Byron dominates NASCAR’s 1st road course race of season, wins at COTA
AUSTIN, TEXAS >> William Bryon started on pole and delivered a dominant drive Sunday to win NASCAR’s first road course race of the season at the Circuit of the Americas.
The Daytona 500 winner snatched his second win of the season and delivered the fourth in six races for Chevrolet. The Hendrick Motorsports driver led 42 of 68 laps and held off a hard-charging run from Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell over the final two laps.
Bell shaved nearly three seconds of Byron’s lead to create some late drama before Byron slammed the door over the final corners. Byron earned career win No. 12.
The Circuit of the Americas, a track built for Formula One, has been the opening road course race for NASCAR each of the last four seasons. And unlike the crash-filled tripleovertime race of 2023, Sunday’s race was mostly incident free as Byron made easy work of the field.
Byron led 23 laps of the first two stages, but found himself quickly dropped to third at the start of the final stage as Ross Chastain, who won at COTA in 2022, jumped to the front.
Alex Palou dominates IndyCar’s first all-star race since 2008. Reigning champion led every lap
THERMAL, CALIF. >> A race meant for all-stars was fittingly won by Alex Palou.
The two-time and reigning IndyCar champion won the Thermal $1 Million Challenge on Sunday in a total rout. Palou dominated the three day weekend — he was among the fastest drivers in practice sessions and led every lap of anything that counted while winning his qualifying group, his heat race and all 20 laps of IndyCar’s first non-points race since 2008.
The race at the members-only Thermal Club was for 12 drivers who earned their way into the main event through a pair of heat races earlier Sunday. But Scott Dixon, Will Power, Pato O’Ward and some of IndyCar’s top names didn’t advance out of the heats and the “A Main” was a mix of competition levels.
Palou, who was one of three Chip Ganassi Racing drivers to make the main event, was never challenged.
“He made it look like a Sunday drive out there. He didn’t even break a sweat,” said Ganassi.
Although the race was billed as a $1 million event, Palou’s payout was actually only $500,000 because the Thermal members shied away from participating in the event with a matching buy-in. Club members instead were randomly paired with teams for an embedded weekend experience with an IndyCar organization.
Scott McLaughlin of Team Penske finished second, Felix Rosenqvist of Meyer Shank Racing was third, Colton Herta of Andretti Global was fourth and Marcus Armstrong of Ganassi was fifth as the bulk of the purse payout only went to the top five. The remaining 22 entrants were paid $23,000 for participating.
Angry Verstappen an early retirement from Australian GP in race won by Sainz
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA >> An angry Max Verstappen was an early exit from the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix on Sunday, with the Red Bull driver sustaining a fiery mechanical failure on the fourth lap of the race, enduring his first race retirement since Albert Park in Australia in 2022.
Minutes after his retirement, he was seen on TV coverage of the race in a heated discussion with Red Bull team principal Christian Horner.
Verstappen had won the first two F1 races of the season in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and was on a ninerace winning streak.
“My right rear brake basically stuck on from when the lights went off,” Verstappen said. “The temperatures (in the car) just kept on increasing until the point that it caught fire. They (mechanics) could see what was going on but they don’t know what caused it.”
“We had a lot of good races in a row, I knew that the day would come when you end up having a retirement and unfortunately that day was today.”
Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton was another early retirement with an engine failure on lap 17.
Verstappen, the threetime F1 world champion, began the race from pole, but was passed by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz on lap two at turn nine. Verstappen kept on the Spaniard’s tail, but just two laps later was spewing smoke from the back of his car, with fire following, forcing his retirement from the race.
The 26-year-old had earlier complained on team radio about “losing the car.” Soon afterward, smoke appeared at the rear of Verstappen’s car and he was forced into the pits, with no hope of a return.