Each of the 13 American drivers taking part in this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours has a story to tell, a long, winding path that led them to the most prestigious and historic sports car race on the planet. But none of them are quite like 44-year-old Tennessee native Ryan Hardwick’s.

Hardwick, who is taking on this year’s 24 Hours with Porsche powerhouse Manthey in LMGT3, grew up in Knoxville. Like many, he developed a passion for motorsport – bike racing, specifically – at a young age through his father.

“I’ve been racing something since I was six years old,” Hardwick tells RACER. “I did my first competitive race on dirt bikes against kids the same age, and I had a love for racing and competing from back then. It was what my dad loved – he did endurance racing on dirt bikes. 

“I did some of that stuff too, but I never made it that good; I crashed a lot. I still ride today and have taught my sons how to drive, and now find myself in the motorcycle sales business with Mountain Motorsports. So racing in the WEC against a guy like Valentino Rossi has been surreal for me, especially when we shook hands for the first time earlier this season on the podium.”

That’s where the regular chapters of this story end, as during his teens and college years spent at the University of Tennessee, he transitioned from two wheels to racing jet skis, winning two national titles and a couple of world championships.

Photo courtesy of Ryan Hardwick

“I made it pretty far in jet ski racing,” Hardwick reflects. “I was racing all over the world, and it was the first sport I turned professional in. I learned so much from racing at a high level there, about what it takes physically and with nutrition. I stopped and went on an entrepreneurial journey. I still do it, but just for fun now.”

With that arc over and his life as a businessman on the up, he turned back to motorsport and began a climb to the top of Pro/Am GT racing back in 2017, trying his hand in Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America. While not directly transferrable, he feels the skill set he developed on the water gave him a leg up.

“My dirt bike years and jet ski years meant I came to car racing late. I didn’t grow up karting, or racing formula cars like a lot of people. But you still learn a lot from it, you learn about surface awareness and traction awareness,” Hardwick explains. “A lot of people were surprised by my ability in a race car when I started.

“I first drove a Porsche Cayman GT4 at high-performance driving events in 2015 before I did Super Trofeo. The coaches were like, ‘Ryan, this is a very high-performance car, with a lot of power and downforce, it can be intimidating.’ So I asked, ‘What sort of power does this have?’ And they were like, ‘It’s got 620 horsepower.’ 

“Well, the last jet ski I won a world championship on had 640 horsepower, with an inline four-cylinder engine, a turbo and 44 pounds of boost. It would go from 0-60 miles per hour in under two seconds. So it wasn’t so bad!

“A lot of people don’t understand, though. They’re amazed I can race against a Bronze like Ben Keating, who has decades of experience. Well, I have decades of experience in competitive racing, and that helped me ascend quickly. I’ll probably never reach a Silver or Gold level, but I feel highly competitive in this sport as a Bronze because of my foundation and because I take care of myself. I take it very seriously.”

Making your way in the world of GT racing is not easy, yet Hardwick has relished the mental, physical and financial challenges it presents. In the years since he first got the taste of high-performance circuit racing, he’s collected a number of wins and accolades stateside in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship competition.

“I learned quickly in Super Trofeo, won the national championship and the world championship and rose up the amateur ranks,” he says. “So I started GT3, and I thought I could do that pretty well. But it was eye-opening, I wasn’t as quick as I expected. I made mistakes, but learned a lot and knew that it was where I wanted to be, especially after joining Wright Motorsports, winning GTD at the Sebring 12 Hours (in 2020), the Rolex 24 Hours (in 2022) and finishing second in the championship twice.”

But the scope of his ambition didn’t stop there. Having made a name for himself in IMSA, he chose to race further afield and went on to win the European Le Mans Series’ GTE title in 2023, racing a Porsche 911 GTE RSR with Proton Competition. It was a rollercoaster season, in which he clinched the championship along with teammates Zach Robichon and Alessio Picariello in the season finale, after book-ending the campaign with wins at Barcelona and Portimao.

