Roger Diez: Larson hopes tough luck ends at Kansas

It was a good weekend if you were the Red Bull Formula 1 team, the Truex Family, or Team Penske.

Red Bull finished 1-2 at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, keeping its perfect score for the season. Martin Truex Jr. broke a 54-race losing streak with his fourth career win at Dover (and his third on a Monday) while younger brother Ryan won his first career Xfinity race on Saturday. And Roger Penske’s IndyCar driver Scott McLaughlin took the win at Barber Motorsports Park while Ryan Blaney took his Penske Ford to second at Dover, his second runner-up finish in a row.

Of course, there’s a controversy in every NASCAR race, and this one came on lap 81 when Ross Chastain rear-ended Brennan Poole, who slid up in front of Kyle Larson, ruining both their races. Chastain went on to finish second but came under harsh criticism from his fellow competitors.

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It will be a busy weekend at Kansas Motor speedway with NASCAR Cup, Craftsman Trucks, and the ARCA Menards series all on tap. Things kick off Saturday with Craftsman Truck practice and qualifying at 9 a.m., the ARCA race at 11 a.m., NASCAR Cup practice and qualifying at 2 p.m., and the Heart of America truck race at 5 p.m. Sunday, the Advent Health 400 for the Cup cars airs at noon, all events on FS1.

Nine of the 36 Cup starters have won at Kansas with the 23XI team taking the last two. Bubba Wallace won last fall and Kurt Busch took the No. 45 car to victory lane last spring. Joey Logano, Denny Hamlin, and Kevin Harvick have three Kansas wins apiece with Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski each winning twice. Single Kansas race winners are Wallace, Busch, Chase Elliott, and Larson.

Larson is the favorite, but based on what has happened to him in the last two races, you may not want to place a bet on the No. 5 Hendrick Chevy.

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Although Roger Penske’s team was second on Monday at Dover, Scott McLaughlin won the IndyCar race at Barber Motorsports Park on Sunday. Teammate Will Power took third with the Andretti Autosport car of Romain Grosjean sandwiched between them. Grosjean led 57 of the 80 laps but couldn’t catch McLaughlin after the final pit stops. The ex-F1 driver will win this season, I’m sure.

The series is off this weekend but will be at Indianapolis for the remainder of the month. The GMR Grand Prix of Indy is May 13 with the following weekend dedicated to qualifying for the May 28 Indy 500.

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Red Bull continues to dominate Formula One with yet another 1-2 finish in Azerbaijan, this time with Sergio Perez taking the checker by 2.137 seconds over Max Verstappen. The team once again ran away from the field with third place Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari a further 19.08 seconds back.

Formula 1 is different from both top American professional racing series in that each team designs and builds its own car. IndyCar has been a spec series ever since the mid-90s split and with the Gen 7 car NASCAR is all but spec as well. Say what you will about the spec car concept, it provides better competition between teams. Formula 1 seems to always have one dominant team until another takes over.

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This weekend will be the second running of the Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix. Free Practice 3 will air at 9:30 a.m. Saturday with qualifying at 1 p.m., both on ESPN. Sunday’s pre-race broadcast on ABC begins at 11 a.m. with the race starting at 2:30 p.m.