Approaching the middle of April, it is that time of the year when racing is fresh and the month of May is getting close. Which means rumors are new each and every day and announcements are expected to be made. With that said, the first big pin has fallen.
Briscoe at Indianapolis
Ryan Briscoe will return to Chip Ganassi Racing for this year's Indianapolis 500. The defending Indianapolis 500 pole-sitter will drive the #8 NTT DATA Honda. Briscoe ran for Penske Racing the past five season, where the Australian scored seven wins, twelve poles and never finished worse than 6th in the points standings. This attempt at Indianapolis will be Briscoe's first race with Honda since Kentucky 2011.
In seven starts at Indianapolis, Briscoe has 2 top-fives, 3 top-tens and has started in the first three rows in five of his seven starts. Briscoe completes an impressive four driver line-up at Ganassi with Scott Dixon, Dario Franchitti and Charlie Kimball.
Briscoe is the 30th announced entry to go along with the 25 full-time cars, AJ Allmendinger, Carlos Muñoz, Conor Daly and a to be determined third driver at Rahal-Letterman-Lanigan Racing. Rumored teams that could be adding a car for Indianapolis are Schmidt-Peterson, Ed Carpenter, Dale Coyne, Sarah Fisher-Hartman Racing and Panther Racing.
Formula One in China
Formula One heads to Shanghai for the third round of the championship. Sebastian Vettel leads the World Driver's Standings after winning the Malaysia Grand Prix three weeks ago. In Friday second practice, the Ferrari of Felipe Massa was quickest ahead of Australian Grand Prix winner Kimi Räikkönen and teammate Fernando Alonso. Defending Chinese Grand Prix winner Nico Rosberg was 4th fastest in second practice after leading first practice. Mark Webber was fifth ahead of Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton, Adrian Sutil, Paul di Resta and Vettel.
Qualifying takes place Saturday morning at 2:00 a.m. ET on NBC Sports Network with race coverage starting at 2:30 a.m. Sunday.
NASCAR in Texas
The first night Cup race of the 2013 season is this weekend at Texas Motor Speedway. Jimmie Johnson leads the point standings after his 8th career win at Martinsville Speedway last Sunday. Brad Keselowski jumped up to second and Dale Earnhardt Jr. fell to third after last week with Kyle Busch and Kasey Kahne rounding out the top five. Clint Bowyer and Matt Kenseth both entered the top ten after Martinsville while Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin dropped out. Hamlin will miss his second consecutive race with a broken vertebra. Brian Vickers will be in the #11 Gibbs Toyota this weekend.
The last two spring races at Texas Motor Speedway have been won by Roush Fenway Racing with Greg Biffle winning last April. Last fall, Jimmie Johnson won at Texas, holding off Brad Keselowski in the race but would fall in the final two races, giving Keselowski the championship and dropping Johnson to third in the final standings. The race can be seen tomorrow at 7:00 p.m. on Fox.
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