Motorsport and Video Games!

TO begin today, I'd like to apologise for the fact that this post is quite late. The reason is that some of the news I'm going to cover here has quite potentially broken Australia's internet. But I'll leave that news until later to build the suspense. Let's begin with Need for Speed news, as the newest release in the franchise has been released.

It's called NFS Heat, and it focuses on a city called Palm City. Palm City is a Fast and Furious fan's paradise in the sense that there are legal street racing events during the day, albeit with police watching over them. With that said, Need for Speed's less condoned side remains in the sense that at night, the racing turns illegal. The police at night are quite ferocious as well, and they bend the rules as well. It'll be out on November 8 on PC, PS4 and Xbox One.

Next of all, we move to the TCR Australia series in which, as usual before a round, there is a new car joining. This time it is a brand new model as well; a Seat Leon Cupra has been ordered by Team Garage1. Garage 1 is a small motorsport team, but they are more well known for 1. selling roll cages and 2. sponsoring Tim Miles in the Carrera Cup. They have also been involved in Production Car and TCM racing, and now they are joining TCR. The driver is TBC.

Moving on to two topics that are not really related except in one famous TV line by Jeremy Clarkson: ham, and open-wheeled racing cars. Yes, Rubens Barrichello, the man famous for many things: his crash at Imola 1994 before Ratzenburger and Senna, his time at Ferrari with Michael Schumacher, his involvement in the Brawn team that won their only championship that they entered, and his beating of The Stig around the Top Gear test track, and Jezza's infamous line following, is back in open wheel racing for a weekend in September. Even more excitingly for Australian racing fans, it's in the new S5000 open-wheel class at Sandown (coincidentially, on the same weekend Garage1 debuts in TCR). Rubens is the first driver to be confirmed as driving in the class, and will race at Sandown considering it's an off-weekend for his current series, Stock Car Brazil.

Next, to leapfrog to another S5000 connected item, but also connected to y final article, some V8 Supercars driver news. Following Richie Stanaway's successful test in the S5000 car built by GRM to check his fitness and the car's chassis, he has been confirmed to take part in The Bend SuperSprint on the 23rd-25th of this month. He has recovered from his prolapsed disc injury initially sustained in 2012 by reaggravated in the Winton SuperSprint in May. This means Michael Caruso's semi-successful temporary drive is at an end. Caruso, like Stanaway, will next be seen at the Bend though, as he will take part in the Additional Drivers' Practice as Chaz Mostert's co-driver in Tickford racing.

And talking of additional drivers, here is the news that's broken the internet: Walkinshaw-Andretti will field an extra Commodore at Bathurst for Schmidt Peterson IndyCar driver and former Gold Coast Indy champion James Hinchcliffe, and former F1 and current Andretti driver and 2nd in the IndyCar championship so far this year, Alex Rossi. They will drive the #27 entry, Rossi's current IndyCar number. No naming rights partner has been found yet but US Concrete and Virgin Australia will support the entry. This means the grid will have at least 26 cars, with all 24 main game entries as well as Kostecki Brothers Racing. Now, who wants to see Will Power and Simon Pagenaud in a Penske Mustang? Come on DJR, we want to see an Andretti vs Penske IndyCar battle at the Mountain!

Briefly in motorsport news, Jack Miller has re-signed with Alma Pramac Racing, Jordan King has said Formula E is an option for next year follwing testing for Dragon, and Track Tec Racing will field three Audis in the upcoming TCR New Zealand series.