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Motorsport

NASCAR News Today: Top 3 this week with plans of hosting an International Cup race, What it means for Australia? and 2 x current Cup racers set for extra racing gigs overseas

by Sports Benches

While the on-air talent and silly season rumour talk is ongoing, there has been some progress as of late when it comes to NASCAR’s International ambitions. Off the back of several International drivers coming here over the last 1-2 years mainly on road courses, they would like to hold an International Cup series race as early as next year. We’ll find out where that might be? And what does it mean for Australia.

If hosting NASCAR races off shore isn’t enough, we got two Cup racers looking to get some extra race time elsewhere that will appeal to local race track promoters and race fans. There’s one who is set for a one-off outing in an International NASCAR-sanctioned series coming up soon while another is set for a return to Australia to race some sprint cars like most other US racers when their respective seasons usually finishes in November.

Time will tell but for now, great to see the sport taking some right steps in order to promote to stock car racing worldwide rivalling Formula 1, MotoGP & IndyCar .

NASCAR’s International Cup Series plans update this week beginning with Mexico and Canada

The 2025 NASCAR Cup Series schedule hasn’t been fully released yet other than a couple of important races and some of the in-tournament summer events that will be on both Amazon Prime & TNT – such as February’s season-opening Daytona 500, May’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and the Championship 4 Finale in Phoenix in early November.

While there’s still ongoing talk as to which of the current races will stay or go, there’s no surprise that NASCAR wants to host at least one if not two Cup races outside the USA. However, those two overseas races they’re looking at will likely be just within the North American border for a start.

We’ve heard so far that Mexico City in Mexico and Montreal in Canada are the key destinations, although Montreal would more likely be a realistic target for 2026. 

NASCAR has been there and done that before in the mid 2000s-early 2010s with the second-tier series with Mexico City between 2005-2008 followed by Montreal between 2007-2012 where both of these venues are usually home to their respective Formula 1 Grand Prix races like the Mexico City & Canadian Grand Prix.

I, for one, would like to see this happen with the sport doing an excellent job on being serious about their International footprint. It’s been going on over the last few years alongside a couple of International drivers coming in to race for a couple of occasions, especially on road courses where these drivers have been usually specialists there for so long.

What’s not going away though is taking some Cup events off on Sundays to accommodate their International ambitions, even if it’s going to be held in Mexico City and/or Montreal. 

It’s the best part business and fan-centric wise of finishing the race weekend as always with most of their viewers coming from across the county in the US while some do come from Canada as well as Europe. So they’re happy where they’re are when their main focus these days is the West Coast market & race day starts tend to fall in the early afternoon rather than putting it at midday like it used to be or else fans who live in the West Coast will miss out the start first thing at 9am PST.

What does it mean for NASCAR in Australia? 

While we continue to see more and more of our Supercars drivers trying their hand in NASCAR since last year with New Zealander Shane Van Gisbergen now racing the Xfinity Series for Kaulig Racing full-time, it looks like we won’t see a big NASCAR race weekend here anytime soon since they want to keep most of the focus locally and domestically across the USA.

Sure, never say never but it’s gonna be a long shot for management to consider in the rear view mirror. Yes, we also had an IndyCar race in the Gold Coast, QLD a long time ago until 2008. But don’t think IndyCar would also want to sacrifice its domestic audience either when racing only within the North and South America other than Toronto, Canada is the series’s only realistic International hotspots right now. 

We can always dream and even having an NASCAR-sanctioned Australian series would help just like they do to Mexico, Canada, Brazil and Europe. But we’ve always got Supercars and even SpeedSeries, so no room at all unfortunately in the meantime for NASCAR to sort out contracts with race tracks as well as suppling their fleet of stock cars to a customers wanting to take part here – which does cost the time of travel & $$$.

