NASCAR Racing Live » NASCAR

Raikkonen marks return with fastest test session (PA SportsTicker)

chris — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 17:49:59 +0000

JEREZ, SPAIN (AP) —Kimi Raikkonen’s Formula One comeback with Lotus started perfectly when the former world champion was fastest on the first day of preseason testing.

The Finnish driver and 2007 F1 champion marked his first official ride since the end of 2009 with a lap time of 1 minute, 19.670 seconds at the Jerez circuit in southern Spain on Tuesday.

Raikkonen edged Force India’s Paul di Resta and Nico Rosberg of Mercedes, with constructors’ champion Red Bull beginning its campaign with a fourth-place run by Mark Webber, who trailed Raikkonen by more than eight-tenths of a second.

McLaren driver Jenson Button was eighth ahead of Felipe Massa of Ferrari, while Spanish outfit HRT ran on the first test day for the first time in its third season on the grid.

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

Top 20 Countdown: No. 9 Brad Keselowski (Yahoo! Sports)

chris — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 15:04:00 +0000

.nascountdown font-family:Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:10px;line-height:16px;border-bottom:1px solid #CCC;padding-bottom:3px;padding-top:3px;

2011 finish: 5th

Our 2012 predictions:• Jay Hart: 10th • Jay Busbee: 9th• Nick Bromberg: 4th • Geoffrey Miller: 10th

Crew chief: Paul Wolfe

Offseason action: Signed a two-year extension, keeping him at Penske Racing at least through 2014; gained AJ Allmendinger as a teammate.

2012 outlook: Put it this way: If Brad Keselowski’s career path follows the same trajectory from this time last year, he’ll have the Cup locked up two races into the Chase. Since that’s not likely to happen, the question becomes, how does Keselowski follow one of the most dramatic turnarounds in NASCAR history? Was his 2011 season a hot streak at the right time or the coming out party for a new elite driver in the Cup Series?

What’s indisputable is that Keselowski reeled off an amazing streak from July to September that saw him finish outside the top 10 only once (12th) and win twice, including a 1-2-3-1 August that launched him from the mid-20s to just outside the Chase cutoff. His three overall wins (Kansas I, Pocono II, Bristol II) gave him the inside edge on the wild card and very nearly put him into the Chase outright. (Had he done so, he would have knocked out eventual champion Tony Stewart.)

Strangely, Keselowski’s streak coincided with an ankle injury suffered while road testing; the Twitter shots of his mangled ankle were stomach-churning to say the least. But like Denny Hamlin’s surgically repaired knee the year before, the injury did little to slow Keselowski’s charge.

He faded toward the end of the year, failing to finish higher than 17th in any of the last four races. But all elements are in place for a strong start to the 2012 season. And even if he stumbles out of the gate, Keselowski can take comfort in the fact that there’s always the chance to make up for early mistakes later in the summer.

Point of interest: With the departure of Kurt Busch, Keselowski is now the senior driver at Penske; strange though that may seem, Penske saw fit to reward Keselowski and his crew chief, Paul Wolfe, with multi-year contract extensions after the season. Keselowski and Wolfe teamed not only for their stellar 2011 but a dominating, championship-level 2010 in the Nationwide series.

Other popular content on Yahoo! Sports:• Forde Minutes: The best college hoops week of the season is here• Dirk Nowitzki doesn’t think he should be an NBA All-Star• Rashad Evans cleared for anticipated Jon Jones fight

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

New-look Williams hails ‘fresh start’ for 2012 (PA SportsTicker)

chris — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 12:24:12 +0000

LONDON (AP) —With an overhauled car and a new driver, Williams hailed a “fresh start” as the team looks to bounce back from its worst season in Formula One.

The British-based team allowed a sneak peek Tuesday of its new FW34 at preseason testing in Jerez, Spain, with the car designed by new technical director Mike Coughlan having fewer than 5 percent of the parts from last year’s car and also a new engine supplier in Renault.

