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Race Recap: Rolex 24 at Daytona was fast and feisty

Let the record show that victory at the 2015 Rolex 24 at Daytona went to the No. 02 Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Target/Ford EcoBoost Riley DP driven by Verizon IndyCar drivers Scott Dixon and Tony Kanaan and NASCAR drivers Jamie McMurray and Kyle Larson. The winner did 740 laps to cover 2,634.3 miles in 24 hours and 57.667 seconds. That's a statement to this year's pace in spite of 18 cautions, two more than last year: the Michael Shank Racing Ligier got pole with a time of 1:39.194, slower than last year's pole time of 1:38.270; however, the winning car last year only did 695 laps. The fight for top honors was shaved to a four-car battle over the first third of the event. The No. 02 Ganassi car took the lead on the first lap, swapping it well into the night with the No. 01 Ganassi car, the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP, and the defending champion No. 5 Action Express Corvette DP, all of them staying within about 20 seconds of one another. The Action Express car had a fuel connector come loose and lost three laps getting towed back to the pits to have it reattached, but was back in the lead 18 hours in. The No. 01 Ganassi car dropped out with recurring clutch problems 22 hours in, retiring not long after. A race-within-the-race is where the concluding action happened, a seven minute, 30-second dash from the end of the last caution to the checkered flag. During the penultimate pit stops with an hour to go, Dixon was in second place followed Jordan Taylor in the Wayne Taylor Racing DP into the pits but beat him out, taking the lead. The Action Express car was in third. In the last pit stops of the race, Dixon gained even more time, getting a four-second advantage over Taylor. Then a full-course caution came out twenty minutes before the finish when a Prototype Challenge car hit the wall and caught fire, bunching up the field. That closed the pits, but the Wayne Taylor Racing car had to pit during that yellow because of a miscalculation of driver time. No driver can be behind the wheel for more than four hours in a six-hour period but Jordan Taylor was going to go over, so he came in to swap out for brother Ricky. That cost the team any chance of second place, since they took an additional drive-through penalty for entering closed pits. When the track went green again, Sebastien Bourdais in the Action Express car stayed all over Dixon for the final five laps but couldn't get around him.

Stellantis is official: FCA and PSA merger finally sealed

MILAN — Fiat Chrysler and PSA sealed their long-awaited merger on Saturday to create Stellantis, the world's fourth-largest auto group with deep enough pockets to fund the shift to electric driving and take on bigger rivals Toyota and Volkswagen. It took over a year for the Italian-American and French automakers to finalize the $52 billion deal, during which the global economy was upended by the COVID-19 pandemic. They first announced plans to merge in October 2019, to create a group with annual sales of around 8.1 million vehicles. "The merger between Peugeot S.A. and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. that will lead the path to the creation of Stellantis N.V. became effective today," the two automakers said in a statement. Shares in Stellantis, which will be headed by current PSA Chief Executive Carlos Tavares, will start trading in Milan and Paris on Monday, and in New York on Tuesday. Now analysts and investors are turning their focus to how Tavares plans to address the huge challenges facing the group – from excess production capacity to a woeful performance in China. Tavares will hold his first press conference as Stellantis CEO on Tuesday, after ringing NYSE's bell with Chairman John Elkann. FCA and PSA have said Stellantis can cut annual costs by over 5 billion euros ($6.1 billion) without plant closures, and investors will be keen for more details on how it will do this. Marco Santino, a partner at consultants Oliver Wyman, said he expected Tavares to disclose the outlines of his action plan soon, but without divulging too many details at first. "He has proven to be the kind of person who prefers action to words, so I don't think he will make loud statements or try to over-sell targets," he said. Like all global automakers, Stellantis needs to invest billions in the years ahead to transform its vehicle range for the electric era. But other pressing tasks loom, including reviving the group's lagging fortunes in China, rationalizing its huge global empire and addressing massive overcapacity. "It will be a step by step process, also to allow the market to better appreciate every single move. I don't think we will have all the details before one year," Santino said.

Houston road rage incident devolves into all-out brawl

The video is no longer available. It appears the associated account has been terminated. Chaos erupted on a Houston freeway last weekend when an altercation spiraled out of control and ended up in a battle-royale style brawl in the middle of traffic. According to KTRK, David Dao and his daughter were traveling along FM 1960 on the morning of May 14 when they came upon a white Honda and a blue Ram truck parked in the right lane. The drivers and passengers of the vehicles were engaged in a spirited argument about something that had happened moments before Dao pulled up. Dao parked in his lane to block traffic in an attempt at making sure other drivers didn't hit the people fighting in the right lane, and instructed his daughter to start filming the incident in case they were needed as witnesses. As Dao's daughter filmed, the incident quickly escalated–harsh words were exchanged, a drink was thrown in a woman's face, and then the driver of the Ram kicked in the Honda's grille. "I couldn't believe it. As soon as he kicked the grille, I was like, 'This is going down now," said Dao. "I was thinking this is going to be bad. At that time, I knew because there was physical damage." As soon as the Ram driver kicked the Honda the entire situation went sideways and devolved into a huge brawl, with the people from both vehicles throwing wild punches and grappling with one another. A woman who was a passenger in the Ram attempted to break up the scrum but took a haymaker in the face for her troubles. Eventually, the fight broke up and the people returned to their vehicles which Dao assumed meant that the altercation was over. Apparently though, the Ram driver felt he hadn't made his point, and he reversed at high speed into the Honda, smashing the fascia and buckling the hood. The Ram then sped off westbound on U.S. 290 with the Honda on its tail. According to the Harris County Sheriff's Office, the incident was not reported and there is no word what happened to the brawlers after they left the scene. Related Video: News Source: KTRK Weird Car News Dodge Lexus RAM Driving Safety Truck Videos Sedan road rage houston fight