If NASCAR isn’t enough to keep you updated here when we all got work on a Monday morning unless you’re a big SVG fan of course in Xfinity level, there’s always highlights and replays to look back in the evening or in a few days whenever you can. Plus, Hendrick Motorsports driver Kyle Larson is coming to Perth at the end of this year to race in sprint cars – a discipline he knows all too well growing up while still racing some mid-week for fun.

Daniel Suarez to compete in a one-off race in Brazil for NASCAR’s sanctioned domestic series there

And lastly, another NASCAR Cup Series driver is going to get another race elsewhere – this time during the two-week break while the Olympics is on – in none other than current Trackhouse driver Daniel Suarez. He will arrive in Brazil next week to get married first with fiancé Julia Piquet, who is the sister of former NASCAR & Formula 1 driver (also Formula E champion) Nelson Piquet Jr. & daughter of 3 x Formula 1 champion Nelson Piquet. 

Then he’ll stay in Brazil a bit longer to compete on a one-off outing at Interlagos in São Paulo in NASCAR’s sanctioned Brazilian series on August 2-4 before they will return home together in Charlotte after this in time for the 2nd half season, with a Playoffs berth already sealed due to his win in Atlanta earlier this year (February).

Congratulations to Daniel on getting to marry the love of his life Julia while he’s able to score some extra race seat time at his future wife’s home soil in Brazil like he did during the Busch Clash weekend back in February at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in the Mexico Series – a series he regularly competed a long time ago before he went on to make a name for himself in America in which he’s just been an naturalised citizen there last month. No doubt this will hopefully put him on the map when it comes to the upcoming Playoffs in the same way that helped him win his next Cup a couple of weeks later. He ended up 10th in drivers’ points two years ago off the back of his first ever Cup win at Sonoma back in June and what he needs to now is to close in on team-mate Ross Chastain to provide better competition for Trackhouse before looking at the top teams.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on Leigh Diffey expecting to call his last IndyCar race at the Iowa Speedway doubleheader this weekend before the Olympics and most likely NASCAR later on

by Sports Benches

This weekend’s IndyCar Series race doubleheader at Iowa Speedway will be Leigh Diffey’s last race on the call after just over a decade, even though there’s six events left on the calendar this season before NBC Sports will bow out on a high with Fox Sports set to take it from here going into 2025 and beyond where they will show all races live including the annual Indianapolis 500 race on free-to-air. We all know he will be calling Track and Field during the 2nd week of the Summer Olympics over in Paris, France in early August for the network, which is a position that is so legendary since he first called the races at a Olympic event four years ago in Tokyo, Japan on top of various top-level races like the World Champs in the past.

Lots more to come when he will be back calling the Olympics Track and Field once again for the 2028 edition in Los Angeles followed by his hometown reunion for the Brisbane edition come 2032 – the time when NBC’s current Olympic contract will be expiring by then unless they renew for a lot more down the track from the last time the network signed their big Olympics renewal with the IOC that dates back to May 7th, 2014. There’s even more exciting news for Leigh post-IndyCar – even though it still hasn’t been made official but close to 100% likely – is that he will be well and truly expected to replace Rick Allen as NBC’s lead NASCAR Cup Series announcer once the Olympics is done alongside Steve Letarte and Jeff Burton. This won’t affect his other commitments such as Supercross and the early season IMSA races when NBC is not doing NASCAR, although he might miss the a rare Cup race or two for the World Championships in Track & Field if required during the odd years.

We don’t know when he will be begin calling the NASCAR races again but most likely when the Playoffs start around September with Leigh getting the promotion. Meanwhile, Rick Allen – who is currently calling the Cup races at the moment – will only keep his Xfinity Series gig for The CW – whether if it’s just the short term under NBC’s production just for the Playoffs or on a permanent basis ahead of its first full-time season next year with all races also free-to-air.

Seems like having a three-man booth suits the network’s style more off the back of good banter and chemistry that Leigh forged with James Hinchcliffe and Townsend Bell in IndyCar rather than the four-man group they’ve done with NASCAR for several years until the end of last season. Then at a time when they’ve renewed their commitment to air NASCAR for another few years not long later but only at Cup level; like the Premier League, NBC would want to go differently without Dale Jr. & now Rick.