With Bruno Senna replacing Rubens Barrichello as the new partner of Pastor Maldonado, team principal Frank Williams is confident of improving on the five points earned in 2011, saying “we feel ready and strong for the fight.”

Williams dominated F1 in the 1980s and ’90s, winning nine constructors’ championships and seven drivers’ titles.

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

Menzer: Patrick’s goals lofty, but very much achievable (NASCAR.com)

chris — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 17:11:09 +0000

Yes, she said it. And why not?

Asked recently what her expectations were for her first full-season foray into NASCAR, Danica Patrick pulled no punches. Her expectations are as high as the stiletto heels she wore to a recent media event.

“On the Nationwide side, getting into the top 10 in points to start out and then getting in the top five more consistently through the year would be a goal, and I’d like to get to Victory Lane,” Patrick said of her ride with JR Motorsports, where she’ll run the full 33-race schedule.

Then came the real verbal bomb. Patrick mentioned that she thinks she can win the season-opening Daytona 500 in the first of 10 races she’ll run in the Sprint Cup Series for Stewart-Haas Racing and team co-owner Tony Stewart.

“As far as the Cup stuff, at Daytona the cars are very fast—as we’ve already seen in the [recent] test. So I feel good about that race,” Patrick said. “I was lucky enough to run with Tony in the Nationwide race there last summer and that went pretty good, so I feel good about Daytona and I think there is a real chance, if luck falls our way, to win. I think that’s a real chance.

“A guy like Trevor Bayne showed that last year. So those are the expectations for the first race—but beyond that, I don’t know. The top 20, maybe?”

So she’s being realistic about her overall season, and she’s also right about lightning possibly striking her SHR Chevrolet at Daytona. If a rookie like Trevor Bayne can come from seemingly nowhere to win the Daytona 500 as Bayne did a year ago, why can’t she do it, too? Why shouldn’t she go ahead and say it?

The fact is, of course, that taking the bet on Patrick to win her first Daytona 500 to Las Vegas would not be wise. Then again, there were folks who actually won money betting on the fact that the New York Giants would score the first points in Super Bowl XLVI on a safety.

You never know in sports, and Bayne’s tale offers hope for virtually every driver who isn’t planning on starting and parking to pick up a quick and still very lucrative paycheck.

Leave it to Stewart to keep it all in perspective. He hears what Patrick is saying, and acknowledges that a Danica victory would be great for the sport and even greater for him as co-owner of the car she’ll be driving in the Feb. 26 Daytona 500. But he actually said he’s less concerned with where she finishes than he is about if she finishes.

Stewart made the same transition from open-wheel racing to stock cars Patrick is attempting, and he did it in a similar way. He dabbled in it at first while continuing to run a full-time open-wheel schedule before finally committing to a full-time NASCAR Cup deal with Joe Gibbs Racing in 1999.

“I think from my standpoint, knowing what my transition was like, I crashed everything that I drove when I first drove Nationwide cars. When we got to the Cup side, it got better, obviously,” said Stewart, the defending Cup Series champion who won his third championship last year. “But I think, looking at these 10 races for her this year, it’s just an extension of what she’s doing on the Nationwide side and it’s going to get her the track time that she needs.

“The short amount of time I’ve worked with her, she’s so good about processing information. What she learns on the race track, she can explain it to you right away and is very accurate. I think her feedback is excellent. So it’s just getting her time on the race track and from my standpoint, I’m not worried about where she finishes. It’s just about getting the time in on the race track, getting the laps in, finishing the race and getting that experience in the car.”

Tony’s take

Bayne on the brain

Much has been made of the fact that the NASCAR seasons are longer, and that the Cup races, in particular, are longer and more physically demanding than anything Patrick has attempted previously in motorsports.

But this is no ordinary woman. This is an athlete in extraordinary shape who apparently is willing to do what it takes to continue learning her new craft in stock cars. She said she actually is looking forward to the longer races in Cup.

