By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor
(NASCAR)—-From sixteen to twelve, and now only eight drivers remain in the fight for NASCAR’s 2021 Cup championship.
Adding color to the competition are two guys, one still in the championship hunt and one who knocked himself out of it in the cutdown race at the Charlotte Roval.
Kyle Larson climbed all the way to the winner’s circle after an early race mishap, getting his seventh win of the year. He has the top seed in the three-race series that will cut the final competitors to four for the last race of the year.
Larson’s alternator lost its belt and his battery started going flat at the end of the second stage of the race. But his pit crew put in a new battery and put on a new alternator belt—without losing a lap. However, he had dropped from 6th to 36th when he got back on the track. But he carved his way through the field and back into the top ten with 31 laps left and was second with eleven laps left. He got past Denny Hamlin for the lead with eight laps left and beat Tyler Reddick to the flag by about eight-tenths of a second.
Hamlin has the second seed for the next round with Martin Truex Jr., Ryan Blaney and Kyle Busch filing the rest of the top five positions. The remaining three drivers are Chase Elliott, Joey Logano, and Brad Keselowski.
Kevin Harvick took himself out of title contention when he charged too hard into the first turn with eleven laps left, trying to stay ahead of Elliott and Truex, and went straight into the SAFER barrier. His departure from the race was good news to Elliott with whom he has had a metal-bending feud going since the Bristol race three weeks ago when Harvick accused Elliott of denying him his first win of the year. Earlier in the race, Harvick had bumped Elliot into the turn eight wall, damaging the rear of the defending NASCAR champion’s car and jeopardizing his chances of advancing in the playoffs.
Elliott’s crew taped the pieces together so he could continue and he wound twelfth. Harvick’s self-elimination put him 33rd for the day and out of the final eight for the first time since NASCAR went to the current playoff system.
Neither driver showed any contrition about their on-track ongoing dispute, which NASCAR noticed.
NASCAR’s senior vice-president for competition, Scott Miller, told SirusXM radio the Harvick-Elliott snit has to come to an end. “We spoke to them after the thing at Bristol…We don’t need that continuing on and we’ll do what we think is necessary to kind of get that one calmed down.”
Harvick was joined by Christopher Bell, Kurt Busch and Tyler Reddick as drivers no longer contending for the championship.
Unlike stick-and-ball sports, NASCAR playoffs are not a win-or-go home proposition. The four eliminated drivers will still be racing wins in the last four races.
(INDYCAR)—More driver lineups are falling into place for the 2022 INDYCAR season.
Jack Harvey will be in the Rahal-Letterman-Lanigan car next year, replacing Santino Ferrucci. Ferrucci is believed to be in the running for the third RLL seat that had been occupied by Takuma Sato in 2021. Sato says his chances of a season-long INDYCAR ride next year are only about 50-50 although he is rumored to be under consideration by Dale Coyne and Rick Ware’s team. Graham Rahal drives the other team car.
Simon Pagenaud has left Penske and has signed with Meyer-Shank Racing, taking the seat Harvey had held in 2021. He’ll team with Helio Castroneves for a full 2022 schedule.
(FORMULA 1)—Frequent F1 bridesmaid Valtteri Bottas inherited pole position for the Turkish Grand Prix when teammate Lewis Hamilton was penalized ten starting positions for an engine change and refused to give up first place afterwards. He finished almost fifteen seconds ahead of Max Verstappen in a race dogged by rain.
Verstappen reclaimed the Formula 1 points lead over Hamilton, who finished tenth and thought he would have done much better if he had not been called to the pits for new tires with seven laps to go while running third. He wound up fifth and dropped out of the points lead to now trail by six.
(photo credits: Bob Priddy)