are fast! We had a part failure on Cameron’s car which unfortunately ended his race early. Austin Green qualified 13th and lost his power steering early in the race and we were wondering if we should bring him in or not but decided not to give up track position. We made him drive that thing without power steering the whole distance and he delivered!” Green proved himself up to the physical challenge as Ken confirmed, “I told him that’s why we lift those weights. On top of that he had contact with another car and that messed things up a bit but we finished P8 and we’ll take it. Great job!” Austin himself clearly enjoyed the experience as he confirmed to our reporter on climbing out of the hot seat, “It was an interesting race. I qualified 13th which was a little further back than we wanted. It’s a long race so there are going to be lots of cautions and a lot of wrecks. We were running pretty good and then on Lap 10 the power steering went out. That was a first for me!”  Austin carried on battling and fortunately contact later in the race didn’t spoil his day though he needed all his strength after the power steering went, “We had a little contact later on. I need to start working out. This is my first time racing with Franklin Road. They work day and night, so huge thanks to Ken, Franklin Road Apparel and everybody on the team.” Former Champion Cameron Lawrence had started on the grid in P4 after an impressive qualifying session saw him post a time of 1:50:580 in the No. 6 Franklin Road Apparel Showtime Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro while Austin’s time in the No. 4 car was 1:51:695. TV Broadcast: TA/XGT/SGT/GT – Sep 18, 5:30p.m. ET on CBS Sports NetworkTA/XGT/SGT/GT (Encore Presentation) – Sep 18, 11:30 p.m. ET on CBS Sports NetworkTA2 – Sep 14, 7:00p.m. ET on CBS Sports NetworkTA2 (Encore Presentation) – Sep 15, 12:30 a.m. ET on CBS Sports Network Next up for the Showtime Motorsports team is a trip to Virginia International Raceway for the Mission Foods VIR Speed Tour October 6 to 9.

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIESF IRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF MONTEREYWEATERTECH RACEWAY LAGUNA SECA IN SALINAS, CALIFORNIA CHAMPION QUOTES – WILL POWERSEPT. 11, 2022 Power earns second INDYCAR driver championshipDriver of No. 12 Verizon 5G Team Penske Chevrolet finishes third in final race of season

Pole-sitter Will Power, No. 12 Verizon 5G Team Penske Chevrolet, finished third in the season-ending Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey and earned his second NTT INDYCAR SERIES driver championship. It is the seventh driver championship since 2012 for Chevrolet, which also wrapped up its seventh Manufacturer Championship.  Champion quick quotes:

COULD YOU HAVE PLANNED A MORE PERFECT WEEKEND?“No. It’s so surreal. In the offseason my wife said to me I believe you’re going to beat Mario’s record and you’re going to win the championship. It actually gave me confidence that I could do it. That’s how much confidence I have in her gut feel. I just couldn’t believe that they came true.” YOU PLAYED THE LONG GAME BY STAYING CALM. WHAT WERE YOU THIKING WHEN YOU SAW JOSEF NEWGARDEN GO PAST YOU?“I just knew I had to get the most out of those stints and not lose any more positions. I had to drive the thing today. It was on the edge, very loose. What a relief to get that done. I can’t thank Verizon enough. They’ve been with me for close to 12 years now and without them I would never have had this career and obviously Roger Penske and the whole team and Chevrolet.” HOW MUCH OF YOUR OFFSEASON MENTAL ADJUSTMENT HAS LED TO THIS MOMENT?“From the beginning it was just playing the long game, not necessarily going for the big wins and all that. As I’ve gotten older, I have a lot more gratitude for my life and what I get to do. Not everyone gets to do this and I’m lucky and I appreciate it a lot.” HOW MUCH DID YOU RELY ON EXPERIENCE THIS WEEKEND?“That’s exactly it; you’ve accumulated so much experience, you understand how races go and you understand that you can never give up no matter what it seems like, so you just keep digging and it just kept unfolding. A solid day.”

Jim Campbell, Chevrolet vice president of Performance and Motorsports:“It’s always exciting to watch Will Power behind the wheel of an INDYCAR. Will started on the pole, led the first lap and managed this race with the No. 12 team to clinch the 2022 championship. It’s been so special to work with Will, Ron Ruzewski, David Faustino and the No.12 Verizon 5G Chevrolet team all season long. We’re proud that both of Will’s championships have been powered by Chevrolet’s 2.2-liter V6.”

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES

GRAND PRIX OF MONTEREY

WEATHERTECH RACEWAY LAGUNA SECA

MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA

TEAM CHEVY QUALIFYING RECAP

SEPTEMBER 10, 2022

WILL POWER CAPTURES HISTORIC 68^TH POLE AT WEATHERTECH LAGUNA SECA RACEWAY TO OVERTAKE MARIO ANDRETTI IN ALL-TIME SERIES’ POLES

TAKES ONE MORE STEP TOWARD CAPTURING HIS SECOND NTT INDYCAR SERIES CHAMPIONSHIP ON SUNDAY

• Three Chevrolet powered drivers in contention for the Driver Championship
• Will Power, Josef Newgarden and Scott McLaughlin
• Scott Dixon and Marcus Ericsson (both Honda) are remaining top-two drivers in the championship fight
• Only one Championship eligible driver advanced to the Firestone Fast Six

 MONTEREY, Cali (Sept. 10, 2022 – The battle for the NTT INDYCAR Series Championship took an interesting turn leaving only point leader Will Power, No. 12 Verizon 5G Team Penske Chevrolet as the last one standing heading to the Firestone Fast Six. 

Power went on to score his historic 68^th NTT P1 Award, topping the great Mario Andretti as the all-time Series’ pole winner – a record Power has been focused on for several seasons.

Qualifying didn’t go so smoothly for Josef Newgarden, No, 2 Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet. The two-time Champion was involved in a single-car incident in Round , One/Group One that, per the rulebook, prevented him from continuing. Scott Dixon did not transfer to the Round of 12 either.

Scott McLaughlin, No. 3 XPEL Team Penske Chevrolet, and Ericsson were eliminated in the Round of 12. McLaughlin will start eighth, and Newgarden will roll off 25^th. Ericsson will start 10^th, and Dixon 13^th setting up a great battle for the title at the end of the 95-lap race.

Making his first Firestone Fast Six was Callum Ilott, No. 77 Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet. The rookie will start next to Power on the front row. 

Pato O’Ward, No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet, the third Team Chevy in the Firestone Fast Six. He will start sixth in the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey.

 The Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey is scheduled to take the green flag at 12:30 PM Local (3:30 PM ET). NBC and INDYCAR Radio will broadcast the action live as well as Sirius XM Channel 106 and racecontrolindycar.com.

POST QUALIFYING PRESS CONFERENCE

THE MODERATOR: Joined by the front row for tomorrow’s Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey, Callum Ilott. Giving Juncos Hollinger Racing their best starting position, certainly Callum’s best starting position in his rookie season. Congratulations to Will Power and the Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, career pole No. 68, moving past the great Mario Andretti for first place on the all-time INDYCAR Series list. Will, congratulations. Couldn’t be more crucial picking up a championship point at a point like this.

WILL POWER: Yeah, that was the focus. That’s all that was on my mind. It had nothing to do with the number of poles. I need to get poles to give myself the best chance here.

So we ticked that box and also another box with the 68. Very good start to the weekend. Super focused on tomorrow.

Q. How crucial is starting up front going to be tomorrow do you think?

WILL POWER: Well, it’s one point. I plan on leading the first lap, which is another point, and if you get a real run you can lead the most laps, it’s another. Just keep going like that.

Yep, super focused, man. I want to give all the boys my best, give my team the best because that’s what they’ve done for me this year.

THE MODERATOR: Callum, congratulations. Up front for the first time in your 

very young NTT INDYCAR Series career. Your thoughts on a huge day for you and the team, as well.

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, what a run, what a day so far. Yeah, super happy with that, honestly. If I didn’t have lunch maybe I would have taken it away. I think he needs it a bit more than I do, but I would love a pole. I’ll have to wait a bit. I mean, you waited enough for 68, so I can maybe get there in 25 years. I’m joking, mate. You’re all good.

Q. What did you have for lunch?

CALLUM ILOTT: Pasta. Pasta and chicken.

Honestly, these guys working so hard throughout the year, we knew sometimes got the pace, but there’s so much more to this series than just having a good car. You’ve got to put it all together, and to do a day like this where you almost get it, almost get it, I think it’s great to finish off the season like this and take a front row.

Q. Will, to be greeted on pit lane by two Mount-Rushmore-of-motorsports figures like Mario Andretti and Roger Penske, you see Roger all the time, you said it’s like when you please him it’s like pleasing your father. You really don’t have that much interaction with Mario. What’s it like to get congratulated by a living legend like that?

WILL POWER: I was actually standing there, I saw Roger there, I saw Mario there and all the cameras, I thought, This is really surreal. It just blows my mind that I can be — I surpassed Mario and obviously I drive for Roger, but just to have those two legends there congratulating me, it’s real, and a lot of gratitude for the chances and the opportunities I’ve been given over the last decade and a half.

Very fortunate. Very fortunate, and I want to repay them back with a championship tomorrow.

Q. Just following up on that, what was it like to be congratulated by that huge receiving line that you had of other people? Seemed like there were other people, team members, Chevy execs —

WILL POWER: Yeah, just looking around, it was surreal. It really was. At such a crucial point, it’s kind of — I couldn’t celebrate it very much because I’m so focused on tomorrow and I don’t want to give out too much energy because I’m going to need it tomorrow, but yeah, a day you’ll remember for sure. Something I’ll remember the rest of my life.