“I feel like the longer races are good,” Patrick said. “I like the longer races. I get more comfortable in the car and we keep tweaking the car and making it a little better each pit stop. So I’m hoping that plays into my favor—the length of some of these races.”

That would include the season-opening Daytona 500. Is it crazy to think she could indeed actually win NASCAR’s biggest race in her very first try?

Stewart tempered the thought, but didn’t totally dismiss the possibility.

“Five-hundred mile races are long races, especially when you’re dealing with the 3,400-pound Cup car,” Stewart said. “So it’s going to be a learning process—and at the end of the day, I don’t think you’re going to be judging her success on her finishes so much as what she’s able to take away from each race weekend. That’s the goal, to take as much away from that as she can.

“There’s a lot more to getting ready to be a full-time Cup driver than where she finishes in these 10 races. It’s the knowledge and experience that she’s going to gain from these 10 races that matters more to me than where she finishes in them.”

What is most important for Patrick, Stewart insisted, is that she is willing and able to put in the time to learn.

“I think the effort that she’s put forth has shown everybody that this is where she wants to be. You haven’t seen that type of dedication from some of the other guys who came in and run a little bit and then left our series,” Stewart said. “I think the other drivers respect that, and I think she’s got a great attitude.

“She’s very humble about realizing it’s going to take a lot of hard work and effort and that she’s probably not going to go out there and win right away. We hope she does, obviously, but the reality is that it’s tough to run well right off the bat. It’s a big transition she’s going to be going through.”

Well said. But with Bayne fresh on the brain, Patrick also is banking on the possibility that the seemingly impossible could always happen once again.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

Top 20 Countdown: No. 10 Denny Hamlin (Yahoo! Sports)

chris — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 15:31:00 +0000

Editor’s note: Yahoo! Sports is counting down the top 20 drivers of the 2012 season, as predicted by the Yahoo! Sports NASCAR staff – Jay Hart, Jay Busbee, Nick Bromberg and Geoffrey Miller. The countdown will conclude Feb. 17 with the unveiling of the No. 1 driver..nascountdown font-family:Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:10px;line-height:16px;border-bottom:1px solid #CCC;padding-bottom:3px;padding-top:3px;

2011 finish: 9th

Our 2012 predictions:• Jay Hart: 9th• Jay Busbee: 10th• Nick Bromberg: 10th • Geoffrey Miller: 8th

Crew chief: Darian Grubb

Offseason action: Replaced long-time crew chief Mike Ford with Darian Grubb.

2012 outlook: Is parting ways with Mike Ford the answer?

In his six Cup seasons, Denny Hamlin has only known one crew chief – Ford. Together, they won 17 races, were 6-for-6 in qualifying for the Chase and very nearly ended Jimmie Johnson’s title run at four.

It’s the” very nearly” part that’s the issue.

Despite their success together, the two could not get past blowing the 2010 championship with a poor pit strategy in the penultimate race of the season (at Phoenix). The hangover from that one lasted all of 2011 when Hamlin went from Johnson’s biggest challenger to a field filler in the Chase for the Championship.

Something had to give and in December it was Ford.

“We were at a point that we felt like we needed to just go a different direction,” team president J.D. Gibbs said.

That direction is Darian Grubb, who unexpectedly found his way to the unemployment line despite helping Tony Stewart win five races in last year’s Chase en route to a third Cup championship. While Stewart made the decision to part ways with Grubb before he began his epic title run, it’s nonetheless bizarre to see a crew chief packing fresh off a championship.

Stewart’s itchy trigger finger is Hamlin’s gain, not to mention the entirety of Joe Gibbs Racing. Remember, before joining up with Stewart-Haas, Grubb was viewed as one of the bright young minds at Hendrick Motorsports, a knowledge base JGR is sure to tap into.

