Texas had it all: chaos, carnage, comebacks, and some of the most intense radio chatter we’ve heard all season. The radios told the story of a wild afternoon, from blown engines and hard crashes to a fired-up celebration. With wrecks breaking out across the track and emotions running high, we got a front-row seat to the raw, unfiltered drama of racing at Texas. Check out all of that on our driver audio shorts linked below.

• Ryan Blaney was furious at himself at the end of the race, but why was it?
• Denny Hamlin’s car caught on fire. What did he and his crew have to say?
• Calamity struck on the final stint of the race; some drivers were mad and frustrated, find out who

Everyone seemed to have different emotions at Texas, but how do you feel? What was your favorite radio moment from Texas? Drop it in the comments.

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After Michael McDowell’s dream ended less than four laps short of the scheduled finish in Sunday’s Würth 400 presented by LIQUI MOLY, Joey Logano took control and rode the NASCAR Cup Series rollercoaster to his first victory of the season.

A week after a missing nut on a spoiler bracket cost him a disqualification from fifth place at Talladega Superspeedway, Logano beat runner-up Ross Chastain to the finish line by 0.346-second in overtime to score his second victory at 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway and the 37th of his career.

In fashioning his first top-five finish of 2025, Logano successfully pursued McDowell, who had charged into the lead after a restart on Lap 245 of 271 and held it through two cautions and restarts.

On Lap 264, less than four laps from a finish, the driver of the No. 22 Team Penske Ford went low on the backstretch, avoided a block from McDowell and passed the No. 71 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet for the lead.

Passed for second by Logano’s Team Penske teammate Ryan Blaney a lap later, McDowell lost control in dirty air behind Blaney’s Ford and slammed into the Turn 2 wall, ending his race in 26th place.

“Sorry, boys, I tried,” a rueful McDowell radioed to his team.

On the subsequent overtime restart, Logano made it look easy. The reigning series champion cleared Blaney through the first two corners, as Chastain charged into second from the bottom lane.

Two laps later, Logano was on his way to Victory Lane, having scored the second straight win for Team Penske after Austin Cindric won at Talladega last Sunday.

“The sport changes so quickly,” Logano said after climbing from his car. “It’s crazy how you can just ride these rollercoasters and just proud of the team. Finally got (sponsor) AAA Insurance into Victory Lane. They’ve been a partner of mine since I’ve been to Penske, so 13, 14 years. I’ve yet to win with them. It was awesome to get that done here.”

Logano had to work his way forward from his 27th-place starting position. He did so relentlessly and without the sorts of mistakes that doomed the winning chances of others.

“Slowly, methodically, a couple at a time,” Logano said of his drive. “We had a really tough pit stall situation. The pit crew did a good job of managing that and just grabbed a couple (of positions) here and there.

“The car was fast. I knew that yesterday. We just did a poor job qualifying. Just grinded it. Just keep grinding a couple here and a couple there and eventually get a win here. It’s nice to get one. Real nice.”

Similarly, Chastain started 31st and didn’t make his presence known until the closing laps.

‘Gosh, that’s a working day,” Chastain said. “Just no confidence in the car yesterday. Y’all saw that. Just the speed of the Trackhouse cars on Saturdays is just terrible. We’re just not confident, all three drivers.

“So there was one pit stop today that (crew chief) Phil Surgen and the group—it takes a ton of people back at Trackhouse and on the box here in GM at Chevrolet. They made me a confident driver all of a sudden with one adjustment. It was small stuff. It doesn’t even make sense, but after that I was a confident driver.”

Blaney came home third, followed by Kyle Larson, who led a race-high 90 laps but surrendered the top spot to McDowell on the Lap 245 restart.

“You don’t want to give up the lead on a mile and a half,” Larson said. “It’s hard to get it back. Yeah, Michael just did a good job timing it.”