For now, things won’t be the same without Leigh calling the open-wheel races at all once he wraps up NBC’s IndyCar coverage at Iowa with Kevin Lee expected to take the baton until the finale at Nashville Superspeedway. He’s been great presenting/calling these races firstly with Formula 1 of course before he got the chance to call the Formula 1 & IndyCar races for NBC at the same time back in 2013 while being the first overseas announcer to call the Indianapolis 500 when NBC had full rights to IndyCar for another few years from 2019 until the end of this year. We’re glad that he’s had one hell of a ride to see it for himself and the wider motorsports community as we can’t wait to hear what Leigh soon enough after the Olympics.

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Entertainment

Thoughts on NBC staying on with IMSA sports car racing the other day for another few years amid the loss of IndyCar to FOX

by Sports Benches

NBC Sports may have lost the IndyCar rights to FOX Sports last week ahead of next season under the series’ new multi-year TV rights cycle, but they did successfully retain the IMSA SportsCar Championship rights however for another few years. Nothing much will change other than the fact there will be up to 17 hours of screen time on the free-to-air NBC channel per year (50% up from what we see right now) with the rest including its support categories and on-demand content being on Peacock.

So it looks like most of the races including the 2 hour and 45 minutes ones and key portions of the long-distance endurance races – such as the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona, 12 Hours of Sebring, 6 Hours at Watkins Glen and 8-Hour Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta will all be happening on NBC. Although nothing is guaranteed like FOX promised to IndyCar when they will have all races live free-to-air from next year while NBC wanted to keep the IndyCar rights by having nearly all races for free & only a handful ending up elsewhere in which the series said no, there’s still a possibility that we could see just a handful Premier Class races going behind a paywall on Peacock and maybe on cable via USA Network like we see with IndyCar at the moment.

Speaking of IMSA on cable, they still should get some air time with some of long-distance endurance races as above but no word at this stage as to whether or not if the taped support race encores/highlights will continue during the following weekend of each round, etc – especially for viewers who is still around as some have already cut the cord in recent years for streaming. They used to do it quite frequently when NBCSN was there a few years back before it was shut down two years ago & the network barely shows motorsport encore/highlights these days with USA Network & CNBC already have their own time filler like USA’s endless marathons of second-run syndicated dramas as well as CNBC’s daily financial/business coverage.

And lastly who will still be around for NBC’s IMSA coverage? Leigh Diffey is one of them who has been around sportscars for a long time and will be back to commentate the early rounds of next season including the 24 Hours of Daytona but is expected to be given the reigns though as the network’s leading NASCAR Cup Series announcer during the second half season. Yes, they haven’t made the announcement yet as official but still likely to happen after the Olympics in September with Rick Allen to fully focus on Xfinity when the CW gets the early Playoff access and for Diffey to come in at the right time during Cup day.

When Leigh is on other commitments, Dave Burns has been filling in every now and then including Brian Till who is also an analyst having competed in CART back in the early 90s. Calvin Fish has always been a mainstay as the leading sports car analyst also for a long time as no doubt he and Leigh will continue their long-running partnership together for another few years. It remains to be seen though if Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe will stick around where both of them have always been around in IndyCar but it looks like they will both likely move on considering Hinch has also done some Formula 1 work from time to time & Townsend barely appeared on the network beyond IndyCar. Then on pit road, there’s no doubt Matt Yocum will be there for the most part including some from NASCAR on an occasional basis like Dillon Welch and Marty Snider.

All in all, it wasn’t a difficult deal for NBC to renew their commitment with IMSA when the US sports car series is also run by NASCAR. You could tell they could get the World Endurance Championship rights that includes the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans race but it seems TNT Sports via Warner Bros Discovery has kept them in great hands for the time being, especially when they use their sister Eurosport English-language commentary feed from Europe for every round on Motor Trend.

