Ben Rhodes steals win in Gander trucks finish at Darlington

Kevin Peterson04 mins

Ben Rhodes’ win at Darlington came as a surprise as he found himself being at the right place at the right time as he stayed on the track and inherited the lead after many lead trucks pitted during a late race caution that saw the race going for two extra laps. After the race restart Derek Kraus managed to get past Ben Rhodes but the rookie was later overtaken by Rhodes through turn 3 and 4 and later held off from the lead durng the last lap. This comes as a first win for Ben Rhodes since his victory at Kentucky Speedway on July 18th. “That was such a tough win, we weren’t the best truck all day,” Rhodes said. “I was actually very disappointed when the caution flag came out because I was thinking 4th place, that would be a good finish for us, we’re going to get into the playoffs.” “But I’m not letting this checkered flag go, it’s been a long time coming and I’m so proud of my No. 99 team…they’ve done an amazing job all year just staying consistent. We come here with no practice and never being here before and we were able to get the win.” “We got challenged. I was trying to get a good jump on the restart but we were playing some games there and (Kraus) tried to get a good run on me and he messed up coming off Turn 2. It feels pretty good.” The race was overwhelmed by Brett Moffitt and Sheldon Creed who were able to lead 145 out of 152 laps when jointly combined but everything took a turn after they headed to the pits. Moffitt finished 10th as Sheldon Creed too the 18th position after he also picked up a speeding penalty as he was making a pit stop. Austin Hill(Hattori Racing) managed to finish third as Grant Enfinger(ThorSport Racing) and Christian Eckes(Kyle Busch Motorsports) finished 4th and 5th respectively. Raphael Lessard, Todd Gilliland, Stewart Friesen, Timmy Hill and Brett Moffitt rounded up as the top 10 finishers in the race.

Kevin Harvick opens Cup Series playoffs with a win at the southern 500

Kevin Peterson03 mins

Kevin Harvick was at the right place at the right time to take the Sunday night win at the nascar cup series playoffs, this comes after putting quite an impressive show to hold off Austin Dillon. This is Harvick’s second win at the Cook Out Southern 500 win at Darlington Raceway in Sunday night’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoff opener. This is considerably Harvick’s 8th best win in the season but the veteran racer was very emotional on his radio sending congratulatory messages to his team as he crossed the finish line. Instead of taking the checkered flag on the finish line Harvick let an appreciative young fan dressed in a brightly colored Harvick t-shirt keep the flag to himself. Kevin Harvick also marked his 57th career victory this win being ninth best of all time. His lead for the race came on lap 355 after Chase Elliot(Hendrick Motorsports) and Martin Truex Jr.(Joe Gibbs Racing) made a contact with the wall racing for the lead infront of him. “The first thing I want to say is ‘Welcome back, fans!’ ” Kevin Harvick said after climbing out of his No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford.   “Just wound up fighting all night long, this Busch Beer Ford Mustang wasn’t where we wanted it to be, but the leaders got tangled up there and next thing you know we were racing for the win….Anytime you can win the Southern 500, it’s a good day. This is one of the most prestigious races in our sport and one of the most prestigious race tracks in our sport. Any time you can win at Darlington it’s a big deal.” The southern 500 winner added. Joey Logano(Team Penske), Erik Jones(Joe Gibbs Racing) and William Byron(Hendrick Motorsports) ended up being in the top five, as Alex Bowman(Hendrick Motorsports), Kyle Busch(Joe Gibbs Racing), Kurt Busch(Chip Ganassi Racing), Aric Aimirola and Clint Bowyer(both Stewart Haas Racing) rounded up the top ten in the race. Jones was the only non-playoff driver in the top ten.

