Tristan Vautier Tag

BRASELTON, Ga. – Braun Fastest Early Thursday In Practice at Motul Petit Le Mans Hunting for their first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Prototype class title, the No. 54 CORE autosport team’s efforts got off to a hot start on Thursday at Road Atlanta. Colin Braun, who is co-driving in Saturday’s 10-hour Motul Petit Le Mans with team owner Jon Bennett and endurance driver Romain Dumas, posted the fastest lap overall across the two afternoon practice sessions with a time of one minute, 11.669 seconds (127.586 mph). The No. 54 ORECARead More

By IMSA Wire Service SEBRING, Fla. – The 66th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts is now one third of the way in the books and the No. 7 Acura Team Penske Acura ARX-05 DPi car shared by Helio Castroneves, Ricky Taylor and Graham Rahal led the way at the four-hour mark. The No. 7 Acura DPi has been among the front-runners throughout the week at Sebring, leading practice on Thursday and qualifying third in the hands of Taylor, a defending champion of both theRead More

By IMSA Wire Service SEBRING, Fla. – For the second consecutive year, Tristan Vautier will start the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts on the pole. This season, however, when he takes the green flag Saturday, there won’t be any cars in front of him. That’s because his Motul Pole Award in 2017 came in the GT Daytona (GTD) class driving a Mercedes-AMG – the first in history for the German manufacturer. This time around, it’s in the top Prototype class driving the No. 90Read More

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer The Roar Before the 24 gives teams in the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship the opportunity to test out their machines ahead of the season-opening Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona at the Daytona International Speedway road course. The end of the testing period is marked by a qualifying session that determines pit road and garage space selection. Prototype It was a near-perfect Cadillac sweep of the top three positions of the seven practice sessions. Out of 21 positions, Cadillac-powered DPi machines occupied 18 of those positionsRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, IndyCar & Road to Indy Writer Enough, Racing Gods. Enough. Dale Coyne has clearly suffered through massive amounts of heartache. During Saturday’s Rainguard Water Sealers 600 at Texas Motor Speedway, the longtime Verizon IndyCar Series team owner had another night that would make any normal team owner question his involvement in the sport. With Tristan Vautier becoming the driver du jour in the No. 18 GEICO Honda replacing Sebastien Bourdais, the new Frenchman qualified fifth and was running in the upper end of the field. Meanwhile, teammate EdRead More

By Adam Tate, Associate Editor FORT WORTH, Texas – On lap 151 of a thrilling Rainguard Water Sealers 600, contact between the No. 10 of Tony Kanaan and the No.5 of James Hinchcliffe led to a pile up that involved nine cars. Along with Hinchcliffe and Kanaan, were Mikhail Aleshin, Tristan Vautier, Ed Jones, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Ed Carpenter, JR Hildebrand and Carlos Munoz of those involved. Kanaan received minor damage and would end up finishing second. Hinchcliffe and Aleshin, the two Schmidt Peterson team mates were running side by side comingRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, IndyCar & Road to Indy Writer Expect the unexpected. This year has seen a massive improvement from Honda as they have won five out of eight races and heading into a newly-reconfigured Texas Motor Speedway, the Verizon IndyCar Series had no idea what to expect into Saturday’s Rainguard Water Sealers 600. Well, looking at the practice and qualifying recaps, it was a complete tossup until final practice. In the first practice session, Honda had the top six times as Scott Dixon led Charlie Kimball, Alexander Rossi, Graham Rahal,Read More

By Adam Tate, Associate Editor Continuing the Verizon IndyCar Series’ unpredictable season, Charlie Kimball scored his first career pole position today with a new IndyCar Series’ track record at Texas Motor Speedway. The Ganassi driver’s two lap average speed of 222.556 mph topped Will Power’s previous top mark from 2015, no doubt aided by the repaved and re-profiled track surface of TMS. “It’s pretty fantastic. It feels really, really good actually,” Kimball said of his first pole position. “The car was pretty good straight out of the trailer for practice. IRead More

By INDYCAR Dale Coyne Racing is bringing a familiar face in to drive its No. 18 Honda this week for the Rainguard Water Sealers 600 at Texas Motor Speedway. Tristan Vautier, who has made 11 of his 30 career Verizon IndyCar Series starts with the team, will fill the seat this weekend as fellow Frenchman Sebastien Bourdais continues to mend from injuries sustained in a May 20 crash during qualifying for the 101st Indianapolis 500 presented by PennGrade Motor Oil. Vautier will team with rookie Ed Jones in the DCRRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, IndyCar & Road to Indy Writer INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana — In eight laps, James Davison was already over 217 mph. The Australian was drafted overnight to replace the injured Sebastien Bourdais after a savage accident left the 2017 St. Petersburg winner on the sideline with multiple pelvic fractures and a fractured right hip. Davison was got back up to speed quickly during Mondays’s post qualifying practice and turned 44 laps within the first 80 minutes of practice. His fastest lap to that point was 223.670 mph, good enough forRead More