Getty Images His last-lap efforts to win a second Daytona 500 may have fallen short, but Dale Earnhardt Jr. still got his season off on the right foot.
A second-place finish in the season-opening race has him, of course, second in the Sprint Cup standings at five markers behind Hendrick Motorsports teammate and Daytona winner Jimmie Johnson. With Sunday’s race at Phoenix International Raceway looming, he also won’t have to worry about the unappetizing prospect of starting the 2013 campaign with two bad races in a row.
“I think it’s important to get a good start points-wise,” Earnhardt Jr. said after the ‘500.’ “It’s important to put a good foundation of points together. If you get behind early, it seems like you’re still chasing that [Chase for the Sprint Cup] spot at Richmond. It’s good to get a good start, get a couple points on some guys.
“We’re a good team. Hopefully, we can keep the pressure on them and stay up in the top five in the points and win some races. I want to really try to win some more races this year. That’s our focus.”
Earnhardt Jr. has won twice at PIR in his career (2003 and 2004), but his fortunes in the Valley of the Sun have varied since then with him collecting just one top-10 finish in his last eight races at Phoenix.
That said, a solid result this weekend will have him sitting in a pretty good spot early on in the championship – and while the Earnhardt Nation would’ve loved to have seen their guy hoist the Harley J. Earl Trophy last weekend, you know they’ll gladly celebrate a Sprint Cup title for Driver #88 as well.
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Reuters
Marussia team principal John Booth is pleased with the start that his drivers have made to the Monaco Grand Prix weekend, but he has admitted that the rest day on Friday does give the team extra time to review the data collected and prepare for the sessions on Saturday and Sunday. Unlike any other race,…
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Lotus driver Kimi Raikkonen has made a slight change to his special Monaco helmet design ahead of Saturday’s sessions, with the move rumored to have been encouraged by Formula One Management. Many of the drivers have opted to run with an alternative helmet livery in homage to F1′s glamour event, with Sebastian Vettel and Lewis…
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Cecotto suspended after causing Sainte Devote crash in GP2 Monaco feature
May 24, 2013, 5:35 PM EDT
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Venezuelan driver Johnny Cecotto Jr. has been suspended from the FIA GP2 Series sprint race in Monaco, after he was judged to have caused the first turn collision in Friday’s feature race. Cecotto started from pole and missed his apex into Sainte Devote, with the ensuing pileup behind him affecting nine cars who were then…
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Scuderia Toro Rosso’s Daniel Ricciardo has spoken of his special affinity for the Monaco Grand Prix, and the Australian driver expects the team to run well at the race after a good showing last time out in Barcelona. Ricciardo ran well at the Spanish Grand Prix to finish P10, and he is sure that this…
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Caterham F1 Team owner Tony Fernandes has spoken out to silence rumors that he may be set to sell the team after it has failed to meet his expectations. Although the tycoon did admit that he expected Caterham to be running in the midfield by now, he believes that the team has come too far…
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AP
Townsend Bell is the IndyCar color commentator on NBC Sports Network and a professional driver. He’ll drive the No. 60 Sunoco Turbo Chevrolet during the 97th Indianapolis 500 on Sunday. My road to the Indianapolis 500 essentially started in 1986. I was 10 years old and living far away in the San Francisco area. Being…
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Three teams appear to be one step closer to signing new engine contracts for next season, according to reports. Marussia, Scuderia Toro Rosso and Williams have all been rumored to be looking for new engine contracts to coincide with the new regulations in 2014, and, according to Auto Motor und Sport, the deals are close…
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Tony DiZinno (@tonydizinno) Race winner: Nico Rosberg. Mercedes and Rosberg’s one-lap pace this year is unquestioned. Is this the race where the team finally puts it together from a good grid position to actually bring it home if they don’t chew through the tires as normal? I think so, for the driver who finished second here a…
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AP
A four-wide drag race to the checkered flag in today’s Firestone Freedom 100 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway was won by Peter Dempsey, who nipped Gabby Chaves to the yard of bricks by .0026 of a second in a wild final lap. The top four were separated by just 0.0443 of a second, and the margin…