If IMSA did move to TNT, they would be the whole home of sports car racing but then it wouldn’t go down well when it comes to the overall reach with no free-to-air presence while the series has so many different manufacturers in the books & there’s no way IMSA would want to accept that. For now, NBC still has the 2nd half NASCAR Cup races, IMSA & dirt bike racing.

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Motorsport

2024 24 Hours of Le Mans back on 9Go for the first two hours with a four way manufacturer Hypercar battle for outright 1st

by Sports Benches

The big Saturday night of sports isn’t done just yet off the back of the Super Rugby semi-finals weekend and the end of the Australian Swimming Olympic Trials where the Olympics might not have started in France just yet, but there’s an annual Endurance race going on right now in the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans Endurance Race from Circuit De La Sarthe & it’s back on free-to-air 9Go for another year through the first two hours window. Glad to see Nine have the authentic sports logo watermark with the Olympic Rings on it which looks really nice, especially during an Olympic year like this. I hope they can keep on doing this by having the WWOS badge more often like they do to other sports by treating their free-to-air limited LIVE motorsports coverage better should they be back airing the World Endurance Championship and 24 Hours of Le Mans next year. It’s been a long time coming since Nine didn’t put the WWOS logo at all for their former SpeedSeries coverage including the previous 24 Hour of Le Mans race last year – despite wearing one before at times two years ago until Motorsport Australia re-took the SpeedSeries media rights off ARG that ended the mixed paywall/free experiment & Seven came back to air the races once again from earlier this year. Seven also didn’t have any issues when putting on their sports logo unlike Nine.

Looking at the race itself, it’s been a Ferrari race so far where one car has been leading up front over the first 30 mins-1 hour before another works Ferrari of the same Hypercar factory team got away with the lead after the leading car just couldn’t hold onto outright 1st on the outside. But don’t forget they’ve got greater competition from the US such as the No.31 Porsche Penske team as well as the No.3 Cadillac while we wouldn’t rule out Alpine as well with Mick Schumacher’s (one of the Alpine F1 frontrunners alongside Australia’s own Jack Doohan to replace Esteban Ocon for next season) No.36 running in between 10th-15th for Signatech. If you wish to watch the rest of the 24 Hour Endurance event, Stan Sport is the only place to see all along until the end of Sunday night. For new viewers, it’s a seven day free trial and if you like it, it will cost you $25 a month.

From there, you can also watch on-demand replays and highlights at any time as well as every other World Endurance Championship race LIVE uninterrupted without having to break away with an ad-break or two at all. Although you can watch IndyCar there in the meantime at least until the rest of this season, but keep an eye out for 2025 as they could end up on Foxtel/Kayo once again since the US rights have just changed hands recently where it’s now heading to FOX from NBC.

We also know Leigh Diffey, who called the 24 Hour of Le Mans for Eurosport last year, will be staying with NBC having called the Indianapolis 500 over the last seven years & he’s still expected to replace Rick Allen for their NASCAR Cup Series coverage as their main announcer after the Olympics is over with Track & Field. His first Cup race full-time would be straight after the network finishes its IndyCar tenure at Nashville while The CW will begin airing the Xfinity Series races relatively early at the same time during the Playoffs with Allen it before the network takes full control at least the next seven years going into 2025.

For now, it’s a Ferrari 1-2 up front (No.50 over No.83 a few mins ago) under wet weather going into the evening, then darkness and hopefully bright weather into the next day where both cars really want to win that one ultimate prize.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on NBC Sports losing another property after Roland Garros with IndyCar now likely to be on FOX Sports next year

by Sports Benches

Well, the next IndyCar broadcast rights deal is set to wrap up soon and it looks like FOX Sports will be taking over for the next couple of years rather than stick around with NBC Sports following its 14-16 year commitment that began with its parent company Comcast’s takeover of the then Versus cable channel back in 2011 (original 10 year deal to air the cable races began from 2009-18). NBC has been great all along when Versus became NBC Sports Network a year later and then NBCSN throughout the 2010s before they were able to get the full rights including the Indianapolis 500 off ESPN on ABC towards the end of the decade and into the early 2020s up until now – even though NBCSN ran its course at the end of the 2021 with USA Network, CNBC and Peacock (streaming only) becoming the network’s main sports subscription content channels since then.

