Heavy crashes send NASCAR race into overtime

Weekend Racing Wrap

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Jimmie Johnson scored his sixth home victory at Auto Club Speedway but several of his rivals suffered heavy crashes during the race.

NASCAR

Race 5 of 36: Fontana

Jimmie Johnson took his second NASCAR victory of 2015 in an eventful race at Fontana, much of which was led by Kevin Harvick. The race distance was extended after a late crash for Kurt Busch which gave Johnson took the opportunity to pass Harvick for the win at the restart.

Guest Series: NHRA Drag Racing

Round 3 of 24: Gainesville

Richie Crampton made the fifth quickest pass ever in NHRA history on Saturday to claim the number 1 and earn the honour of opening Sunday’s eliminations, though it rather backfired.

Crampton was beaten in the first heat by 84-year-old (yes, you are reading that correctly!) Chris Karamesines and duly knocked out. Karamesines was then beaten in the second round by Dave Connolly who himself lost in round three to eventual winner Brittany Force.

IMSA

Race 2 of 12: Sebring

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The Sebring 12 Hours was won by the Extreme Speed Motorsports team of Pipo Derani, Scott Sharp, Ed Brown and Johannes van Overbeek in treacherous conditions, giving a second classic US endurance title this season to add the Daytona 24 Hours won in January.

After qualifying on pole, the car fell to fourth by the final restart, but two deftly-executed moves by Derani in the last ten minutes saw the car take the win. Action Express and their Corvette DPs were the leaders for the majority of the event, which was red-flagged for almost two-and-a-half hours due to huge thunderstorms in the area, and cars throughout the classes hit trouble both on track and in the pit lane.

The GTLM honours went to Corvette Racing, with another set of repeat winners from Daytona: Oliver Gavin, Tommy Milner and Marcel Fassler. CORE Autosport took the Prototype Challenge honours, while GT Daytona was won by the Scuderia Corsa Ferrari team.

Also last weekend

The Formula One world championship returned with a bang – quite literally for Fernando Alonso – with the Australian Grand Prix at Albert Park, Melbourne. Nico Rosberg took the honours ahead of team mate Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel.

Moto GP also returned after their winter break with the now traditional Qatar opener. Reigning champion Jorge Lorenzo claimed victory for Yamaha ahead of Andrea Dovisioso’s Ducati and Marc Marquez’s Honda.

Over to you

Whatever racing action you watched last weekend we want to hear about it. Let us know in the comments – plus your viewing plans for this weekend.

Thanks to Robert Mathershaw (@Mathers) for contributing to this article.

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8 comments on “Heavy crashes send NASCAR race into overtime”

  1. @bradley13 I think that it was Kyle Busch that brought out the final caution

    1. It was Kyle and I wouldn’t consider his mishap a heavy crash. Atleast no compared to what Kyle Larson and Danica Patrick went through.

  2. I watched the first half of Sebring, part of the 12 Hours of Mugello and the MotoGP trio of races. Derani is well and truly a special talent. That’s now two eyebrow-raising performances stateside in the space of two races. It is surely only a matter of time before he is snapped up by a top manufacturer in the WEC.

    The Moto 2 race at Qatar was simply a farce. Some drivers complained of the lights flickering at the start, others did not. In total, nine ride-through penalties were handed out but it took until the final lap of the race for the final ones to actually be handed out. The premier class delivered a cracking race though. Ducati could well be real threats for race victories this year, and I am thoroughly impressed by the job Michelin have done over there.

    1. @craig-o Technically Derani is already a factory driver. He’s signed to Onroak and has been loaned out to ESM, since they’re racing two of Onroak’s Ligier JS P2s in WEC this year. I agree though, he has to be on the radar of the three LMP1 teams, and I would expect him to get a test in a P1 car sometime this year.

  3. I know we only cover 4 wheels in the “weekend of racing” but as time and time again someone enjoys making some analogies between either F1 and motogp or f1 and Wec therefore I just wanted to say as someone who’s been watching motogp for a decade, that qatar’s season opener was in spite of the favourable rule changes for 2016 a bust, many pointed out that qualifying was great but the race was single file for the most part, and the worst Qatari race of the past 3 or 4 years.

  4. I am a NASCAR fan but the same headline could apply to almost any race. Either debris or crashes send the race into overtime

    1. Or Ricky Bobby running in underwear..xD

  5. i still feel that the overtime/green-white-checker thing that nascar use to artificially extend there races is one of the worst gimmicks in the history of the sport.

    ok a race ending under a caution is frustrating but if a race is scheduled for 200 laps the race should end on the 200th lap be it under green or yellow. putting drivers in situations where they may not have enough fuel or tyre life to go more than 200 laps is ridiculous & from the races i’ve watched since its introduction it seems that its fairly common that the ‘overtime’ results in more chaos because everyone starts to drive like idiots because its the last chance to make up places, especially on the plate tracks.

    if you get towards the end & don’t want to end under yellow then throw a red as indycar have a few times at indy in recent years, to arbitrarily just extend the length of the race & give them 3 attempts to end under green (which could see them do 10-15+ laps extra including caution laps) is complete & utter nonsense!

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