Expect Wednesday’s announcement of the ABC Supply Wisconsin 250 at the Milwaukee Mile the first of several upcoming for Michael Andretti, the Andretti Autosport team, and the Andretti Sports Marketing arm, in 2014.
The team locked up 2012 IZOD IndyCar Series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay to a contract extension prior to the last race of last season. And Marco Andretti, obviously, also isn’t going anywhere.
As for the status of James Hinchcliffe, E.J. Viso and potentially Carlos Munoz, Michael Andretti said: “We’re hopefully announcing some things soon – there are some things I think we can do this weekend.”
Andretti is spending today in Dallas for sponsor meetings, then heading to Los Angeles for this weekend’s season finale in Fontana, Calif.
The other domino is whether Andretti Autosport will switch to Honda from Chevrolet for 2014, which appears likely at this point. I asked Michael whether Chip Ganassi’s move the other way caught him off guard.
“We knew something was going on, but I was surprised it was announced then (at Houston two weeks ago),” Andretti explained. “It’s put me in a bit of a weird position. But it’s been an interesting last couple weeks. We’re close to making a decision, hopefully announcing soon, and all options are on the table.”
Andretti is seeking further duties for his ASM promotional arm – a separate team and staff under the Andretti umbrella. The group lost Baltimore, another ASM-promoted race, for 2014. But whether it’s in Formula E, which the team has announced its plans to participate in, or with other possible new venues, Andretti is optimistic of finding something to fill the gap.
“We’re actively looking at other venues, and things to do,” Andretti said. “We were disappointed in the loss of Baltimore for sure. But it’s important for our staffing to be utilized. We’ll be announcing other things we’ll be doing, maybe not just IndyCar.”
It’s easy to forget because the team has been so snakebit with luck the second half of the season, that Andretti’s quartet of 2013 drivers have been quick and probably better as a collective unit than they were during the 2012 title-winning season.
But James Hinchcliffe’s podium two weeks ago in Houston Race 2 was the team’s first since Hunter-Reay was second in Iowa, back in June. Heading into the season finale, Hunter-Reay (second, 5.1 average), Marco Andretti (fourth, 9.0), and Hinchcliffe (fifth, 9.1) have three of the five best qualifying averages in the field, but not the results to match.
“It’s so weird,” Michael Andretti explained. “One of the highlights of the year for us was being on the front row at Pocono. From start of that race to now, it seems like the wheels came off.
“We’ve been competitive in every race, but you wouldn’t know it, because all our guys have bad luck,” he added. “That’s the way it goes. To win a championship, you have to have the breaks go your way. We could have won the championship this year with Marco or Ryan if they had the breaks Ryan did last year. People are saying we’re uncompetitive, but we’re not uncompetitive. We just wanna finish it off with a win to cap our bad luck.”
It was not the first time it has been done, but a rider winning in his Motocross debut is rare as the results show Jett Lawrence swept the motos at Fox Raceway in Pala, California and took the early points lead.Dylan Ferrandis may not be quite 100 percent yet, but he was good enough to finish on the podium at Fox Raceway – Align Media
Lawrence became the 16th rider to win in his Motocross debut and was the 10th rider to do so in the season opener, At 19, he wasn’t the youngest to perform the feat; Rick Johnson was 17 in 1982 when he won the lidlifter at Hangtown, the site of next week’s race, but Lawrence’s inaugural win bodes well. The last time a rider performed this feat, Dylan Ferrandis went on to win the 2021 Motocross championship as a rookie in 2021.
Ferrandis did not sweep the motos that season while Lawrence’s performance on Saturday was perfect. He paced both practice sessions, earned the holeshot in each race and finished first in both motos after leading every lap to score maximum points. Lawrence started the weekend needing 85 points to climb into 20th in the combined SuperMotocross standings for the 450 class. Earning 50 with his perfect Motocross results at Fox Raceway, he is nearly 60 percent of the way to his goal.
