Latest news with #AdventHealth400
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Appeals panel amends penalty levied against RFK Racing No. 17 team
On Wednesday, the National Motorsports Appeals Panel amended the L1-level penalty issued to the No. 17 RFK Racing team and driver Chris Buescher on May 15 after the NASCAR Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway. Upon hearing the testimony, the decisions of the National Motorsports Appeals Panel are that the appellant violated one or more, but not all, of the rule(s) set forth in the penalty notice. The team violated 14.5.4 (front bumper cover) but did not violate 14.1.2 (exhaust cover panel). Therefore, the panel amended the original penalty assessed by NASCAR to include a loss of 30 championship driver and team owner points, a loss of five driver and team owner playoff points, a two-race suspension for the crew chief and a $75,000 fine for the team. Advertisement In reaching the above decision, the panel provided the following explanation: 'The panel concluded that NASCAR met its burden of proof regarding the reinforcement of the front bumper cover but did not meet it regarding the trimming of the exhaust panel cover. The rule book regarding the exhaust panel trimming lacked specificity on the amount trimmed or not trimmed. Accordingly, the panel reduced the owner and driver points penalty from 60 to 30 points.' As a result of the modified points penalty, Buescher moves up from 23rd to 16th in the NASCAR Cup Series standings. The three-member panel was comprised of Mr. Tom DeLoach, Mr. Cary Tharrington and Mr. Kevin Whitaker. At Kansas, Buescher finished eighth in the AdventHealth 400 and his No. 17 Ford was selected as one of two cars to be taken back to the NASCAR Research and Development Center in Concord, North Carolina, for further inspection. That is where officials ruled the car was in violation. Crew chief Scott Graves has already served his two-race suspension.
Newsweek
19-05-2025
- Automotive
- Newsweek
RFK Racing Reveals Penalty Appeal Decision After Severe Buescher Punishment
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. RFK Racing has revealed that it will appeal the penalties levied against Chris Buescher and the No. 17 Ford team ahead of the race weekend in North Wilkesboro. The 32-year-old driver was docked 60 championship points and 5 playoff points for a front bumper violation in Kansas. On top of this, the No. 17 Ford team also lost 60 championship points, five playoff points, and were fined $75,000. Bueschers's crew chief Scott Graves was also handed a two-race suspension. The team has now confirmed that it will appeal the penalties. It revealed it in a statement: "After a thorough review of the penalties issued to the No. 17 Ford Mustang, RFK Racing has decided to appeal NASCAR's decision. Chris Buescher, driver of the #17 Kroger/Kleenex Ford, wiats backstage during pre-race ceremonies prior to the NASCAR Cup Series AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway on May 11, 2025 in Kansas City, Kansas. Chris Buescher, driver of the #17 Kroger/Kleenex Ford, wiats backstage during pre-race ceremonies prior to the NASCAR Cup Series AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway on May 11, 2025 in Kansas City, Kansas."We respect NASCAR's commitment to fair competition and appreciate the opportunity to engage in the appeals process." NASCAR confirmed that the time of the penalties, as previously reported by Newsweek Sports: "During inspection this week at the R&D Center in Concord, North Carolina, series officials discovered that the No. 17 Ford was in violation of Sections 14.1.C (overall assembled vehicle rules) and 14.5.4.G (front bumper cover) of the NASCAR Rule Book. The team went over the maximum reinforcement allowed for its front bumper covers. "As a result, the team and driver Chris Buescher were each assessed with the loss of 60 championship points and five playoff points, and the team was fined $75,000. Additionally, crew chief Scott Graves has been suspended for the next two races through Charlotte." Buescher stated to the media after receiving the penalty, ahead of the All-Star Race weekend at North Wilkesboro Speedway: "Yeah, it's already behind me right now. "You know, we're here at the race track, we've been prepping for this race for a really long time already. Nothing's changing on our weekend. For us, we'll deal with that during the work week, but it's race weekend now. "So yeah, with the speed we've had this year and what we've been able to do at a lot of different styles of race tracks, it's the same opportunity we felt like we had before Thursday. So yeah, I'm ready to go for this one." He added: "You've got to rough people up for a million dollars, I guarantee it, and that's the way it should be. "It's supposed to be good, hard racing here. We've had some great racing through the years here, well before we came back, and we're trying to be a part of more coming back to this historic raceway here."
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Kyle Larson's peak is highest in today's NASCAR; how does it stack up all-time?
