IRG Sports + Entertainment and the International Hot Rod Association (IHRA) recently announced a three-year, multifaceted partnership with MAHLE Aftermarket Inc. naming Clevite the Official Bearing of the IHRA.

Clevite, part of the MAHLE Aftermarket family, brings more than 95 years of customer service and experience to the IHRA as a world leader in engine bearings for racing applications.

Now, Clevite brings that experience and expertise back to the IHRA Motorsports family as the Official Bearing of the IHRA and sponsor of a brand new program rewarding sportsman winners at select IHRA Nitro Jam Drag Racing Series events.

In addition to being named the Official Bearing of the IHRA, Clevite will also present a special award at IHRA Nitro Jam Drag Racing Series events run in conjunction with the Summit Racing Equipment Pro-Am Tour presented by AMSOIL. The new Clevite Bonus Program will award the winner of each of the seven major IHRA sportsman classes at those double weekends a $200 bonus and a special presentation in the winner’s circle.

The Clevite Bonus Program will be awarded at Nitro Jam Drag Racing Series events held at Bradenton Motorsports Park (April 11-12), Rockingham Dragway (May 17-18), Maryland International Raceway (June 13-14), Grand Bend Motorplex (June 20-22), Castrol Raceway (July 4-6) and Cordova Dragway Park (July 18-19).

For more information on Clevite engine bearings, visit their website at www.mahle-aftermarket.com; for more information on the IHRA, visit www.ihra.com.

Stokely G. Caldwell, Jr., an attorney with Robinson Bradshaw & Hinson, P.A., was honored with the “TRAC Star Award” at The Racing Attorney Conference (TRAC), an annual motorsports law conference presented by the Indianapolis Bar Association Sports and Entertainment Law Section and the North Carolina Bar Association.

The award is given each year to one attorney for outstanding achievement in the field of motorsports law.

Candidates for the award must exhibit exemplary skills, service and leadership in the field of motorsports law, demonstrated by a highly professional approach to motorsports legal and/or business matters. Candidates must also be regarded as a person of high integrity and possess qualities held in the highest regard by those in the field of motorsports law. Candidates must also have a consistent record of presenting the practice and/or theory of motorsports law in a positive light to the sports world and the general public.

For 20 years, Caldwell has provided legal counsel to a variety of motorsports teams, drivers, owners, sponsors, agents, crew members, licensors and licensees. His experience includes creation, negotiation, interpretation and dispute resolution with respect to driver agreements, sponsorship agreements, personal services and license agreements, endorsements agreements, television and film agreements, employment agreements, digital rights agreements, engine lease and servicing agreements, race car and race team servicing agreements, agency agreements and other types of motorsports arrangements.

Caldwell is a frequent speaker on sports law and is the co-founder of The Racing Attorney Conference. He currently serves on the board of directors of the Dale Jr. Foundation, Kevin Harvick Foundation, Martin Truex, Jr. Foundation and the Sports Lawyers Association. He has also served as the chairman of the Sports and Entertainment Law Section of the North Carolina Bar Association.

Robinson Bradshaw is a corporate and commercial law firm with more than 130 attorneys.

IndyCar announced this week an addition to the practice schedule and further definition of the qualification format for next month's 98th Running of the Indianapolis 500.

The schedule change features an extra day of on-track activity with the addition of a Verizon IndyCar Series practice session on May 19.



In March, IndyCar announced an enhanced qualification format to increase the excitement level and on-track action during qualifications. The weekend will culminate on May 18 with the Fast Nine Shootout, which will determine the coveted Indianapolis 500 pole position and the recipient of the Verizon P1 Award.



The practice session May 19 will be held from 12-5 p.m., and the extra day of on-track action will be open to the public like any other practice day during May. 



IndyCar also confirmed an update to the qualification format that allows a competitor that suffers a hardship in qualifying at the conclusion of May 17 an opportunity to make the starting field during May 18 qualifications.

The revision would also permit teams that want to bring new entries forward after qualifying on May 17 an opportunity to compete for a position in the race. In both cases, these teams would be restricted to the last row of the field.



At the conclusion of May 17 qualifications, positions 31-33 will be provisional and those cars, plus any entry not already in the field that has declared its intention to qualify to IndyCar prior to 7 p.m., will participate in a separate qualification session May 18 to determine the 11th row on the grid.

May 18 qualifying will include three separate group sessions:

    •    Group One (10:15-12:15 p.m.) - Determines starting positions 10-30;
    •    Group Two (12:45-1:30 p.m.)  - Determines positions 31-33; and
    •    The Fast Nine Shootout (2-2:45 p.m.) - Determines the Verizon P1 Award winner and first three rows of the race.

