Here are your United States Grand Prix times on NBC, NBCSN

By Oct 19, 2016, 3:12 PM EDT
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This week, Formula 1 heads to the United States for the fifth United States Grand Prix to be held at Circuit of The Americas in Austin.

It seems hard to believe this is the fifth running here already, but it is. The championship battle rages between Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton, with the Mercedes AMG Petronas duo separated by 33 points, with Rosberg ahead.

Here are the full times and details for this weekend’s coverage, with race coverage starting Sunday, at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC. Lights out is at 3 p.m. ET/2 p.m. CT and local time, from Austin.

We should also note Off the Grid: Austria premieres at 12:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN, following coverage of Practice 1 on Friday.

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Mercedes teammates Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg continue their championship battle, and the American Haas F1 Team makes its debut in the United States, as NBC Sports Group presents the Formula One United States Grand Prix this Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on NBC from Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. Coverage begins at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC with F1 Countdown.

NBC and NBCSN will combine to present comprehensive live coverage of all practice, qualifying and race coverage this weekend, beginning on Friday at 11 a.m. ET on NBCSN.

NBCSports.com and the NBC Sports app — NBC Sports Group’s live streaming platforms for desktops, mobile devices, tablets, and connected TVs — will provide live streaming coverage of practice, qualifying, and the U.S. Grand Prix.

NBC Sports Group’s lead F1 commentary team of play-by-play voice Leigh Diffey, veteran analyst and former race car driver David Hobbs, analyst and former race mechanic for the Benetton F1 team Steve Matchett, and F1 insider Will Buxton will call the race on-site from Circuit of the Americas.

F1 U.S. GRAND PRIX – SUNDAY AT 3 P.M. ET ON NBC

Rosberg currently holds a 33-point lead over Hamilton with just four races remaining in the 2016 season heading into this weekend’s race at Circuit of the Americas, following his ninth win of the season in Japan on Oct. 9. Hamilton will look for a strong showing this weekend at COTA, where he has won three of the four races since 2012, and where he clinched the drivers’ championship last season.

This also marks the first race on U.S. soil for the American Haas F1 Team, which made its debut into Formula One this season. Haas F1 has secured 28 points this season, led by driver Romain Grosjean, who has secured four top-10 finishes for the team this season.

Live coverage begins on NBCSN Friday at 11 a.m. ET with Practice 1, followed by Practice 2 at 3 p.m. ET. NBCSN will present live coverage of Practice 3 and Qualifying on Saturday, beginning at 12:30 p.m. ET.

Pre-race coverage on Sunday begins at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC with F1 Countdown, and F1 Extra will recap the U.S. Grand Prix with post-race coverage at 5 p.m. ET. NBCSN will also air an encore presentation of the race on Sunday at 7 p.m. ET, and Monday at 3:30 p.m. ET.

Following are quotes from Diffey and Hobbs previewing the U.S. Grand Prix:

Diffey on the Haas F1 Team competing stateside for the first time: “For so many years, we’ve waited for an American team – and now the wait is over. The fact that the team has scored 28 points, and got both drivers into the top 10 in qualifying at the last race – they can be so proud.”

Hobbs on Rosberg and Hamilton: “The battle for the front will be between Rosberg and Hamilton, but Hamilton has had some terrible problems starting the car. It’s no good being quicker than everybody else if you’re half a lap behind after lap one.”

Diffey on whether Rosberg can hold off Hamilton to win the championship: “For the longest part of this season, I didn’t think so…but it’s so difficult to imagine that Nico isn’t going to do it at this point. This weekend could be a do-or-die weekend for Hamilton. He cannot get another bad start and cannot afford another poor finish…this weekend is going to be a defining moment in this championship.”

NASCAR AMERICA AND NASCAR ON NBC PODCAST TO FEATURE HAAS F1 DRIVERS ROMAIN GROSJEAN AND ESTEBAN GUTIERREZ

Haas F1 Team drivers Romain Grosjean and Esteban Gutierrez join Kyle Petty at the NASCAR Hall of Fame during Thursday’s NASCAR America for a discussion about the evolution of stock car racing. From the creation of the first window net, to historic race cars Grosjean and Gutierrez immerse themselves in the history of NASCAR and even try their hand at changing tires. In addition, Grosjean and Gutierrez will appear on Thursday’s edition of the NASCAR on NBC podcast with Nate Ryan. The pair discusses this weekend’s race in Austin, Texas, which will mark Grosjean’s 100th career Grand Prix start. Available on NASCAR Talk, iTunes, AudioBoom, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher and podcasting apps, the NASCAR on NBC podcast discusses the latest NASCAR news each week with major stars and personalities.