Jonathan Rea wins Aragon WSBK after a late pass on Rinaldi

Kevin Peterson05 mins

Jonathan Rea stretched his WorldSBK Championship win after finishing the top in the second round of the Aragon grand prix. The 33-year-old was able to break through the stiff Ducatti defence of Michael Reuben Rinaldi and Scott Redding to take the Sunday’s win. This was arguably one of the hardest fought victories of his career as he takes a step further to extend his 6th WorldSuperbike championship. The top three riders(Rea, Rinaldi and Redding) stood-out on the two weekends as they closely competed for the top up to the final stages. This was Rea’s eighth win of the year giving him a 36 point lead over Redding who comes in second in the overall standings. Following Scott Redding’s success on his superpole race, the 27-year-old began race 2 at the pole position but was overwhelmed by Rea in the drag to the first corner a move which appeared to be unorthodox. However, Redding was able to retake the lead at turn 13 forcing his rival to sit up. Rea tried to fight back in his Kawasaki through the first technical parts of the circuit but would later loose it to the Ducattis which were practically faster on the straights. Jonathan Rea kept the pressure on the Ducattis which eventually payed off on lap 6 when he overtakes Redding agressively early in on the lap which leads to a robust back and forth between the riders through the next few corners. Their fight through the corners just give Rinaldi a chance, first getting ahead of Rea before going off and overtaking Scott Redding and moving into the lead. Redding eventually recedes behind Rea when approaching the end to the back straight steadily dropping out of the fight. The battle for victory became an unlikely one between Rinaldi and Rea as Rinaldi tried as hard to keep defence of the top position through three-quarters part of the lap section. Rea tries to overtake at Turn 7 with four laps remaining instead bucked him out of his seat as he ran wide. However, he was quickly back onto the tail of Rinaldi, with Rea avoiding the same mistake at the same turn a lap later to grab a lead and win he had to work incredibly hard for. Leon Haslam secured his best WorldSBK result of the season with a confident ride to fourth on the Honda, the Briton helped in part by first Alvaro Bautista and then Chaz Davies both tumbling out of fourth place in separate incidents. Alex Lowes completed the top five, ahead of a quintet of Yamahas – Michael van der Mark, Toprak Razgatlioglu, Loris Baz, Federico Caricasulo and Garrett Gerloff – between sixth and 10th, the Iwata marque no doubt itching to leave Aragon after two average weekends. Eugene Laverty was the sole BMW finisher in 11th after problems for Tom Sykes, while Marco Melandri, Xavi Fores, Matteo Ferrari and Roman Ramos picked up the remaining points.

Pierre Gasly wins maiden italian GP as Hamilton takes penalty

Kevin Peterson04 mins

A turn of events took place at Monza when AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly emerged the first in the Sunday afternoon’s race. This is after a fierce battle on the track with Carlos Sainz(Mclaren) and Lance Stroll(Racing Point) who were also eyeing for the win. This comes after Lewis Hamilton who was the polesitter was penalised for a safety car infraction. The Sunday afternoon’s race was turned around after a safety car was brought out after Charles Leclerc(Ferrari) had a crash at the Parabolica,Leclerc was able to get out his car and head to the medical centre for precautionary checks.This comes as Kevin Magnussen’s Haas had to be recovered after grounding to a halt as it was approaching the pitlane,the race marshals had to push it to the pit. Lewis Hamilton was handed the penalty after driving into the pitlane while it was closed, AlfaRomeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi was also penalised for doing the same. Pierre Gasly remained in the lead as he had pitted before the safety car came out and held on to the top position. This comes as Carloz Sainz closely followed and Lance Stroll came in third to complete the podium. Lando Norris came fourth in the sister Mclaren as Valtteri Bottas ranked 5th being the first Mercedes. This comes after the Mercedes’ driver had a poor start which saw him dropping to the 6th position at the end of lap 1. Daniel Ricciardo took the 6th position as Hamilton came in 7th after getting the penalty, Esteban Ocon came in as the second renault at the 8th position as Daniil Kvyat(AlphaTauri) and Racing point’s Sergio Perez came in 9th and 10th rounding out the points for the Sunday afternoon’s event. Both Ferraris retired from the race in their homeground, Charles Leclerc crashed at the Parabolica as Sebastian Vettel suffered a brake failure on lap 6. Redbull’s Max Verstappen also retired on lap 31 as he did not have a great race which had seen him drop from among the top to p15. Verstappen’s teammate Alexander Albon came in 15th despite nearly clashing with Pierre Gasly at the initial first corner in an incident that was never investigated.

