Motorsport’s popularity is on the rise here in the United States, and we’ve been absolutely blessed with a year chock full of great headlines. From the wild saga of Formula 1's Las Vegas Grand Prix to Marc Marquez’s shock departure from Honda in the MotoGP realm, these are the biggest headlines to rock the racing world in 2023.
You don’t have to have followed F1 all season to know that Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen was simply unstoppable in 2023 — and by “unstoppable,” I mean “absolutely dominating the record books. Some of his finest work this year:
The Las Vegas Grand Prix was a regular feature in motorsport headlines this year, thanks to its position as one of the most hyped F1 races in history. Whether it was poorly named buildings, eternal construction, annoyed locals, high ticket prices, a disastrous FP1 followed by a compelling race, or the citywide hope that the event would fail, F1 made a gamble on the fact that no news is bad news. Whether that pays off for American F1 fans or the sport overall remains to be seen.
In February, the FIA opened an expression of interest for prospective teams to show their ability to compete in F1. Andretti Global submitted an entry in partnership with General Motors — and that expression of interest was approved. While there are more steps to go before the team can actually consider itself a part of F1, the fact that GM is looking to become a power unit manufacturer in the future may strengthen its bid.
The iconic 24 Hours of Le Mans features a category called Garage 56, where experimental technology can make its debut in the endurance event by essentially competing in its own class. This year, NASCAR took over the Garage 56 entry to showcase an endurance-ready Chevrolet Camaro — in part to showcase NASCAR’s versatile Next Gen technology and in part to tickle the imagination of European race fans. The entry was a raucous success, holding its own against the GT field and successfully shining a spotlight on American stock car racing.
This race season saw multiple international racing stars take their first starts in NASCAR, be it F1 Champion Jenson Button or endurance racing star Kamui Kobayashi. But the biggest story of them all went to Shane Van Gisbergen. A superstar in Australia’s Supercars series, Van Gisbergen won on debut at the inaugural Chicago Cup Race — and secured a 2024 future in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. It was a stunning and unheard of first race for the driver, one that will go down in history.
If there’s one thing Formula 1 hates, it’s having to cancel a Grand Prix. In 2023, F1 was forced to nix the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix due to extreme flooding in Italy, a result of unprecedented climate change concerns. Later, the Qatar Grand Prix resulted in horrifyingly hot conditions that stifled drivers and led one to retire and others to vomit in their helmets. While heat is common in Qatar that time of year, the humidity was unprecedented and exacerbated what was already set to be a challenging race.
This year, former F1 driver Felipe Massa decided to go to court with the claim that he should have been crowned 2008 World Champion; in his eyes, the results of the Singapore Grand Prix should not have counted because it was marred by a cheating scandal. The move would essentially return Lewis Hamilton’s first title to an entirely different driver. While the FIA has tried to stay out of it, former FIA head Jean Todt has gone on record to claim that the race result should have been scrapped.
More directly involving the FIA was the recent concern with the Wolffs. One journalist wrote that undisclosed team members had expressed concern that Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff was gaining critical insights from his wife Susie Wolff, head of F1 Academy. The “investigation” into the supposed conflict of interest lasted two days, during which time every team issued statements claiming no one on their team had mentioned the so-called conflict of interest. Is a future spat between F1 and its regulatory body coming in the future?
The AlphaTauri F1 team kicked off 2023 with drivers Yuki Tsunoda and Nyck de Vries, but by the summer break, it was clear that the Formula E Champion wasn’t living up to Red Bull’s high standards. AlphaTauri ruthlessly chopped De Vries and replaced him with ol’ reliable Daniel Ricciardo — who shortly after broke his wrist and was forced to withdraw. Rather than bring De Vries back, AlphaTauri instead decided to fill the seat with Liam Lawson. Lawson showed significant promise but stepped aside for Ricciardo’s return, all while gambling that he’ll benefit by spending 2024 as reserve driver.
Ferrari stepped back from top-level endurance racing in the 1960s and finally decided to return with the Hypercar class in the World Endurance Championship. And while winning the championship is nice, individual races were often Enzo Ferrari’s focal point. In its return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Ferrari won on debut in a frankly storybook race.
Penske may not have been the out-and-out dominant force in either IndyCar or NASCAR this year, but The Captain did clock two big wins. First came the coveted Indy 500, won by an ecstatic Josef Newgarden. Although Newgarden has won the IndyCar title and competed in the sport for years, he hadn’t added the 500 to his list of accomplishments. To celebrate, he leaped into the crowd.
In NASCAR, Ryan Blaney has been something of the opposite. The driver has won coveted races but failed to ever secure the title. In a tense battle at the series finale, Blaney held on for a second-place finish — the highest finish of the four drivers in championship contention. It was his first Cup Series title.
In the MotoGP world, Marc Marquez has been a firm member of the Honda camp, so it came as a massive shock to hear that Honda would be prematurely ending its contract with the Spanish rider per Marquez’s request. He’ll be starting fresh at Gresini for 2024.
After W Series folded at the end of 2022, F1 Academy appeared to fill the gap. The open-wheel series had a successful first year that saw Marta García take the inaugural title. Next year, each F1 team will field one woman, while five additional entries will be available to other sponsors.
In endurance racing, the Iron Dames, an all female LMGTE AM team in the World Endurance Championship became the first all-female team to win in class at the 24 Hours of Spa, taking second overall in their class.
Nope, the McLaren vs. Alex Palou saga still isn’t over. The Spanish IndyCar driver won the 2023 championship for Chip Ganassi Racing and decided he’d be sticking with the American open-wheel squad after Zak Brown of McLaren cut Palou from the team. Now, McLaren is seeking $23 million in damages; apparently, this is the cost of future sponsorship tied to Palou, the $400,000 advance paid to Palou for his services, the cost it took for McLaren to develop Palou, and the costs of losing him as a reserve driver.
A latecomer in the big-news game, former NASCAR legend Tony Stewart has announced that he’ll be competing in NHRA dragsters for 2024. Why? Well, his wife Leah Pruett, who also happens to be something of a big deal in the drag racing world, is taking the year off while the two focus on beginning a family.
In a previous life, we used to be lucky to get a good racing movie, documentary, or TV show every few years. Now that Netflix’s Drive to Survive has proven that people care about watching race car drivers on the big screen — and Hollywood has delivered.
This year saw the release of two movies inspired by reality, Gran Turismo and Ferrari, the latter of which will hit the big screen on Dec. 25. Brad Pitt has also hit the race track to film his own F1 film — one that has seemingly been delayed due to Hollywood’s writer strikes this year.
Plus, there have been rumors about a sitcom similar to The Office, except the ‘workplace’ will be a Formula 1 team led by a personality similar to Haas’ Guenther Steiner, and Daniel Ricciardo is allegedly working on a scripted F1 series for Hulu.
Unfortunately, 2023 also saw its fair share of heartache. Motorsport and YouTube icon Ken Block was killed while snowmobiling, leaving a massive hole in the global motorsport community.
Kyle LeDuc, a multi-time off-road champion and recent Extreme E competitor, died after a lengthy battle with cancer.
Dilano van ‘t Hoff was part of a multi-car crash at the Spa-Francorchamps round of the Formula Regional European Championship; van ‘t Hoff lost control of his open-wheel machine and was T-boned by a competitor.
During a testing session for the Croatia Rally, Craig Breen was killed when his Hyundai struck a pole in the road. The pole penetrated the cockpit and took Breen’s life; his co-driver was uninjured.