“I got to Le Mans through an IMSA invite, but to me, just showing up wasn’t enough,” Hardwick explains when asked about his move to racing in the ELMS. “I wanted to do it properly, so I raced in Europe, which taught me a lot of the ACO rules like full-course yellows. I had no idea how I’d stack up in a GTE. I definitely flat-spotted a lot of tires early on, but Proton were superb; we were so competitive, we even won our first race, and it grew my love for racing in Europe.”

It was that year that he made the pilgrimage to Le Mans for the first time, too. Racing in the centenary Le Mans 24 Hours, he says, was special and a real privilege, even though it didn’t go to plan.

“I watched the race roughly 15 years ago and after that, I started to learn as much as I could. I got super into it,” he reflects. “So when I was there in the flesh doing it the first time… I’ll never forget standing on the grid before the race. It was so emotional for me and my family, even though the race didn’t go well.”

Looking back, it’s clear that the DNF on debut at La Sarthe, plus last year’s struggles racing with the brand-new Ford Mustang GT3 in the first season for the LMGT3 class in WEC, lit a fire inside Hardwick. It led him on a path to where he is today, back racing the Manthey 1st Phorm-liveried Porsche in LMGT3 with Porsche stalwart Richard Lietz and rapid Italian Riccardo Pera.

Hardwick and teammates Riccardo Pera and Richard Lietz celebrate after winning the Six Hours of Imola. Jakob Ebrey/Getty Images

“Last year in the WEC was a really cool opportunity,” he says of his first WEC season and second Le Mans attempt. “I was approached by Chris (Ried, from Proton Competition) and Ford when they were trying to put a line-up together. To be approached for a first-year development program with a new car was nice. But we were on the back foot from the start. We were learning a new car, new tire, and torque sensors – it was a lot.

“And I’ll say now I feel more suited to a mid or rear-engined car. It’s why I left and came back to Porsche for this year. It was a tough decision, but to join Manthey…. They know how to prepare and win. I’m glad I made the jump, as I believe this is the car, the team, the co-drivers, the engineering group, that it would take for me to win.

“I focus on the things I can control. I can control studying data and test notes. I can control my diet and workouts. I can control how I drive when I’m on track. I can control who I race with. That’s what makes the difference at the end of the season.”

Hardwick feels Manthey’s deep line-up offers him his best chance at Le Mans glory. Jakob Ebrey/Getty Images

Heading into his third attempt at winning Le Mans, Hardwick has reason to be confident and believe this year’s edition will prove to be a case of “third time lucky” after winning the second round of the WEC season at Imola back in April and finishing in the points at Spa last time out.

“It’s clichéd, but I have two main aims: to win Le Mans and to win a world championship,” he says. “To me, this is the highest level as a Bronze. The racing in the WEC is perfect as you get a lot of drive time, and the Bronze plays a pivotal role.

“I feel like this is my home now, and I will continue to keep this as my focus until I achieve those two goals.”

No. 16 Action Industries Camaro ZL1

Start: 19th
Stage 1 Finish: 15th
Stage 2 Finish: 19th
Finish: 17th
After qualifying in 19th, AJ Allmendinger made his way into the top 15 by lap 23. He maintained position until the conclusion of the opening stage when he reported the car was building tight as the run went on.  Allmendinger came to pit road during the stage break for tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment to help with the handling of the No. 16 Action Industries Chevy. During the second stage, Allmendinger received a pit road speeding penalty and restarted at the tail end of the longest line. By the end of the stage, he had driven up to 19th place. Allmendinger stayed out at the end of the stage to restart in 12th place. On the final pit stop of the day, Allmendinger lost positions and as a result, restarted in 25th place on lap 151. By lap 154, he had driven up to 13th and was told he needed to save fuel. Allmendinger went on to finish in 17th place.

“Just a hard fought day for our No. 16 group. I needed to be a little bit better, definitely made some mistakes for our race team and tried to get them back on the final restart. I felt like we got pretty close to where we probably should have been running, just more disappointed in myself today. I need to be a little bit better, but we fought hard and got everything out of it at the end there. We had to save a little bit of fuel, probably lost two spots in doing that, but at the end of the day, I think about 14th to 17th was about all we had. We did a fairly good job of maximizing our day and we’ll go to Mexico City and try to win the race.”