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Following is this week’s NBC Sports Group F1 coverage schedule:

DATE COVERAGE NETWORK TIME (ET)
Fri., October 21 F1 United States Grand Prix – Practice 1 NBCSN 11 a.m.
Off the Grid: Austria NBCSN 12:30 p.m.
F1 United States Grand Prix – Practice 2 NBCSN 3 p.m.
Sat., October 22 F1 United States Grand Prix – Practice 3 Streaming 11 a.m.
F1 United States Grand Prix – Practice 3 & Qualifying NBCSN 12:30 p.m.
Sun., October 23 F1 Countdown NBC 2:30 p.m.
F1 United States Grand Prix NBC 3 p.m.
F1 Extra NBC 5 p.m.
F1 United States Grand Prix (Encore) NBCSN 7 p.m.
Mon., Oct. 24 F1 United States Grand Prix (Encore) NBCSN 3:30 p.m.

‘It’s gnarly, bro’: IndyCar drivers face new challenge on streets of downtown Detroit

By Jun 2, 2023, 7:32 PM EDT
IndyCar Detroit downtown
James Black/Penske Entertainment
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DETROIT – It was the 1968 motion picture, “Winning” when actress Joanne Woodward asked Paul Newman if he were going to Milwaukee in the days after he won the Indianapolis 500 as driver Frank Capua.

“Everybody goes to Milwaukee after Indianapolis,” Newman responded near the end of the film.

Milwaukee was a mainstay as the race on the weekend after the Indianapolis 500 for decades, but since 2012, the first race after the Indy 500 has been Detroit at Belle Isle Park.

This year, there is a twist.

Instead of IndyCar racing at the Belle Isle State Park, it’s the streets of downtown Detroit on a race course that is quite reminiscent of the old Formula One and CART race course that was used from 1982 to 1991.

Formula One competed in the United States Grand Prix from 1982 to 1988. Beginning in 1989, CART took over the famed street race through 1991. In 1992, the race was moved to Belle Isle, where it was held through last year (with a 2009-2011 hiatus after the Great Recession).

The Penske Corp. is the promoter of this race, and they did a lot of good at Belle Isle, including saving the Scott Fountain, modernizing the Belle Isle Casino, and basically cleaning up the park for Detroit citizens to enjoy.

The race, however, had outgrown the venue. Roger Penske had big ideas to create an even bigger event and moving it back to downtown Detroit benefitted race sponsor Chevrolet. The footprint of the race course goes around General Motors world headquarters in the GM Renaissance Center – the centerpiece building of Detroit’s modernized skyline.

INDYCAR IN DETROIT: Entry list, schedule, TV info for this weekend

JOSEF’S FAMILY TIES: Newgarden wins Indy 500 with wisdom of father, wife

Motor City is about to roar with the sound of Chevrolet and Honda engines this weekend as the NTT IndyCar Series is the featured race on the nine-turn, 1.7-mile temporary street course.

It’s perhaps the most unique street course on the IndyCar schedule because of the bumps on the streets and the only split pit lane in the series.

The pit lanes has stalls on opposing sides and four lanes across an unusual rectangular pit area (but still only one entry and exit).

Combine that, with the bumps and the NTT IndyCar Series drivers look forward to a wild ride in Motor City.

“It’s gnarly, bro,” Arrow McLaren driver Pato O’Ward said before posting the fastest time in Friday’s first practice. “It will be very interesting because the closest thing that I can see it being like is Toronto-like surfaces with more of a Long Beach-esque layout.

“There’s less room for error than Long Beach. There’s no curbs. You’ve got walls. I think very unique to this place.

PRACTICE RESULTS: Speeds from the first session

“Then it’s a bit of Nashville built into it. The braking zones look really very bumpy. Certain pavements don’t look bumpy but with how the asphalt and concrete is laid out, there’s undulation with it. So, you can imagine the cars are going to be smashing on every single undulation because we’re going to go through those sections fairly fast, and obviously the cars are pretty low. I don’t know.

“It looks fun, man. It’s definitely going to be a challenge. It’s going to be learning through every single session, not just for drivers and teams but for race control. For everyone.

“Everybody has to go into it knowing not every call is going to be smooth. It’s a tall task to ask from such a demanding racetrack. I think it’ll ask a lot from the race cars as well.”

The track is bumpy, but O’Ward indicated he would be surprised if it is bumper than Nashville. By comparison to Toronto, driving at slow speed is quite smooth, but fast speed is very bumpy.

“This is a mix of Nashville high-speed characteristics and Toronto slow speed in significant areas,” O’Ward said. “I think it’ll be a mix of a lot of street courses we go to, and the layout looks like more space than Nashville, which is really tight from Turn 4 to 8. It looks to be a bit more spacious as a whole track, but it’ll get tight in multiple areas.”

The concept of having four-wide pit stops is something that excites the 24-year-old driver from Monterey, Mexico.

“I think it’s innovation, bro,” O’Ward said. “If it works out, we’ll look like heroes.