Michael Ruben Rinaldi tops Aragon practice

Kevin Peterson03 mins

Ducatti team Go Eleven’s Michael Ruben Rinaldi set the pace in today’s two practice sessions for this weekend’s second Aragon WSBK round. He also topped up being the best overall, setting a time of 1m 49.840s which was achieved in the first session in the morning. This came as Rinaldi defeated the reigning champion Jonathan Rea on the Kawasaki by only a thousandth of a second. Quite close! Rinaldi also continued to win the afternoon session with 1m 50.377s again three tenths of a second faster than Rea. Scott Redding(Aruba IT Ducatti Racing) and Alvaro Bautista(Honda WSBK) finished top three in the afternoon session. The other Kawasaki ZX-10RR made it into the top three being driven by Alex Lowes with a 0.507s off the pace. This afternoon turned out to be better for BMW Motorrad as Tom Sykes and Eugene Laverty finished 9th and 10th respectively in the overall timesheet, although Laverty had a crash in the afternoon’s session after hitting the deck at turn 1. Federico Caricasulo(GRT Yamaha Junior Team) and Maximilian Scheib(Orelac Racing) ranked 7th and 10th respectively as Chaz Davies(Aruba Ducatti) became another crash victim after losing control on turn two but managed to get back up and return his Ducatti Paningale V4R back to the pits, he ended up ranking 6th overall. On the combined timesheet though it’s Loriz Baz who was the quickest on the Ten Kate Yamaha. Jonathan Rea and Rinaldi. Bautista, Redding and Davis complete the top six respectively, with Toprak Razgatlioglu and Michael van der Mark in 7th and 8th. Leon Haslam and Alex Lowes complete the top 10 in the overall standings. Marco Melandri was 12th on his return to WSBK, after briefly making an appearance inside the top 10. The Italian has replaced the injured Leon Camier at the Barni Racing Ducati team. 

Hamilton leads second practice at Monza as Norris takes third

Kevin Peterson04 mins

Lewis Hamilton lead Mercedes’ one-two ahead of Valtteri Bottas closely followed by Lando Norris who ended up P3 in the second qualifying session at Monza. This comes as Daniel Ricciardo lost the third position due to track violations. Under cloudless skies and temperatures exceeding 28 degrees, Lewis Hamilton finished with a time of 1m 20.192s beating Leclerc’s time set last year in the same session with a 0.786s gap. Hamilton also lead his teammate Bottas with 0.262s making him top in the practice session. Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo lost his third position after running too wide at the exit of the Parabolica meaning Mclaren’s Lando Norris came in third despite missing in on the middle part of the practice session due to a power unit problem, but it was solved after changing to the soft slicks giving the british racer P3 just 0.897s behind Hamilton. Pierre Gasly(AlphaTauri) took P4 being the fastest Honda runner just a tenth of a second quicker than Max Verstappen(Redbull Racing) who came in 5th despite spinning into the wall during first practice at Ascari after driving wide at the exit of Lesmo 1. Carlos Sainz came in 6th with a time of 1m 21.313s being in the second Ferrari as the sister AlphaTauri driven by Daniil Kvyat came in 7th. Lance Stroll(Racing Point) came in 8th as Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was able to get to the top ten after finishing 9th, this was good news for Ferrari who had been struggling this season despite Sebastian Vettel finishing out of the top ten, being 12th but this was an improvement compared to Spa although he too experienced a spin at the exit of Lesmo 1. 10th position was taken by Sergio Perez(Racing Point) bringing into question why the likes of Alex and Ricciardo were missing from the top ten. This is because their laps were deleted(same case happened to Vettel too) due to track infringements at the Parabolica. Alexander albon(Redbull) and Daniel Ricciardo ended up ranking 14th and 15th respectively. Antonio Giovinazzi finished 13th in his AlfaRomeo C39 as his teammate Kimi Raikkonen who is a polesitter at Monza came in 17th, as Kevin Magnussen(Haas) came before him in 16th. Romain Grosjean came in 18th being the second Haas. The 19th and 20th positions were taken by Williams’ Nicholas Latifi and George Russel respectively.