• AJ Allmendinger
   
  No. 10 Sea Best Camaro ZL1 Start: 18th
  Stage 1 Finish: 23rd
  Stage 2 Finish: 9th
  Finish: 24th
  Ty Dillon and the No. 10 Sea Best Chevy team started Sunday’s race at Michigan International Speedway from the 18th position. As the first stage ran caution free, Dillon reported his Chevy was a little too free and finished the stage in 23rd. Making adjustments to the No. 10 Chevy throughout the second stage, Dillon ran as high as sixth before finishing the second stage in the ninth position and earned valuable stage points. During the final stage, Dillon restarted the race from the 20th spot. As the laps ticked off, the team continued to adjust on the No. 10 Chevy and Dillon crossed the finish line in the 24th position.

Kaulig Racing PR

he NASCAR Chicago Street Race and its official American Whiskey partner Jack Daniel’s announced the release of the 2025 “NASCAR Chicago Street Race” Single Barrel Whiskey, hand-selected by 2024 Grant Park 165 Champion and driver of the No. 48 Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports Alex Bowman. This limited-edition selection marks the second annual barrel release in commemoration of the NASCAR Chicago Street Race. The product will be available for purchase at select retailers in the Chicagoland area beginning this month.

“Jack Daniel’s has been a terrific partner all three years of the Chicago Street Race, and at NASCAR tracks around the country,” said Julie Giese, NASCAR Chicago Street Race President. “We’re excited to host Jack Daniel’s in Grant Park once again this summer, and bring this limited-edition bottle back to Chicago to toast the 2025 NASCAR Chicago Street Race, July 5-6.”

Jack Daniel’s welcomed Bowman to its distillery in Lynchburg, Tennessee on April 8, where the distillery team walked the 2024 race winner through the whiskey making process. As the reigning champion, Bowman personally selected the single barrel that will be made available for this year’s limited edition run.

Jack Daniel’s will once again be a fixture during the NASCAR Chicago Street Race Weekend, with the return of the Jack Daniel’s Turn 1 Club. Located on the corner of Columbus Drive and Balbo Drive, the Jack Daniel’s Turn 1 Club provides guests with access to an exclusive hospitality club including premier food and beverage options, Jack Daniel’s branded experiences, and the choice between two reserved viewing areas. Trackside seating provides a reserved chair seat with views as drivers race from the frontstretch to the exciting Turn 1 setting up for an exhilarating Turn 2. The club is conveniently located between the Fan Plaza and Festival Field.​

“We’re thrilled to once again bring a taste of Lynchburg and the iconic Jack Daniel Distillery to the Chicagoland area” said Byron Copeland, Barrel Maturation Manager and Master Taster at the Jack Daniel’s. “I look forward to returning to Chicago for the 2025 race and raising a glass with fans.”

In addition to the Jack Daniel‘s Turn 1 Club and other branded experiences for fans 21+, Jack Daniel‘s will be encouraging fans to celebrate responsibly. To learn more about Jack Daniel‘s and its commitment to responsibility, fans over 21-years of age can visit jackdaniels.com or jackdaniels.com/responsibility.

The NASCAR Chicago Street Race – which was named “Sports Event of the Year” by Sports Business Journal – previously announced new ticket options, along with reduced prices throughout the footprint, and a shorter overall build schedule. Guests will also enjoy significantly lower price points on Grounds Pass tickets and reserved seating (which now includes a new single-day option as well). Single-day Grounds Pass tickets start at $123.08 including ALL taxes and fees (35% less than last year), and Frontstretch Premier Grandstands Reserved seats are available at nearly a 50% reduction from 2024 prices.

Fans can subscribe to receive exclusive NASCAR Chicago Street Race emails for ticketing alerts. For a complete listing of ticketing options or to purchase tickets, fans can visit NASCARChicago.com or call 888-629-7223. Follow @NASCARChicago on Instagram, X and Facebook and download the NASCAR Tracks App for the latest real-time updates on all aspects of the event.