Erik Jones was fifth, scoring his first top five since last year’s fall race at Talladega. Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Austin Dillon, John Hunter Nemechek, Christopher Bell and Daniel Suarez completed the top 10.

Other expected contenders fell by the wayside as the race progressed.

Denny Hamlin’s streak of 21 consecutive lead-lap finishes—eighth-most all-time in the Cup Series—came to an abrupt end on Lap 75. One circuit earlier, Hamlin lost power with an engine the team was running for the third time.

As Hamlin slowed, flames shot from beneath the chassis of the No. 11 Toyota. Hamlin stopped the car, which was enveloped in dark smoke and climbed to safety.

“It was blowing up for about a lap or so before it really detonated,” Hamlin said. “I tried to keep it off to keep it from full detonating.

“That was so they can diagnose exactly what happened to it. It’s tough to say exactly what it is, but they’ll go back and look at it and we’ll find out in a few weeks.”

A promising run for Las Vegas winner Josh Berry likewise ended early on Sunday. Berry had led 41 laps and was running at the front of the field on Lap 125 when the treacherous bump in Turn 4 upset his No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford.

Berry slid into the outside wall, slamming the barrier on the driver’s side of the car.

“Just started to approach the lapped traffic,” said Berry, who returned to the track after repairs, 84 laps down. “You have no choice but to run the opposite lane. Your car is never going to turn if you follow them. I went around the 62 (Jesse Love) on the outside and felt pretty decent about it. Then caught the 51 (Cody Ware) and was working on the 51 and hit that bump and got loose.

“I don’t know what I would do too much different. Obviously, in these cars, especially at a place like this, if you’re going to be fast, it’s going to be uncomfortable and you’re going to be on edge. Unfortunately, it bit us today.”

In a race that produced 12 cautions for 73 laps, Austin Cindric led 60 laps but fell victim to a four-car crash on Lap 247. Ten laps earlier, pole winner Carson Hocevar, who led the first 22 laps but was relegated to the back of the field when caution interrupted a green-flag cycle of pit stops on Lap 219, suffered a similar fate in a three-car wreck.

William Byron, who finished 13th, retained the series lead by 13 points over Larson.

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — The new Cadillac F1 team officially announced its arrival at a glitzy South Beach extravaganza packed with industry executives and influencers and highlighted by a musical showcase from Janelle Monáe and actor Terry Crews Jr., who shared an anecdote about how he’d never been born had his father not relocated at age 20 to Flint, Michigan, in search of a job with General Motors.

A splashy video ultimately unveiled the Cadillac F1 team logo at a multimillion-dollar party jammed elbow-to-elbow in the Queen Miami Beach venue.

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What wasn’t revealed? Cadillac’s car, a bit of a disappointment for those who expected to see all the bells and whistles at the brand launch introduction to F1’s newest team.

No worries, promised the leaders of the new team: Cadillac F1 is on pace to be on the grid in 2026.

“We’re building cars, we’ve been in the wind tunnel for a long time,” said Dan Towriss, CEO of TWG Motorsports, the team owner. “Chassis has arrived, we’re continuing to add (personnel) to the team, there are so many work streams that are happening all at once. But I want to make sure everybody understands just how deep the partnership is with General Motors and with Cadillac. I think that’s something that really will set apart this team, this entry, on the grid.”

Cadillac will debut in 2026 with a two-car lineup that will push the F1 field to 22 cars — the first time since 2016 the grid will have more than 20 cars.

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A long drive

It was a long road for Cadillac F1 to get to this point. The project started with Michael Andretti, who failed to buy Sauber in his effort to create a true American team that would feature at least one American driver. When he didn’t close the Sauber deal, Andretti petitioned F1 and governing body FIA to expand the field for Andretti Global, which led to the equivalent of an IRS audit during a grueling application process.

F1 denied the application.

Towriss and Cadillac pressed on — they spent the last year saying work on the project “continues on pace” — and when Towriss bought out Andretti late last year, F1 changed course and the new team was suddenly fast-tracked.

