(Indianapolis Motor Speedway)
From the IMS Press Release:
Rocky Moran, a veteran of three Indianapolis 500 starts and one of the most respected sports car racers of his generation, died last weekend after a battle with cancer. He was 74.
After failing to qualify with Salt Walther’s small team in 1987, Southern California native Moran made three consecutive “500” starts from 1988-90, with a best finish of 14th in 1989 while driving the No. 33 Skoal Classic March/Cosworth owned by A.J. Foyt. He also made his Indianapolis 500 debut in 1988 in a Foyt-owned car, finishing 16th in the No. 48 Skoal/Trench Shoring March/Cosworth as the second-highest placing rookie in the field. His final start came in 1990 with Gohr Racing. He earned the 33rd and final spot in the field in an older car and was credited with 25th place in the No. 56 Glidden Paints Lola/Buick when his engine expired after he completed 88 laps. It was his final INDYCAR SERIES start.
The popular, versatile Moran never raced a full season in INDYCAR SERIES competition, but his talent still attracted rides from prominent team owners besides Foyt. Moran drove for Dan Gurney’s All American Racers in his INDYCAR SERIES debut in 1981 at Watkins Glen. He qualified a strong seventh in the No. 48 Pepsi Challenger Eagle/Chevrolet, drove to first and led 21 laps. A storybook victory in his first series start was denied when the team didn’t put enough fuel in the car to make the finish during his final pit stop. Moran still was credited with sixth place in a race won by Rick Mears.
He started his amateur racing career in the early 1970s on the West Coast in open-wheel and sports cars before climbing to national sports car series such as Trans Am, Can-Am and IMSA later in the decade.
Gurney didn’t forget Moran’s impressive INDYCAR SERIES debut with AAR in 1981 and hired him as a driver for the team’s factory sports car program in the IMSA GTO class in 1986. Gurney also hired Moran to team with Willy T. Ribbs in an earlier version of a Toyota prototype in IMSA competition in 1991, and they earned a podium finish at Portland. The pinnacle of Moran’s sports car racing career came in 1993 when he teamed with PJ Jones and Mark Dismore to win the Daytona 24 Hours, a year after they finished fourth. It was the first Rolex 24 victory for AAR and Toyota.
Moran is survived by his wife, Kayla; daughter, Kelly; sons Rocky Jr. and Cody; and seven grandchildren.
(Formula1.com)
Lando Norris (No. 4 Mclaren Formula 1 Team) converted pole position into victory with a dominant drive during Sunday night’s Singapore Grand Prix, finishing 20 seconds clear of Max Verstappen (No. 1 Oracle Red Bull Racing) and reducing the championship leader’s points advantage once more. Norris banished the memories of previous poor starts from the front of the grid to slot ahead of Verstappen at Turn 1 and control the opening laps, before romping clear and spending most of the encounter in a league of his own – a couple of brushes with the wall aside. With no answer to Norris’s raw pace, Verstappen had to settle for a distant second position, while Oscar Piastri’s (No. 81 McLaren Formula 1 Team) rise from fifth to third – and a lowly points finish for Sergio Perez (No. 11 Oracle Red Bull Racing) – means McLaren moves further ahead of Red Bull in the constructors’ standings. Watch the Race Highlights here. (Thank you to Formula1.com)
(MotoGP.com)
Enea Bastianini (No. 23 Ducati Lenovo Team) is victorious at the Gran Premio Pramac dell’Emilia-Romagna after a showstopping and controversial move on the final lap. ‘The Beast’ crossed the line to take a historic win after running a red-hot pace throughout the GP. It was an important day for Ducati, with the Bologna factory claiming the Constructors’ World Championship and their 100th win in the premier class. The Italian defeated Jorge Martin (No. 89 Prima Pramac Racing) in Misano as Martin extended his title advantage after Francesco Bagnaia (No. 1 Ducati Lenovo Team) crashed out on Lap 21. Martin’s advantage is now 24 points as the momentum swings as the series leaves the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli. Meanwhile, Marc Marquez (No. 93 Gresini Racing MotoGP™) earned another podium, finishing less than three seconds behind Martin at the line. It was a strong day for the eight-time World Champion, who sits fourth in the Championship after Bastianini took 25 points. Watch the Race Highlights here. (Thank you to MotoGP.com)
Editor-in-Chief's Note: The INDYCAR season finale was the last for NBC Sports, with coverage moving to FOX next year. I think that network did a superb job with its coverage and I really appreciated it. NBC released a farewell video narrated by Leigh Diffey. It's well worth your time. Watch it here.