Now IndyCar is expected to swap networks by airing all of the races live on FOX throughout the year and free-to-view as well since the network will only be able to show five free-to-air NASCAR Cup races including the Daytona 500 with the rest (nine races) being on cable via FS1 from next year to at least through 2031. It looks like it’s the beginning of an end from NBC as they will be left with the second-half NASCAR Cup races and Supercross/Motocross racing while they still have IMSA SportsCar Racing at the moment whose existing seven-year deal also expires at the end of the year. With NBC losing a bunch of sports lately such as the MotoGP at the start of the year and the Roland Garros Tennis tournament a few days ago to TNT Sports, we wouldn’t be surprised if IMSA SportsCars ends up on TNT’s hands next year – who also has a great line-up of sportscar racing through Motor Trend – like the World Endurance Championship and the 24 Hours of Le Mans (this weekend).

Looking at FOX picking up IndyCar, congrats to them on picking up a top-level open-wheel series with the most money offered than NBC which has the historical Indianapolis 500 value alongside some great competition on-track. Things won’t be the same next year when it comes to airing the annual Coca Cola 600 NASCAR event after 24 years (2001-2024) but they can continue airing the biggest day of motorsports by airing the Indianapolis 500 event earlier on at midday rather than late afternoon to night. They’ve also aired the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix race in the past throughout the 2000s and early 2010s but that was through the former Speed Channel cable network as it never was on FOX unlike NBC and now ABC these days.

Who will be commentating the big Indy 500 race and all other races throughout the IndyCar season? We know Mike Joy has been commentating the Daytona 500 for so long but it looks like Adam Alexander will be the favourite to take over – who hails from Indiana and also started his media career there – before he made the step up on Fox Sports for a long period of time, having also just wrapped up co-hosting its flagship weekly show NASCAR Race Hub with Shannon Spake following its final 90-min episode this week. We will also expect to see a few people from NBC coming over like Townsend Bell and Kevin Lee but we can definitely see Jamie Little returning home alongside Adam as the one of leading pit reporters. She used to be around at the 500 when ABC was airing the races until FOX hired her to replace Krista Voda after ESPN/ABC lost the NASCAR rights at the end of 2014 & Jamie’s been great with FOX ever since including calling a couple of Truck & ARCA races now.

On the NBC side post-IndyCar, it seems more and more likely now that Rick Allen is still expected to hand over the main commentary duties to Australia’s own Leigh Diffey after the Olympics while staying on to call all other Xfinity Series races at the end of this season including the last few Playoff events on The CW. While it won’t be the same for Leigh to not call the Indy 500 anymore having been the first overseas caller to do for a few years now, but at the same time, he’s getting the chance to be front and centre for the network’s NASCAR coverage. He’s done Formula 1, Rugby, IMSA SportsCars, Supercross and whole bunch of other sports before including being the network’s leading track and field caller for a few years now that began from the previous Summer Olympics back in 2021 in Tokyo, Japan. Calling the Daytona 500 would’ve been great since it’s the greatest race there to kickstart the season every year but it looks like FOX is staying for a bit longer until at least 2031.

And lastly what does it mean for its International coverage including Australia? As it stands, Stan Sport via Nine Entertainment Co. currently holds the exclusive rights there that started back in 2022 with every practice, qualifying and race LIVE, ad-free and on-demand including every hour-long race highlights during the following weekend via free-to-air on 9Go. This could have a huge impact going forward as should IndyCar end up on FOX in the US, we will expect to see IndyCar moving back to Foxtel through Fox Sports and Kayo Sports’s streaming service. It looks like these die-hard motorsports fans who subscribe to watch the Supercars and Formula 1 races will be able to watch IndyCar on the same platform again, which is going to be great news without having to subscribe to another subscription service. You never know including Europe, Asia & Africa but this is going to be a possibility with FOX already having a few International affiliate cable channels in Australia, Mexico & Argentina.