In the week leading up to the 2025 All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro, it was fitting that NASCAR's star of stars delivered a performance worthy of the title. Not only did Kyle Larson win his third race of the season at Sunday's AdventHealth 400 in Kansas City, but he also barely gave the field a chance — starting on pole, sweeping both stages, and leading 221 of a possible 267 laps (82.8 percent). His reward: a 149.7 Driver Rating, just a fraction shy of the perfect 150.0 mark outlined in the official rating formula. Advertisement (In football terms, Larson came up just short of a perfect 158.3 passer rating — a feat we see only once or twice per NFL season, if that often.) RELATED: All-Star Weekend schedule | Paint Scheme Preview: North Wilkesboro For Larson, it was his second near-perfect performance in the span of just four races, joining the 149.6 he posted at Bristol. And that was on the heels of a 149.7 at Bristol last fall and a literal 150.0 at the Charlotte Roval in the 2024 playoffs. At this point, it's clear: Larson is the one active driver who can roll into any track on any weekend and utterly destroy the field through the sheer force of perfection (or at least near-perfection). So just how much more likely is Larson to unleash one of these super-dominant performances than a typical driver? Let's compare the frequency at which Larson has posted a Driver Rating within various ranges over his career to the overall Cup Series average since the stat became available in 2005: As we can see, Larson posts an above-average Driver Rating far more often than the typical driver. (He's also much less likely to have a bad day than the average driver.) And while most of his competition hovers near the middle of the distribution — the 'Cup average' sweet spot is around a 70.0 rating — Larson's distribution skews heavily toward the extreme right tail of the chart. Advertisement He's logged a rating of 140 or higher in 5.6 percent of his career races, making him 6.8 times more likely than the average driver to turn in that kind of dominant day. Narrow it further to ratings of 145 or higher, and Larson does that in 2.9 percent of his races — 6.9 times the Cup average. KYLE LARSON: Driver page That's still not exactly a routine occurrence, as it can sometimes seem when Larson is on one of these red-hot streaks. But it is as close to a common sight as this kind of thing can get — at least among current-era drivers. If we go back to 2005, the earliest season when we have data on Driver Rating, Larson has the best frequency of 140+ rated races (5.6 percent), and only Jimmie Johnson (at 3.4 percent) was more likely to have a 145+ rating in any given race than Larson at 2.9 percent. Only Kevin Harvick — at 4.7 percent and 2.5 percent, respectively — was all that close to Larson and Johnson in those categories of dominance: So if Johnson is Larson's only current-era peer, what about previous eras? Advertisement We don't have Driver Ratings for seasons before 2005, but we do know what goes into the Driver Rating formula. Given that, we can use what data we do have for each pre-2005 race, plus a technique called Logistic Regression, to estimate the odds that a driver posted a rating of 140 or higher in any historical race since the modern era began in 1972. (Specifically, we'll use data points like whether or not a driver won the race, their share of laps led, their starting grid position and where they finished the race — all of which are strong predictors of Driver Rating for the years where we do have data.) Suppose we apply this to all Cup Series races from 1972-2004. In that case, we find that only six drivers are estimated to have a higher share of races with a rating of 140+ than Larson's career 5.6 percent rate: Mark Donohue (16.6 percent), Cale Yarborough (14.5), David Pearson (12.2), Jeff Gordon (7.6), Bobby Allison (7.0) and Dale Earnhardt Sr. (6.4): Donohue is a unique case, an early road-course ringer who only ran six modern-era Cup races. He won one of them — the 1973 season opener at Riverside — leading 72 percent of the laps and dominating the field. The logistic model gives him a 99.6 percent chance of posting a 140+ Driver Rating in that lone victory, which came just two years before Donohue tragically died following a crash in Formula 1. Advertisement Beyond Donohue, the remaining five drivers on the list are a who's-who of NASCAR royalty — led by Cale Yarborough, with a staggering 14.5 percent estimated frequency of 140+ rated performances. (That's more than 2.5 times Larson's rate in modern cars.) Known for his utter dominance during the 1970s, Yarborough even had a couple of wins where he led every lap, so it's not implausible that he might have rattled off a near-perfect Driver Rating that often as well. It was a different sport back then — one where Yarborough once averaged a record-low finish of 4.5 over a full season, providing another verifiable benchmark of domination from the Hall of Fame legend. With that in mind, it's a bit surprising to see Richard Petty fall below Larson on this list. The King's name is synonymous with dominating the NASCAR record book, but the model estimates a lower share of 140+ rated races than Larson. In part, that's because he led fewer laps per win on average (43.3 percent) than peers like Yarborough (54.8 percent), and in part it's because Petty's unusually long career — which stretched until age 54 in 1992 — likely diluted his peak stats as well. Anyway, all of this helps add even more context to just how dominant Larson has been, particularly in recent seasons. He may not win the title every year, but when he's on, nobody buries the field quite like the driver of the No. 5 car. As we saw at Kansas, Larson can make a 267-lap race feel like a breezy Sunday drive. And while a few all-time legends may have reached similar heights more often in their primes, nobody in this current era has a higher ceiling — or hits it more often — than Larson does.
