Nascar
Bubba Wallace honored as Comcast Community Champion of the Year
Bubba Wallace's “knees were trembling” when he cast his ballot in his first presidential election. NASCAR’s only Black full-time driver didn't watch the news before this summer, one of national unrest over politics and racial justice. Wallace successfully called on NASCAR to ban the display of the Confederate Flag at races, ran a “Black Lives Matter” paint scheme and became the central figure in a sport facing its own racial reckoning.
Bubba Wallace will drive the No. 23 car for Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin
Picking the car number for Michael Jordan's new NASCAR team was a slam dunk: Bubba Wallace will drive the No. 23 car when the team makes its debut next season. Jordan named his team 23XI Racing — that's pronounced twenty-three eleven — in honor of both his retired uniform number with the Chicago Bulls and the car number of his partner and three-time Daytona 500 champion Denny Hamlin. Jordan and Hamlin announced last month they had formed a NASCAR team with Bubba Wallace as the driver, a high-p
Kyle Larson reinstated to compete in NASCAR next season
Kyle Larson can return to NASCAR competition next season following a long suspension for using a racial slur while playing a video game. Larson, who is half-Japanese, spent the last six months immersed in diversity programs that helped him gain an understanding of racial injustice. Larson has spent significant time with retired soccer star Tony Sanneh, whose foundation works on youth development and empowerment in the Minneapolis area.
NASCAR's Jimmie Johnson partners with Chip Ganassi Racing in IndyCar move
Jimmie Johnson will transition from NASCAR to IndyCar with Chip Ganassi Racing in a partnership that could pair two of the most dominant drivers of this generation on one team. The seven-time NASCAR champion will work with the Ganassi organization to finalize sponsorship on a two-year program for Johnson to run the road and street course races on IndyCar's schedule. If funding is secured, Johnson would be teammates with five-time IndyCar champion Scott Dixon.
Heavy smoke, jammed exit: NTSB describes Earnhardt Jr. family's plane crash escape
Dale Earnhardt Jr. and a pilot struggled to open a crashed airplane's wing emergency exit as the aircraft began to burn and fill with smoke before the race car driver and his family managed to escape from the main door, according to new details about the 2019 accident released by the National Transportation Safety Board. Documents released Thursday by the NTSB provide pilot, passenger and witness statements about the Aug. 15, 2019 plane crash at an airport in Elizabethton, Tennessee. Earnhardt
NASCAR hosts largest crowd at a sporting event since pandemic
Clint Bowyer hopped off his pit stand at Bristol Motor Speedway to learn he'd won the fan vote to advance into NASCAR's All-Star race — an announcement met by a roar from the grandstands. Up to 30,000 fans were allowed to attend Wednesday night's race, NASCAR’s largest with spectators since the coronavirus pandemic shut down sports in March. Attendance figures were not released, but it appeared at least 20,000 spectators were socially distanced throughout the grandstands — making it the larges
Trump claims NASCAR noose was 'hoax,' demands Bubba Wallace apologize
After a weekend spent stoking division, President Donald Trump on Monday went after NASCAR's only Black driver and criticized its decision to ban the Confederate flag at its races and venues. Exploiting racial tensions, Trump wrongly accused Bubba Wallace of perpetrating “a hoax” after one of his crew members discovered a rope shaped like a noose in a garage stall they had been assigned to. Federal authorities ruled last month that the rope had been hanging there since at least last October an
FBI investigating noose as NASCAR drivers and crews unite behind Bubba Wallace
Federal authorities on Monday confirmed they are investigating the discovery of a noose found in the Talladega Superspeedway garage stall of Bubba Wallace, NASCAR's only Black full-time driver who successfully pushed the stock car series to ban the Confederate flag at its venues earlier this month. At Wallace's urging, it went ahead with the ban as the nation grapples with social unrest largely tied to George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who died in the custody of Minneapolis police. NASC
NASCAR deals with new rules, feuds and more fans at Talladega
The Alabama track will admit up to 5,000 fans Sunday — with at least one NASCAR team facing a coronavirus scare — while NASCAR will be on the lookout for the newly banned Confederate flag. Corey LaJoie and Denny Hamlin are in a bizarre feud that started on social media and escalated until NASCAR intervened last weekend by summoning both drivers to a face-to-face meeting.
NASCAR'S Bubba Wallace reflects on a dramatic week, and finding his voice
Bubba Wallace can count Spike Lee and Demi Lovato in his corner since he became the leader of NASCAR’s push for change. Wallace is the only black full-time driver at NASCAR's top level and has had to scrap for sponsorship money his entire career. Since he has taken a prominent role as an activist — successfully calling on NASCAR to ban Confederate flags at its events and leading the conversation among his peers about racial equality — the only new friends Wallace has are celebrities and fans.
NASCAR champ Kyle Busch calls for mandatory masks as photos show race fans without
Kyle Busch says he supports wearing a mask in public so “we all can take care of our neighbor" amid the coronavirus pandemic, a rare instance of the two-time NASCAR champion wading into a social issue. The reigning Cup champion rarely speaks on non-racing issues, but Busch entered the debate after images from short tracks over the weekend showed packed grandstands with little social distancing and few people wearing masks. Busch retweeted a photo from South Alabama Speedway in Ozark, Alabama,
Ryan Newman eager to race again this weekend after violent Daytona accident
Ryan Newman says he has no memories of his harrowing accident on the final lap of the Daytona 500. The first thing Newman can recall is walking out of a Florida hospital holding hands with his two young daughters. “As I watched the crash and had to make myself believe what I had went through, I really looked to my dad to say, ‘Hey, did this really happen?’” Newman said Thursday.
NASCAR's U-turn to racing raises flags of uncertainty, change
NASCAR is back. On May 17, the roar of engines - albeit without the roar of the crowd - will return to a NASCAR Cup Series race track. "I don't know that right now there's many procedures that are business as usual, so to speak," Cliff Daniels, crew chief for seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson, said.
NASCAR ends coronavirus shutdown May 17 with wildly accelerated schedule
NASCAR announced Thursday that it will resume its season without fans starting May 17 at Darlington Raceway in South Carolina with the premier Cup Series racing three more times in a 10-day span. NASCAR joins the UFC as the first major sports organizations to announce specific return to play plans since the coronavirus pandemic shut down U.S. sports in mid-March. “NASCAR and its teams are eager and excited to return to racing, and have great respect for the responsibility that comes with a ret