(IMSA)
The standard playbook for a six-hour IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship endurance race is “preserve the car and put yourself in position for when things get serious with an hour to go.” BMW M Team RLL executed it to perfection Sunday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course. Jesse Krohn and Philipp Eng led a 1-2 finish for the suburban Indianapolis-based team in the second running of the TireRack.com Battle on the Bricks. Eng finished the victorious drive in the No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8, crossing the speedway’s famous yard of bricks finish line 1.647 seconds ahead of the team’s similar No. 25 entry shared by Nick Yelloly and Connor De Phillippi. The winners completed 219 laps of the 2.439-mile IMS road course for a total of 534.141 miles of racing over the course of six hours. Roughly an hour was run under caution early in the event due to excessive standing water from a heavy rainstorm. Mathieu Jaminet and Nick Tandy finished third in the No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963, moving the duo to within 14 points of the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class-leading No. 7 Porsche of Felipe Nasr and Dane Cameron, who finished ninth in class on Sunday. The final round of the 2024 WeatherTech Championship is the 27th annual Motul Petit Le Mans, set for October 9-12 at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta. Watch the Extended Race Highlights from Motorsports on NBC here. (Thank you to John Oreovicz/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
Steven Thomas and Mikkel Jensen repeated their 2023 Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) class victory Sunday in the No. 11 TDS Racing ORECA LMP2 07. Joined this year by Carmel, Indiana, resident Hunter McElrea, they won by a commanding 26.049 seconds over the Motul Pole Award-winning No. 52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA shared by Nick Boulle, Tom Dillmann and Jakub Smiechowski. The No. 18 Era Motorsport ORECA featuring the driver lineup of Dwight Merriman, Ryan Dalziel and rising teen star Connor Zilisch claimed third in class. (Thank you to John Oreovicz/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
After unexpected adversity, the pair of Laurin Heinrich and Michael Christensen (No. 77 Porsche 911 GT3 R 992) authored a comeback for the ages with a last-to-first, title-push bolstering third victory of the season for the team in Grand Touring Daytona Pro (GTD PRO). Heinrich had qualified the No. 77 Porsche fastest of the 35 cars entered in the two GT classes at the 2.439-mile, 14-turn IMS road course. The car was sent to the rear of the field, however, for not meeting the minimum ground clearance, so it rolled off 56th and last overall and 13th and last in GTD PRO. After the first hour, Heinrich had gained 33 spots overall, and rose to 23rd overall and fourth in GTD PRO. Heinrich pitted under a lengthy early full-course yellow, just under 90 minutes into the race, and handed off to Christensen where the team could deploy its intended strategy. The pivotal moment of the race occurred on the final pit stop sequence with just over one hour remaining. Entering the pits third, the AO Racing crew propelled the No. 77 Porsche to the lead ahead of the leading No. 64 Ford Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3 and No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3. Heinrich extended the gap from the restart and ultimately secured the class victory by 12.527 seconds over Mike Rockenfeller, who shared the No. 64 Ford with Harry Tincknell to deliver that pair its second straight runner-up finish. Antonio Garcia claimed the final podium place for the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette Z06 GT3.R, in the car he shared with Alexander Sims. Garcia captured the spot after a daring inside move of Jack Hawksworth, in the No. 14 Lexus, at Turn 13 three laps from the finish. (Thank you to Tony DiZinno/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
Similar to AO Racing with its Porsche in GTD PRO, Wright Motorsports with its Porsche started deep in its class – GT Daytona – and emerged victorious after six hours of racing in Indianapolis. When the skies opened with consistent and increasingly heavy rain, the strategy and pace propelled the trio of Elliott Skeer, Adam Adelson and Jan Heylen, and their No. 120 Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) forward early from 14th in a 22-car GTD class. Solid stints from all three kept them in the lead. Adelson started and delivered a strong opening stint, scything through cars and avoiding the many pitfalls that caught out others. He made it into the top five and once he’d handed over to Heylen, the No. 120 Wright Porsche took the lead for the first time on Lap 54. The car added two other stints up front between Skeer and Heylen and all told led a class-high 140 of 207 laps, including the last 84. Turner Motorsport kept its championship hopes alive with a runner-up finish, achieved by the trio of Robby Foley, Patrick Gallagher and Jake Walker in the No. 96 BMW M4 GT3. They’re now 222 points (3,006 to 2,784) behind championship leaders Russell Ward and Philip Ellis, who with third driver Indy Dontje finished fifth in the No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3. Mercedes-AMG completed the podium in GTD with the Motul Pole Award-winning No. 32 Korthoff/Preston Motorsports entry, driven by Mikael Grenier, Kenton Koch and Mike Skeen. The WeatherTech Championship full season and Michelin Endurance Cup conclude the weekend of October 9-12, at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta in Braselton, Ga. Coverage of the 10-hour Motul Petit Le Mans begins with live coverage on Saturday, October 12, at noon ET on NBC, with coverage continuing at 6 p.m. ET on USA. The full race will be streamed on Peacock and outside the U.S. on IMSA’s Official YouTube channel. (Thank you to Tony DiZinno/IMSA Wire Service)
(Indianapolis Motor Speedway)
(From the Press Release): INDYCAR confirmed today the establishment of a charter system across the NTT INDYCAR SERIES. In total, owners of 10 teams have accepted charters for 25 entries competing in North America’s premier open-wheel racing series, beginning immediately.