Ultimately, though, success will depend on Hamlin getting himself straight. He started seeing a sports psychologist this past season, which only further fuels talk that he’s still not mentally right after the Phoenix debacle. Ford’s departure makes for one less reminder of that nightmarish day, but will that alone be enough for Hamlin to finally get over it?

Point of interest: Hamlin had just 14 top-10 finishes in 2011 – the fewest of his career – but seven of those came in the season’s final 13 races.

Other popular stories on Yahoo! Sports:• Giants win Super Bowl behind another comeback by Eli Manning• Tom Brady in postgame daze of disappointment after Super Bowl loss• Giants’ Mario Manningham makes remarkable Super Bowl grab | Blog

Jay Hart is the NASCAR editor for Yahoo! Sports. Send Jay a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.

Foyt released from Houston hospital

chris — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 02:53:39 +0000

A.J. Foyt has been released from a hospital in Houston, where he was beingtreated for complications from knee surgery.

The 77-year-old Foyt had knee surgery two weeks ago, and an infection senthim to the hospital Wednesday.

A spokeswoman for the four-time Indianapolis 500 winner said Foyt wasreleased Friday and is still taking antibiotics for the infection.

Foyt is the only driver to win the Indianapolis 500, the Daytona 500, the 24Hours of Daytona and the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Foyt was scheduled to be the grand marshal Saturday at Daytona InternationalSpeedway for the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

Kansas opens casino, finalizes road course plans (NASCAR.com)

chris — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 14:55:31 +0000

Lesa France Kennedy strode through the Art Deco-inspired lobby, past rows of blinking slots machines and spinning roulette wheels, her eyes trying to take in the homage to old Hollywood.

The chief executive of International Speedway Corp., which owns and operates Kansas Speedway, could only marvel at the new casino overlooking Turn 2 of the race track—a $411 million facility that has created 1,000 new jobs and is expected to attract 4 million visitors annually.

“All the different screens, all the colors,” Kennedy said. “I’m blown away.”

Kennedy is gambling on the Hollywood Casino at Kansas Speedway, which celebrated its grand opening on a rainy Friday morning, to generate interest, drive ticket sales and increase revenue for ISC during a sluggish time for motorsports.

It’s a bet she’s confident will pay off.

“Anything we can do to bring more entertainment to the area, and also for our fans, will help not only us but the overall region,” Kennedy said. “The group here has been so supportive and so interested in bringing tourism that it’s made it really easy.”

Long lines of cars snaked out of the parking lots and along the access roads running parallel to the backstretch in anticipation of the opening. After a ribbon was cut and Sprint Cup drivers Clint Bowyer and Kasey Kahne threw the ceremonial first dice, people began streaming through the doors and taking up seats at slot machines and blackjack tables.

The casino, a partnership between ISC and Penn National Gaming, is the first to open in the Kansas City market in 15 years, and the first land-based, Las Vegas-style casino in the area.

All of the gaming is on a single, 95,000-square-foot floor, with a bar and restaurant that overlooks Turn 2 of the speedway, providing a unique vantage point for its two race weekends.

The first is in late-April, when the Truck Series and Sprint Cup Series visit the track. The second weekend, in mid-October, brings an ARCA race, the Nationwide Series and one of the Chase races that make up the Sprint Cup playoff system.

“I get to do this for a living and we’ll open several new facilities this year, but you can imagine the creativity that comes with opening a venue like this,” said Peter Carlino, the chief executive of Penn National Gaming, which owns and operates casinos across the country.

The casino is only the latest development on the Kansas side of Kansas City.

The speedway, which opened in 2001, served as the cornerstone of a building boom that took advantage of good economic times. Several outlet stores, theaters, a minor league ballpark and the new stadium for MLS team Sporting Kansas City have popped up around the facility.

But the economic downturn has hurt motorsports, and suddenly it’s become tougher to sell the 80,000-plus seats at Kansas Speedway, along with a dozen other tracks that are owned and operated by International Speedway Corp.