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General Motors President Mark Reuss was finally able to attend an F1 race — the Miami Grand Prix over the weekend — in an official capacity. So geeked to finally be in the club, Reuss pulled out his phone to play an audio clip for reporters of the first Cadillac engine being fired.

Cadillac will initially race with Ferrari engines before GM’s power unit is ready for 2029. Reuss said the Cadillac approach is deliberate to have a reliable, fast engine rather than rush one out for next season.

“You have to go slow to go fast,” Reuss said.

Cadillac will have the largest U.S. presence of any F1 team and will operate out of facilities in Fishers, Indiana, as well as in Charlotte, North Carolina. The team also has a satellite facility at Silverstone, England.

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Who will drive for Cadillac F1?

When Andretti first launched this project, he was adamant it was for an American driver, specifically California native and current IndyCar driver Colton Herta.

Now the list of potential drivers is rather long. Towriss and Reuss were adamant they’ve yet to sign a driver amid reports that Sergio Perez has already signed. The need for there to be an American is not a pressing issue to TWG.

“There’s a lot of interest in this team and we’re very appreciative of that,” Towriss said. “We want that person set up for success, and want that seat respected when that American driver does come in for the team. … We’ll find the right way and the right time to bring the right driver into Formula 1.”

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IndyCar driver Pato O’Ward, who races under the Mexican flag but spent most of his childhood in Texas, wants a seat. Towriss said they had a funny run-in two weeks ago at the Indianapolis 500 open test when the elevator Towriss was in opened and there was O’Ward; they joked they would talk.

McLaren Racing boss Zak Brown said he wouldn’t prevent O’Ward from pursuing a seat with Cadillac. O’Ward drives for McLaren in IndyCar and is the team’s F1 reserve driver.

“I wouldn’t like it, but I wouldn’t stop him,” Brown said.

Valtteri Bottas, now an F1 reserve driver for Mercedes, told The Associated Press he is very interested while IndyCar driver Colton Herta has recently hedged on whether he wants the seat.

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There are a number of Americans who could be candidates, especially if the team is willing to wait until deeper into its existence to hire one. NASCAR driver Connor Zilisch, an 18-year-old quickly climbing through the stock car series’ ladder system, initially pursued European racing in his career. Sebastian Wheldon, who is deep into the Andretti Global driver development program, on Saturday won his debut Italian F4 race at Misano with Prema Racing.

Another idea could put a long-debated topic to the test: NASCAR champion Kyle Larson, who often comes up as potentially the only driver in the world who could match F1 standout Max Verstappen in talent.

When AP asked Reuss about the possibility of Larson, Reuss said “let’s focus on Indianapolis first.” Larson will run for McLaren and Chevrolet for a second consecutive year in the Indianapolis 500 later this month.

Potential effect of tariffs

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Reuss said GM’s F1 efforts will not be affected by President Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs despite a potential $5 billion (£3.8bn) impact. Despite reversing a number of the planned tariffs on imports in recent weeks, a 25% tariff is still in place.

“This is a long-term footprint that we have that are very old in some cases, that have been there a long time,” Reuss said. “So we’re working to bring as much as we can into the United States and avoid the tariffs. But not at all cost, and it doesn’t happen overnight. There’s no light switch that says, ‘Oh, all of a sudden we’re tariff-free.’

“You probably would have seen over the last few days, we did earnings on the early part of the week, and then we came back and did the earnings review and guidance. In that second one, there’s about $5 billion of impact for us. But it’s not going to affect this (F1) project.”

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

“The King” still reigns more than 30 years after his last NASCAR start.

That sentiment was valid throughout Richard Petty’s May 5 appearance in Harborcreek Township.

The 87-year old NASCAR Hall of Famer, who transcended the sport with his friendly personality and a record 200 Cup Series victories, took pictures with fans and autographed memorabilia for nearly 45 minutes outside the TA Travel Center.

