Esteban Gutierrez to make IndyCar debut with Coyne in Detroit - MotorSportsTalk

Mexican driver, and another ex-Formula 1 driver in Esteban Gutierrez, will make his Verizon IndyCar Series debut this weekend as the next in the line of drivers aboard Dale Coyne Racing’s No. 18 Sonny’s BBQ Honda, at the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix dual races.

Gutierrez will race at Detroit for Coyne as the first Mexican driver to race the series since Michel Jourdain Jr. at the Indianapolis 500 in 2012. Gutierrez told NBC Sports’ Luke Smith at the Monaco ePrix “IndyCar is more attractive” for jumping into at some point.

The series hasn’t had a Mexican driver run full-time since 2008, when Mario Dominguez raced with Pacific Coast Motorsports. In CART and Champ Car’s peak, six Mexicans – Jourdain, Dominguez, Adrian Fernandez, Rodolfo Lavin, Roberto Gonzalez and Luis Diaz – raced at Mexico City in 2003.

“I’m very grateful to join Dale Coyne Racing, a highly competitive team,” said Gutierrez. “When Dale Coyne called me, I had no doubt that this would be a great opportunity for me to get experience in the Verizon IndyCar Series. My target is to learn as quickly as possible. IndyCar is a very challenging series for drivers, but I feel ready to take this chance.

“I’m excited about my debut races at the Detroit Grand Prix and I cannot wait to start working with the team, engineers and Honda, as well as driving a Dallara car again. I have very good memories of my successful GP3 and GP2 Series seasons with the Dallara cars and I worked very well with them at Haas F1 Team. I will do my best for Dale Coyne Racing, Honda and all the Mexican fans.”

Gutierrez steps into the car which had been driven by Sebastien Bourdais through qualifying for the Indianapolis 500, before Bourdais was injured with multiple pelvic fractures and a fractured right hip. The Frenchman, though, is well on his way to recovery and rather quickly judging by his social media posts, and even visited IMS on Sunday morning to check back in with the Coyne crew and the media.

While James Davison filled in at Indianapolis and acquitted himself well to drive from 33rd on the grid up to the lead for two laps, he was part of a five-car accident in the race’s final 20 laps that left him in an unrepresentative 20th place at the checkered flag.

Gutierrez will be an interesting case study to watch as an ex-F1 driver making his IndyCar debut. He won’t have had a test day and will be jumping in at the deep end of the 22-car field, and will be matched up against rookie Ed Jones, who it could be argued would have been a worthy rookie of the year at the Indianapolis 500.

But at 25, he’s incredibly experienced both in open-wheel and on street courses. He did three full seasons in Formula 1 with Sauber and Haas, and won the GP3 Series title in his first attempt in 2010 – a year that featured future IndyCar drivers Alexander Rossi, Josef Newgarden, Mikhail Aleshin, James Jakes and Stefano Coletti and other notables such as Robert Wickens, Daniel Morad, Rio Haryanto, Jean-Eric Vergne, Renger van der Zande, Antonio Felix da Costa and Michael Christensen. He also has finished third in GP2 and has been competing in Formula E this season, having started at Mexico City with the Techeetah team, where incidentally he’s now Vergne’s teammate.

All three remaining Formula E doubleheader weekends run on IndyCar weekends. FE is in Berlin next weekend while IndyCar is at Texas. In July, FE’s North American swing hits New York City (July 15-16) and Montreal (July 29-30) while IndyCar runs at Toronto and Mid-Ohio, respectively.

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Vicki Golden has earned a career worthy of a thousand stories and 805 Beer tells at least one of them, as “Inverted Perspective” premiered March 30 on the company’s website and YouTube channel.

Golden did more to break the glass ceiling in SuperMotocross than she ever thought possible. She knows this because riders have never felt the need to explain any of her accomplishments with the disclaimer, “for a girl”.

At this point in Golden’s career, she’s been the first woman to finish top 10 in AMA Arenacross Lites, the first woman to qualify in the Fast 40 in Monster Energy AMA Supercross and the first woman to compete in freestyle Moto X competition, earning a bronze medal by doing so.

Her love for moto came from childhood while she watched her dad and brother ride. By seven she was on her bike and making waves throughout Southern California.

Golden, 30, is still madly in love with the sport and has no plans on moving away but her career is already one to talk about. 805 Beer’s film series wanted to do exactly that.

“I’m taken aback by it all,” Golden told NBC Sports about the documentary. “It’s just crazy to see your story, it’s one thing to live your life and battle everything that comes about but it’s another to just sit there and talk about it.”

805 approached Golden about the feature by asking, “Do you even realize that what you do, and your story is special?”

Golden took the question as a blank canvas to map out the highs and lows of her career and life.

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The title “Inverted Perspective” came from a brainstorming session with Dominick Russo and it highlights Golden’s outlook on the sport of SuperMotocross and her life in general.

“My whole life, my whole career was thinking differently and looking at things that shouldn’t be done and aren’t there, while being able to make a place for myself, where no one thought there should be a place,” Golden said. “It’s inspiring someone to think in different ways. It sums up my life.”

*Vicki Golden is not “fast for a girl”; she’s just fast. – 805 Beer*

While Golden is no stranger to the spotlight, this was the first time she’s been fully involved with the storytelling and creation of a feature about herself.

“It’s not like a full new experience,” Golden said. “Obviously, you get your standard questions about your upbringing and accomplishments, but I’ve never really put into perspective things that happened in my past with my dad and putting that to light. Also, certain other things that maybe got overlooked in previous interviews or films. I wanted to touch on these and Dom wanted to create a story. It’s just cool to see it come to light, it’s a nearly impossible thing to tell somebody’s life story in 40 minutes.”

Golden’s father was left paralyzed after an ATV accident, robbing him the opportunity to ride again. This happened a few months before the father-daughter duo was set to compete in the Loretta Lynn’s Amateur Nationals when Vicki was 12. While she might have been unable to grasp the severity at the time, it’s something she carries with her. Golden continues to ride in his honor.

Years later, an accident in 2018 nearly sidelined the then 25-year-old Vicki when a freestyle accident almost resulted in the amputation of her lower leg.

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Golden 805 Beer — *Vicki Golden has ridden a variety of disciplines in SuperMotocross, which gives her a unique perspective. – 805 Beer*

“Inverted Perspective” highlights her father’s diligence in helping Vicki continue with her career and the kindness and strength he carried while fighting his own battle.

“My dad was the entire reason that I started riding in the first place,” Golden said. “So, to honor his memory and to honor what we went through and how hard he pushed to keep our dream alive and keep everything going – in that sense then, it was really special to be able to honor him and talk about him.”

The 40-minute feature was filmed entirely in black and white, a stark contrast from the oversaturated world of motocross where the brighter the suit the easier it is for fans to find their rider and follow him in the race. By filming in monochrome Russo and Golden had the chance to focus on the race and track from a different perspective.

“It was cool to be able to film it differently,” Golden said. “It created a challenge in the sense of what was going to be more visually impactful for the film.

“I couldn’t be here without the companies that back me but at the same time, it’s not like the logos or colors disappeared, it’s just different lights shed on different spots. It’s just a cool way to do it and to take color away and still be impactful. When you think of black and white, you think of old school, the OG way of doing things.”

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