QuickTrick Alignment in Birmingham, Alabama, has announced two high powered industry partners: True High Performance Sales, and BC Sales & Marketing.

True High Performance Sales, established in 1992, is owned and operated by Skeeter and Thomas Jourdan. Skeeter has been involved as a SEMA Manufacturers rep for over 50 years. Thomas (Tommy) Jourdan serves as SEMA Manufacturer’s Representative Network chairman.
True High Performance Sales covers the Delta region of the US.

Bill Kendrick of BC Sales & Marketing, Inc. became sole owner of the business in 1997 after partnering with Bob Christie until his retirement and buying his portion of the business. Three years ago his son-in-law, Brad Lane, joined the team to help with a substantially growing business.

QuickTrick Alignment started as a garage based business and has utilized many industry and state resources to build a global brand. “We are excited to move to our next chapter with Bill, Skeeter & Tommy as part of our QT family,” stated Tess Winningham, CEO. “Our next big project is the release of our new line QuickTrick SL & SLX, which we hope to launch through a kickstarter project and release with a bang at SEMA 2014.”

Melling Engine Parts has hired Karen Bewley for the position of Western Territory Sales Manager.

Bewley brings strong knowledge and experience of the industry with over 24 years in the Automotive Aftermarket. She comes to Melling/Dura-Bond from Nickson Industries where she served as the Regional Manager since 2010. She also worked at ROL Manufacturing, Corteco division of Freudenberg NOK and Keystone Commercial Warehouse. Her vast automotive experience will be very valuable to our customer base.

Bewley was educated in Edinburgh, Scotland. She will report to Bill McCleskey—Melling Western Regional Manager.

After three years of planning and development, Calico launched its new website, calicocoatings.com. This robust new site gives engineers and manufacturers of high performance components the ability to choose specifications that accurately pinpoint the right coating solutions. Modeled after major retail sites such as Target and others, this advanced search functionality has refined filtering that gives the convenience of searching as little or as many specifications as needed.

For example, if you know exactly the “category” of coating such as “anti-scuffing” or “PECVD” you can go directly to those coatings. Or, if you’re looking to refine the search in a more granular way, you can search by “industry,” “application,” “substrate” and more. The data engine was designed to also identify areas of “advantages” such as abrasion resistance, reduced friction, non-wetting and others.

Once you’ve conducted your search, you can quickly choose from the query of results provided and determine the best coating solution for your components. A “Tech Sheet” is then provided with technically accurate information about that coating, making the process of finding the right solution nearly perfect.

“We wanted to make it easy for our customers and prospects to find exactly what they needed on our website,” said Calico President, Tracy Trotter. “They spend a good amount of time researching technologies online and after-hours so we wanted to give them access to all of this information 24/7.”

Stefano Domenicali has resigned from his position as team principal of the Ferrari Formula One team beginning immediately.

He will be replaced by Marco Mattiacci, currently president and CEO of Ferrari North America.
Ferrari have had a disappointing start to the 2014 season, with neither Fernando Alonso nor Kimi Raikkonen scoring a podium over the first three races. In a statement, Domenicali said he takes “responsibility, as I have always done, for our current situation.

“There are special moments that come along in everyone’s professional life, when one needs courage to take difficult and very agonising decisions. It is time for a significant change,” Domenicali said. “This decision has been taken with the aim of doing something to shake things up and for the good of this group of people that I feel very close to. With all my heart, I thank all the men and women in the team, the drivers and the partners for the wonderful relationship we have enjoyed over all these years.

“I hope that very soon, Ferrari will be back where it deserves to be.My final words of thanks go to our President, for having always supported me and to all our fans. I only regret that we have been unable to harvest what we worked so hard to sow in recent years.”

Domenicali joined Ferrari in 1991 and after a series of promotions was appointed sporting director in 2003, when Michael Schumacher took the fourth of his five straight world championship crowns with the team. He then took over from Jean Todt as team principal ahead of the 2008 season.

The team secured the constructors’ championship in Domenicali’s first year in charge, but have since failed to clinch the drivers’ crown despite several near misses.

On Saturday, a special painting created for the Pirelli World Challenge Championships' 25th Anniversary was unveiled. The watercolor painting, in partnership with Pirelli, was created by California artist Hector Cademartori, and features a number of historic Pirelli World Challenge racecars that have competed over the last 25 years. A poster created from the painting was handed out to fans during Saturday's driver autograph session for Round 2 of the season, The Roar By the Shore Presented by Kia, in Long Beach. There are plans for distribution of the poster at future autograph sessions throughout the rest of 2014.