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Motorsport

9Go to simulcast two hours in the 24 Hours of Le Mans LIVE once again on Saturday 15th June with Stan Sport showing the full race

by Sports Benches

Hope everyone enjoyed the Indianapolis 500 highlights on 9Go this weekend off the back of that last lap battle towards the checkered flag even though it started a bit later than expected due to rain with congratulations to Josef Newgarden on his 2nd straight win for Team Penske Chevy as they will be back broadcasting a bit of the 24 Hours of Le Mans race once again on Saturday June 15th 2024 at midnight to 2am like it was last year. Similar to what we’ve saw with the annual UEFA club tournament grand finals during play, there won’t be any ads during those two hours since it’s also an annual event – which is great news for those motorsport and causal sports fans looking to stay up at night for a bit longer by watching one of the greatest endurance motor races in the world including some Aussies & Kiwis in the mix too. Also, the commentary will come straight from the world feed that we normally hear in each and every WEC season rather than picking one off Eurosport.

Should you wish to watch the remaining 20 odd hours after 2am, then you would need a Stan Sport subscription as Stan has the exclusive rights thanks to Nine management to show the full race including every event of the World Endurance Championship live and on-demand with 1 hour highlights being played during the following weekend on 9Go.

I’m sure it will be another great one to watch during the big weekly sports weekend and the last thing we hope to see here that they should bring out the Nine Olympics watermark since it’s an Olympic year going into July-August in Paris. But even with SpeedSeries now back to 7, I wouldn’t be surprised if they went with a 9Go logo with the LIVE wording on it once again rather than a WWOS or Nine Olympics watermark when their motorsport history isn’t that much for a very long time until in recent years compared to FOX Sports, Seven, SBS and even Network 10 until Stan Sport was a year old going into 2022.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on SpeedSeries broadcasting the South Australian Round mostly from the studio instead of The Bend Motorsport Park with a handful of staff on-site this weekend

by Sports Benches

Yes, we all know Chris Stubbs is back on Stan Sport at Nine’s Sydney studios alongside Wally Masur and Casey Dellaqua with the next grand slam already underway for nearly a week now over at the Roland Garros in Paris, France. That isn’t going anywhere with Wimbledon coming up in a few week’s time (maybe on-site again like it was last year) since he’s freelance having also done a bit for Network 10 a few months ago at the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix. Not only that he will be on Stan more often instead of being at Queensland Raceway twice (one in mid-July and another in early August) when the next Summer Olympics will arrive also from the same place come late July to early August. So for SpeedSeries and Australian motorsport fans, they won’t see him for a long while until the penultimate round on the 18-20th October at Sydney Motorsports Park not long before the season usually wraps up at Mount Panorama in Bathurst on the 8th-10th November. He will also be at the next Bathurst 1000 in early October as always to provide the big event action for 7 like he does every year.

I know SpeedSeries is happening right now going into tomorrow at The Bend Motorsports Park in South Australia but it seems they chose to things a bit differently by having a host/commentary team calling from a studio being supplied by SEN while still having a small on-site presence of just a handful of staff and 1-2 pit reporters. As said when Stubbsy is unavailable, just didn’t see that coming when The Bend just came back into life for the first time since 2019 & it would be great if they sent a full group of staff there to celebrate after a difficult last few years on top of COVID. However, I can understand given the shortage of staff and long distance from here – despite the fact that Matt Naulty and Richard Craill are SA based but both had to come over to Melbourne to do the job rather than from the race track. Don’t forget the series has found its progress back on free-to-air/free-to-view all over it following the mixed free and paid content experiment throughout the last two years with most via subscription on Stan and some on Nine when SpeedSeries was really struggling to attract sponsorship back then.

