Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - July 22, 2024, Winnipeg, Manitoba C4 ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM BUDAPEST — Australian driver Oscar Piastri won his first Formula One race after teammate Lando Norris handed him back the lead to complete a McLar- en one-two at the Hungarian Grand Prix on Sunday. That outstanding result came after a long and at times awkward back-and- forth between the British team and its top driver before Norris finally obeyed orders to let Piastri back in front. Piastri started second behind pole-sit- ting Norris and beat him to the first turn. Norris then got ahead after a pit- stop strategy that favoured him despite being behind his teammate, but he eventually listed to team orders and let Piastri take the victory. “This is the day I dreamed of as a kid, standing on the top step of the podium,” the 23-year-old Piastri said. “A bit complicated at the end, but I put myself in a good position off the start. “I had a lot of trust in Lando, and I think it was a fair decision to swap us back at the end.” Lewis Hamilton finished third behind the papaya-coloured pair for his re- cord-extending 200th career podium. Points leader Max Verstappen fin- ished fifth behind Charles Leclerc in a Ferrari and has now gone three races without a victory. Verstappen still leads the standings with 265 points to Norris’ 189 but the Dutchman has seen Red Bull’s speed advantage evaporate this summer. McLaren’s huge victory will also be remembered for the team debate over which driver would finally come out on top. At first, the team told Piastri that the pit strategy was to ensure Norris could keep Hamilton at bay, while asking Norris to give the place back “at his convenience.” As the laps ticked by and Norris didn’t budge, McLaren told Piastri that he could get back in front when he caught up with Norris. Finally, the team turned to pleading with Norris just to let Piastri by. “I know you will do the right thing,” the team told Norris. After a long silence, Norris replied “tell him to catch up then please.” The tension was building until Norris eased up and allowed Piastri past with two laps to go. Piastri and Norris exchanged a brief handshake while taking off their hel- mets and after both were congratulated by McLaren staff and other drivers. “I don’t know any driver who when leading the race is happy to swap back, that’s not the nature of drivers,” McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said. “That’s why we have to recall our principles … in these battles, Lando will need the support of Oscar and the support of the team.” When asked directly about the deci- sion to cede his lead, Norris said curtly: “The team asked me to do it so I did it, that’s it.” Piastri became the seventh different winner in 13 races this season that started looking like another cruise for the three-time defending champion Ver- stappen but has now turned into a fight. Red Bull saw its lead in the constructors championship reduced to 389-338 over McLaren, after Verstappen’s teammate Sergio Pérez continued to struggle and finished seventh. Born in April 2001, Piatri became the first F1 winner born in this century. While McLaren was unchallenged on the track, Hamilton and Verstappen delivered the most exciting driving at the Hungaroring. Hamilton had already held off Ver- stappen during a long stretch before the Dutchman tried again to pass him on the final laps with third place at stake. But as Verstappen lunged past Hamil- ton on the inside of a right-hand corner, he locked his front wheels and his back clipped Hamilton’s Mercedes, sending the Red Bull’s rear airborne before veering off the track. Verstappen got back into the race but had lost a place to Leclerc in the process. Carlos Sainz was sixth in the other Ferrari. Mercedes’ George Russell was eighth, behind Pérez. Yuki Tsunoda of RB and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll of Canada closed out the points positions. — The Associated Press TORONTO — Colton Herta celebrated his first NTT IndyCar Series win in over two years with doughnuts. Upon crossing the finish line at the Honda Indy Toronto on Sunday, the American immediately began spinning his car around in triumphant circles. “I love doing doughnuts,” Herta said. “And this engine’s getting ripped out after this race so I can destroy it as much I want … I hate when I don’t get to do doughnuts and this was the perfect race to win.” Teammate Kyle Kirkwood started and finished in second, while four-time