Q. I know you probably can’t reflect on it too much now, but did you realize there was that much respect for you and what you’ve done?

WILL POWER: No. I’m not sure respect. You have those sort of figures there congratulating you, you kind of pinch yourself. Yeah, I wasn’t even thinking about that today. My goal was to get to the Fast Six, and it was to get pole. I didn’t even think about the number of poles it was.

Q. For Callum, I think you were telling us yesterday in the bullpen that you feel like you’ve been talking to team management and you guys have just enough to do things as necessary but not quite to take that next step. To qualify second and do all this planning for next year and the second car, is this a big boost for your team?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, it shows what we can do with what we have in a certain way. I mean, we started the season with two and a half sets of dampers and one of them is for ovals. We finished with, I think, three and a half, and they’re not much different to the first one. We just bought another version of the first set and adapted them a little bit.

That’s what happens when you work with what you’ve got and you optimize it.

Yeah, we’re not — our terms of development this year have been what we had to start with, and again, just fine-tuning it. Whether it’s me and the driving and the experience, we’ve just been chipping away and trying to do a good job with that, and yeah, it’s been tough, especially with no teammate to kind of have anything to use very well, learn from. To get to this stage and have a result like this, I think they’re all super chuffed, and yeah, amazing job.

At the end of the day even if it’s just one lap at the end, it’s great to do it, finish it like this, and I think gives us so much more motivation in the off-season when they get some time to really digest everything and work on it.

Q. Callum, you start second tomorrow next to the points leader. What’s your plan of attack there to win that race?

CALLUM ILOTT: I mean, if they’re very nice to me, I might hold up the others.

Q. But you’re not going to screw with them?

WILL POWER: It’s a Chevy so I’m lucky in that respect. I’m going to tell him where I’m going to go so he can slip in behind me.

CALLUM ILOTT: I like steak. (Laughter.)

No, unfortunately, I can’t have the alcohol tonight, but we’ll talk about it.

No, honestly, it’s the fourth time starting in the top 10 — third, whatever it is —

Q. It’s your first Fast Six, right?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, first Fast Six, so we’ll take that. It’s one step at a time. I’d love to win races if we have the pace to do it. I’m not going to ruin anyone’s race to do it. But it’s more about working away. I’d love to just finish the season with a top 5, top 3, take it as it comes.

Hopefully I have a long career, and like this man, can have many podiums and wins, so there’s no point messing people around to try and save something with the last one. The team will be happy with that. If we’ve got the pace, I’m all for it, but it’s a long, long race.

These races aren’t won in the first corner. They’re won with good strategy, good pit stops and a fast car. We’ll see. I’ll be calm and all of this, but if someone pushes me off I’ll get them soon.

Q. Your season has taken a real turn since you’ve started coming to the bullpen, so thank you.

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, for reference, I was told it was invitation only, so I took that and I never turned up, and I do apologize. Not that anyone wants to hear what I have to say anyway, but I will turn up now. So I do apologize.

Q. I don’t know who told you the invitation only.

CALLUM ILOTT: Well, we’re a new team. If you don’t make it clear, you get what you get, and that was not me.

Q. Will, there were a few people that were running off during qualifying and you obviously can see that because you see the dust that you drive through and everything. Was there any concern that maybe you needed to back off just so you didn’t run off the course yourself? Did you need to take it easy at all?

WILL POWER: Actually it was definitely a thought in my head when I was doing the black runs because if it goes red at any time you need to keep updating in the top six, so I was very conscious because you get to the very edge of the track, you even stick some of your tire over the edge a bit. But yeah, it’s easy to get sucked out into the dirt.

Q. For tomorrow, are you going to be thinking championship all day, or are you going to try and go out in style and stay out front for the entire day?

WILL POWER: Just thinking start, now that, and then just get into that rhythm and then it will sort of play out as we go based on what the other competitors do. Yeah, just need a good solid day.

Q. Callum, a lot of people were I think slightly surprised when you re-signed with Juncos so early because at that point we didn’t know they were definitely going to go up to a two-car team and also because it was such a fluid silly season. They thought you might be in with a shot at one of the bigger teams. Does this help vindicate your decision to stay?

CALLUM ILOTT: I mean, that decision was made independently of the results now or at the time. It was made with the work ethic behind. Yes, the world is moving very quickly in motorsports, and this year has been a shock for quite a few in this silly season. I had some discussions, but that was quite late on really.

Yeah, it just shows that we can do it in the right places. I’ve always said at the beginning, I think when the car is in a good window we can compete, and this is one of those weekends where we got it in a good window and it was there. But it’s a tough championship, and the experience is what counts.

Like I said, I want a long career in this. I don’t want to burn any bridges by being a dick.

You know, money is one thing. It comes when you’re in this sport a long time. You’re comfortable anyway. I’m not trying to get too much from any situation in that sense.

I’m taking my time. Yes, you could argue that some situations maybe would have boosted me a bit quicker if it was to appeal to F1 teams. Again, that kind of thing, maybe jumping to another team for probably an easier start to 2023 may have been better for that. But like I said, I want a long career, and I think doing it this way, whether it’s for ’24, ’25, ’26, getting recognized by other teams, I’m sure if they’re looking now, they’ll definitely look in later years.

Q. Will, I wanted to ask about your tire tactics in the Fast Six. Like we saw you do one lap on primaries and then on TV they were speculating that that was to warm up the brakes and that kind of thing but then you just sat on pit lane and gave yourself one shot. What was the idea behind it?

WILL POWER: Yeah, it was. Wanted to save a set of used reds and then obviously warm the brakes up on those blacks and then just go out and just do one. I had a second one going just in case, so we were going to see what happened.

Q. Once Palou didn’t improve on —

WILL POWER: They called it, yeah.

Q. Will, early in the session when you saw that everything was kind of falling into place for you, the Newgarden incident which also badly affected Scott Dixon being able to get out and trying to advance, were you beginning to think that, hey, man, this is my day?

WILL POWER: It made things easier, yeah, less pressure for sure because we didn’t have to shadow exactly what those guys did. Yeah, definitely took some pressure off, I’ll tell you. Yes.

Q. I know that you’ve said in the past you never really wished for your closest competitors in a championship to have problems, but certainly helps —

WILL POWER: Yeah, in this series, a problem like that can win you the race tomorrow because you have more tires. But you cannot — it kind of sucks because Firestone or the series doesn’t give us enough tires. But yeah, that can totally be the winning strategy. What happened? Yeah, I screwed up in qualifying. That’s how you won the race? Yeah, that’s how this thing rolls sometimes.

Q. Do you think 13th where Dixon is would be the first place a team or driver would flip the strategy?

WILL POWER: Yeah, it’s a great spot because he didn’t use his tires up, and he’s not that far back. So yeah. Tough. Tough, man. Tough race. It’s far, far, far from won, and I’m really aware of that.

Q. Will, you talked about the achievement that you had today and not focusing too much on it because of having to focus on the championship tomorrow. How difficult is that to not celebrate the success and get excited about it?

WILL POWER: I’ve only got one day, so not long. Maybe I’m celebrating, maybe I’m not. We’ll see.

Q. Callum, obviously you’ve come a long way since you last came to Laguna Seca. Where do you think the biggest gains have come from from what you remember from last year and how the car is now?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, our car was not very good last year. I felt like I did a good job, but yeah, it was T25 I think in qualifying, which was horrendous, considering I kind of knew the track a bit, as well. It wasn’t very good. But that was last year. We changed a lot, improved, turned things around, and personnel change, as well. Yeah, massively different and massively positive. To be on the front row, I think, yeah, I’ll take it.

Q. Will, prior to today, the time you were one away from Mario, then equaling him, at any of those points did Mario ever come up and chat with you about the record at all, and if so, can you recall what he said?

WILL POWER: No, we never spoke about the record. But I was informed by Marco every time I got a pole, Mario was in a bad mood. (Laughter.) Marco told me that about 10 poles ago. Yeah, I was told Mario was watching, but rightly so because it is a longtime standing record that he had. I’d be feeling the same.

Q. Callum, we’ve obviously talked about how small the team is, but at the beginning of the season did you ever think that you’d have a chance at possibly grabbing a pole position? You were just like, what, two hundredths off of grabbing it?

CALLUM ILOTT: No, not really. I learned very quickly on that it was going to be a hard year and a long year. Putting it all together like this, yeah, we had some weekends, I think bar we are was the first one where we kind of clicked and got it right and that was P11 in qually, and then from there it was getting closer and closer. But it’s so tight, and just having that edge when you put everything together, getting the tires in, not having yellows or even here like guys just chucking dust up out of Turn 3 and then ruining your lap, yeah, it’s not easy, and it has to all come together.

So yes and no. I would have loved to. I didn’t think after the first couple races we’d get there, probably towards the end of the season.

But yeah, we got there, and I think everyone is super pleased with that.

Q. I know you’re just getting out of the car, but do you know where you lost that tiny bit of time or where you might have been able to gain it?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah, the corkscrew. It was the second apex. I kind of bounced and didn’t get the throttle. It was a close one. I think I was up on the first two-thirds and I threw it away. I guess experience, you know.

Q. I really would like to know a little more about these tires and how they survive. It sounds like being a low-grip track that drivers have said the reds might only last a lap or two so maybe people will start on reds hoping there’s a caution and get off of them. How far do you think the reds will last, and what about the black tires? Will they last 20, 25 laps, or do you think it’s like Dixon said, might be five pit stops or more?

WILL POWER: Yeah, it’s going to be interesting. Yeah, I have to say, though, the second run, reds were pretty good.

CALLUM ILOTT: One of them was. The other one wasn’t for me.