All in all, it’s a tough decision but glad SpeedSeries is experimenting all options in order to keep its free-to-air exposure growing so everyone who is interested can see it – even though doing 1-2 events remotely might be the norm these days like we see with other sports and also other networks given the costs to cover the production side of things & on-air staff as well.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on Daniel Ricciardo’s Hulu Formula One sitcom project getting a pilot order earlier this week now titled Downforce

by Sports Benches

Also this week, ABC Signature has one of their new sitcom pilots being approved to the pilot stage by the Hulu streaming service and it’s Formula 1 related called Downforce with current RB Visa CashApp driver Daniel Ricciardo involved as one of the executive producers alongside Alec Berg, Adam Cortnee, Lionsgate and Temple Hill Entertainment. It will be lead by a female who was suddenly required to oversee the family-run racing team as she will need to make some tough choices whether if she will continue running it or step aside that would impact the future of the organisation and her family’s legacy.

So a it’s bit like Claire Williams taking over her famous dad’s Formula 1 team during the last decade when he needed to take a back seat before it was sold to Doriton Capital back in 2020, which marked a new era for Williams and then Sir Frank sadly passed away a year later. Maybe this might be based on a true story since Formula 1 has grown a lot in America off the back of the seasoned Netflix documentary Drive to Survive over the last 5-6 years. The cast and its format (thinking it’s going to be single-camera) remains to be seen at this stage, having first developed the show when Ricciardo was involved with Hulu a year ago. Yes, he was out of a drive at the time as even though his results this year might not be good any longer after he unexpectedly replaced Nyck De Vries nearly a year ago at Red Bull’s sister team (then Alpha Tauri), he will still have a job within the sport where he’s always been popular with the fans when he raced for Red Bull, Renault and McLaren for many years.

Now let’s see if Downforce can be put into series which isn’t guaranteed but should things go well later this year, we the original airing would be on Hulu sometime in 2025 with the International distribution as per ABC Signature being available via Disney +. Yes, this project also would’ve been perfect for ABC on TV who also airs selected Formula 1 races during the year thanks to Disney property ESPN but they want more new multi-camera sitcoms going forward that isn’t expensive. So best to build a following on Hulu rather than seeing things being unexpectedly axed after a few episodes if they’re really that lucky.

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Motorsport

Thoughts on Tickford’s Supercars driver Cam Waters making his NASCAR debut in Trucks for ThorSport next weekend at Martinsville

by Sports Benches

In April 2023, Tickford Racing’s Cam Waters made his way from Melbourne to the paper clip short track called Martinsville Speedway over in the US – having taken a closer look of Riley Herbst’s No.98 Ford Mustang Xfinity Series race car from Stewart-Haas Racing. Then he came back to America again as a spectator during the 2023 regular season finale at Daytona a few months ago and here he is now ready to expand his love of NASCAR this time as a race car driver where he will be returning to Martinsville next weekend by driving the No.66 Ford F-150 for ThorSport Racing in the Craftsman Truck Series.

It’s so fitting for Waters to begin his NASCAR debut at a place he first came there a year ago & there wouldn’t be any issues at all to begin his oval racing career since he will be racing on a short track/0.5 mile oval. If he wants to run superspeedways at some point, no problem. But he can go take part in the season-opening ARCA Menards Series round at Daytona in February next year (surely that won’t affect his Supercars commitments short-term) in order to pass the rookie orientation test & race on the big tracks as Shane Van Gisbergen (currently at Kaulig Racing in the Xfinity Series while still being tied up under Trackhouse) had to do 1-2 months ago regardless of his race result (an early crash sadly saw him limping down in 29th).

