This was quite a fanatical week in motorsports, even with several series NOT running!  Dale Earnhardt Jr. signs with his perceived arch-rival team Hendrick Motorsports, Lewis Hamilton continued to rewrite the record books in Formula One, Ricky Carmichael eclipsed freakin’ 100, Audi dominated again at LeMans (though not quite as they had expected), Aston Martin made history, Carl Edwards’ allows his truck driver to shave and even the Indy Pro Series drivers finally snapped Lloyd’s winning streak.  These are just a few of the reasons why we love this sport so much…

Formula One
Back in the US of A, Bernie and his posse of F1 drivers wrecked havoc on Indianapolis just weeks after the flood of fans crowded downtown from the Indy 500… some thought the dates were too close, but obviously it seemed to work out OK after all.  The crowd was thought to be the biggest since the debut in 2000, the fans had access like never before at the track and at the F1 headquarters at the Conrad Hotel downtown and they were all treated to one heck of a race with rookie Lewis Hamilton taking the crown.  Some of the better stories are linked here.  By the way, it was SWEET to see F1 make the front page of the Sports section in the LA Times, while NASCAR was relegated to the mid-section!  Now WHO is doing the diversity program correctly?  Yep, nuff said.
www.formula1.com
www.lewishamilton.com
www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070618/SPORTS0111/706180355/
www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-usgp18jun18,1,2559278.story?coll=la-headlines-sports&ctrack=1&cset=true

NASCAR
So speaking of the other major series racing in America, NASCAR was just 5 hours north of Indy in Jackson, MI… west of Detroit.  The Trucks took to the track first, where Travis Kvapil settled any doubt from his Texas spin out to take the win.  Then in Nextel Cup, Carl Edwards also settled a bet of sorts… with his win, his truck driver Tommy G. was FINALLY able to shave his beard… a beard he had been growing since Carl’s last Cup win 52 races ago!!  That’s over 1 ½ years of facial hair growth!  So much growth that Lugg Nuttz appropriately compared TG to one of the Geico Cavemen… even a tick had lodged himself in the gnarly mess.  Alas, no more ticks, no more hair and finally he can begin to date around again. 😉

The Busch series raced in Kentucky (damn the Midwest was busy this weekend) and yet another Ford took the honors… Stephen Leicht saw victory lane for the first time in his Busch career.
www.nascar.com
www.jayski.com

And how about defending IndyCar Champ Sam Hornish nabbing the pole for the ARCA race at Michigan!!  Then finishing 2nd (oh yeah) to winner Erik Darnell.
www.arcaracing.com

More Open Wheel
The Indy Pro Series raced in conjunction to the F1 weekend in Indy, and can you believe it?  After 5 straight wins by Lucas Oil’s Alex Lloyd, his competitors had finally had enough.  First it was Hideki Mutoh who broke the streak by taking the checkers on Saturday’s round one of the doubleheader.  Then on Sunday morning, the top 8 from Saturday’s results were inverted on the start.  Even though Lloyd battled back to 2nd, it wasn’t enough to catch flag to flag leader Bobby Wilson.  Congrats to Mutoh and Wilson for their wins at Indy!  Quite a feat!  Read the link for more… plus a story on Alex Lloyd and his longtime friendship with F1’s Lewis Hamilton!
www.indycar.com/pro

Terry McCarl showed that he is back in contention by winning in Knoxville, IA this weekend.
www.worldofoutlaws.com/sprint/

Sports Cars
24 Hours of LeMans also ran this weekend (yep, it was strange to me that there would be an F1 race on the same weekend as the enormously historic 24 Hours of LeMans… especially when so many of the F1 drivers love to attend… but oh well, I don’t make the schedules).  This was as good as they usually are… ALWAYS drama in a 24 hour race, but would you expect TWO of the three Audis to crash out??  Especially last year’s winners?  Then, when no one had counted on the debut of the Puegeot to last beyond hour 12, there they were in 2nd place at the end of the race!  What in the world could this mean for the Petit LeMans coming up later this year?  How about a really good battle… Audi finally has competition!  Can I hear a “Hell Yeah!”  Also of note was the impressive Aston Martin run… they knocked off the Corvettes in GT1 for the first time in eons… and their first 24 win in 50 years!  And truly none of this can be attributed to the wet, lake-like conditions, either!  For the complete stories and results, click the link below.
Winners – LMP1 – Audi: Emanuele Pirro, Frank Biela, Marco Werner
               LMP2 – Bill Binnie, Allen Timpany, Chris Buncombe
               GT1 – Aston Martin: David Brabham, Darren Turner, Rickard Rydell
               GT2 – Porsche: Patrick Long, Raymond Narac, Richard Lietz
www.americanlemans.com/home/ALMSHome.aspx
www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-lemans18jun18,1,6041968.story?coll=la-headlines-sports&ctrack=2&cset=true

The Grand Am Series had their Koni Challenge racing in Mosport, Canada.  Winners on Saturday were hometown boy Scott Maxwell and co-driver Joe Foster… then on Sunday it was Billy Johnson and Karl Thompson.
www.grand-am.com

Two Wheel
The GOAT did it!!!!  And this time it wasn’t as easy as it has been so far this year in the outdoor season.  Ricky Carmichael, aka The GOAT (Greatest of All Time), entered Budds Creek this weekend to attempt to take his 100th overall Motocross win.  In the first moto, James Bubba Stewart thought he would have something else to say and for this first time this year, he beat RC to the line.  But in moto 2, RC ran like hell to take the win.  Thus, with each having a 1st place and a 2nd place, they actually tied for the overall win… but that still counts, enabling RC to notch win #100 of his outdoor career!  HUGE congrats Ricky!!
www.amaproracing.com
www.amamotocross.com

World Superbikes ran two 24 lappers in Misano… and Troy Bayliss took them both.  With those 50 points, TB now sits second in the points championship.
www.worldsbk.com

Drag Racing
It was a crowd stunt that had never gone wrong… until now.  Troy Critchley, an EXTREMELY nice, generous, wonderful person, who drives in the AMS Pro Mod Series, unfortunately lost control in a demonstration run during a charity event in Selmer, TN on Saturday.  Sadly, his car veered into the crowd and killed 6 people as well as injured himself.  Obviously none of that was supposed to happen, but the question must be asked… why put a nitro powered car on full throttle display on the street?  There were no barriers to the crowd AND the crowd was WAY too close to a moving car that powerful!  Even I know that is wrong… so who organized such a stunt?  Please people, let’s use our heads!  I know Troy is extremely distraught with the tragedy… please keep your thoughts and prayers with the families affected, as well as Troy.
www.beta.cnn.com/2007/US/06/18/car.show.deaths.ap/index.html

Oh, and congrats to Julia Roberts and her latest edition to the family… new baby is a cutie!  And how about Rod Stewart getting married this weekend in Portofino, Italy…

Need more?  Well, wait… Mondays are supposed to be my day off… so I’m out to straddle the horsepower of my Suzuki into the mountains of SoCal… Lake Arrowhead, here I come!

See ya tomorrow, Freak Nation!  And yes, yes, yes… the Indy 500 and TX IndyCar photos are coming… hey, at least I finally downloaded them to my laptop… now I just need to upload them to the site… that should be the easy part, right? 😉

CrashG@SpeedFreaks.TV

Remember to sign up for www.MyRacer.com NOW so you can be eligible for the F1 2-seater ride that we are giving away!!!!!