"Pirelli is an enterprise deeply rooted in tradition and motorsport, we have been racing for 107 years and enjoy the opportunity to celebrate this milestone accomplishment with our partner WC Vision," said Rafael Navarro, VP Communications, Media Relations & Motorsports. "We are proud of our title sponsorship with Pirelli World Challenge and Hector Cademortari has done a marvelous job of capturing the style and passion of the series with this piece of art."

"One of the things that World Challenge has captured, more than any other series, is to present a field in which you have several manufacturers in all classes, that have equal opportunities to fight for the win," Cademartori said. "I have always thought that the type of racing that World Challenge presented was great, was real racing with close competition. Now to create a painting for the 25th Anniversary, it was an honor."

Starting with the inaugural series champion, R.K. Smith in a Chevrolet Corvette in 1990, through the four class champions in 2013: Johnny O'Connell in a Cadillac CTS-V.R (GT), Lawson Aschenbach in the Blackdog Speed Shop Chevrolet Camaro (GTS), Ryan Winchester in the Compass360 Racing Honda Civic Si (TC) and Robbie Davis in the MINI of Charleston Racing Mini Cooper (TCB), there's a wealth of memorable cars and drivers on the print.

Seven-time series champion Peter Cunningham, arguably the most successful driver in series history, is featured prominently in the RealTime Racing Acura TSX. Cunningham holds most series records since the series' inception, and moves into the GT class later this year at Detroit with the new Acura TLX GT.

Others featured include James Sofronas of GMG Racing (Audi R8), one of Pirelli World Challenge's most veteran stakeholders with more than 150 career starts and seven career victories, and past series champions Tommy Archer (Viper), Michael Galati (Audi S4), Randy Pobst (Volvo S60) and Patrick Long (Porsche 911). Long's presence owes to his winning the 2011 GT class championship, the first year Pirelli served as title sponsor.

International Speedway Corporation (ISC) has announced the election of Craig A. Neeb to Senior Vice President, Business Development and Chief Digital Officer following its ISC Board of Directors meeting.

Neeb, 53, first employed by ISC in 2000, has been serving as vice president, business development and chief digital officer since February 2013. As Senior Vice President, he will continue to be responsible for leading ISC's strategic business development opportunities while providing project guidance to the DAYTONA Rising and ONE DAYTONA initiatives. Specific areas of operational oversight include MRN Radio, and interactive media.  

Also, Mr. Neeb will continue to oversee ISC's information and telecommunications services with specific emphasis on positioning innovation in the digital space and technology solutions to maximize their impact on business strategies including guest experiences.  

"We are pleased to recognize Craig's dedication and hard work with this well deserved promotion," stated ISC Chief Executive Officer Lesa France Kennedy. "Craig has been critical in leading the development and implementation of ISC's digital strategy.  He has earned this opportunity for expanded responsibility through his passion and focused determination to maximize revenue for the Company while enhancing the guest experience."

Neeb lives in Ormond Beach, Florida, with his wife Nancy.

Formula E has announced details of the pre-season testing programme for its inaugural championship.

The new FIA all-electric single-seater has chosen Donington Park for its base, and will hold five days of running at the British track before its maiden races in Beijing in September.

The opening test will take place on July 3-4, with subsequent running on July 9-10 and August 19.
Private testing will be banned in the series, but two more in-season tests will be scheduled during the championship.

All the Donington tests will be open to the public free of charge.

Series chief Alejandro Agag said: "Given all 10 Formula E teams will shortly be based at Donington Park, using the circuit for all official pre-season tests was the natural choice.

"It will be fascinating to see all cars running together for the first time - another significant milestone for the championship - and we hope by opening up all test days to the public, fans will be able to share this with us."
 
Formula E calendar

 1. Beijing, China             September 13, 2014                       
 2. Putrajaya, Malaysia        October 18, 2014                       
 3. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil     November 15, 2014                       
 4. Punta del Este, Uruguay    December 13, 2014                       
 5. Buenos Aires, Argentina    January 10, 2015                       
 6. Los Angeles, USA           February 14, 2015                       
 7. Miami, USA                 March 14, 2015                       
 8. Monte Carlo, Monaco        May 9, 2015                       
 9. Berlin, Germany            May 30, 2015                       
10. London, UK                 June 2, 2015    

Formula E entrants so far

Drayson Racing
China Racing
Andretti Autosport
Dragon Racing
e.dams
Super Aguri
Audi Sport Abt
Mahindra Racing
Virgin Racing
Venturi Grand Prix