Newsweek
19-05-2025
- Automotive
- Newsweek
Richard Childress Responds To AJ Allmendinger's Scathing ECR Attack
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Richard Childress has repsonded to AJ Allmendinger's scathing attack of the ECR Engines in Kansas. The 43-year-old retired from the NASCAR Cup Series AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway after just seven laps. As his engine blew, he fumed: "Hey ECR, you guys f***ing suck. I mean, what ... f*** you guys!" Responding to the comments from the Kaulig Racing driver, Childress explained to NBC Sports NASCAR reporter Justin Long: RCR team owner and NASCAR Hall of Famer, Richard Childress (R) and Roger Penske owner of the Penske Motorsports talk on the grid prior to the NASCAR Cup Series Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway... RCR team owner and NASCAR Hall of Famer, Richard Childress (R) and Roger Penske owner of the Penske Motorsports talk on the grid prior to the NASCAR Cup Series Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway on February 16, 2025 in Daytona Beach, Florida. More"The 12 [Ryan Blaney] blew up two times [this year]. The 48 [Alex Bowman] blew up [one time]. They never said anything. It's how you want to run your mouth. "I just want to know what happened to the engine. When [Allmendinger] jumps out [of the car at Kansas], he don't even know if the belt come off the oil pump or what." Vice president of alliance operations for ECR Engines, Danny Lawrence, explained the issue that Allmendinger encountered. He commented: "It was a bearing issue. We at RCR and ECR have a quality control department. They're struggling to figure out exactly what happened. They've sent the bearings off to be analyzed, but the initial [cause] looks like lack of lubrication. "That engine had ran at Darlington. We're not so sure that we didn't have some kind of foreign material, something, an oil line or something happened for [the] lack of lubrication." He added: "We have filters on the oil going in, we have filters on the oil coming out. So it's baffling, but Richard is holding a strong arm [saying] 'I want answers to be able to show [Kaulig Racing President] Chris Rice and [team owner] Matt Kaulig. We're going to know exactly [what happened] and try to make sure this never happens again." NASCAR Cup Series: Current Standings
Newsweek
16-05-2025
- Automotive
- Newsweek
Kyle Larson Defiant After Indy500 Crash As He Misses NASCAR All-Star Practice
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Kyle Larson has spoken out after crashing during the Indy500 Fast Friday practice. The 32-year-old driver, who is taking on the ambitious challenge of racing in the Indy500 and the NASCAR Cup Series Coca-Cola 600 on the same day, spoke to FOX Sports reporter Bob Pockrass after being cleared by the infield medical center. He explained: "Yeah, I think [I can maintain my confidence]. I think so. I think the conditions will be better tomorrow. I'm sure the track is actually cooling down a lot now, similar to what tomorrow will be. Bob, you see me crash all the time. So, I don't think it usually affects me. But yeah, we'll see. Kyle Larson goes around and into the wall at #Indy500 practice. — INDYCAR on FOX (@IndyCarOnFOX) May 16, 2025 "Like, today, I think when you turn the boost up for your speed lap, usually it's like, 'Oh my gosh,' you're flying. That didn't feel like as crazy as like the open test felt like when I turned it up for the first time. So, I'm happy the speed didn't scare me or anything like that. I think, as long as the car is okay, I think we'll be fine." Kyle Larson said he doesn't feel the crash today will impact his confidence to push it in qualifying tomorrow. @IndyCarOnFOX — Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) May 16, 2025 As a result of the Indy500 testing, Larson is missing the start of the NASCAR Cup Series All-Star weekend. Hendrick Motorsports confirmed that Justin Allgaier is stepping in for Larson and will also be on hand to replace him should any delays prevent him from entering the race. Cliff Daniels, crew chief for Larson's No. 5 team, said, as previously reported by Newsweek Sports: Kyle Larson, driver of the #5 Chevrolet, looks on in his car during qualifying for the NASCAR Cup Series AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway on May 10, 2025 in Kansas City, Kansas. Kyle Larson, driver of the #5 Chevrolet, looks on in his car during qualifying for the NASCAR Cup Series AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway on May 10, 2025 in Kansas City, Kansas."We're fortunate to have Justin and we appreciate him stepping in to help. He and Kyle are very similar in size, so there's a lot in the cockpit that's common between the two. "I think that serves him well and it serves us well. He's had some time in the simulator driving the track and he did the wheel-force test there a year ago, so he's got some experience in the Cup car at North Wilkesboro. We're looking to put in a solid practice and make sure the car drives good." What are the NASCAR Cup Series standings ahead of the All-Star Race?