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The session highlighted a stop during Kyle Petty’s latest Charity Ride Across America. It was the first time in nearly 30 years the son of Richard Petty, who won eight times on NASCAR’s top tour, scheduled a pause during one of his motorcycle rallies in northwestern Pennsylvania respite.

Richard Petty, in a brief interview with the Erie Times-News, was humorous and humble about the sustained influence he and his family have had on American culture since the late 1950s.

“I think some of that is because I’ve been here this long,” Petty said, “but it does make you feel good we’ve got this many people who still follow racing and the Petty crowd.”

Others on two wheels

An estimated 125 riders arrived en masse at the travel center. Kyle Petty, 64, scheduled Harborcreek to be the third of seven stops for his current rally, which began May 3 at Traverse City, Michigan.

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It will conclude May 9 at Hot Springs, Virginia.

Besides Kyle Petty and his father, the caravan also included 1982 Heisman Trophy winner Herschel Walker; retired NASCAR veterans Ken Schrader and Kenny Wallace; and Hershel McGriff, at 97 another NASCAR Hall of Famer.

“We’ve had as many as 150 bikes (in a rally),” Kyle Petty said, “but we wanted to keep (the amount) shorter this year. It’s still been a great group.”

More: Auto racing icon Richard Petty scheduled to appear in Harborcreek Township on May 5

Multiple motives

Kyle Petty’s current rally, as have many before it, was arranged to raise money for Victory Junction and related children’s charities.

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Victory Junction, located in Randleman, North Carolina, is a camp the Petty family specifically created for children with life-threatening illness. The facility, at no cost to their families, offers them outdoor life experiences largely unavailable elsewhere.

More than 135,000 youth have benefitted from Victory Junction’s 23-year existence, according to the charity’s website.

Donations made during the rally’s May 5 stop will add to more than $22 million formerly raised.

Kyle Petty also has arranged the rallies as a cathartic way to honor his late son.

Adam Petty, the family’s fourth-generation stock car driver, died during a May 12, 2000, practice session at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. He was only 19.

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“When I see the smiles on campers’ (faces),” Kyle Petty said, “I know it’s an Adam Petty smile.”

More: Tony Stewart takes 9th in All Star race at Eriez

Unwanted do-over

The line for Richard Petty’s autograph briefly spilled into the travel center’s southern parking lot. Among those who comprised it were Ron Honey, 48, and his wife Kristen, 46.

Although the Warren couple sought Richard Petty’s autograph a second time, their reason why was a bittersweet one.

Among the memorabilia the Honeys held was a photo of Richard Petty signing Ron’s die-cast replica of Petty’s famed Pontiac STP No. 43 car. It was snapped during Petty’s 2017 appearance at New York’s Watkins Glen International.

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Last year, a housefire engulfed most of Honeys’ possessions. Among them were Ron Honey’s shirt and miniature car from the picture.

“When we found out (Petty) was going to be here,” Kristen Honey said, “we wanted to try and recreate the whole photo. (Ron) found the same shirt he wore and die-cast car on eBay.”

The Erie Times-News caught up with the couple after their brief time with Petty.

Their do-over was deemed a success.

“He’s so personable and such a down-to-earth guy,” Ron Honey said.

‘Good genes’

The Petty caravan departed the travel center roughly an hour after it arrived. The riders were due in Niagara Falls, New York, by night’s end.

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It’s there that Richard Petty is scheduled to spend much of May 6 at an American locale also considered iconic.

Petty considered himself blessed he can still actively help raise money for Victory Junction as an octogenarian, and even more so after former decades in a life-threatening profession.

“I guess I’m lucky to have good genes,” Richard Petty said. “It feels good to know (Kyle and I) are still here.

“If God let us live this long, the least we can do is give back.”

Contact Mike Copper at mcopper@timesnews.com. Follow him on X @ETNcopper.

This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Richard Petty remains “The King” to Erie’s auto racing fans