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AP
The “Andretti Curse” at Indianapolis Motor Speedway isn’t stopping the NBC Sports Network team from making Marco Andretti (pictured) their popular choice to win the 97th Indianapolis 500 on Sunday afternoon. Andretti will start on the outside of the front row and has utilized a race-first mentality in preparing for this year’s Greatest Spectacle in…
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Simona de Silvestro on IndyCar 36 to air Friday night on NBCSN
May 24, 2013, 1:15 PM EDT
Reuters
IndyCar’s Carb Day coverage is currently airing on the NBC Sports Network until 4 p.m. ET. Later tonight, the focus shifts off-track, for the latest installment of IMS Productions’ IndyCar 36, featuring KV Racing Technology driver Simona de Silvestro. It airs at 10:30 p.m. Friday night. IMSP keyed in on de Silvestro at the last…
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Today’s GP2 feature race at the Circuit de Monaco got off to a chaotic start as a 14-car pileup ensued in the first corner just after the start of the race. Pole sitter Johnny Cecotto was blamed for the incident and has been kept out of the remainder of the GP2 weekend in Monaco. Cecotto…
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AP
Simon Pagenaud led Carb Day practice with a late flier, tow-assisted, fastest lap of 225.827 mph for Schmidt Hamilton Motorsports. Until that point, Andretti Autosport’s E.J. Viso (225.304) looked set to lead the timesheets as has been the trend this month. Besides Pagenaud’s No. 77 HP entry, Honda has made some strides in the morning…
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AP
During yesterday’s Media Day activities at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Team Penske rookie A.J. Allmendinger (starting fifth) was asked about which race was bigger to him: The Daytona 500, which he has run four times in his Sprint Cup career, or the Indianapolis 500, which he will run for the first time this Sunday. The…
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Hobbs, Matchett take over F1 on NBC Sports Twitter for fan questions
May 24, 2013, 10:00 AM EDT
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Friday is a light day in Monaco with no on-track Formula One activity. That makes it a good day to reflect on a couple insights and observations from our NBC Sports Network F1 analysts, David Hobbs and Steve Matchett. You can see the Monaco Grand Prix live on NBC, at 7:30 a.m. ET on Sunday,…
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Honda’s two North American arms has been in the news with two major announcements this week related to its IndyCar program. On Wednesday, Honda Performance Development officially opened its Indiana Tech Center in Brownsburg, Ind. The facility features a full-scale DIL (Driver-in-the-Loop) Simulator. Construction began in 2012. A DIL Simulator can save racing teams both…
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AP
The Indianapolis 500 has witnessed and endured many things in its 97 years of existence. In more recent times, it has had to sustain itself against a crippling split in open-wheel racing, NASCAR’s evolution from a strictly Southern tradition to a national phenomenon, and perhaps more importantly, a wealth of entertainment options that simply didn’t…
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Rookie Carlos Munoz: Indy’s biggest surprise to date this year
May 24, 2013, 7:00 AM EDT
Reuters
A little more than one month ago, only the most ardent of IndyCar observers had heard of, or really paid attention to, Andretti Autosport Indianapolis 500 rookie Carlos Munoz. Now, mere days before the 97th running of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing, the Colombian is probably the month of May’s biggest surprise. Munoz really came…
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F1 flashback: Hakkinen, Button’s Monaco win anniversaries are today
May 24, 2013, 6:00 AM EDT
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Here’s two more Monaco Grand Prix anniversary wins this date: Mika Hakkinen won for McLaren in 1998, and Jenson Button for Brawn in 2009. Both were routs in their championship-winning seasons. Hakkinen’s 1998 win was relatively uneventful, and marked McLaren’s first win at Monaco since Ayrton Senna’s in 1993. A heavy attrition rate promoted Giancarlo…
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The previous track record at Charlotte Motor Speedway was shredded by eight drivers during tonight’s qualifying for the Coca-Cola 600, but it was Denny Hamlin who came away with the pole for Sunday night’s event with a speed of 195.624 miles per hour in the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Hamlin earned his first…