“If it doesn’t, we tried.”

Because of the four lanes on pit road, there is a blend line the drivers will have to adhere to. Otherwise, it would be chaos leaving the pits compared to a normal two-lane pit road.

“If it wasn’t there, there’d be guys fighting for real estate where there’s one car that fits, and there’d be cars crashing in pit lane,” O’Ward said. “I get why they did that. It’s the same for everybody. I don’t think there’s a lot of room to play with. That’s the problem.

“But it looks freaking gnarly for sure. Oh my God, that’s going to be crazy.”

Alex Palou of Chip Ganassi Racing believes the best passing areas will be on the long straights because of the bumps in the turns. That is where much of the action will be in terms of gaining or losing a position in the race.

“It will also be really easy to defend in my opinion,” Palou said. “Being a 180-degree corner, you just have to go on the inside and that’s it. There’s going to be passes for sure but its’ going to be risky.

“Turn 1, if someone dives in, you end up in the wall. They’re not going to be able to pass you on the exit, so maybe with the straight being so long you can actually pass before you end up on the braking zone.”

Palou’s teammate, Marcus Ericsson, was at the Honda simulator in Brownsburg, Indiana, before coming to Detroit and said he was shocked by the amount of bumps on the simulator.

Race promoter Bud Denker, the President of Penske Corporation, and Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix President Michael Montri, sent the track crews onto the streets with grinders to smooth out the bumps on the race course several weeks ago.

“They’ve done a decent amount of work, and even doing the track walk, it looked a lot better than what we expected,” Ericsson said. “I don’t think it’ll be too bad. I hope not. That’ll be something to take into account.

“I think the track layout doesn’t look like the most fun. Maybe not the most challenging. But I love these types of tracks with rules everywhere. It’s a big challenge, and you have to build up to it. That’s the types of tracks that I love to drive. It’s a very much Marcus Ericsson type of track. I like it.”

Scott Dixon, who was second fastest in the opening session, has competed on many new street circuits throughout his legendary racing career. The six-time NTT IndyCar Series champion for Chip Ganassi Racing likes the track layout, even with the unusual pit lane.

“I don’t think that’s going to be something that catches on where every track becomes a double barrel,” Dixon said. “It’s new and interesting.

“As far as pit exit, I think Toronto exit is worse with how the wall sticks out. I think in both lanes, you’ve got enough lead time to make it and most guys will make a good decision.”

It wasn’t until shortly after 3 p.m. ET on Friday that the IndyCar drivers began the extended 90-minute practice session to try out the race course for the first time in real life.

As expected, there were several sketchy moments, but no major crashes during the first session despite 19 local yellow flags for incidents and two red flags.

Rookie Agustin Canapino had to cut his practice short after some damage to his No. 78 Dallara-Chevrolet, but he was among many who emerged mostly unscathed from scrapes with the wall.

“It was honestly less carnage than I expected,” said Andretti Autosport’s Kyle Kirkwood, who was third fastest in the practice after coming off his first career IndyCar victory in the most recent street race at Long Beach in April. “I think a lot of people went off in the runoffs, but no one actually hit the wall (too hard), which actually surprised me. Hats off to them for keeping it clean, including myself.

“It was quite a bit less grip than I think everyone expected. Maybe a little bit more bumpy down into Turn 3 than everyone expected. But overall they did a good job between the two manufacturers. I’m sure everyone had pretty much the same we were able to base everything off of. We felt pretty close to maximum right away.”

Most of the preparation for this event was done either on the General Motors Simulator in Huntersville, North Carolina, or the Honda Performance Development simulator in Brownsburg, Indiana.

“Now, we have simulators that can scan the track, so we have done plenty of laps already,” Power told NBC Sports. “They have ground and resurfaced a lot of the track, so it should be smoother.

“But nothing beats real-world experience. It’s going to be a learning experience in the first session.”

As a Team Penske driver, Power and his teammates were consulted about the progress and layout of the Detroit street course. They were shown what was possible with the streets that were available.

“We gave some input back after we were on the similar what might be ground and things like that,” Power said.

Racing on the streets of Belle Isle was a fairly pleasant experience for the fans and corporate sponsor that compete in the race.

But the vibe at the new location gives this a “big event” feel.

“The atmosphere is a lot better,” Power said. “The location, the accessibility for the fans, the crowd that will be here, it’s much easier. I think it will be a much better event.

“It feels like a Long Beach, only in a much bigger city. That is what street course racing is all about.”

Because the track promoter is also the team owner, Power and teammates Scott McLaughlin and Indy 500 winner Josef Newgarden will have a very busy weekend on the track, and with sponsor and personal appearances.

“That’s what pays the bills and allows us to do this,” Power said.

Follow Bruce Martin on Twitter at @BruceMartin_500