2015 Week 26

Welcome to week 26 – two races this weekend. NASCAR is at the intermediate length track in Louden, New Hampshire; Indycar is on the oval in Newton, Iowa. Sebastian has the links you need to make your picks at https://themotorracinggame.wordpress.com/tmrg-week-twenty-six-guide-and-links/. Picks can be made at: http://www.roadracetracks.com/motorracinggame.shtml.

Scores from week 25:

MotoGP Germany, NASCAR Kentucky, Indycar Wisconsin, USCC Mosport:

Marc Marquez won the Moto GP race in dominating fashion. He started from pole, and despite dropping to third in the first few corners, he quickly got back around the faster starters to take the lead, and from then on wasn’t threatened. Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo battled early with Rossi coming out ahead, but he couldn’t get around second-place Daniel Pedrosa, and at the end Pedrosa, Rossi, and Lorenzo all finished with quite large gaps (by Moto GP standards) between them. Andrea Iannone had a boring race, never really challenging those ahead of him, and never really being threatened from behind – he finished fifth. Iannone’s Ducati team mate, Andrea Dovizioso crashed and so was classified down in 22^nd place.

Kyle Busch won the NASCAR race in Kentucky. Unlike the other drivers, Busch can’t get into the Chase by wins due to him missing 11 races with his broken leg, suffered in a crash earlier in the year, but can get in via points which those at the lower order of the top 16 expect to use to get into the Chase. With two wins Busch is now closing in on 16^th place in the points, and will certainly get there if he continues with the performances he’s shown since coming back 6 races ago.

Sebastien Bourdais won the Indycar at the Milwaukee Mile by employing an off-sequence pit strategy. His risky pit strategy from early in the race turned out to be such an advantage that at one point he’d lapped the entire field. He wasn’t quite so dominating at the end, but still crossed the finish line a comfortable 2.2s ahead of Helio Castroneves, who had also adopted a different pit strategy compared to the rest of the field. Graham Rahal was close behind Castroneves in third, followed by championship leader Juan Pablo Montoya. Scott Dixon was seventh, and Simon Pagenaud was ninth. Will Power got collected when Ryan Briscoe crashed, leaving Power classified in 22^nd place.

It was an extremely close race in the USCC event at Mosport with the #10 Wayne Taylor Corvette beating the #31 Action Express Corvette by less than ½s after 2 hours and 40 minutes of racing. It was the first race (that I can recall) where none of the Prototypes had significant issues, resulting in all of them finishing in the top 10. Completing the podium behind the #31 was the #60 Michael Shank Honda, followed by the #90 Visit Florida Corvette, the #5 Action Express Corvette, and the #01 Ganassi Ford; which meant that we picked five of the top six.

Congratulations to me and my eighth outright win of the year, with one tie. No changes in the season long standings …