“This is an important development that demonstrates an aligned and optimistic vision for the future of our sport,” Penske Entertainment Corp. President and CEO Mark Miles said. “I want to extend my sincere appreciation to our team owners for their collaboration and ideation throughout this process. Ultimately, we’re pleased to have a system in place that provides greater value for our ownership and the entries they field.”
This is the first charter system to be introduced in the history of the NTT INDYCAR SERIES. A chartered entry is guaranteed a starting position on the grid at all NTT INDYCAR SERIES races, excluding the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge. An entry also must be chartered to qualify for the annual NTT INDYCAR SERIES Leaders Circle program – an annual award program that compensates the 22 top finishers in the prior year’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship. The terms of the initial, long-term charter agreements are committed through the end of 2031.
Chartered 2025 INDYCAR Teams:
Charters were extended to team owners based on full-time entries over the previous two seasons, with a maximum of three awarded per team.
(From the Press Release): INDYCAR confirmed today the establishment of a charter system across the NTT INDYCAR SERIES. In total, owners of 10 teams have accepted charters for 25 entries competing in North America’s premier open-wheel racing series, beginning immediately.
“This is an important development that demonstrates an aligned and optimistic vision for the future of our sport,” Penske Entertainment Corp. President and CEO Mark Miles said. “I want to extend my sincere appreciation to our team owners for their collaboration and ideation throughout this process. Ultimately, we’re pleased to have a system in place that provides greater value for our ownership and the entries they field.”
This is the first charter system to be introduced in the history of the NTT INDYCAR SERIES. A chartered entry is guaranteed a starting position on the grid at all NTT INDYCAR SERIES races, excluding the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge. An entry also must be chartered to qualify for the annual NTT INDYCAR SERIES Leaders Circle program – an annual award program that compensates the 22 top finishers in the prior year’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship. The terms of the initial, long-term charter agreements are committed through the end of 2031.
Chartered 2025 INDYCAR Teams:
|
NTT INDYCAR SERIES Team
|
Entries
|
|
A.J. Foyt Enterprises
|
2
|
|
Andretti Global
|
3
|
|
Arrow McLaren
|
3
|
|
Chip Ganassi Racing
|
3
|
|
Dale Coyne Racing
|
2
|
|
Ed Carpenter Racing
|
2
|
|
Juncos Hollinger Racing
|
2
|
|
Meyer Shank Racing
|
2
|
|
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
|
3
|
|
Team Penske
|
3
|
Charters were extended to team owners based on full-time entries over the previous two seasons, with a maximum of three awarded per team.
Editor-in-Chief's Note: The INDYCAR season finale was the last for NBC Sports, with coverage moving to FOX next year. I think that network did a superb job with its coverage and I really appreciated it. NBC released a farewell video narrated by Leigh Diffey. It's well worth your time. Watch it here.
Editor's Note: This is our dearly departed billboard, which we had at Road America for several years. Peter gifted the phrase "America's National Park of Speed" to the track, which now uses it proudly in all of its communications. -WG
Editor's Note: Click on "Next 1 Entries" at the bottom of this page to see previous issues. - WG