GEN3 manufacturer deadline extended

Kevin Peterson04 mins

FIA has extended the deadline for the manufacturer to put in action the set of generation 3 rules for the 2022/2023 Formula E season. The manufacturers are now required to make the decisions at a board level by July 2021 opposed to earlier mentioned January 2021 deadline. The change in time comes as a result of several meetings held by Formula E stakeholders during the lockdown period this year due to the covid-19 pandemic. The extension of time will mean the stakeholders will be able to manage themselves after months of lower sales and dwindling finances. Frederic Bertrand who is the FIA Formula E Innovative Motor Sports Projects department director said the discussions between the Formula E stakeholders led to the consensus of time extension. He continued to add that the motivation behind the extension of the timeframe is to ensure that the manufacturers recover from the pandemic and come to a situation where the visibility of the business and confidence in thre tomorrow will be better. “So we, first of all delayed the commitment period so that we can commit later in 21. No commitment is expected by the end of this year it will be more than the first part of 2021 where we start to commit from the beginning of 2021, but we will accept up to June 2021.” It is also believed that the manufacturers will be expected to issue a purchase order before the end of 2021 besides budgeting for the development of their own cars, this comes as manufacturer Gen3 cars delivery is still fixed for January 2022 with race car deliveries still set for May 2022. “Nobody has to put any money on the table before early 2022, and we understand that it still means that the manufacturer will have to go through validation process, presentation process through the boards and development process of their own cars but no cash is expected by the suppliers before 2022,” said Frederic Bertrand. The status of the Formula E’s future is considered to be very strong as the sustainability relevance of formula E and substantial budget overlay has actually paid off. Additional manufacturers are also eyeing programmes for 2022 and 2023. “We got strong support on all the current ones (manufacturers), and also good signals from potential newcomers thinking that the job done here was something interesting for them,” said Frederic.

Dovizioso may not be replacing Lecuona at KTM Tech 3

Kevin Peterson05 mins

On August 15th, just a day before the Austrian grand prix Andrea Dovizioso made a shocking announcement that he was going to be parting ways with Ducatti team. The union that lasted for seven years did not rather end well as the rider said “There were no more conditions”. The 34-year-old went on to win the cup in Austria. Rumours have been going around on Andrea Dovizioso joining KTM Tech 3 as the Tech 3 boss Herve Poncharal shot down the rumours that Andrea Dovizioso was going to replace Iker Lecuona who is a rookie in the team. Andrea Dovizioso had been asked out by the KTM team earlier on in the year but his price was quite high, even putting into consideration that the 2020 KTM RC16 proved to be very good this year. A similar price issue could have led to his ouster from the Ducatti team. Herve Poncharal(KTM Tech 3 boss) said he has not yet given up on the young rider who he believes is a star in the making. The Tech 3 boss has a very good reputation in spotting young talent, and Iker Lecuona proves it. “We told him all year that his job this year is to learn, We have Brad, Pol, and Miguel(Iker Lecuona’s teammates) and his job isn’t too compete with them,” Poncharal said. “He was only 19-years-old when he started testing, Of course, the first race in Jerez he stopped because of the heat, and I told him he needed to train more. The second race a stupid crash and I wasn’t angry, but I was unhappy.” “But even then Mike Leitner [works KTM team principal] was telling me that they could see on the data how fast he was, and it’s easier to calm down a fast rider than make a slow rider fast. We arrived in Brno and he did a perfect weekend, tried to pass Mir and made a mistake braking on the bumps and crashed and took Mir with him – and I thought ‘oh my god, three races and no finishes.” Herve added. “Then the media started to say that he needs to be better, that they’re going to kick him out for Dovi, we didn’t want to put him under too much pressure though, he went to Austria and he finished ninth, I was so happy. You can see his riding style is incredible too, and in the second race with more confidence it was coming you could see how close he was to Brad and Pol.” At the end the biggest mystery of where Andrea Dovizioso will land for 2021 season is still on, its believed there are talks with APrilia but finances might be an issue as the cant match with Ducatti and KTM. There are also news going round that Petronas Yamaha team may have reached out to Dovizioso and also securing in Valentino Rossi but tend to have problems in finalising the 9 time world champion.

