Thirty six seconds. That’s all it took for the fiesty Ford Fiesta R5 to reach the top of the 2025 Hagerty Hill Climb. Of more than 100 cars and drivers to tackle the historic Shelsley Walsh track, the professionally prepped WRC car proved itself the fastest.

A need for speed wasn’t the only reason that Hagerty customers, Hagerty Drivers Club members, and other guests arrived at the wooded venue in Worcestershire early on a sunny Saturday morning. First held in 1905, the annual event has become a fabulous rolling car show that highlights the wildly eclectic nature of Britain’s car enthusiast community.

At one end of the scale there was Jonathan Taylor and his tiny MG Midget; at the other, Peter Thompson’s 1965 Ford GT40. Where else but the Hagerty Hill Climb would you see a 1956 Citroën Traction Avant follow an Aston Martin DB11 in friendly competition, or classic Minis go up against Mazda MX-5s?

“It was a really amazing mix of cars,” says John Mayhead, the editor of Hagerty’s UK price guide, who turned up in his Porsche 944 to co-host the Hagerty Drivers Club area with Hagerty contributor Charlotte Vowden. “And the stories behind them were just as fantastic. For example, there was Ian Tomlinson in his absolutely beautiful Triumph Italia which had been in Mexico, of all places, then he found it in three different locations in Germany and fully restored it.”

“Naturally, a lot of the focus at a hill climb event is on the track itself, but this year I spent more time talking to drivers in the paddock—it’s a story-filled place,” adds Vowden. “With a 120-year history, Shelsley Walsh has many tales to tell, and the nature of Hagerty’s ‘run what you brung’ event means that anyone can have a go at tackling the oldest motorsport venue in the world. Seeing the trepidation experienced by first-time hill-climbers on the start line transform into elation upon their return reminded me of the emotions I felt during my inaugural run up the hill. The event followed on from the Hagerty Drivers Club Goes North tour in the Lakes and Dales, a road trip that John Mayhead and I took part in. Going up the hill as passenger in John’s 944 was the pinnacle moment of a brilliant few days.”

Armed forces charity Mission Motorsport provided some off-track competition with an epic Scalextric replica of Silverstone and also ran its hand-control equipped Subaru BRZ on the hill, while members of the Hagerty Drivers Club were treated to an exclusive area with refreshments and entertainment—one of many reasons for gearheads to join! (If you aren’t in the UK, never fear — the same perks are available for Drivers Club members on this side of the pond.)

The drivers of the Ralli 22 club swapped the special stage for the hill and put on an incredible display featuring Group A and Group B cars from the Ford Escort Cosworth and Lancia Delta Integrale to the Renault Maxi Turbo and MG Metro 6R4.

As the engines shut down at the end of the day, the Hagerty Hillclimb was once more an unqualified success. Road and race cars of almost every vintage, from current production to the earliest days of driving, were all being used as intended.

Roll on, 2026—and. in the meantime, enjoy gallery of 2025 highlights below.

Sunday’s NASCAR Cup race at Pocono Raceway was a forgettable one for 23XI Racing. The team battled brake issues, resulting in two destroyed race cars and a third just hanging on.

On Lap 41, Riley Herbst caused the first caution as his No. 35 Toyota slammed the wall. It looked like a flat tire at first, but the issue turned out to be a brake failure. Unfortunately, it was not an isolated incident as his teammate Bubba Wallace crashed even harder just 13 laps later after a brake rotor exploded on his No. 23 Toyota.

Both drivers were uninjured, but neither was able to continue. Wallace finished 36th and Herbst 37th, scoring just one point each.

“The brakes just went to the floor”

Riley Herbst, 23XI Racing Toyota

Photo by: Meg Oliphant / Getty Images

“Nothing,” said Wallace when asked if he had any warning inside the car. “I was going to battle the #17 [Chris Buescher] and the #2 [Austin Cindric] and by the time I was ready to touch the pedal it just went to the floor and the brakes exploded. I hate it, we’ve had two or three good races in-a-row and there goes the bad luck again. They told me there’s no such thing as bad luck, we create our own luck. I hate it for my guys. I hate it for McDonald’s.

