Stadium Super Trucks join Race of Champions - MotorSportsTalk

The Stadium Super Trucks series will be part of the 2019 Race of Champions weekend, it was announced Friday on the Race Champions web site. The ROC will be hosted in Mexico City this year.

Helmed by former NASCAR / IndyCar driver and current off-road star Robby Gordon, the Stadium Super Trucks will compete January 19-20 at the Foro Sol, the amphitheatre forming part of Mexico City’s Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez Formula 1 circuit.

The series will have standalone support races on both days featuring aluminum jumps .

“We’re especially thrilled that the Stadium Super Trucks will have their own separate support race once the main racing action has finished on both Saturday and Sunday,” said Gordon at RaceofChampions.com. “I know the trucks will be a first for many of the competing drivers – not to mention the spectators – but these 650 (horsepower) trucks have the capability to jump 20 or 30 feet off the ground for the length of a football field so either way it will be exciting.”

The Race of Champions is an all-star event encompassing the entirety of motorsports. It has been an annual event of more than 30 years. The drivers compete in a variety of identical cars. Drivers have to switch among the car types and adapt their driving style from one to another while competing in head-to-head races.

“Robby is one of the most colorful figures in world motor sport,” said Fredrik Johnsson, ROC President. “At his first Race Of Champions appearance in 2001 he rolled one car, pulled off another spectacular save and set a lap record round our Gran Canaria circuit that still stands … talk about giving the fans value for money!

“But if that sounds good just wait till you see his SPEED XX’s and his Stadium Super Trucks, which are sure to put a smile on the faces of all the drivers – and everyone watching. We have greats racing from Formula 1, Le Mans, IndyCar, NASCAR and RallyX but I bet you will never have had the chance to watch them drive anything like this before. If you’ve never seen a truck fly, now’s your chance.”

Excited that @SSuperTrucks will be part of #ROCMexico next monthhttps://t.co/u9F6X0sEa4 https://t.co/oWFJKZbGAa

— Robby Gordon (@RobbyGordon) December 21, 2018

Follow Dan Beaver on Twitter

INDIANAPOLIS — The first Indy 500 victory for Josef Newgarden also was the richest in race history from a record 2023 purse of just more than $17 million.

The two-time NTT IndyCar Series champion, who continued his celebration Monday morning at Indianapolis Motor Speedway earned $3.666 million for winning the 107th running of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

The purse and winner’s share both are the largest in the history of the Indianapolis 500.

It’s the second consecutive year that the Indy 500 purse set a record after the 2022 Indy 500 became the first to crack the $16 million mark (nearly doubling the 2021 purse that offered a purse of $8,854,565 after a crowd limited to 135,000 because of the COVID-19 pandemic).

The average payout for IndyCar drivers was $500,600 (exceeding last year’s average of $485,000).

Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Roger Penske, whose team also fields Newgarden’s No. 2 Dallara-Chevrolet, had made raising purses a priority since buying the track in 2020. But Penske but was unable to post big money purses until the race returned to full capacity grandstands last year.

The largest Indy 500 purse before this year was $14.4 million for the 2008 Indy 500 won by Scott Dixon (whose share was $2,988,065). Ericsson’s haul made him the second Indy 500 winner to top $3 million (2009 winner Helio Castroneves won $3,048,005.

Runner-up Marcus Ericsson won $1.043 million after falling short by 0.0974 seconds in the fourth-closest finish in Indy 500 history.

The 107th Indy 500 drew a crowd of at least 330,000 that was the largest since the sellout for the 100th running in 2016, and the second-largest in more than two decades, according to track officials.

“This is the greatest race in the world, and it was an especially monumental Month of May featuring packed grandstands and intense on-track action,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said in a release. “Now, we have the best end card possible for the 107th Running of the Indianapolis 500: a record-breaking purse for the history books.”

Benjamin Pedersen was named the Indy 500 rookie of the year, earning a $50,000 bonus.

The race’s purse is determined through contingency and special awards from IMS and IndyCar. The awards were presented Monday night in the annual Indy 500 Victory Celebration at the JW Marriott in downtown Indianapolis.

The payouts for the 107th Indy 500:

1. Josef Newgarden, $3,666,000
2. Marcus Ericsson, $1,043,000
3. Santino Ferrucci, $481,800
4. Alex Palou, $801,500
5. Alexander Rossi, $574,000
6. Scott Dixon, $582,000
7. Takuma Sato, $217,300
8. Conor Daly, $512,000
9. Colton Herta, $506,500
10. Rinus VeeKay, $556,500
11. Ryan Hunter‐Reay, $145,500
12. Callum Ilott, $495,500
13. Devlin DeFrancesco, $482,000
14. Scott McLaughlin, $485,000
15. Helio Castroneves, $481,500
16. Tony Kanaan, $105,000
17. Marco Andretti, $102,000
18. Jack Harvey, $472,000
19. Christian Lundgaard, $467,500
20. Ed Carpenter, $102,000
21. Benjamin Pedersen (R), $215,300
22. Graham Rahal, $565,500*
23. Will Power, $488,000
24. Pato O’Ward, $516,500
25. Simon Pagenaud, $465,500
26. Agustín Canapino (R), $156,300
27. Felix Rosenqvist, $278,300
28. Kyle Kirkwood, $465,500
29. David Malukas, $462,000
30. Romain Grosjean, $462,000
31. Sting Ray Robb (R), $463,000
32. RC Enerson (R), $103,000
33. Katherine Legge, $102,000

*–Broken down between two teams, $460,000 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, $105,500 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing/Cusick Motorsports