WILL POWER: You did two runs?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah.

WILL POWER: Okay, two singles. Like I said — was your hottest set the worst?

CALLUM ILOTT: Yeah.

WILL POWER: I wondered if they cooled if they got better.

CALLUM ILOTT: No, it was the other way around.

WILL POWER: But yeah, it could be just like Detroit where the things just die. It could just be like that because it’s going to be very interesting.

I think they’re going to drop two seconds like they have done in the past. I think they’ll be similar.

CALLUM ILOTT: When we were testing here, it wasn’t much. So yeah, it will be an interesting race.

THE MODERATOR: Guys, thanks for coming up. Appreciate it.

THE MODERATOR: Wrapping up qualifying for tomorrow’s Firestone Grand Prix of Monterrey. Again, Will Power will start from pole. He’ll be in here momentarily.

Josef Newgarden, driving the Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet, second in points, will start 25th tomorrow; Scott Dixon, just 20 points back, will start 13th in the PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing Honda; Marcus Ericsson, fourth in points, will start 10th in the Huski Chocolate Chip Ganassi Racing Honda; and Scott McLaughlin, fifth in points, will start eighth tomorrow in the XPEL Team Penske Chevrolet.

Josef, we all saw what happened there in the corkscrew. How devastating starting back, or do you start already thinking about going off strategy and maybe the opportunities that might present themselves tomorrow?

JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, obviously it’s not over yet, but it was an unfortunate session for us. Tough to make a mistake like that. I don’t know that we’ve — it’s been a long time since we’ve had one of those in qualifying, but it’s happened now, and obviously didn’t put us in a good position for tomorrow, but we’re going to make the most of it, like we always do, on the No. 2 car.

THE MODERATOR: Scott, third in a row, tied with Newgarden in points, 13th place starting position. Unfortunately you started back a little bit this year, but you’ve also made up a lot of positions à la what happened at Portland. What do you guys have in store tomorrow do you think?

THE MODERATOR: Scott, your thoughts on starting eighth?

SCOTT McLAUGHLIN: I think from where I was, especially this morning, my car just really wasn’t that good, and we made some big changes before qualifying, and it was really good. A similar story to Marcus. I feel like maybe if I had just done the lap, I could have been in the Fast Six. I feel like I was definitely fast enough.

But yeah, I feel like we’ve done the right thing with certain tires and strategy-wise for that sort of stuff. Hopefully puts us in good stead for tomorrow. Eighth is not all too bad. I’m excited to start from there and see what we’ve got.

Q. Watching Will on screen there with Mario, was that frustrating knowing y’all are in the title hunt, or was it okay?

SCOTT McLAUGHLIN: We all want pole, but I think at the same time it’s an incredible milestone. The guy has wanted it probably almost more than a championship, so yeah, just happy for him to get it.

Q. Josef, can you take me through — I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to diagnose it yet or watch the video, what happened as you were going down through the corkscrew there on that spin?

JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It’s just a mistake. I turned in too early and I hit the curb. As soon as I hit the curb, I was all out of sorts. You can hit that second one in the bottom, but if you touch the first one it’s going to send the car in a mess.

Kind of a simple error and a very sad error, so you know, we were done pretty early today.

Q. Josef, you were talking about maybe this gives you a chance to flip the strategy. I would presume it’s the same for you. Do you approach it like we can just stop more often, especially with the tire deg, like this could be an opportunity in a way?

JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I mean, I’ve had it happen more times than not this year where starting up front didn’t work out, at least not perfectly as you’d plan it. I would welcome it working from the back, for whatever reason. If something mysteriously happens and it’s like, wow, you actually wanted to start in the back? I would be very appreciative to have the other end of this 

JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Sounds great. I’d love it.

I mean, look, I’ve seen it — there’s so many races I’ve been in this year where I was like, should we have just started in the back? We’ll see if that’s the right thing for tomorrow.

Q. I’m going to take you slightly off topic here. Final Supercar meeting at Pukekohe this weekend. I just wanted to know one thought from you each an what Pukekohe means to you in your career, do you have another memory other than those ones?

SCOTT McLAUGHLIN: For me, it’s probably my first ever win in Supercars. That was my — awesome place to win your first race. At home, as well. But yeah, it sucks that it’s going because it’s a great track.

Shark Racing Finishes 1-2, Separated by 0.050-Seconds in Photo Finish

CHICO, CA – September 10, 2022 – Almost exactly two years to the day (Sept. 11, 2020) Shark Racing finished 1-2 in Jacob Allen’s first-career World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series win, they did it again; this time by topping the $25,000-to-win Gold Cup Race of Champions, giving the fan-favorite the biggest win of his life.

To make things more dramatic, Allen beat his uncle, his teammate, and his best friend Logan Schuchart, by a mere 0.050-seconds as the checkered flag waved at Chico, CA’s Silver Dollar Speedway.

The Pells Tire Service, Low-E Insulation #1A officially controlled all 40 laps at the 68th running of the prestigious event, but that is a deceiving box score. Allen, amid his ninth year on tour at 28 years old, fought off challenges from champion Brad Sweet at first, then winning machine Carson Macedo, and ultimately his running mate in the DuraMAX Oil, Drydene Performance Products #1S.

It came down to the 40th and final lap as Schuchart closed on Allen and showed him his nose coming to the white flag. With traffic blocking his path into the final corner, Allen found himself in no man’s land through the middle and quickly losing grip as Schuchart stuck to the bottom. As the #1S rocketed off the corner, the #1A found grip up high and the drag race to the line began.

They never touched, but Allen hit the wall and pulled a wheelstand as he crossed the finish line ahead of Schuchart by a jaw-dropping 0.050-seconds to score a win that left him speechless.

“I don’t know what to say,” Allen noted trying to compose himself. “As a team, Logan and I always dream about running 1-2. Having a finish like that is just so damn awesome. I didn’t know who won at first, I was just waiting for Mike [Hess] to say #1A or #1S. I can’t believe it. I just won the Gold Cup and it was a Shark Racing 1-2 and that’s back-to-back Gold Cups for our team. Wow.”

He took every restart and every lap traffic bout in stride, never wavering as he ventured away from his stereotypical low-line and throttled around the outside of the 1/4-mile. The victory brings Allen to five-career World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series wins with four of those coming in 2022.

“You guys doubt me a little bit, but we’re figuring out how to set up these cars and I’m getting better as a driver,” Allen added. “It’s okay if people don’t want to believe in me, but as a team, we believe in each other and that’s what makes this happens.”

Perhaps the happiest second-place finisher in World of Outlaws history, Logan Schuchart couldn’t stop smiling on frontstretch following the spectacular finish with his nephew and teammate – even though his pursuit of back-to-back Gold Cup titles was stopped by the slimmest of margins.

“I honestly didn’t know who won it,” Schuchart said. “I’m so pumped, though. This is about the coolest outcome we could ever ask for. It’s awesome for two PA boys to be racing for the win at Gold Cup, the most prestigious race on the West Coast. I’m so proud of Jacob, his team, my team, and everyone involved in Shark Racing. You can’t ask for much more than this.”

Following the pair of Shark Racing entries to the stripe was Carson Macedo with a third-place effort in the Jason Johnson Racing, Albaugh #41. It’s his 23rd World of Outlaws podium finish of the season as the Lemoore, CA native looks to cut into his 96-point championship deficit with only 12 races remaining in the 2022 campaign.

“This place was really racey tonight,” Macedo said. “My guys gave me a car to win, but I just felt like every time we would get to the tail of the field a caution would come out. I needed more traffic to get up there with those guys. It was pretty cool to watch that photo finish right behind them at the line, though.”

Closing out the top-five in Saturday’s finale was Sheldon Haudenschild in fourth aboard the Stenhouse Jr. / Marshall Racing, NOS Energy Drink #17, and Brad Sweet, who momentarily led on Lap 23, finishing fifth in the Kasey Kahne Racing, NAPA Auto Parts #49.

David Gravel took sixth aboard the Big Game Motorsports, Huset’s Speedway #2, and Spencer Bayston came home seventh in his CJB Motorsports, TrueTimber #5 to give the World of Outlaws a top-seven sweep over the California locals.

Rounding out the top-10 in the 68th Gold Cup was 16-year-old Ryan Timms with his third top-10 in four Series starts, Donny Schatz with a KSE Hard Charger performance from 21st to ninth, and Fremont, CA’s Shane Golobic driving the Kevin Kozlowski-owned #57 as the highest finishing local competitor.

NOS Energy Drink Feature Results (40 Laps) – 1. 1A-Jacob Allen [1][$25,000]; 2. 1S-Logan Schuchart [5][$10,000]; 3. 41-Carson Macedo [3][$6,000]; 4. 17-Sheldon Haudenschild [9][$5,000]; 5. 49-Brad Sweet [2][$4,000]; 6. 2-David Gravel [11][$3,500]; 7. 5-Spencer Bayston [8][$3,200]; 8. 5T-Ryan Timms [4][$3,000]; 9. 15-Donny Schatz [21][$2,800]; 10. 57W-Shane Golobic [6][$2,500]; 11. 88N-DJ Netto [20][$2,300]; 12. 17M-Kalib Henry [12][$2,250]; 13. 22-Ryan Bernal [13][$2,200]; 14. 41S-Dominic Scelzi [15][$2,100]; 15. 2XM-Max Mittry [14][$2,050]; 16. 83-James McFadden [7][$2,000]; 17. 24-Chase Johnson [18][$2,000]; 18. 14-Corey Day [24][$2,000]; 19. 83JR-Kerry Madsen [19][$2,000]; 20. 83T-Tanner Carrick [16][$2,000]; 21. 21-Mitchell Faccinto [10][$2,000]; 22. 38B-Blake Carrick [22][$2,000]; 23. 83V-Sean Becker [17][$2,000]; 24. 92-Andy Forsberg [23][$2,000]. Lap Leaders: Jacob Allen 1-40. KSE Hard Charger Award: 15-Donny Schatz[+12]

UP NEXT (Fri) – The World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series will host its ninth and final race of the year in California this Friday, September 16 at Keller Auto Speedway in Hanford, CA with a $21,000 prize available in the Tom Tarlton Classic.

