All posts by Motorsports Tribune

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service CONCORD, N.C. – Kyle Busch never tires of winning, even though he does it more often than anyone else. Busch led 90 of 134 laps in Friday night’s NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway and completed a dominating victory in the event, sweeping both early stages of the race and taking the checkered flag .986 seconds ahead of runner-up Johnny Sauter. The win was Busch’s seventh in 11 starts at the 1.5-mile track, his second of the season in threeRead More

By IMS Auto Racing Hall of Fame inductee Jim McElreath, the 1962 Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year and a veteran of 15 starts in the “500” between 1962 and 1980, passed away Thursday, May 18 in his hometown of Arlington, Texas. He was 89. One of the last eight surviving drivers who could claim to have driven a front-engined car in the “500,” McElreath was 34 years old and had been racing on short tracks for 16 years when he burst on the scene at Indianapolis in 1962. DrivingRead More

Mercedes Lewis Hamilton took his second career Spanish Grand Prix victory after winning a thrilling, tight strategic battle with Sebastian Vettel after the Ferrari driver led for the first half of the race. Third place went to Red Bull Racing’s Daniel Ricciardo, the Australian inheriting the podium spot after an engine failure ruled Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas out midway through the grand prix. When the lights went out, it was Vettel who made the best start. The German powered away from P2 on the grid and grabbed the lead as heRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Martin Truex Jr. finally ended his Kansas hex. Truex streaked away on the final restart with two laps left in Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400 to win his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway. Truex led a race-high 104 of 267 laps to win for the ninth time in his career and for the second time this season. Three times in the past, Truex had led the most laps in a Kansas race—without winning. But onRead More

By INDYCAR Will Power used the backdrop of iconic Indianapolis Motor Speedway to move past a pair of Team Penske greats in the Indy car record book. Driving the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, Power dominated today’s INDYCAR Grand Prix on the 2.439-mile, 14-turn road course to collect win No. 30 in his 13-year Indy car career. The milestone victory pushed the 36-year-old Power ahead of current teammate Helio Castroneves and retired Team Penske legend Rick Mears for sole possession of 11th place on the all-time list. INDYCAR GRANDRead More

By Road to Indy Victor Franzoni ensured a banner weekend for himself and the Juncos Racing team by sweeping both races that comprised the Mazda Road to Indy Grand Prix Presented by Royal Purple Supporting Lupus Foundation of America on the 2.439-mile Indianapolis Grand Prix road course. Franzoni, from Sao Palo, Brazil, was never seriously threatened this morning in cool and sunny conditions, finishing a full 1.0798 seconds clear of Team Pelfrey’s TJ Fischer. Fischer’s teammate, Carlos Cunha, from Campinas, Brazil, finished a comfortable third ahead of Australian’s Anthony MartinRead More

Lewis Hamilton edged Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel by just five hundredths of a second to claim the 64th pole position of his career at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Hamilton’s Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas will start tomorrow’s Spanish Grand Prix third ahead of Kimi Raikkonen in the second Ferrari. FP1 saw Hamilton go quickest with a lap of 1:20.511, two tenths of a second ahead of Raikkonen and Vettel. There was a scare for Vettel, however. After detecting a potential problem during FP3, Ferrari opted to change the German’s power unit aheadRead More

After a Friday dominated by Mercedes, Ferrari fought back in final practice with Kimi Räikkönen heading a one-two for the Scuderia ahead of team-mate Sebastian Vettel. After leading the way during the medium-tyre shod opening half of the session with a time of 1:22.409, Raikkonen bolted on soft tyres shortly after the halfway point in the one-hour final practice session and immediately lowered the benchmark by more than two seconds, logging a best time of 1:21.214 that stood until the end of the session. He was quickly joined at theRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Kyle Busch didn’t do a celebratory burnout when he won Friday night’s Toyota Tundra 250 at Kansas Speedway. He didn’t do his customary bow after notching his 47th victory in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series. Heartbreak for Ben Rhodes, who was leading by more than a second when his engine expired with eight laps left, provided the stroke of serendipity that launched Busch into Victory Lane. And Busch knew it. “That’s one of the worst ones to swallow rightRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Improving in each round of knockout qualifying in relation to other cars, Ryan Blaney won the pole for Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400 at Kansas Speedway (7:30 p.m. ET on FS1), claiming his first career pole by a mere .009 seconds over Joey Logano. During a Friday qualifying session in which 11 cars failed to make it to the grid because of inspection issues, Blaney toured the 1.5-mile speedway in 28.481 seconds (189.600 mph) in the final round to earnRead More