Toronto champion Scott Dixon round- ed out the podium of a chaotic race in which just 15 of 27 cars were able to finish. It had been 41 races since Herta, the Andretti Global driver, topped the po- dium, including a pair of pole positions he was unable to convert earlier this season. But 24-year-old, who now has eight career victories, left no doubts about this one. He became the first IndyCar driver ever to top both practice ses- sions, take pole in qualifying and go on to win the race in one weekend. “It’s awesome. It’s amazing,” he said. “For whatever reason it just hasn’t gone our way. We’ve had speed, we’ve had plenty of podiums, we’ve had a lot of poles, a lot of top fives, but no wins. And so it feels great to finally get one back.” The race featured six restarts, in- cluding a massive multi-car crash that caused a red flag on the 73rd lap when Pato O’Ward, third in the season-long standings, spun out into a wall, leaving the nose of his car jetting out onto the track. Marcus Ericsson locked up into the wall behind O’Ward, then three more racers — Pietro Fittipaldi, Santino Ferrucci and Nolan Siegel — clipped O’Ward’s nose. Ferrucci’s car went airborne and landed upside down, but the American immediately signalled to his team that he was OK and emerged from his vehicle relatively unscathed. The other four drivers also escaped without injury, but none were able to continue. “I feel like I never get the 85-lap full green races to win,” Herta said. “It’s always red flags and yellows at the end. But it’s good, it makes you work a lot harder for it so you feel a lot better when it happens. But it is crazy. It was a crazy race.” Herta and Kirkwood appeared to work together throughout the race, with the latter giving his teammate room at the front after each of the race’s six restarts. Kirkwood, who enjoyed his best finish of the year and third career podium, said he was taking the result “as an Andretti Global win.” “Super happy with second, especial- ly when a teammate wins. That was the goal today. We started 1-2 and we wanted to finish 1-2. Of course I would have (preferred to) have won but I also wasn’t gonna push the envelope whatso- ever in that situation,” Kirkwood said. Dixon started in 15 and chose to pit well after the rest of the field. The strategy bore fruit as he re-entered the race in sixth before slowly moving up the standings as cars seemed to exit left and right. The podium appearance was the 141st of the New Zealander’s decorated ca- reer, drawing him even with legendary Mario Andretti for the most all-time. “I didn’t even know anything about that. That’s very cool,” Dixon said. “Podiums are a big deal and it’s always fun to celebrate. Obviously you want to be on the top step but to be at the peak of it, especially in this current field, it feels really good.” Current IndyCar series champion- ship leader Alex Palou began the day in 18th but climbed all the way up to fourth. The Spaniard increased his sea- son-long lead to 49 points over Will Power, who placed 12th after he incurred a late penalty over an incident that caused teammate Scott McLaugh- lin to go into the wall and out of the race. Christian Lundgaard, the defending Toronto champion, placed seventh. Christian Rasmussen went into the wall on the first lap and Agustin Cana- pino slammed the concrete on the fifth almost immediately upon the restart. Both drivers were forced to exit the race, but neither was injured. Rookie Kyffin Simpson was also forced out of the race after crashing with 18 laps to go. For the second time in the race’s history, there were no Canadians in the field. The last time that happened was in 2015. The IndyCar Series will now take three weeks off for an Olympic break before returning Aug. 17 in Illinois. “That sucks because all I wanna do, even after three weekends back to back to back, I just want to go race again and have a chance at another win,” Herta said. To that end, Herta added that his victory celebration would have to wait a few days as he’s headed back to India- napolis Sunday night and has a simula- tion practice scheduled for today. “I don’t need to celebrate. I’m just happy that we finally did it.” — The Canadian Press N ICE, France — Tadej Pogacar had no need to attack on the final stage of the Tour de France. Defending a lead of more than five minutes in Sunday’s time trial, he was set to comfortably win the race for the third time and first time in three years, anyway. But defence has not been in his vocabulary during this race and he simply