ByKolles Racing Team unveils new Le Mans LMP1 car

Kevin Peterson01 mins

ByKolles Racing Team has revealed its stunning new car for the No. 4 Enso CLM P1/01 Gibson car which will race at the upcoming 24 Hours of Le Mans, round 7 of FIA WEC Season 8. The new body features ByKolles’ well-known yellow and black colour scheme but sees an updated design by Mark Antar, confirmed to drive the LMP1 car at Le Mans will be its regular drivers Tom Dillmann and Oliver Webb, plus Bruno Spengler who joined the squad for his LMP1 debut at Spa-Francorchamps last month. “We collaborated with livery designer Mark Antar Design for the second consecutive year to create a new look for our 2020 contender. He delivered our best and most refined livery to date along with stunning 3D visuals to showcase the design in its full glory.” Boris Bermes the head of operations said 

William Byron gets a two year extension with Hendrick Motorsports

Kevin Peterson03 mins

Hendrick Motorsports on Tuesday announced that they will be extending William Byron’s contract by two years up to 2022. The contract that was signed early August will keep him in the Chevrolet car No.24 for at least two seasons. This comes after Byron won the saturday’s race at Daytona International Speedway earning him a berth into this season’s playoffs which will be opening this Sunday night at Darlington Raceway. “It’s been a fun ride so far with @TeamHendrick and I’m excited to finally share that I’m signed up through 2022 in the No. 24! Thanks for all the support. Now let’s go to Darlington and lock ourselves into the next round of the #NASCARPlayoffs.” The 22-year-old’s twitter handle read. Byron has 98 career starts in Nascar Cup having won once, earned 5 pole positions and 26 top 20 finishes. His career best win was just last year when he ranked 11th in the overall standings. He also takes business communications classes remotely through Liberty, he grew up rooting for the Hendrick organization and was developed in a NASCAR program for future stars. Byron spent one full season in the Truck Series winning a total of seven races before winning the Xfinity Series championship in 2017 driving for JR Motorsports, a Hendrick’s affiliate. Chad Knaus(Hendrick Motorsports crew chief) is also in talks with the Hendrick organisation on the extension of his contract which will be expiring at the end of the year. This is his second year as the crew chief.

Reprieve for F1 fans as Turkish GP organisers hope to accomodate 100,000 fans

Kevin Peterson04 mins

The Turkish Grand Prix will be returning to the Formula 1 calender this year and the event organisers hope to open the race to 100,000 spectators to experience the race. The F1 race will be held in Istanbul Park circuit on November 15th as Liberty Media put the event back to the calendar for the 2020 F1 season. The Turkish GP was last held in 2011 but it was listed to feature the 2020 F1 calendar’s 17 rounds with the event being round 14. The organisers were initially not certain on opening the event to spectators. The chairman Intercity Promoters, Vural Ak on Tuesday confirmed that spectators will be allowed in the Istanbul Park circuit even as covid-19 pandemic still continues to affect globally. “We are prepared for anything, if the disease becomes worse than now, then the race can be run without spectators,” Viral Ak said, being open to the possibility that there might be a spike in covid 19 cases forcing an alternate plan. “At the moment for safety reasons, if we close some sections, about 100,000 spectators will be able to watch the race by following social distancing rules.” Viral added. Normally the Istanbul circuit can hold over 220,000 spectators in the grandstand and open areas meaning holding 100,000 spectators the park circuit will just be half full. The chairman also revealed the ticket prices will be very low as the promoters are not looking to make profits but just interested in running a successful race event which will be backed by the government. “Formula 1 normally has certain standards and ticket prices are at a certain level, however, as Intercity, we do not seek to gain financial advantage from this and the government has encouraged us.” “The ticket prices will be 30 TL(£3) per day. It will be 90 TL(£9) in total for three days. Tickets will be on sale next week and we think the tickets will sell very quickly.” the chairman added. There are also plans to allow a limited number of fans at the Tuscan GP which will be held in Russia mid September and the Portuguese GP which will be held end-October. The rest of the race rounds have not yet permitted spectators.