Kennedy believes unique entertainment options like the casino can help bring people back to the track. In places where gambling may not work, it could mean shopping and restaurant projects, concert venues and general upgrades to facilities such as Phoenix that have seen better days.

“We have a certain amount of capital each year for all our tracks,” she said, “and we’ll take a look at those that are ready for the next step.”

Kennedy said she couldn’t have envisioned setting foot inside a casino at Kansas Speedway five years ago. The truth is that nobody could have.

It wasn’t until 2007 that the legislature passed a bill authorizing the construction of casinos in four areas of Kansas to generate additional revenue, one of them near the speedway.

Under the bill, the games themselves are owned by the state.

There’s more to the facility than just gambling, though. A steakhouse offers fine dining, a buffet on the casino floor caters to nearly 300 at a time, a coffee bar and VIP lounge offer more dining options, and the place to be on race weekends is the patio overlooking the track.

“It’s truly brought Las Vegas to Turn 2 of this race track,” said Bowyer, who grew up in Emporia and considers Kansas Speedway his home track. “Can you imagine what the atmosphere is going to be like on race weekend?”

Everything inside the facility is modeled after the golden age of Hollywood.

There are soaring columns with ornate scrollwork, video screens rolling historic clips of Grace Kelly and James Stewart, and vintage movie posters of Steve McQueen in Le Mans and James Garner in Grand Prix, a nod to the motorsports element of the unique partnership.

“Any time we can bring more things to the race track area and offer more entertainment, we’d definitely look at that,” Kennedy said. “The casino happens to work for this property. Obviously it’s available here in the area. But we would look at this or any other types of things that would add an extra boost to the economy and to the experience.”

But the casino is not the only change taking place at Kansas Speedway.

Officials received the final layout from their design team this week for a proposed road course through the infield, and construction is scheduled to begin after the April race weekend.

Track president Pat Warren also said Friday he hopes one of the two Sprint Cup races at Kansas Speedway will be run at night in 2013. The track installed lights last year and drew about 25,000 fans last fall for an ARCA race run under the lights.

“I can tell you opportunities like this don’t come along very often, but when they do you take advantage of them,” Warren said. “We added lights to the track, last year we replaced 20,000 seats. We’ve done a number of things to the speedway itself.

“We always talk about Kansas Speedway being a unique destination. We are truly unique now in a sense of being a destination casino, and a hotel in the not-too-distant future.”

The road course, which will be built in conjunction with a reconfiguration and repaving of the original 1.5-mile tri-oval, begins after the frontstretch. Drivers will make a hard left and meander down the backstretch before a hairpin turn brings them back to the main speedway.

There are also configurations that allow for the course to be run as a mile-long road course contained entirely in the infield, and part of it as a smaller go-kart track.

The work will be finished before the October race weekend, though there won’t be competitive racing on the road course until next year, when a Grand-Am stop is planned.

“We haven’t announced the date yet and I’m sure we will in the near future, but that’ll be the first Grand-Am race here and give us road racing, and that will even diversify the fan base even more than it already is,” Kennedy said.

The repaving project has generated mixed reactions.

Some drivers argued last fall that the new surface would hurt the quality of racing at the track, while others pointed to cracks and potholes as potential safety issues. Some also are upset that 15-degree banking will be replaced by variable banking designed to make passing easier.

“I liked the old surface, too, but you have to repave at certain times,” Hendrick Motorsports driver Kasey Kahne said. “To repave now, it might take a few races to get back to where we want it, but overall it’ll be good.”

Kahne also said he’s in favor of a night race at Kansas, something that Warren has been pushing for since the lights were installed last year.

It won’t happen this season, but the track president is optimistic about next year.

“One day race, one night race—the tracks change,” Kahne said. “They race differently at night, so it’ll be good. I’d be looking forward to that.”

Follow Yahoo! Sports NASCAR coverage on Twitter.

Kansas opens casino, finalizes road-course plans (NASCAR.com)