Mercedes confirms cause of Hamilton’s Malaysia engine failure

By Oct 6, 2016, 11:00 AM EDT
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Mercedes has confirmed the cause of Lewis Hamilton’s engine blow-out during last weekend’s Malaysian Grand Prix.

Hamilton suffered an engine failure while leading the race by 20 seconds with 17 laps remaining, costing him the chance to regain the lead of the drivers’ championship at Sepang.

Mercedes confirmed at the time that it received no prior warning ahead of the engine failing, with the power unit being returned to its base in England for further evaluation.

On Thursday ahead of this weekend’s Japanese Grand Prix, a spokesperson from Mercedes confirmed the cause of the failure.

“Our analysis has shown that Lewis’ engine suffered a big-end bearing failure. This happened without warning after 618 km and was preceded by a loss of oil pressure in Turn 15,” he said.

“For this race weekend, Lewis will revert to his Singapore unit and Nico will use his Malaysia engine. We will introduce revised running parameters for all Mercedes engines this weekend.

“Planned new engines for five customer drivers this weekend will be delayed to contain further possible learning from the strip of the failed unit. They will continue to use their units from Malaysia.”

Hamilton enters this weekend’s race in Japan trailing Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg by 23 points in the drivers’ championship.

IndyCar disappointed by delay of video game but aiming to launch at start of 2024

By Mar 27, 2023, 3:00 PM EDT
IndyCar video game 2024
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An IndyCar executive said there is “absolutely” disappointment that its long-awaited video game recently was delayed beyond its target date, but the series remains optimistic about the new title.

“Well, I don’t know how quick it will be, but the whole situation is important to us,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said during a news conference Monday morning to announce IndyCar’s NTT title sponsorship. “Motorsport Games has spent a lot of money, a lot of effort to create an IndyCar title. What we’ve seen of that effort, which is not completely obvious, is very reassuring.

“I think it’s going to be outstanding. That’s our shared objective, that when it is released, it’s just widely accepted. A great credit both to IndyCar racing, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, something that our fans love.”

In June 2021, IndyCar announced a new partnership with Motorsport Games to create and distribute an IndyCar video game for the PC and Xbox and PlayStation consoles in 2023.

But during an earnings call last week, Motorsport Games said the IndyCar game had been delayed to 2024 to ensure high quality.

Somewhat compounding the delay is that IndyCar’s license for iRacing expired after the end of the 2022 season because of its exclusive agreement with Motorsport Games.

That’s resulted in significant changes for IndyCar on iRacing, which had provided a high-profile way for the series to stay visible during its 2020 shutdown from the pandemic. (Players still can race an unbranded car but don’t race on current IndyCar tracks, nor can they stream).

That’s helped ratchet up the attention on having a video game outlet for IndyCar.

“I wish we had an IndyCar title 10 years ago,” said Miles, who has been working with the organization since 2013. “We’ve been close, but we’ve had these I think speed bumps.”

IndyCar is hopeful the Motorsports Game edition will be ready at the start of 2024. Miles hinted that beta versions could be unveiled to reporters ahead of the time “to begin to show the progress in a narrow way to make sure we’ve got it right, to test the progress so that we’re ready when they’re ready.”

It’s been nearly 18 years since the release of the most recent IndyCar video game for console or PC.

“(We) better get it right,” Miles said. “It’s something we’re very close to and continue to think about what it is to make sure we get it over the line in due course.”