Former Daytona 500 champion Trevor Bayne to make a comeback in Darlington NASCAR Truck race

Kevin Peterson02 mins

Trevor Bayne will be driving car No.40 (Niece Motorsports) Chevrolet Silverado in the Darlington Raceway Truck Series this weekend. This will be a surprise return because Bane has never raced since 2018 in the Nascar Cup race which was held at Texas Motor Speedway. The 29-year-old has quite an experince having 187 races in Nascar Cup Series and 152 in the XFinity series, he has won two times in the XFinity series and only once in the Cup series 2011 at Daytona.This will however be his debut in the Nascar Truck Series this weekend. “After almost two years of being out of the seat, I’m so excited and grateful for another chance to go racing, the call from Niece Motorsports to get back behind the wheel at Darlington was unexpected and came together really fast.” Bayne said. “They have a great group and a lot of potential with their program.  I’m looking forward to working with everyone there and going back racing this weekend” Trevor added. Bayne will join 2000 Truck Series champion Greg Biffle(GMS Racing) who was also a former Nascar cup racer

Mattia Binotto in denial that Ferrari is in crisis

Kevin Peterson04 mins

Mattia Binotto struggles to explain the disappointment and anger after a worst performance at Spa-Francorchamps, however he was unable to explain the reason behind the non-performing Ferrari SF 1000. Ferrari’s downfall at Spa started in Saturday’s qualifying session when Charles Leclerc Finished 13th while his teammate Sebastian Vettel finished 14th. The race did not do justice for them as they finished in the same positions having not earned any points, it was even more surprising that Kimi Raikkonen(Alfa Romeo) was able to beat the ferrari duo being their engine customer. Mattia Binotto however said that the team’s performance needed to be put into consideration believing that the downfall was caused by track characteristics. “I think it is wrong to use the word crisis for the moment we are going through, certainly this is a very bad result within a difficult season that we are experiencing. But we knew it was coming, we saw it in winter testing, and then came the freeze(after car modification) and the impossibility to develop the car.” “On a track that requires aerodynamic efficiency and power, we were severely lacking in both,” said Binotto after Sunday’s race. “We are disappointed and angry, as indeed are our fans and with good reason. It’s a difficult moment in a season that we knew from the start would be a tough one, but it’s at times like this that we need to stand firm and look ahead in order to get over this difficult period. It’s the only way we will get out of this situation.” The Ferrari team boss also took liabity after being questioned on why they had lagged so far behind. “The entire team is responsible, myself as team principal as first,” Binotto said. “Am I the right man or not ? Not myself to answer. How long it will take? “ “I think if you look back in all the winning cycles that have been set, it’s always many years. There are no silver bullets in F1, patience and stability is required.” the Ferrari boss added, but also warned that this is just a small set back but the oldest team in Formula 1 will step back to its glory

Sheldon Creed wins Gander Truck Series at Worldwide Technology Raceway

Kevin Peterson04 mins

Sheldon Creed scored his third win in the 2020 Nascar Truck Series on Sunday after a late leap to lead after holding off the former series champion, Brett Moffitt by 0.881 seconds taking home the trophy. The 22-year-old also won a total of $155,000 in race bonuses, this was his second win this month, with the Truck Series having only three races. However, the Sunday’s race did not come around without drama as car No.2 driven by Sheldon Creed(GMS Racing) collided with car No.38 steered by Todd Gilliland(Front Row Motorsports) with just 40 laps remaining. This got Gilliland’s Ford out of action as he had to pit immediately. The American went on to finish a disappointing 24th even after being the winner of the 1st and 2nd stage of the race. Sheldon creed went on to apologise to Todd Gilliland, “Feels great, but I want to start by apologizing to the 38 (Todd Gilliland), It’s so hard to pass here and I got down into his inside and just was really loose getting in, He was really close to my door.” “They were having such a good day and me and Todd are buddies, I hate doing that to him. They are a strong team. He owes me one,” the 22-year-old Californian added. However Todd Gilliland was frustrated,“I think he (Sheldon Creed) knows what happened and I know what happened, He just drove in there over his head and got us. That’s racing. I just hate it.” Austin Hill(Hattori Racing Enterprises) finished 3rd as he continued as the leading champion by points. He was closely followed by Sam Meyer(GMS Racing) who had lead for 24 laps but was later beaten by Creed after the race restart with only 13 laps remaining. “I was just trying to play games on the restart and it didn’t work out in my favor obviously,” said the 17-year-old, “That’s what I get for playing games, I was a sitting duck really, I am proud of my GMS guys today.” Stewart Friesen(Halmar Friesen Racing) ended the Sunday battle 5th which was very commendable for the Canadian in a season that was not in his favour. The newbies Raphael Lessard(Kyle and Busch Motorsport) and Zane Smith(GMS Racing) finished 6th and 7th respectively.