“We knew it was going to be a grind and I was mentally prepared for that all day. As frustrating as it gets not being able to pass here in Pocono, we were going to just take our lumps and march our way through and set ourselves up for the end of the race, but the brakes just didn’t want to hang on that long.”

The DNF moves Wallace much closer to the cut line, just 29 points above the danger zone. As for Herbst, he was just as surprised by the issue. “I’ve grown up watching these races at Pocono and seeing what happened to me happen to lot of other guys. It was a scary feeling for sure. I was just starting to get tight, just a bad adjustment on my part. Getting into (Turn) one, the brakes just went to the floor. A brake rotor exploded and I was along for the ride with our Monster Energy Camry XSE.”

Their one remaining teammate on track was Tyler Reddick, who was warned about the issue. The No. 45 team opted to bring his car behind the wall to take a look at the brakes, hoping to avoid the same fate.

He did manage to finish the race, but Reddick was scored in 32nd. 

Photos from Pocono – Race

In a thrilling late-race shootout at Pocono Raceway, 18-year-old JR Motorsports rookie Connor Zilisch surged to his first oval-track victory in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, claiming the checkered flag in Saturday’s Explore the Pocono Mountains 250.

Zilisch, piloting the No. 88 JR Motorsports Chevrolet, passed close friend and fellow young standout Jesse Love with three laps remaining, edging out the Richard Childress Racing driver by 0.437 seconds. The win marks Zilisch’s second career Xfinity victory, but his first on an oval—a milestone he’s chased all season.

“It’s been amazing all weekend long,” said JR Motorsports co-owner and NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr., who stepped in as crew chief for the day. Filling in for suspended crew chief Mardy Lindley, Earnhardt not only called the race but assisted during pit stops. “Connor Zilisch is going to be a big deal in this sport for a long time,” he added.

Zilisch echoed the excitement. “I’ve been dying for this one for a while now,” he said. “I finished second at Charlotte, second at Nashville. Pretty cool to have Dale Junior up there. This one is definitely special.”

The 100-lap contest was defined by 10 cautions and a final flurry of restarts. Former NASCAR Cup Series champion Chase Elliott led a race-high 38 laps and appeared poised to contend for the win until a near collision with JR Motorsports’ Justin Allgaier opened the door for Love to take the lead.

On the race’s final restart, Zilisch restarted directly behind Love and made the decisive move within a lap. Love, last year’s Rookie of the Year, took the runner-up spot with Kaulig Racing’s Christian Eckes finishing a career-best third. Elliott recovered to finish fourth, while Ryan Sieg completed the top five.

“It’s the most focused I’ve ever been in a race car,” Love said of the final battle with Zilisch. “I did not want Connor to beat me because I’ll have to hear about it for a long time.”

Allgaier, the reigning series champion and current points leader, finished 10th and extended his advantage to 82 points over Austin Hill, who was caught in an early crash and finished 35th.

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LONG POND, Pa. (AP) — It’s time to bust out the brackets, pick an upset or two, and follow winners on the road — a journey over city streets, concrete and bricks — to the final four and beyond.

Totally awesome, baby?

Forget all the upset specials in March.

NASCAR will find out soon enough if its attempt to snap out of a mid-summer malaise with its first in-season tournament is a success with drivers and fans as it strives to boost engagement and build buzz in the staid regular season.

The concept has already juiced enthusiasm in NASCAR to levels not seen since the halcyon days when Donnie Allison and Cale Yarborough duked it out in the 1979 Daytona 500.

“To be really honest with you,” 2020 NASCAR champion Chase Elliott said, “I have not paid any attention to it.”

Maybe a look at the matchup will get NASCAR’s most popular driver pumped!

Elliott is seeded fifth against No. 28 seed Austin Dillon in the first round of the head-to-head showdown in the race-within-the-race set for this weekend at the track better known as Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Here’s a refresher for Elliott and any other sports fan who missed out on the specifics of NASCAR joining the in-season tournament party, much like attempts in the NBA, NHL, and, of course, throughout the world in soccer.

