The final weekend of October features three series heading to their penultimate rounds of their 2014 championships. Meanwhile, V8 Supercars heads to a fan favorite and NASCAR heads to their oldest track on their schedule.
Sepang
For the third consecutive week, MotoGP is on track as they head to their penultimate race of the 2014 season, taking place at Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia. Valentino Rossi is coming off victory at Phillip Island and that victory extended Yamaha's winning streak to four consecutive races, the manufacture's longest since 2009 when Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo combined to win Brno, Indianapolis, Misano and Estoril in a row. Lorenzo has finished on the podium in the last eight races.
Marc Márquez was on his way to his twelfth victory of 2014 at Phillip Island before falling with ten laps to go. His Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa also retired in Australia after the Ducati of Andrea Iannone damaged Pedrosa' Honda on lap five. Because of the retirement, Pedrosa was jumped in the championship by Lorenzo and is now fourth, 17 behind the Majorcan. Andrea Dovizioso is coming off a fourth place finish and is fifth in the championship. Bradley Smith finished third at Phillip Island, his first MotoGP podium. Smith is eighth in the championship, nine points behind Aleix Espargaró in sixth and eight behind Pol Espargaró. The Espargaró brothers both retired in Australia.
Pedrosa has won the last two Malaysian Grand Prix. The only other active rider to win the Malaysian Grand Prix in the premier class is Valentino Rossi who has won at Sepang six times with his most recent victory being in 2010. Pedrosa also has victories at Sepang in the 125cc and 250cc classes. Márquez's lone Malaysian triumph was in 125cc four years ago. Lorenzo won the 250cc race in 2006 race. Other winners at Sepang scheduled to compete in this week's MotoGP race are Álvaro Bautista (125cc, 2006; 250cc 2008), Hiroshi Aoyama (250cc, 2007 and 2009) and Alex De Angelis (Moto2, 2012).
Spain – Rally Catalunya
The World Rally Championship heads to their penultimate round of 2014 with Sébastien Ogier looking to lock up his second consecutive title. The Frenchman finished 13th in his home Rallye de France-Alsace but scored three points by winning the power stage and leads his Volkswagen teammate Jari-Matti Latvala by 27 points.
Ogier and Latvala have each won five rounds this season with Thierry Neuville's maiden victory for Hyundai at Rallye Deutschland being the lone defeat for Volkswagen in 2014. Volkwagen's third driver Andreas Mikkelsen is third in the championship, 50 ahead of M-Sport Ford driver Mikko Hirvonen. Mikkelsen has finished runner-up on three occasions this season while Hirvonen's lone podium was a second in Portugal. The Finn Hirvonen has finished fifth in fourth consecutive rounds. Neuville rounds out the top five, ten points behind Hirvonen while Citroën's Kris Meeke is a point behind the Belgian and coming off a third place finish in France. Meeke is only two points ahead of his teammate Mads Østberg. M-Sport Ford's Elfyn Evans is nine points behind the Norwegian.
Ogier won last year's Rally Catalunya and extended the streak to nine consecutive years the rally has been won by a Frenchman. Sébastien Loeb won the eight other editions. Estonian Markko Märtin is the last non-Frenchman to win the race in 2004. It was the Märtin's last WRC victory and it was the last WRC victory for his co-driver Michael Park, who would lose his life in an accident during the 2005 Wales Rally GB. Märtin retired from competing after the accident. The only time a Spaniard won Rally Catalunya was Carlos Sainz in 1992 and 1995.
Suzuka, Part II
The 2014 World Touring Car Championship heads to their penultimate round at Suzuka. Argentine José María López leads the championship by 93 points over Citroën teammate and four-time WTCC champion Yvan Muller. López can clinch the title by scoring 12 points this weekend. López has won eight of 19 races this season including race one at Shanghai a fortnight ago. Muller has four victories this season but has not won since race one at Spa back in June.
Sébastien Loeb is 50 points behind Muller in the championship. Loeb has two victories this year, coming at Morocco and Slovakia. Former Formula One driver and podium finisher in the 2005 United States Grand Prix, Tiago Monteiro is fourth in the championship, 81 points behind Loeb. The Portuguese driver is coming off his second runner-up finish of the season in race two from Shanghai. Hungarian Norbert Michelisz rounds out the top five, 28 points behind Monteiro.
This is the fourth consecutive year WTCC is competing at Suzuka but this will be the first time the WTCC is using the full 3.609-mile Grand Prix Circuit. The previous three editions have been held on the 1.394-mile East Circuit. Last year Michelisz and Dutch driver Tom Coronel split the weekend.
Surfers Paradise
Despite running out of fuel on the final lap of the Bathurst 1000, Jamie Whincup extended his championship lead in V8 Supercars, as he leads Mark Winterbottom by 297 points. Craig Lowndes is 339 points back of his Red Bull Racing teammate. Shane Van Gisbergen and James Courtney are tied for fourth, trailing Whincup by 451 points. Fabian Coulthard is 523 points behind Whincup and Bathurst winner Chaz Mostert is seventh in the championship, 553 points back.