could not resist another attack. With his main rival Jonas Vinge- gaard unable to challenge him, Pogacar celebrated his Tour victory in style with a dominant win in the time trial ending in Nice for the 17th stage win of his already illustrious Tour career. The 25-year-old Slovenian rider also became the first cyclist to secure the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France in the same year since the late Marco Pantani in 1998. “To win both together is another level above,” said Pogacar, who rides for UAE Team Emirates. “I think this is the first Grand Tour where I was totally confident every day. Even at the Giro I remember I had one bad day. This year, the Tour was just amazing. I was enjoying it from day one.” The two-time defending champion Vingegaard of Denmark was second overall. He also finished the 21st and final stage in second place. Pogacar won the 34-kilometre time trial on the French Riviera’s roads from Monaco to Nice in 45 minutes, 24 seconds. Vingegaard was 1 minute, 3 seconds behind him and Belgian rider Remco Evenepoel 1:14 back in third spot. In the overall standings, Vingegaard finished 6:17 behind Pogacar and Eve- nepoel was third overall, 9:18 behind Pogacar — whose other Tour wins came in 2020 and 2021. “I’m super happy. I cannot describe how happy I am after two hard years in the Tour de France,” Pogacar said. “This year everything (was) perfec- tion.” The race did not finish in Paris as it usually does because of the Olympic Games. Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi called the region between the Mediter- ranean Sea and the southern French Alps “perfect cycling territory.” From early Sunday morning, fans camped along the popular Promenade des Anglais in Nice to guard a spot that would offer the best glimpse of cyclists. Some fans chanted “Remco, Remco” as the race-against-the-clock specialist zoomed past them. They may have been surprised to see Pogacar going flat out. After his explosive attack on Friday, Pogacar said he would not try to win Saturday’s stage. Yet he still won it to become the second man to clinch five mountain stages in one Tour after Ital- ian rider Gino Bartali in 1948. Pogacar led Vingegaard overnight by 5 minutes, 14 seconds. But the lure of another stage win proved too strong and he flew down the winding roads past picturesque Èze and Villefranche- sur-Mer on the approach to Nice, where the route flattened out again. Pogacar held out three fingers as the finish line and a sixth stage win approached on this year’s Tour — the same number of stages he won when dominating the Giro d’Italia. It was Pogacar’s biggest winning margin of his three Tour wins — beat- ing the 5:20 gap on Vingegaard three years ago, but below the 7:29 victory margin Vingegaard enjoyed over Pog- acar last year. The battle with Vingegaard was not as close as it might have been in differ- ent circumstances. The 27-year-old Vingegaard was hospitalized for nearly two weeks in April following a high-speed crash in the Tour of the Basque Country. He resumed competitive racing only on this Tour. “Under normal circumstances, I would be disappointed with my Tour de France. But, after everything I’ve gone through, I can’t be disappointed,” Vingegaard said. “I would have loved to go a bit further, but it is what it is. I would like to come back to the Tour de France and win it again … I believe the yellow jersey is the most beautiful jersey in road cycling.” Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz won the best climber’s polka dot jersey while Eritrea’s Biniam Girmay won the top sprinter’s green jersey and the 24-year- old Evenepoel capped a fine debut Tour with the white jersey for best young rider. “I feel like I’m floating through the sky. It’s super nice,” Girmay said. “I just want to say for the young kids, keep working hard and everything is possible.” Ottawa’s Derek Gee ended ninth overall in the Tour, after a sixth-place finish in Sunday’s time trial. — The Associated Press SPORTS MONDAY, JULY 22, 2024 Pogacar celebrates third Tour title in style JEROME PUGMIRE DANIEL COLE / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Tadej Pogacar celebrates after winning the Tour de France in Nice, France, Sunday. Piastri wins first F1 race in McLaren one-two finish after team orders drama FRANK GUNN / THE CANADIAN PRESS Colton Herta climbs from his car after capturing the Toronto IndyCar race title Sunday. Herta tops in Toronto to end win drought Dominating ride in time trial finale MYLES DICHTER Oscar Piastri ;