Looking at Waters’s ambitions with NASCAR, he’s almost age 30 with another good 10-15 years left as we also know that he is on RFK Racing’s radar who might as well give him a partial Cup ride later this year in the 3rd No.60 Ford Mustang race car for three races – most likely in the road course events like the Chicago Street Course & maybe one short oval one. He’d be a great long-term replacement there should the co-boss Brad Keselowski eventually calls it a day in the No.6 team or the team can see the potential 3rd charter happening to expand into three full-time Cup cars someday, but Xfinity would be a great start with a good midfield team like RSS & AM Racing who can give him the resources to run upfront and win races from there.

Now looking at his Supercars record, it’s not bad having finished 2nd twice via the Drivers’ Standings in the Supercars championship before back in 2020 and 2022 to both NZ drivers who now ply their trade in the US such as Scott McLaughlin (Dick Johnson Racing, now at Team Penske in IndyCar) and SVG (Triple Eight, now racing NASCARs full-time as above) respectively. Don’t forget he also finished 2nd twice at the Bathurst 1000 back in 2020-21 as well. Yes, he has won a couple of races there before but still has unfinished business though after an up and down start so far this Supercars season despite a good qualifying run last weekend at Albert Park that saw him win the pole award for Race 2. A Bathurst 1000 win would be great while catching up with the drivers’ standings in the hope of at least walking away with one series championship before he can think real big full-time in the US. For now, we wish him good luck as a Top 15-20 run would be a great start on debut.

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Motorsport

Formula 1, an unexpected early mechanical DNF from Red Bull’s Max Verstappen paves a Ferrari 1-2 finish with Spaniard Carlos Sainz Jr. now a first time winner at Albert Park

by Sports Benches

We didn’t see that coming but we now have a new Australian Grand Prix winner for 2024 and his name is Carlos Sainz Jr who drives for Scuderia Ferrari off the back of these unexpected early retirements from reigning champion and last year’s winner Max Verstappen (Red Bull-Honda RBPT) as well as Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes whose team-mate George Russell also suffered a late race crash). He too had a great race for the majority unchallenged with team-mate Charles Leclerc rounding off a 1-2 Ferrari finish since the 2022 season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix. Looks like it will be Ferrari v Red Bull for the championship now with Sainz Jr (-11 points) and Leclerc (-4 points) not far behind Verstappen (currently on 51 with back-to-back wins) in the drivers’ standings. Plus, fellow Red Bull driver Sergio Perez has still yet to win this year despite back-to-back 2nd places in the hope of going one better that would help him keep his ride for another couple of years after he just finished 5th (-5 points).

For the Aussies, We also hoped to at least see one on the podium but Oscar Piastri didn’t do bad though just outside the Top 3 places in 4th behind his McLaren-Mercedes team-mate Lando Norris, while Daniel Ricciardo finished not far from the Top 10 in 12th despite being a lap down for Visa CashApp RB-Honda RBPT since he was in a midfield race machine.

Also, shoutout to the two Haas-Ferrari cars just rounding off the Top 10 points in Nico Hulkenberg (9th) and Kevin Magnussen (10th). So does Ricciardo’s team-mate Yuki Tusnoda from Japan after he collected a few points in 8th just behind the Aston Martin duo of Lance Stroll (7th) & Fernando Alonso (6th). And although things are still going slow at the moment over at Jack Doohan’s Alpine-Renault squad with Esteban Ocon finishing last on track (16th), but Pierre Gasly did benefit from these early race retirements on what has been an okay 13th placed finish. It remains to be seen if Alpine’s form will turn things around sooner rather than later as a mid-season driver change remains unlikely for now but Doohan hopes his time will come most likely next year depending on the team’s commitment to the sport & if Ocon and/or Gasly leaves for a better race team like Mercedes and Red Bull. F1 will now go from Albert Park in Melbourne to Suzuka in Japan who will now host early rather than later during the season as the next race (Round 4 of 22) will take place after Easter on the weekend of Sunday 7th April 2024.

If you wish to follow all other races after watching this annual Australian race since it’s free-to-air protected, Fox Sports/Kayo will be the only place here to watch live & on-demand with next day race highlights available for free thanks to Kayo Freebies.

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