Whincup and his co-driver Paul Dumbrell lead the Endurance Cup standings with 522 points, 30 points ahead of Mostert and Paul Morris. Courtney and Greg Murphy are 114 points back with Lowndes and Steven Richards are 126 back. Winterbottom and Steve Owen are fifth in the Endurance Cup standings, trailing Whincup and Dumbrell by 162 points. Last year Lowndes and Warren Luff won the Endurance Cup with Whincup and Dumbrell finishing second and Winterbottom and Steven Richards finishing third.
Since Surfers Paradise adopted the 600km format in 2010, Holden has won five of eight races. Holden has won race one at Surfers Paradise each of the last four years and Ford has won the second race the last three years. Whincup and Garth Tander are tied for most wins at Surfers Paradise with four. Lowndes, Winterbottom and Russell Ingall each have two victories at Surfers.
Martinsville
Eight drivers enter the semifinal round of the Chase for the Sprint Cup. Brad Keselowski enters with the most victories this year after picking up his sixth at Talladega, a race he had to win to keep his championship hopes alive as the 2012 champion was not going to advance on points alone. His Penske teammate Joey Logano has five victories this season, having at least one race in each round of the Chase. Jeff Gordon has four victories and Kevin Harvick has three victories. Both drivers have won a race in the Chase.
Carl Edwards has two victories but has not won since Sonoma at the end of June and Denny Hamlin's lone victory this season came at Talladega in May. Ryan Newman and Matt Kenseth are still alive for the championship, despite both having yet to win a race in 2014. Kenseth picked up his second runner-up finish of the season at Talladega last week while Newman finished fifth, his third top five of the season. Newman has scored four consecutive top ten finishes, the longest active streak amongst the eight remaining drivers in the Chase.
Gordon has won eight races at Martinsville with his most recent being last year's fall race. Five of Gordon's eight victories have come in the fall race. Hamlin has four wins in 17 starts at his native Virginia track. Harvick and Newman each have a victory at Martinsville. Both won the spring race in 2011 and 2012 respectively.
Keselowski, Logano, Kenseth and Edwards have all yet to win at Martinsville with Keselowski and Edwards having the fewest amount of top fives at the track amongst Chase driver, each having only one top five. Keselowski finished fourth in last year's fall race while Edwards' best Martinsville finish was third in the 2008 fall race. Logano's best Martinsville finish is second, which came in the 2010 spring race. Kenseth's best finish at the paperclip half-mile track is second on two occasions, the first being the 2002 spring race and the most recent being last fall when he finished 0.605 seconds behind Gordon, despite leading a race-high 202 laps.
Some miscellaneous facts heading to Martinsville:
The only time a non-Chase driver has won the Chase race at Martinsville was in 2005 when Jeff Gordon led 151 laps from 15th on the grid, holding off eventual champion Tony Stewart.
Joey Logano's finishes through six Chase races : 4th, 1st, 4th, 1st, 4th, 11th.
With his third place finish at Talladega, Clint Bowyer was the top finishing non-Chase driver, ending Ganassi's run of five consecutive Chase races with the top finishing non-Chase driver.
Kevin Harvick has led the most laps in four of six Chase races.
Over/Unders
1. Over or Under: 2.5 riders in the top ten that are not Italian or Spaniards?
2. Over or Under: 24.5 seconds between first and second in final results of Rally Catalunya?
3. Over or Under: 38.5 points scored by José María López this weekend?
4. Over or Under: 0.5 podium finishers from outside the top ten of the V8 Supercars Championship at Surfers?
5. Over or Under: 215.5 laps led by the driver who leads the most laps?
Last Week's Over/Unders
1. Over: All three Brits, Jamie Green, Paul di Resta and Gary Paffett, finished in the points at Hockenheim.
2. Over: The winning teams at Estoril were French (Sébastien Loeb Racing), Russian (SMP Racing) and Belgian (Marc VDS).
3. Under: The only Germans on the podium at the Zolder championship race were Maximilian Götz and Maximilian Buhk.
4. Under: Marc Márquez did not lose any positions on lap one at Phillip Island.
5. Under: Only six drivers retired from the NASCAR race at Talladega.
Predictions
1. Second time is the charm, Marc Márquez ends his winless streak at Sepang.
2. Sébastien Ogier clinches the title in Catalunya.
3. José María López clinches the title at Suzuka.
4. Mark Winterbottom will end his streak of 11 consecutive races without a top five.
5. A non-Chase driver wins at Martinsville.
Last Week's Predictions
1. We will see a driver pick up their first victory of 2014 in the DTM season finale (Wrong. Mattias Ekström won his second consecutive race to close out 2014).
2. Ferrari will not sweep the GT classes this weekend (Correct. Marc VDS BMW won in GTC).
3. Belgian Audi Club Team WRT gets a win on home soil (Correct. The #1 of César Ramos and Laurens Vanthoor won the qualifying race).
4. Marc Márquez ends his slump and wins in Australia (Wrong. It was looking good until he fell just a little past half way, gift wrapping the victory to Valentino Rossi).
5. Brad Keselowski, Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. all fail to advance to the next round of the Chase (Wrong. With his win at Talladega, Keselowski advanced to the next round of the Chase).
Overall: 2/5. Running Tally: 14.5/30
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