(Sept. 11, 2022) – Try as it might, Corvette Racing couldn’t replicate its Monza magic on Sunday as it finished fifth in the GTE Pro class of the Six Hours of Fuji for the FIA World Endurance Championship.

Tommy Milner and Nick Tandy, coming off a victory together in the previous WEC race in Italy, soldiered through a difficult day in the No. 64 Mobil 1/SiriusXM Chevrolet Corvette C8.R during the team’s first race at Fuji Speedway.Milner, Tandy and the rest of the team had a tough time coming to grips – figuratively and literally – with the unfamiliar Fuji circuit and track surface.  The Corvette team found itself in a hole early as the No. 64 had to serve a drive-through penalty for exceeding track limits just shy of the 30-minute mark. Tandy rejoined the track undeterred and managed to gain a spot up to fourth with an inside dive on the No. 91 Porsche – which also was called in for a similar penalty – at the first corner just shy of the one-hour mark. The tire management of the Corvette progressed nicely for the remainder of Tandy’s stint compared to the other GTE Pro runners. Another stroke of misfortune struck, however, as the Corvette ran out of fuel on pitlane as Tandy headed for his first stop. After some assistance from the Corvette Racing crew, the No. 64 took on fuel and left-side tires for Tandy’s second stint. The struggles continued with Tandy reporting a severe lack of rear grip and a tire issue through the back half of his run. Milner drove the middle two stints and took on four tires for each run in an effort to claw back into contention. Unfortunately the continuing struggles with pace and grip plus a caution-free race limited any ground that he and Tandy could make up at the end. Corvette Racing closes its first-year WEC campaign with the Eight Hours of Bahrain on Nov. 10-12.

TOMMY MILNER, NO. 64 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “Today was not our best day on many fronts, for sure. It was a frustrating day I think for Nick, frustrating for our engineers and frustrating for me all in our own ways. We’ll give ourselves some time after the race to decompress and think about those lessons and take them with us to Bahrain. In general, we had some struggles through practice and we improved the car for Nick through FP3 and qualifying. We were still behind the eight-ball a little bit, and in the race we saw some residuals from that. I was pretty slow the first couple of laps of my stint just because I was realistically driving a new car from what I had from the practice sessions. The second stint was a bit better but for me not as good as it needed to be. In the grand scheme of things, no thing that one person did or one group did had an ultimate effect on today; it was a collection of many things. We’ll isolate the mistakes and at the same time highlight the positives and find the things we did well. We’ll take our lumps from today and focus on Bahrain to be more prepared, be faster and make less mistakes. Hopefully that’s enough and we can have a good race there.”

NICK TANDY, NO. 64 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “The story of the race wasn’t so great. Really since Friday morning, it’s been a struggle. I think the characteristics of this track and the track surface just don’t suit our car. You’re never going to have the fastest car at every track you go to; that’s not how racing works. So what we have done is learned a lot. If we could start the race again tomorrow, there are things we absolutely would change but you only learn things from experience. This is something we can take forward. We’re not going to win every race. What we need to do is capitalize on days where the car is competitive. We had some issues but this was the one take because this was our least competitive showing from a pace perspective. This shows again the things we need to focus on in practice and in simulation when we are coming to a new track. And it shows that racing is difficult. It shows that the day we had Monza is just as big as we thought it was at the time. This weekend shows just what a good job we did there and how tough it can be if the stars don’t align.”

Ballou P2 after leading early, Thomas Jr. runs third in cap to debut weekend

LEWISTOWN, IL – Sept. 10, 2022 – Two wins in two days; three in the last three races. Jake Swanson and Team AZ Racing are firing on all cylinders.

With another victory with the Xtreme Outlaw Sprint Car Series pres. by Low-E InsulationSaturday night at Spoon River Speedway, Swanson – the 29-year-old wheelman from Anaheim, CA – completed a sweep of the Series’ Illinois weekend and made up a big chunk of ground in the chase for the inaugural season points championship.

“Two races in a row – I don’t think I’ve ever swept a weekend in my life,” Swanson said. “I’m pumped about that, but three Xtreme Series races in-a-row is massive. I’m blown away.”

Coming into the weekend, Swanson sat fifth in the standings, 116 points out of first place. After the win at Jacksonville Speedway Friday night and again at Spoon River on Saturday, he now rides third, 53 behind leader Shane Cockrum. Add-in his victory at Federated Auto Parts Raceway at I-55 in June, and that makes three wins for him in the last three Series races.

“If we had a good weekend, we were gonna be like, ‘Alright, let’s focus on a championship,’” Swanson said. “Really, the $20,000 [points championship check] is what we’re after. Obviously, [the weekend] couldn’t have played out any better.”

Taking the green from inside Row 2, it didn’t take long before Swanson had the lead. Polesitter Robert Ballou led the first three trips around the 3/8-mile oval before Swanson made the move to his inside coming out of Turn 2 and sealed the pass as they raced into Turn 3.

It was a maneuver Swanson said he’d struggled to get right in the past, but worked it to perfection Saturday night.

“Lately, we’ve been really good squaring-off [the corner]; the thing leaves from center-off so much better,” Swanson said. “I felt like that was our biggest issue last year, and sometimes at the beginning of this year. We fixed some stuff and really got that dialed in.”

Now with the lead in-hand, it became Swanson’s race to lose. After a quick caution and red-flag combo shy of the halfway point, he checked out, building up a near three-second lead on Ballou as they entered the home stretch.

Once Swanson hit lapped traffic, Ballou was able to close-in on him slightly, but never close enough to make a move.

“When there was that caution with about 10 laps to go, it felt it took like 10 laps for my racecar to get going,” Ballou said. “I could catch [Swanson] after about four or five laps, but I was overdriving the car, and you make mistakes when you do that.”

Just when all hope seemed to evaporate, the yellow flag was displayed. Wesley Smith looped around in Turn 2, erasing Swanson’s lead and giving Ballou and a hungry Kevin Thomas Jr. one final chance.

In the end, Swanson kept the field at bay and drove across the stripe to collect his second $5,000 check in two days.

“Really cool racetrack to be able to run two lines like that and finesse the bottom and rip the top,” Swanson said. “One of the most fun places I’ve been to the last two weekends. These were really great racetracks, and I hope we can come back more.”

Though Ballou was able to hang on for a strong runner-up finish, he said was dissatisfied with his car’s handling throughout the 30-lap event.

“From Lap 1, I knew I was in trouble, and I was just kinda hanging on,” Ballou said. “I finally figured I could overdrive the car and get it to be decent, but you can’t win races overdriving your racecar.”

Rounding out the podium, Kevin Thomas Jr. bagged a third-place finish to cap-off his debut weekend with the Xtreme Outlaw Sprints. Coming from fourth on the starting grid, he made the move for third on Anton Hernandez on Lap 11 and chased Ballou for the rest of the way. He tried several times to make a move to his inside but was unable to muster the speed to execute a pass.

“I tried to slide him once, and didn’t feel like I got a good enough run,” Thomas said. “I didn’t want to crash both of us, so I left a little bit of room.”

Like Swanson, Thomas enjoyed both tracks on the Illinois swing and the new challenges they brought along.

“It was fun to get to Jacksonville and here to Spoon River to kind of do something different,” Thomas said. “That was a lot of fun.”

UP NEXT

The Xtreme Outlaw Sprint Car Series pres. by Low-E Insulation returns to action with a two-day event at Atomic Speedway in Waverly, OH, Oct. 7-8. Tickets are available at the gate on race day, or if you can’t be at the track, stream every lap live on DIRTVision.

ABBREVIATED RESULTS (view full results)

Feature (30 Laps): 1. 21AZ-Jake Swanson[3]; 2. 12-Robert Ballou[1]; 3. 15K-Kevin Thomas Jr[4]; 4. 2B-Anton Hernandez[2]; 5. 66-Shane Cockrum[10]; 6. 6-Mario Clouser[8]; 7. 17GP-Max Adams[16]; 8. 20-Alex Bright[6]; 9. 52-Isaac Chapple[7]; 10. 77M-CJ Leary[12]; 11. 28-Kory Schudy[5]; 12. 33M-Matt Westfall[9]; 13. 44-Wesley Smith[11]; 14. N2-Nic Harris[17]; 15. 28M-Brandon Mattox[13]; 16. 11-Colton Fisher[18]; 17. 1JR-Steven Russell[20]; 18. 8-Tyler Roth[22]; 19. 8D-Will Armitage[21]; 20. 24-Landon Simon[14]; 21. 56-Mitchell Davis[19]; 22. 29-Mitch Wissmiller[15]

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES

GRAND PRIX OF MONTEREY

WEATHERTECH RACEWAY LAGUNA SECA

MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA

TEAM CHEVY POST QUALIFYING DRIVER QUOTES

SEPTEMBER 10, 2022

WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON 5G TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, POLE WINNER:

CAN YOU TAKE A MOMENT TO THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU ACHIEVED TODAY?