Lewis Hamilton pays tribute to Chadwick Boseman after his Belgium Grand Prix win

Kevin Peterson03 mins

The defending champion Lewis Hamilto won his 89th grand prix this sunday at Spa-Francorchamps. This puts him two wins away from Michael Schumacher’s record 91 wins and may also equal the veteran’s seven title wins if he wins this year. The Mercedes’ driver only made one pitstop on lap 11 after the safety car came out after Antonio Giovinazzi(Alfa Romeo) and George Russel(Williams Racing) incident that saw their two cars off the race. The next 33 laps for Hamilton were successful although he had expressed concerns over his hard tyres which were vibrating. After finishing the race he did a ‘wakanda salute’ on the podium paying tribute to Chadwick Boseman who was the main actor in the movie ‘black panther’. The black american actor passed on Friday night after a 4-year battle with colon cancer. The 35-year-old had dedicated his pole position to Chadwick Boseman on Saturday. “Today’s a really important pole for me because I woke up to the saddest news of Chadwick passing away” “It’s been such a heavy year, I think, for all of us and it just really, really broke me so it was really not easy to get back in focus coming into today, with that hanging on my heart.” said Hamilton on Saturday after getting the pole position. His dedication to the ‘Black Panther’ actor paid off with his undisputed win at Spa. “As a kid, dreaming of superheroes, and finally seeing a superhero of the same colour for me was really a remarkable moment for the black community, I broke down when I heard the news,” said Hamilton after the race.

Pierre Gasly gets the driver of the day after presenting a good show at Spa

Kevin Peterson04 mins

Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly presented an impressive performance at Spa-Francorchamps on Sunday evening’s Belgium grand prix. He finished the race position 8 which was a good performance and also a tremendous improvement from the Spanish Grand prix at Catalunya. The frenchman dedicated his success to Anthoine Hubert who passed on a year ago after a crash in the 2019 Formula 2 race at Spa. This was not the only factor giving him ‘the best driver of the day’, his car was the only one on the grid to start on the hard tyre and he also decided to stay out when the safety car came out after a crash that involved Antonio Giovinazzi(Alfa Romeo) and George Russel(Williams Racing). What impressed many was the impressive pass that he pulled off as he tried to pass Racing Point’s Sergio Perez while they were running downhill from La Source to Eau Rouge. The 24 year-old managed to squeeze between the RP20 and the barrier. “Honestly I thought we were in the wall,” Pierre Gasly recalled “I’m not kidding I was inside…I was like I can’t move more than that. And at that point we’re probably going 280 or 300km/h”. “Sergio is a hard racer,” Gasly continued “I knew it but there for sure, My heartbeat went slightly high when he started to squeeze me, but I was committed and I was like, there is no way I’m gonna lift, I’m gonna make this move work, and it was a great one.” Pierre Gasly also pulled off another pass on Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel who tried to hold him off. He later commented on Ferrari’s problems saying he had seen their struggle with higher and lower wings and it was painful for him considering their achievements, however he was happy to be ahead of them. The AlphaTauri driver also admitted it wasn’t easy for him in the fist laps due to the hard tyres.”so I tried to keep it clean, stay close to the guys ahead. I was happy to make these two positions on lap one, because we didn’t expect that.”