NASCAR is set to start the engines on a five-race, bracket-style tournament called the In-Season Challenge in the midst of the summer slate, which comes with a $1 million prize to the winner.

The final 32-driver field was set by results of the last three races at Michigan, Mexico City and Pocono. The drivers are paired in head-to-head matchups based on seeding, with the winners advancing to the next round in a bracket format that mirrors the NCAA basketball tournaments.

Buoyed by a win at Michigan and a runner-up finish at Pocono, Denny Hamlin earned the top seed. He’ll square off — race off? — against No. 32 seed Ty Dillon. Pocono winner Chase Briscoe is the No. 2 seed and is pitted against No. 31 seed Noah Gragson.

Chris Buescher is third, Christopher Bell fourth and Elliott fifth, among notable names.

The format is single elimination with the field cut to 16 at the street race in Chicago, eight at Sonoma, four on the lone concrete track in the series at Dover and the final two over the yard of bricks at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The Challenge is part of NASCAR’s media rights deal that includes TNT, and the Atlanta-based cable network will broadcast all five races in the tournament, starting with the 400-miler in Atlanta.

Aside from a shrug from Elliott and a few others, drivers are intrigued by the idea of increasing the stakes in each race beyond a playoff berth, trophy and the winner’s purse.

“I love it. I think it’s great,” three-time Cup champion Joey Logano said. “I think it’s placed perfectly where it is in the season. This is kind of that moment where the newness is worn off. We’re into the rhythm, we’re racing every week. It’s starting to start a little bit of, who’s going to be in the playoffs, who’s not, the cutoff line all those types of things. But it’s not really the main story quite yet.”

Stories are what sell, of course, and the sizzle in Pocono over the weekend had little to do with which drivers or teams are the ones to beat for the 2025 championship. Rather, it was whether two pedestrian drivers were going to fight, the end of Amazon Prime’s run of wildly-popular telecasts and Hall of Fame driver Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s win in his first race as a crew chief.

“This really spices up the mid-part of the season,” Logano said.

So does placing a few bucks on No. 11 to win.

But as of Monday afternoon, most sports gambling sites did not offer odds on specific matchups headed into Atlanta. NASCAR is offering $1 million to a winning fan with a perfect bracket in its fantasy game.

There are some quirks to the bracket: Shane van Gisbergen won the Cup race in Mexico City and is not in the field while series points leader William Byron is only a No. 9 seed. The tournament boasts matchups in the first-round of past Cup champions (Kyle Busch-Brad Keselowski), former teammates (Briscoe-Gragson), and even best friends (Bubba Wallace-Daniel Suarez).

The idea for the challenge was largely championed by Hamlin, a three-time Daytona 500 champion who floated the idea of a mid-season tournament on his “Actions Detrimental” podcast. When NASCAR bought into the idea and announced the creation of the tournament last year, Hamlin called the tournament on social media “such a win for our sport and drivers.” He jokingly added, “I will collect my 1M royalty next season.”

Hamlin’s on deck and clearly a favorite to win it all, with three wins this year for Joe Gibbs Racing and the top seed.

(And let’s not haggle over who gets credit in court.)

“I’m a sports guy, so I’m going to be engaged with it,” Hamlin said. “I’ll know who I will have to beat next week. I’ve told the team, we are going to try and do what we can. We are going to be up against it because we are going to tracks that aren’t very favorable to me. But we are going to try to do our best to beat that one car for the next four to five weeks.”

NASCAR will present the tournament winner at Indianapolis with a ring, jackets, trophy and — oh yeah, a million bucks.

That’s enough cash to get anyone’s attention — even Elliott’s.

“I don’t know what you get. You get anything,” Elliott asked.

“Oh, a million dollars to the winner? Then yeah, we want to win.”

___

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Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

NASCAR Cup Series icon Carl Edwards has sent a warning to Chase Elliott after hearing the Hendrick Motorsports star’s latest interview regarding his 2025 campaign and playoff hopes

Carl Edwards has issued a warning to Chase Elliott about the precarious nature of the NASCAR Cup Series playoff cut line, given that the Hendrick Motorsports star hasn’t seen a win in 2025.