“Tremendous milestone. To be up there with an iconic guy like Mario is amazing. When I think about the era that he raced in, how dangerous it was and how much more a risk it was, it just blows my mind that I’m there with Mario. It’s great to have Mario here. Someone I respect tremendously and was a massive fan of growing up. I want to swap a helmet with him, put his in my collection if he would do it.”  

WHAT ALLOWED YOU THIS YEAR TO WIN ALL THE POLES TO GET TO THIS MOMENT? 

“Really focusing in on certain races that we knew we had a good shot at pole.”

NOW THE FOCUS TURNS TOWARD TOMORROW. WHAT IS THE MINDSET?

“We put ourselves in a great position to lead the first lap to get one point and hopefully lead the most laps to get more points. Competitors with better tires but we have track position for right now, so we’ll have a good think about it tonight and see how we attack that one. But it will be a long day. I’ll do my best. “

Mario Andretti, who held the record with 67 poles:

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS MAN?

“Awesome. I know how much I loved qualifying and I can see that he’s the same. It’s just trying to reach and just try to do the lap that you cannot repeat and that’s what puts you on pole.”

DID YOU KNOW THAT THIS MOMENT WOULD EVENTUALLY COME?

“Absolutely. It’s great fort the series, great for the sport. Records are made to be broken. It’s with a good man. Will Power throughout his career has been a really good qualifier. He deserves this. He’s worked for it and he’s the best when it comes to qualifying.”

WHAT IS IT THAT SETS A DRIVER APART IN QUALIFYING?

“How badly do you want it? If I had the specific formula I’d bottle it and sell it. It’s just a matter of really wanting it and just doing that lap that you know you can’t repeat. That’s how records are made.”

CALLUM ILOTT, NO. 77 JUNCOS HOLLINGER RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 2^ND

 “This shows what we can do with what we have in a certain way. I mean, we started the season with two and a half sets of dampers and one of them is for ovals. We finished with, I think, three and a half, and they’re not much different to the first one. We just bought another version of the first set and adapted them a little bit.

Our terms of development this year have been what we had to start with, and again, just fine-tuning it. Whether it’s me and the driving and the experience, we’ve just been chipping away and trying to do a good job with that, and yeah, it’s been tough, especially with no teammate to kind of have anything to use very well, learn from. To get to this stage and have a result like this, I think they’re all super chuffed, and yeah, amazing job.

At the end of the day even if it’s just one lap at the end, it’s great to do it, finish it like this, and I think gives us so much more motivation in the off-season when they get some time to really digest everything and work on it.

PATO O’WARD, MO.5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 6^TH:

“It was a decent day for us. We got into the Firestone Fast Six and then made the wrong tire choice and was just on the wrong tire to do that run, which put us P6, but it’s not a bad position to start tomorrow. It’s a tire degradation race. Track position is important. It will be interesting to see who chooses a three-stopper or four-stopper, and we’ll let it rip from there.”

SCOTT MCLAUGHLIN, NO. 3 XPEL TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 8^TH:

YOU GUYS HAD A QUICK CAR, WHAT HAPPENED OVER THERE IN TURN FOUR SCOTT?

“Yeah, trying a bit hard.  We missed the balance all weekend in the Xpel Chevy and unfortunately we made just a little mistake there. Just trying to find the limits and get confidence in this car. I am really proud of the guys because we were nowhere in practice and they really shook this one down and gave us a great car. They did a great job and I think we have something to play with tomorrow. We have some tires up our sleeve and we are in a decent starting spot.”

HOW MUCH OF YOUR FOCUS TOMORROW WILL BE TRYING TO FINISH SECOND IN THE POINTS AS OPPOSED TO HELPING WILL POWER OR JOSEF NEWGARDEN WIN A TITLE?

“Look, we all drive for Team Penske. When the team wins, we win. We will do what we need to do to get the best result for the team. Whether that is Will (Power) winning the championship or us trying to get 1-2-3 or 1-2. We will do what we need to do. I am very happy with this organization and proud to have signed on and proud to represent all these partners and we just want to do a good job for all them.”

 FELIX ROSENQIST, NO. 7 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET. QUALIFIED 9^TH: 

“In Round 1, Group 2, we did 71.3 second lap and tried to do the same in Round 2, but we were missing four tenths of that lap, so I’m not really sure what happened. Just kind of lacking grip a little bit, something on tire warmup or something I could have done different, but a top 10 is pretty solid. I would have been happy with a little bit higher starting position here, but I think I have a good opportunity tomorrow.”

 RINIS VEEKAY, NO, 21 BITCOIN RACING TEAM WITH BITNILE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 14^TH: We definitely got better from practice to qualifying, but we should have advanced. A car came out in front of me on my second lap, so even though my time should have improved, it didn’t. It’s a bummer, but we definitely moved in the right direction. We should be in good shape for the warm up tomorrow and we’ve got some good things to try for the race.”

CONOR DALY, NO. 20 BITNILE ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET. QUALIFIED 15^TH: “Our qualifying session was a bit chaotic. To produce one lap and just get about a tenth and a half away from transferring was actually a good step forward for us. Last year we struggled here, I’m proud of the team for working really hard on this BitNile car. We’ll just get after it in the race. It’s going to be really interesting with the tire degradation, we have a set of reds that are saved. We’ll see what happens. We were close, definitely close!”

KYLE KIRKWOOD, NO.14 SEXTON PROPERTIES AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 17^TH: 

“So, with qualifying finished, we were one of the few to do red red and it paid off for us because we were in the lead in the first half of qualifying. With the red coming out, we almost got super lucky there. Ultimately, we qualified I think P9 in our group. Not exactly where we want to be, but I think we found some pace between practice one, practice two and qualifying. We are constantly progressing, and we will go into the final practice tomorrow morning hopefully with a good race car and the big thing here is making the tires last.  If we can do that, we have a lot of people starting around us that should be up front as well and hopefully we can just move forward from there.”

DALTON KELLETT, NO. 4 K-LINE AJ FOYT RACING CHEVROLET,QUALIFIED 24^TH:

“Our last qualifying of the year and not where we want to be in qualifying P24. We have closed the gap from where we were at the start of the weekend, so I am happy we found some little bit of time on those new tires and we had banked on going red red but I wasn’t really able to find a gap in that first run because we started at the back of pit lane and just at the mercy of that accordion effect.  So then on that second set, it was really tight coming in and its pretty much hand over hand and grabbed the clutch coming in and I didn’t quite get it into pit lane speed.  Then we sat there and changed tires with the car running so when I launched, I accelerated over pit lane speed, and we got docked there. We had to do a drive through and that probably didn’t help us. It just wasn’t enough to transfer there by seven tenths or so. But the real question tomorrow is how well we keep the tires under us for the long run. That is the name of the game here with how abrasive the track surface is.”

JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 2 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 25^TH:

“I just made a mistake, it’s a real shame. I think we have the fastest car in the field right here, so, yeah, it’s a bummer, it’s a bummer for everybody. It’s not over but it’s not ideal, what just happened here. It is what it is.”

SIMONA DESILVESTRO, NO. 16 THUN SWITZERLAND PARETTA AUTO SPORT CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 26^TH: 

It was a tough day. We got stuck behind people that were gapping and we just didn’t put a (good) lap in which was a bummer. This morning I felt it was going to be a good day and we were going to have been a good qualifying result. Anyways, it is what it is and we’ll go out there tomorrow and do our best.

September 10, 2022

Harrison Burton and the No. 21 Menards/Masterforce team got off to a good start to the race weekend at Kansas Speedway.

Burton was 10^th fastest in practice for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400, with a best lap at 176.835 miles per hour. He posted that on the second of the 28 laps he ran in Saturday’s session.

In qualifying, Burton was faster than in practice, touring the 1.5-mile track at 177.521 mph, but wound up 18^th in the starting line-up.

Sunday’s 400-mile, 267-lap race is scheduled to start just after 2 p.m. (3 p.m. Eastern Time) with TV coverage on USA Network. Stage breaks are planned for Laps 80 and 165.
 

Alexander Rossi to start third, Romain Grosjean fourth in final NTT INDYCAR SERIES race of 2022
Championship contenders Marcus Ericsson, Scott Dixon to start 10th and 13th
Honda drivers Christian Lundgaard and David Malukas carry series Rookie of the Year battle into the final race

MONTEREY, Calif. (Sept. 10, 2022) – Andretti Autosport’s Alexander Rossi and Romain Grosjean topped Honda’s effort today in qualifying for Sunday’s season-ending Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey, while championship contenders Marcus Ericsson and Scott Dixon will start 10th and 13th, respectively.

Both Rossi and Grosjean advanced through the first two rounds of “knockout” qualifying; with Rossi claiming third in the “Fast Six” final round, while Grosjean will start alongside in fourth.
Dixon, 21 points away from scoring his seventh drivers’ title – with 53 points on offer tomorrow – will start 13th after just missing advancing out of the first qualifying round. His Chip Ganassi teammate, Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson, will start 10th and is 40 points out of the lead.

In the tight battle for series Rookie of the Year honors between two Honda drivers, David Malukas will start seventh and his rookie rival Christian Lundgaard will line up 16th. Lundgaard carries a five-point lead into tomorrow’ championship finale.

Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey Honda Qualifying Results
3rd Alexander Rossi Andretti Autosport Honda
4th Romain Grosjean Andretti Autosport Honda
5th Alex Palou Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
7th David Malukas-R Dale Coyne Racing with HMD Honda
10th Marcus Ericsson Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
11th Simon Pagenaud Meyer Shank Racing Honda
12th Helio Castroneves Meyer Shank Racing Honda
13th Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
16th Christian Lundgaard-R Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
18th Colton Herta Andretti Autosport Honda
19th Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
21st Jack Harvey Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda
22nd Takuma Sato Dale Coyne Racing with RWR Honda
23rd Jimmie Johnson Chip Ganassi Racing Honda

R – Rookie

Quotes
Scott Dixon (#9 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda) tied for second in the championship going into tomorrow’s season finale; will start 13th: “Because of the red flag [for Josef Newgarden’s spin], we only had a single lap at the end [to set a qualifying time] and unfortunately, some slower traffic kept me from getting my tires up to proper temperature. We missed [advancing to second-round qualifying] by less than a tenth of a second, which is always frustrating because we definitely had the speed in the car today, it felt really comfortable. For the race tomorrow, strategy is going to be the key, it’s going to be a struggle to complete a full fuel run without the tires going off on this slippery, very low-grip track. There may be more cautions as well. Everything’s to play for, so it may be even more exciting than usual here tomorrow.”

Alexander Rossi (#27 Andretti Autosport Honda) will start third: “Overall, a really good day for the whole Andretti Autosport Honda team. I’ve started, second, third and third here previously, so hopefully we can close out the year – and my time with Andretti, NAPA and Honda – on a high note and get a great result for them this weekend.”

Romain Grosjean (#28 Andretti Autosport Honda) will start fourth: “We’re starting nine places up from where we started last year (to finish third), so that should make my life a little bit easier in tomorrow’s race! Qualifying went well, the changes we made to the car [since practice] all seemed to work and I feel really positive about our weekend so far. I definitely want to have a good race tomorrow, so we can go into the winter break with a bit more confidence than we had in recent races.”

Fast Facts
Honda comes to this weekend’s 2022 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season finale at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca with two of its drivers in contention for the series championship.

Scott Dixon, a two-time winner this year and six-time series champion, comes to the classic central California road course third in the drivers’ title standings, 20 points away from a record-tying seventh title. His Chip Ganassi Racing Honda teammate, Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson, is fourth, 39 points out of the lead.

In the contest for series Rookie of the Year honors, the coveted award will go to one of two Honda drivers. Rahal Letterman Lanigan driver Christian Lundgaard leads with 293 points heading to Laguna Seca. But fellow Honda racer David Malukas is only five points back, driving for Dale Coyne Racing with HMD.

Sheldon Creed and the No. 2 Whelen Chevrolet Team Earn 11th-Place Finish in Rain-Shortened NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Kansas Speedway

11th

3rd

13th

“I had a lot of confidence in our Whelen Chevrolet before the start of the race today at Kansas Speedway. When we fired off at the beginning of the race, I thought we were really good and then we weren’t good when the track starting building rubber. I tried running at the bottom, top and middle and tried different lines. I just couldn’t get anything to work or make speed. I don’t know where we missed it there because we weren’t as good as we thought we would be. It looks like we gained three points, so that will make things interesting in Bristol. I’m proud of everyone at RCR and ECR. I wish we could have finished this one. Maybe we could have played things differently and got a better finish and maybe got a bigger gap in the points back to the No. 39 car.”  -Sheldon Creed

Austin Hill and the No. 21 United Rentals Chevrolet Team Earn 12th-Place Finish at Kansas Speedway

12th

6th

6th

“We ran well today at Kansas today. We led some laps and I think we were capable of finishing better than where we did. Our United Rentals Chevrolet was tight all day and unfortunately with the rain we didn’t have a chance to work on it in the second half of the race and make the balance better. I’m really looking forward to Bristol Motor Speedway next week and getting some positive momentum when we start the NASCAR Playoffs.” -Austin Hill

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES FIRESTONE GRAND PRIX OF MONTEREY WEATERTECH RACEWAY LAGUNA SECA IN SALINAS, CALIFORNIA TEAM CHEVY NTT P1 AWARD WINNER QUOTES – WILL POWERSEPT. 10, 2022 Power sets all-time INDYCAR pole record with 68Points leader breaks tie with Mario Andretti, seeks to wrap up second title in season finale CAN YOU TAKE A MOMENT TO THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU ACHIEVED TODAY?“Tremendous milestone. To be up there with an iconic guy like Mario is amazing. When I think about the era that he raced in, how dangerous it was and how much more a risk it was, it just blows my mind that I’m there with Mario. It’s great to have Mario here. Someone I respect tremendously and was a massive fan of growing up. I want to swap a helmet with him, put his in my collection if he would do it.”   WHAT ALLOWED YOU THIS YEAR TO WIN ALL THE POLES TO GET TO THIS MOMENT? “Really focusing in on certain races that we knew we had a good shot at pole.” NOW THE FOCUS TURNS TOWARD TOMORROW. WHAT IS THE MINDSET?“We put ourselves in a great position to lead the first lap to get one point and hopefully lead the most laps to get more points. Competitors with better tires but we have track position for right now, so we’ll have a good think about it tonight and see how we attack that one. But it will be a long day. I’ll do my best. “ Mario Andretti, who held the record with 67 poles:WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS MAN?“Awesome. I know how much I loved qualifying and I can see that he’s the same. It’s just trying to reach and just try to do the lap that you cannot repeat and that’s what puts you on pole.” DID YOU KNOW THAT THIS MOMENT WOULD EVENTUALLY COME?“Absolutely. It’s great fort the series, great for the sport. Records are made to be broken. It’s with a good man. Will Power throughout his career has been a really good qualifier. He deserves this. He’s worked for it and he’s the best when it comes to qualifying.” WHAT IS IT THAT SETS A DRIVER APART IN QUALIFYING?“How badly do you want it? If I had the specific formula I’d bottle it and sell it. It’s just a matter of really wanting it and just doing that lap that you know you can’t repeat. That’s how records are made.”

NASCAR CUP SERIES KANSAS SPEEDWAY HOLLYWOOD CASINO 400 TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT SEPTEMBER 10, 2022

TYLER REDDICK RECORDS SECOND POLE OF 2022 AT KANSAS SPEEDWAYFive Camaro ZL1’s to Start in Top-10

·       Tyler Reddick clocked-in a lap of 29.899 seconds, at 180.608 mph, to capture the pole position for tomorrow’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway.   ·       This marks Reddick’s third career pole in 102 NASCAR Cup Series starts. ·       Reddick’s pole gives Chevrolet its eighth NASCAR Cup Series pole win of 2022; and 731st all-time in NASCAR Cup Series history.

TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 GUARANTEED RATE CAMARO ZL1 – Press Conference Transcript:YOU GOT YOURSELF A SECOND PEDAL CAR HERE. TALK ABOUT THAT LAP YOU PUT DOWN OUT THERE.“It was good enough. My lap in the first round was certainly a little better. Based off of what I was hearing; everybody was running about the same. I guess in that second round, Ross (Chastain) wasn’t able to put down the exact same lap, so had a little bit of wiggle room. I just tried to maximize our speed and hit it right in turns one and two. I felt like I still could have been a little bit more aggressive, but understanding what we needed to get done, it was just a matter of duplicating the lap from before. We were able to do that and win a pedal car for my kid, so I’m excited about that.” YOU WERE ON THE FRONT ROW IN THE SPRING. HOW CONFIDENT DOES ALL OF THIS MAKE YOU GOING INTO TOMORROW?“It’s reassuring. Again, the last few times we’ve been here, we’ve had a car capable of leading and we’ve been able to do that. It’s just been a matter of putting together the whole day, which is something we’ve fought at times throughout the year. I’m really glad that we’ve been able to learn from a lot of those experiences. It’s made us stronger; it’s made us better as a team. I feel really good and excited about it. Starting first is great any weekend, but to be able to have that first pit stall selection is going to be key. I’m looking forward to it.” FIRST ROUND, YOU RAN A 29.8 SECOND LAP, AND IN THE SECOND ROUND, YOU WERE ONE OF MAYBE TWO OR THREE THAT MATCHED WHAT YOU RAN IN THE FIRST ROUND. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE ABLE TO KEEP THAT CONSISTENCY UP CONSIDERING THE WEATHER CHANGING, THE SUN COMING OUT A LITTLE BIT IN BETWEEN? WHAT CAN YOU TAKE FROM THAT TO LEARN GOING INTO TOMORROW?“Having a consistent car is really important. This place is a track where you’ll have some fall off, but not a lot, so a car that doesn’t swing tight or loose will be important. All of those things, it’s about as perfect of a situation as you’re going to get out there in qualifying today. In practice for us, we didn’t have a lot of traffic, so we had a really good read on what our car will do. But from here on out the rest of the weekend; you’re going to be in traffic at some point, whether it’s later, in fifth and fifth on back. I feel really good about the speed our car has shown. Handling-wise, it’s just about right where I would want it for a place like this so I can move around a little bit and get up by the wall. It pretty much checked all of our boxes today. We can obviously make some small adjustments, but we’re not having to do anything crazy. We’re pretty happy with what we have.” BRISTOL, IN THE SPRING, YOU SAW HOW CRAZY THINGS CAN GET IN THE CLOSING LAPS. HOW PRECARIOUS DOES IT MAKE THAT TRACK SINCE IT’S A CUT-OFF RACE IN THE PLAYOFFS?“I’ll be honest.. I’m not expecting anything crazy there. I really don’t. Just the trend of how this car has been on the short tracks – Martinsville, Richmond – there’s a lot of grip. We don’t really have to pedal the car at all. We were actually working on Bristol a little bit today. At first, I was surprised like ‘wow, this has got a lot of grip’. It feels like you’re out of the gas about as much as you would be on a 1.5-mile track and then I realized you can just start connecting the dots. We went to Richmond and Richmond was a certain way; and Martinsville was, too.  I really don’t know. I think the speeds are going to be high enough there where I just don’t think someone is going to be able to move somebody out of the way like that without going to the extent that we saw, for example, Joey Logano do to William Byron earlier in the year at Darlington. You’re pretty much going to have to go in there and hope that you hit the guy because if you don’t, you’re going to just go flying up into the wall and crash. It could be chaotic.. I don’t know. It’s the type of place where things stack up. You could have some action, but I don’t think it’s going to be the type of race where people are going to be moving each other out of the way because I just don’t think you’re going to be able to get there.” DENNY (HAMLIN) WAS IN HERE EARLIER AND HE SAID HE THINKS TYLER (REDDICK) WOULD LIKE TO PLAY OUT HIS CONTRACT AT RCR AND THAT’S WHAT HE ALWAYS INTENDED. IS THAT YOUR INTENTION IF THE RUMOR MILL GOES TO FRUITION AND SOMETHING HAPPENS WITH KYLE BUSCH AT RCR?“If it does, then I’ll figure out what to do. But until then, I’m just going to keep doing my job and the task at hand. That’s what we did today. We got a pole. We were fast in practice in a lot of different measures.  If I was pretty bored during the week, didn’t have a lot going on and wasn’t spending a lot of time trying to prepare; it would be easy to get distracted and give that some of your mind and some of your attention. But for me, thankfully, I stay really busy with my team. We have a lot on our minds; right here, doing stuff like this, bringing fast race cars. So we don’t even have time to let that into my head.” WHEN GROUP A WAS RUNNING THEIR QUALIFYING SESSION, IT DIDN’T SEEM UNTIL (CHRISTOPHER) BELL’S LAP THAT PEOPLE FIGURED OUT THAT YOU NEEDED TO MIGRATE TO THE TOP TO GET THE SPEED THERE. I ASSUME THAT WAS YOUR PLAN ALL ALONG. DO YOU THINK THAT IS WHERE THE SPEED IS GOING TO BE ON SUNDAY?“It certainly will be for large amounts of this race. I think it has the potential, under green flag cycle, to move around off of that wall. The fastest car here in the spring was Kurt Busch and he was able to really do a good job of running on that top seam. It’s going to lay rubber with 30 plus cars out there, all running in the majority of the same area of the racetrack. So I think it’s going to open up that opportunity for other lanes to come into play because it’ll just be less rubber on it.  Certainly when we have cautions, the track cleans up and we’ll go out there with brand new tires; all of the rubber will come off the race track and kind of reset. But I definitely think it has the opportunity to where you’re going to be moving around. More so than anything, clean air is always going to be key. Everyone knows that at this point. You’re not going to be able to follow somebody into the corner, two or three-car links off of them, and run the same lap as the car ahead. You’re going to have to move around, so having some versatility is going to be important tomorrow.” DID YOU NOTICE ANY DIFFERENCE FROM THE NEW TIRES FROM THE SPRING? “I’ve paid some attention to that. Just from what I know from the little bit we played with it when I drove the wheel force car a long time ago; you can definitely get the car a little bit more unsettled. You have a little bit more of a window to work with it on the tire before you just crash. I don’t know if that’s actually a good thing or not, but everyone has kind of adjusted for it and worked on the cars.  Between that and the temperature differences, it’s pretty much been about what I expected it to be.” YOU’RE TWO CAREER NASCAR CUP SERIES WINS WERE BOTH ON ROAD COURSES. YOU HAD A GOOD FINISH LAST WEEKEND AT DARLINGTON. WHAT GETS YOU OVER THE HUMP ON THE OVAL? “I think it’s the very same thing that we were able to do on the road courses.. and that’s just execute all day long. I would say that – at one point when I came into the Cup Series – I had more speed on the ovals and I had to figure the road courses out. I think road courses have a higher chance of playing out naturally. We’ll see more cautions and more things happen on ovals I feel like. And because of that, we’ve had more opportunities to make mistakes. We’ve made them and that’s kept us from getting the job done.  But we’ve been close a few times. A lot of second-places, which are painful. But thankfully we have some wins, some top-three’s. We’re right there, it’s just a matter of putting the whole day together.”

Title is Seventh for the Chevrolet INDYCAR Program 

DETROIT (Sept. 10, 2022) – Chevrolet has won the NTT INDYCAR SERIES (NICS) Manufacturer Championship for the seventh time since it returned to the Series in 2012.

The Chevrolet 2.2-liter, twin-turbocharged, direct-injected V6 INDYCAR engine has produced 12 poles and ­­­11 wins in 16 events heading into Sunday’s season finale at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca. 

“Preparation, teamwork and great execution were key this season to every pole, every win and now Chevrolet’s seventh Manufacturer Championship,” said Jim Campbell, U.S. Vice President Performance and Motorsports for Chevrolet. “Thank you to Team Penske, Ed Carpenter Racing, Arrow McLaren SP, AJ Foyt Racing, Juncos Hollinger Racing, Paretta Autosport, our Chevrolet Competition and Propulsion engineers, and our technical partners for their combined efforts that resulted in delivering Chevrolet’s NTT INDYCAR Series Manufacturer Championship.”

In the 11 seasons of the Chevrolet 2.2-liter V6 INDYCAR engine, Team Chevy drivers have amassed 106 wins of the 181 races to date – an impressive 58.6%. This season, Chevy-powered drivers have won 69% of the races and 75% of the NTT P1 Awards.

The 2022 Manufacturer Championship clearly demonstrates the never-give-up attitude of Chevrolet engineering, its teams, the GM Propulsion Group and its technical partners. Chevrolet proudly fielded 11 full-time entries during the 17-race season. Despite having less than half of the total car count, the Chevy teams and drivers maximized all the available support, engineering tools and simulator time to continue performance growth that translated to tremendous performance. 

All of Chevrolet’s full-time teams contributed valuable time and effort toward the seventh NICS Manufacturer Championship. Team Penske, with drivers Will Power, Josef Newgarden and Scott McLaughlin; Ed Carpenter Racing, with drivers Rinus VeeKay and Conor Daly; AJ Foyt Racing, with drivers Dalton Kellett and Kyle Kirkwood; and Juncos Hollinger Racing, with driver Callum Ilott, were instrumental in Team Chevy’s success.

“Winning Chevrolet’s seventh NTT INDYCAR Series Manufacturer Championship has been a true team effort by our Chevrolet engineers, Chevy-powered race teams, Chevrolet Propulsion engineers and technical partners at Ilmor Engineering and Hitachi Automotive Systems,” said Mark Stielow, Director Motorsports Competition Engineering. “The performance delivered by Chevrolet’s 2.2-liter twin turbo, direct-injected V6 engine has proven throughout the season to be the consistent combination of reliability, drivability and power for our teams to win races and this championship.”

Since 2012, in addition to the seven Manufacturer Championships, Chevrolet has won six driver championships with Ryan Hunter-Reay (2012), Power (2014), Scott Dixon (2015), Pagenaud (2016), Newgarden (2017 and 2019). Three Chevrolet drivers are in contention to win the crown in 2022. 

Additionally, the Chevrolet 2.2-liter V6 engine powered drivers to win the Indianapolis 500 with Tony Kanaan (2013), Juan Pablo Montoya (2015) Will Power (2018) and Simon Pagenaud (2019). 

Previously, Chevrolet competed in Indy-style racing as a manufacturer of V8 engines from 1986-93 and 2002-05, powering 111 wins, one manufacturer championship in 2002, seven Indianapolis 500 wins and six driver championships.

NASCAR CUP SERIES

KANSAS SPEEDWAY

HOLLYWOOD CASINO 400

TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT

SEPTEMBER 10, 2022

DANIEL SUAREZ, NO. 99 COMMSCOPE CAMARO ZL1, met with the media in advance of the NASCAR Cup Series practice and qualifying session at Kansas Speedway. Press Conference Transcript:

YOU’VE GOT ONE TOP-10 HERE IN 11 STARTS AT THE CUP LEVEL. WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS TRACK THAT’S DIFFICULT TO GET A HANDLE? 

“I don’t know.. I wish I knew. It has been a difficult place for me in the past, but this year has been different. Last time here, we were running top-five when I had a flat tire. I felt like we were going to have a shot to fight Toyota for the win, but we didn’t make it to that point.

I feel like the Next Gen car has changed a lot; the history in previous races, results and stuff like that. In the past, it hasn’t been a great place for me. But I truly believe that right now is quite different. I feel like we are going to be contending for the win this weekend.”

WITH BEING A FORMER CHAMPION, YOU’VE GOT POST-SEASON EXPERIENCE. WHAT’S THE EXPERIENCE BEEN LIKE SO FAR IN THE CUP SERIES AND WHAT’S IT LIKE BEING ON THE BUBBLE OR HOW DO YOU AVOID THINKING ABOUT THAT ASPECT AT THIS POINT?

“Really, I think the secret is not to think about it. At the end of the day, there is a lot of stuff going on around the playoffs; a lot of pressure, a lot of media obligations, a lot of stuff going on. But at the end of the day, when we put the helmets on and we go to race, it’s exactly the same thing. It’s no different than the first Kansas race in the spring to the Kansas race right now in the playoffs. You have to try to be smart; try to control what you can control. At the end of the day, I can only control one car and that is the No. 99 team. I cannot control what everyone else does or doesn’t do. I have to be smart, control what I can control and put all of my energy and effort into maximizing the results for the No. 99.”