Chase Sexton was second across the board. He qualified in the second position and finished 2-2 in his motos. In the first race, he was a relatively distant runner-up behind Lawrence, crossing the finish line a little more than 10 seconds ahead. He got a great start in Moto 2 and pushed Lawrence for the entire race, never getting further back than three seconds. He tried to pressure Lawrence into making a mistake, but both riders hardly put a wheel wrong and they finished within a second of one another.
Returning from a concussion suffered in the Houston Supercross race earlier this season and exacerbated at Daytona, Ferrandis finished third in both motos to take third overall. His most important task at hand this week was to avoid trouble and start the Motocross season healthy at Fox Raceway so he can begin to accumulate strong results and move up in SuperMotocross points.
Ferrandis entered this round 25th in the standings and left Pala in 19th. With that position, he has an automatic invitation to the feature starting grid in the SuperMotocross World Championship as long as he does not fall back.
Aaron Plessinger and Cooper Webb both ended the race with 34 points, but Plessinger had the tiebreaker with a better finish in the second race. Notably, both riders sustained injury sometime during the season, but Plessinger had an advantage by coming back a week sooner in Salt Lak City for the Supercross finale. He finished second in that race.
Webb was cleared late in the week by doctors after being on concussion protocol from a vicious strike to his helmet in a Nashville Supercross heat race late in the season. He made a beeline to the track to run the Motocross opener. After missing last year’s outdoor season, he wanted to make certain that did not happen again. He still has a solid opportunity to catch Sexton for the No. 1 overall seed in the SuperMotocross standings., but he will need to make up 78 points.
For the first time in history, Pro Motocross results from Fox Raceway show brothers as winners on the same day.
Battling a rib injury suffered practicing earlier in the week, Hunter Lawrence got a poor start to Moto 1 and had to overcome his 10th-place standing at the end of Lap 1. He methodically worked his way toward the front but might have settled for a position off the podium if not for heavy traffic in the closing laps. Lawrence was able to get through the field quicker than Justin Cooper and Jo Shimoda to finish third.
Hunter Lawrence overcame sore ribs to score the overall 250 win at Fox Raceway – Align Media
Lawrence’s second moto was much stronger. He earned the holeshot and led all 15 laps of the race to win by a more than eight seconds.
Haiden Deegan didn’t feel any pressure heading into this round. No one expected much in his third Motocross National and he would have been happy with anything in the top five. At least that’s what he said in the post-race news conference. Deegan said similar things after finishing fourth in his first Supercross race this season. In a stacked field of 40 riders at Fox Raceway, “Danger Boy” finished sixth in Moto 1 and second in Moto 2 for the second-place finish overall.
In only his third Pro Motocross National, Haiden Deegan finished second overall. – Align Media
RJ Hampshire had an eventful weekend. He dominated Moto 1 and won by a healthy margin, making a statement about how he will race now that Jett Lawrence is no longer in the field. He was a victim of mayhem in Turn 2 of Moto 2, which forced him to the ground. Another crash on an uphill portion of the track later that same lap put him in 39th. Hampshire salvaged as many points as he could and finished 11th in the second race to stand on the final box of the podium.
Tom Vialle came within a lap of scoring his first career podium. He had the position based on a tiebreaker over Justin Cooper and Maximus Vohland until Hampshire passed two riders on the final lap and earned one point more than that threesome. Instead, Vialle settled for his first podium in an individual moto with a 7-3 in the two races. More accustomed to this style of racing, Vialle will be a factor in the coming rounds.
Cooper finished with a 5-4 in the two motos to sweep the top five and take fourth-place overall. Cooper started five rounds in the 450 class in Supercross this season and none on a 250, so he is starting with zero points in the SuperMotocross seeding, but with runs like this it won’t take long to make up the 89 he needs to climb to 20th.
One of the best performances of the weekend was put in by Vohland. He finished second in Moto 1 and had to withstand pressure from Lawrence in the closing lap. A poor start of 16th in the second race forced him to play catchup and he could only climb to ninth at the checkers.