Currently ranked fifth in the Cup standings, Elliott’s lack of victories this season puts the 29-year-old at risk of missing the cut if 16 different racers cross the finish line before the playoffs. Elliott boasts nine top-ten finishes, including consecutive top-five results in Mexico City, where Shane van Gisbergen emerged victorious, and Pocono, won by Chase Briscoe.

The Cup star seems on the brink of a regular-season win, and Elliott has expressed confidence that his No. 9 can reach Victory Lane before the playoff deadline.

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“I think so. When I look at today, I feel like we were just right there, one little adjustment away from being right with Ryan (Blaney) and Denny (Hamlin), I felt like,” Elliott said when asked if he feels a win is near.

“I feel like it’s all well within reach, we’ve just got to piece it all together at the same time. It’s hard to be mad about top-fives. It’s not what we’re after, but certainly looking for more.”

However, NASCAR icon Edwards, who narrowly missed out on a Cup title during his racing career, cautioned Elliott about the playoff cut line should he remain winless in the 2025 regular season.

“He’s a winner, he’s a champion. He wants to be in Victory Lane. That interview tells me that,” Edwards said on Elliott’s admission.

“It’s so tough because consistency in the history of the sport is so important.

“But right now, as we talked about that cut line, 160 (points) might not be enough.”

Elliott admitted to making some expensive mistakes at Pocono, especially with Turn 3 being a tough spot.

“I think we’ve been capable of doing that in other weeks, so I’m not surprised by it, truthfully (back-to-back top fives),” he candidly shared.

“At the same time, it’s not what we’re here to do either, so just got to be a little better. I was really proud of the effort from where we were yesterday. We missed pretty bad yesterday.

“So to get our NAPA Chevy back, just in contention, and really gave ourselves a shot… I thought (turn) three was my weak point, I just never could get comfortable over there, and especially late in the run, just made too many mistakes.

“It was a solid day, not what we’re after, but on to Atlanta.”

NASCAR’s in-season challenge has arrived, but what exactly is it all about? But before we get into specifics, let’s be clear that this has no bearing on the actual championship in any way, shape or form.

The purpose of this bracket-style tournament is simply to provide some added excitement and engagement for fans, while also awarding a $1 million dollar prize to the driver who actually wins it.

Your next question is likely about how it works. Well, the top 32 drivers in points (as of three weeks ago) get to take part. So no Shane van Gisbergen, who only broke into the top-32 after winning in Mexico City. Each week, two drivers will face off against each other in a bracket similar to what you’d see for March Madness. To advance forward, a driver simply has to finish ahead of whoever they are facing that week. Points scored are not a factor in the final outcome.

This tournament lasts five weeks for the entirety of TNT’s run as they plan to broadcast a handful of NASCAR Cup races this summer between Prime Video and NBC. It will go through Atlanta, Sonoma, Chicago, Dover, and end with the final two drivers facing off in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis. 

Denny Hamlin is the No. 1 seed, but in case you were looking to bet on a long shot, the No. 32 seed is Ty Dillon. Now, here’s a look at who is actually facing who this weekend:

Round 1 matchups — NASCAR Cup at Atlanta (EchoPark Speedway)

Denny Hamlin vs. Ty Dillon

Kyle Busch vs. Brad Keselowski

Alex Bowman vs. Joey Logano

Bubba Wallace vs. Daniel Suarez

John Hunter Nemechek vs. Josh Berry

Chase Elliott vs. Austin Dillon

Ross Chastain vs. Erik Jones

Christopher Bell vs. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Chase Briscoe vs. Noah Gragson

Ryan Preece vs. William Byron

Ryan Blaney vs. Carson Hocevar

Kyle Larson vs. Tyler Reddick

Michael McDowell vs. AJ Allmendinger

Ty Gibbs vs. Justin Haley

Zane Smith vs. Austin Cindric

Chris Buescher vs. Todd Gilliland