AFTER LAST WEEKEND’S RACE, YOU WERE A BIT OUTSPOKEN ABOUT THE NO. 20 CAR.. SAYING YOU OWE HIM ONE FOR WHAT HAPPENED DURING THAT RACE. A WEEK LATER, HAS ANYTHING CHANGED IN TERMS OF YOUR MINDSET OR DO YOU STILL STAND BY WHAT YOU SAID AFTER THE RACE? 

“No, nothing has changed. But once again, that’s a perfect example of I have to control what I can control. Last week, I couldn’t control what the No. 20 was going to do. I feel like we were very, very lucky that we were able to finish the stage and continue with minor damage. The car wasn’t the same.. the toe and the right rear tire was messed up after that. 

But you make decisions as a racecar driver. You have to live with those and that’s the way he races. Something that is very, very general in the Cup garage is that you’re going to race people and you have to expect those people to race you the same way back. If that’s 100 percent clean, with a little bit of respect but aggressive, that’s the rule of the game and I feel like it’s going to be no different this time. I’m not thinking about it too much, but I definitely won’t forget what happened last week because it could have been way, way worse. I feel like I got very lucky.”

YOU HAD A LOT OF SPEED AT DARLINGTON LAST WEEKEND. HOW DOES THAT TRANSITION TO HERE AT KANSAS BECAUSE THERE ARE SIMILARITIES.. UP AGAINST THE FENCE, THAT SORT OF THING. HOW DOES THAT TRANSITION TO HERE AND YOUR DEGREE OF OPTIMISM WHEN YOU LOOK AT THIS RACE THIS WEEKEND?

“I’m very excited. Nobody pays attention to the No. 99 team like I do or my team does. But we’ve been extremely strong. At Daytona, we were in the position to win it before the rain. We probably should have won that race. 

In Darlington, whatever happened, happened. I made a mistake (on pit road) and that cost us a lot, but we were in contention to fight for the win once again. This weekend, honestly, is going to be no different. I think the No. 99 team right now is in a very, very good place. We’re just continuing to get better. At the beginning of the year, we were a very young, new team; new people working together. Right now, we are just jelling more and more. I’m excited for everything that we’re doing. The results on paper, they don’t look that great right now. But I’ve been extremely pleased with the speed that we’ve had. I’m really looking forward to continuing that.”

WHAT’S GOING TO BE THE BIGGEST DIFFERENT BETWEEN THE RACE HERE IN THE SPRING AND THE RACE TOMORROW?

“That’s a good question. I think that the biggest difference will be all of the developing that the teams have done. If you think about it, in the spring, the No. 45 team won the race in a very, very strong way in the final stage; and I don’t think there was a better car than the No. 45 in the final stage. If that team brought the exact same car to this race, I don’t think he’d be able to run in the top-20. The teams have gotten so much smarter and they’ve done so much developing in just a few months. It’s crazy to me and that just continues to grow. 

I feel like the biggest difference would be the development that we’ve done in the last few months. I was expecting the race to be hot, but it probably won’t be that way. It’s actually a little chilly. With that being said, we may be racing with the same temperatures as we did a few months ago in the spring. So I think the biggest difference would be all the developing that the teams have done throughout the last few months.”

NEXT WEEK AT BRISTOL.. OBVIOUSLY YOU GUYS HAVE RAN THERE, BUT ON DIRT, SO IT’S A BRAND NEW RACETRACK IN A WAY. WHAT KIND OF CHALLENGES OR UNKNOWNS ARE THERE WITH THIS CAR BEING ON THE CONCRETE THERE?

“That’s a very good question. The only racetrack that we’ve been that is similar to Bristol – but not the same by any means – is Dover. Nobody really knows what to exact at Bristol. It’s a racetrack that is by itself. It’s completely different than anything else and it’s a tough place. With 20 minutes of practice; if you miss it during the week, you’re going to have a long weekend and a long 500 laps. 

I love Bristol. It’s actually one of my favorite racetracks and I’m really looking forward to the challenge. It would be nice to have a strong weekend here in Kansas and go to Bristol a little bit more relaxed when it comes to points. Like I said, I’m not really thinking about it too much once I’m in the race. But during the week, there are a lot of conversations about that. I think the preparation we do during the week is going to be important because nobody really knows what is going to work in Bristol, just because it’s so different than everything else that we’ve done.”

FROM A COMPETITOR’S POINT OF VIEW, WHAT’S YOUR PERSPECTIVE TO SEE WHAT THE UNCERTAINTY THAT KYLE BUSCH HAS GONE THROUGH THIS SUMMER AND TO SEE SOMEONE OF HIS CALIBER TO HAVE THAT UNCERTAINTY FOR SUCH A LONG TIME? YOU’VE GONE THROUGH SOME DIFFERENT THINGS – NOT SAYING THEY ARE THE SAME THINGS AT ALL – BUT I’M GUESSING YOU PROBABLY HAVE A MORE UNIQUE PERSPECTIVE THAN I WOULD OR ANYBODY ELSE WOULD?

“I’ve unfortunately been in those situations in the past. Racing at this level is very consuming. You have to work 24/7 to be competitive; with your team, preparation both physically and mentally, looking at data. When you’re in a situation where you don’t really know where you’re going to land next year – team, contracts, all that kind of stuff – at the end of the day, in my mind with my experience, were distractions. Once you get to a race, you put the helmet on and you forget everything else and you get to drive. But everything else that happens during the week is not as good.. the preparation, the meetings, all those things. There is ‘X’ amount of time a day that you have to put into all of these discussions and negotiations that you aren’t putting into the competition. So, it’s never a good thing, especially for Kyle (Busch). He hasn’t had to experience that in many years. It’s definitely not the best situation, but you learn to deal with it.”

IN THE TWO 1.5-MILE RACES – CHARLOTTE AND HERE – THE TOYOTA’S WERE PRETTY DOMINANT.. FIVE OF THE TOP-SIX, TOP-TWO AND THREE OF THE TOP-FIVE AT CHARLOTTE. SINCE YOU GUYS HAVEN’T BEEN ON A 1.5-MILE TRACK SINCE THE COCA-COLA 600, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO TRY AND MAKE UP THAT GAP AND HAVE YOU BEEN SPENDING A LOT OF TIME ON THE SIMULATOR? 

“Do you remember who was the best car in the Coca-Cola 600 (laughs)? 

I think everyone has worked really hard. What Toyota has been able to do in the last few months has been very good. They weren’t as good a few months ago and now they have a pretty good package with whatever they were able to figure out. 

Everyone at the Chevy camp has done a very, very good job just continuing to develop. I feel like we started the year as, I would say, the leader group in some of the racetracks. Some of these guys were playing catch-up, like Toyota, they are right there with us.. and at times, even a little bit better. But I feel like we continue to get better. I think that in Darlington, we showed some pretty good speed. We showed that we can fight with them. I personally felt like I was going to give them a fight. It was going to be a track position race, but I don’t feel like they were much better than me. And I feel like hopefully, here in Kansas, is going to be similar. We can fight in a level field. I guess time will tell.

I feel very confident. Everyone at Chevrolet and GM have done an amazing job. Trackhouse Racing with the No. 99 and No. 1 teams, we’ve been working together very, very hard to continue to move forward. I feel confident in where we are right now to continue to fight.”

YOU KNOW WHAT IT’S LIKE TO FIGHT FOR AND WIN A CHAMPIONSHIP IN A NASCAR NATIONAL SERIES. CAN YOU COMPARE AND CONTRAST WHAT YOU’RE GOING THROUGH NOW TO WHAT YOU WERE GOING TO THEN? HOW MUCH MORE STRESSFUL, IF IT IS? ALSO, DOES HAVING WON THE XFINITY TITLE GIVE YOU A BETTER IDEA OF WHAT YOU’RE IN FOR DURING THE NEXT EIGHT OR NINE WEEKS?

“That’s a good question. If you really think about it, it’s the same thing. It’s exactly the same thing. The process is the same, the system is the same, what you have to go through is the same. The only part that is very different is the level of competition. Everyone is better and everything is more difficult. But the system – the pressure and the stuff that you have to do, how you have to be smart and how you have to pick and choose your battles – is the same thing. I feel fortunate that I have that experience in the past.. to live, experience and learn from that championship battle in 2016. It’s been fun. If it wasn’t because of that, right now would probably feel a little bit more like ‘OK, what is next.. what is going to happen next’. At least I’ve been there before. 

But like I said, it’s quite different when it comes to the competition. I’m really looking forward to continue doing what we’ve been doing. We have to control what we can control. The No. 99 team has been doing an incredible job. Everybody is very calm; everybody is very relaxed. We are taking one day at a time and I feel like we’re going to be in good shape. I truly believe that. I feel like the playoffs are coming at a very, very good time for Trackhouse Racing.”

PLACERVILLE, CA (Sept. 10, 2022) – For the second consecutive year, Placerville Speedway is becoming the base for regional California firefighting efforts, including a fire rescue camp, and thereby forcing the postponement of the Sept. 17 Bonney Plumbing 49er Gold Rush Classic to 2023.

The thoughts of the entire World of Outlaws family are with the firefighters and all of those affected by the fires throughout the area.

The Tom Tarlton Classic at Keller Auto Speedway in Hanford, CA — one of the most exciting races in 2022 — remains scheduled for Friday, Sept. 16, and will now be the final World of Outlaws race this season in California.

Those who already purchased tickets to the 2022 Bonney Plumbing 49er Gold Rush, originally scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 17, will be able to use them for the 2023 event at Placerville. The date of the 2023 race will be announced by the end of the year. Ticketholders unable to make the 2023 race can request a refund when the 2023 date is announced.

The World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series West Coast Swing continues tonight at Silver Dollar Speedway for the $25,000-to-win Gold Cup Race of Champions, live on DIRTVision.