NASCAR PR

Rightly so, Sunday’s race winner Denny Hamlin celebrated his dramatic victory in Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway with a huge burnout and even a wink-wink tease to those in the massive crowd who booed the Toyota driver’s clutch win in Detroit.

But as significant as Hamlin’s third win of the season was – the 57th of his NASCAR Hall of Fame bound career – the driver that finished runner-up to him had some legitimate reason to feel good too. In fact, Chris Buescher’s entire Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing team took Sunday’s checkered flag with some legitimate good vibes.

Buescher’s runner-up finish in the No. 17 RFK Racing Ford was his best showing of the season. And for the first time this year, all three of the RFK Ford Mustangs finished in the top-10 in a race.

It was exactly the kind of summer-swing boost the team needed as it heads to toward the final 11 regular season races to set the 16-driver Playoff grid.

“That was such a fast Kroger/Heinz Ford Mustang, I really appreciate everybody on this team working so hard to put us in this situation and to have a chance to win,” said Buescher, the 2023 Michigan race winner.

“I’m disappointed I didn’t get it done. It’s on me. I had a couple different decisions I would love to go back and make and ultimately should have had us ahead of the 11. We were faster on the day and I didn’t do a good enough job. We’ll certainly take the good with it. We certainly need a little bit of good luck or fortune on our side.

“It hurts right now, but certainly there’s a ton of positive out of today,” he continued. “Our car was so fast here from the time we unloaded off the truck yesterday. I’m certainly proud of that and excited for what we have to come, but there’s a little bit of a sting right now to be that close and miss out.”

Although Buescher’s took a self-critical assessment of his day in the immediate moments after climbing out of his car on pit road Sunday, looking at the big picture, Michigan represented a significant step forward for the team.

His teammate Ryan Preece finished ninth, the third top-10 in the last four races and sixth of the season. Owner-driver Brad Keselowski finished just behind in 10th-place for his second top-10 of the year – both coming in just the last three weeks, however.

“We had a really good car,” Keselowski said. “I felt like we had a top two or three car and just didn’t get to see it through. I’m really disappointed.

“We kind of crushed ourselves on pit road with the speeding penalty and then having to go around the 45 and the 71. Every time we pitted we would lose a lot of spots. It wasn’t the pit crew’s fault, we just needed a better pit stall. I’m not really sure on the speeding penalty. I felt I was way slow, so getting called fast didn’t really add up, but we had the speed to do a lot more than we did today and I’m disappointed to not get that. Still, we’re reasonably happy with a top 10.”

The difference Sunday is that the drivers were disappointed because they were justifiably competitive. And that’s a step forward for a team that carries perpetual and legitimate high expectations.

Buescher is currently 14th in the Playoff standings 20 points to the good on the 16-driver Playoff grid. Preece is tied for 16th with Kyle Busch, but holds that final position “to the good” based on a higher race finish this season. Keselowski, whose had a rough start to the year, is ranked 32nd and will likely need a victory in these next 11 races to ensure his chance for a title run.

The series now moves to Mexico City for the inaugural race, the Viva Mexico 250 (3 p.m. ET on Amazon Prime, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at the world-renowned Autodromo Hermanos Rodriquez road course. And there is reason for RFK to be optimistic.

Not only is this a first-time event for the entire field – an equalizer in itself – but Buescher, Preece and Keselowski are proficient road course racers. Buescher is the defending Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International race winner and has six top-five finishes on road or street courses. Preece has a pair of top-10s on road courses and Keselowski has seven top-10s over the course of his championship career.

“We’re in this stretch of races where we’ve won at a few of these things,” Buescher said. “We’ve run really strong at a lot of others. We’re gonna get in the summer where it’s gonna get hot and we’re gonna start catching a few drivers off guard here or there.

“Ultimately, there’s a lot of good racetracks coming up for some good racing for us, selfishly at RFK and probably some good ones for some other teams as well. We’ll see where it all plays out, but I guess, for us, I don’t think we have any racetracks on the schedule that we don’t feel good about. One, it’s fun to have that mindset and not have to head into a race weekend just hoping to get through it, and that comes from fast race cars.”

NASCAR’s first international Cup Series race of the modern era is all about the eyeballs, specifically new fans in the Mexico City market.

NASCAR will be on the track Friday for the first of three days of racing at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez, one of the most popular stops on the Formula 1 calendar and Ben Kennedy’s newest project.

The great-grandson of NASCAR founder Bill France Sr., Kennedy has taken the family business beyond its comfortable confines before.

Kennedy in 2022 moved the preseason exhibition Clash from its longtime home at Daytona International Speedway in Florida to a temporary track built inside Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Kennedy this year moved the Clash to The Madhouse — the historic Bowman Gray Stadium, which had last hosted a Cup race in 1971, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

NASCAR under Kennedy also returned to North Wilkesboro Speedway in North Carolina for the first time since 1977 when the All-Star race was moved there three years ago. He allowed dirt at Bristol Motor Speedway, a hybrid road course and oval at Charlotte Motor Speedway, alongside his biggest undertaking: NASCAR’s first street race, held in downtown Chicago.

He also had his eyes set on expanding internationally, which will come Sunday with the first points-paying international race in the Cup Series since 1958. It is only third time in 77 years that NASCAR’s top series will run an event that counts in the championship outside the United States. The last two times were in Canada; the Cup Series also has held exhibitions in Japan and Australia.

“Our biggest opportunity to grow as a sport is international,” Kennedy said when he announced Mexico City was replacing one of the two races on the schedule allocated to Richmond International Raceway.

“The U.S. is always going to be our mainstay and our next opportunity was to expand internationally,” he said. “We said we’ve wanted to do this for a long time, but also needed to make sure it was the right time, the right partners and the right location. Mexico City checked every box. To be in one of the biggest cities globally — over 20 million people that live in the city — is a massive opportunity for us to bring the sport.”

The weekend includes the second-tier Xfinity Series and the NASCAR Mexico Series. It’s a strong return to a market that devours the entire F1 weekend ticket package within an hour of them becoming available.

Mexicans have proven to be rabid motorsports fans but haven’t gotten a chance to see NASCAR’s big names since 2008, the final year of a four-year run of Xfinity races. Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr. were winners during the four-year stretch.

Daniel Suarez, the former Xfinity champion and native of Monterrey, is NASCAR’s face of the event. He raced the circuit 13 times with a different layout in the NASCAR Mexico Series, and three of Suarez’s starts were wins.

“I’m super excited for the event. I’m super excited to live the moment because the first time is going to only happen once,” Suarez said. “I’m really trying to be as present as possible, enjoy the moment and try to execute the best possible weekend that we can. We know that we are capable of winning the race, but that’s not the goal. The goal is the execution of the entire weekend, and hopefully the win is the result of the execution part.”

The planning that has gone into Mexico City, one of 38 events on the Cup schedule, began about a year ago. NASCAR has worked on myriad details, beginning with how to get nearly 200 trucks hauling race cars and equipment from Michigan International Speedway into Mexico City.

NASCAR official Tom Bryant has spearheaded the organizational logistics and made multiple trips to the border crossing in Laredo, Texas, to meet with customs officials from both nations.

The drive from Michigan to Mexico City is about 40 hours, not including the tedious customs crossing, where all the equipment and tools on every NASCAR hauler must be documented on an exhaustive manifest. Cup Series teams cars were scheduled for a Monday night arrival at Laredo, with crossing scheduled for Tuesday and arrival at the track on Thursday.

“It’s been a ton of coordination moving lots of people and lots of stuff safely and efficiently across a great distance and an international border,” Bryant said on the “Hauler Talk” NASCAR podcast.

“There is a lot to it, but the key to it is you just have to define the problem. We’ve got to get these people and these things from this point to that point within a certain time period,” he said. “How do we do it in a way that’s going to best position us to be ready to go to work as soon as we hit the ground down there? Because this is a pretty tight window.”

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AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing

Jenna Fryer, The Associated Press