LAWRENCE COUNTY, Ark. (KAIT) – The Walnut Ridge Fire Department and the Hoxie Fire Department are responding to a fire at the former Cox Motorsports building.

According to Lawrence County Sheriff Tony Waldrupe, dispatch received a call at 7:23 p.m. about a fire in a commercial building on the intersection of Highway 63 and Lawrence County 701.

He identified it as the former Cox Motorsports building.

Sheriff Waldrupe said firemen reported heavy smoke when they arrived.

No injuries have been reported at this time.

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Steve Phelps became NASCAR’s first commissioner in March 2025 after previously serving as its president since 2018. However, he will be leaving that position ahead of the 2026 season, and there aren’t any plans to line up a suitable replacement anytime soon. The duties he served will instead be shared by other executives. But what led to this sudden turn of events?

The core cause of his resignation is the inflammatory text messages that were revealed during the antitrust lawsuit proceedings between NASCAR and 23XI Racing/Front Row Motorsports. Phelps had spoken badly about Richard Childress, one of the most respected veterans of the sport, and offensively insulted him in these messages. It led to widespread disruption of NASCAR’s image.

Former driver Kenny Wallace spoke about this in a recent video posted to his YouTube channel, detailing how Phelps might have been NASCAR’s scapegoat to fix everything wrong. He pointed out the statement that Bass Pro Shops CEO Johnny Morris made after the messages came to light. Morris, a longtime friend of Childress and a reputed sponsor in NASCAR, hadn’t sounded very happy in it.

He wrote, “…Such blatant disrespect would probably not sit well with the fans – such a commissioner most likely wouldn’t, or shouldn’t keep his or her job for very long!” This is where Wallace sees the silver lining. He emphasized that Phelps is gone now because NASCAR doesn’t want to antagonize the most powerful and wealthy people in the industry.

Bass Pro Shops has been a long-time supporter of NASCAR, sponsoring Richard Childress Racing since 1998. Firing him was the only way to fix the image issue the promotion was suffering from and move forward. 

Wallace added, “So, NASCAR has an image issue. I don’t think Steve Phelps could have walked around the pit area. Could you imagine Steve Phelps the first week at Daytona? How could he have walked around the garage area?” It surely would have been as awkward for the drivers and crew members as it would have been for Phelps himself. In that light, perhaps, this is only for the good.

Wallace was also keen to bring across his opinion that the good work that Phelps did with NASCAR must not go unappreciated because of the one bad thing he did. Again, his resignation was only a plausible outcome of all the fiasco that went down over the past couple of years. Fresh beginnings await the sport with the 2026 season on the horizon.

NASCAR star Kyle Larson has announced that he will be canceling his gym membership after Hendrick Motorsports struck a partnership with Atrium Health, with a new 35,000-square-foot facility set to open on the team’s campus.

Hendrick vice chairman Jeff Gordon announced the exciting new partnership on Thursday, with athletes, crew members, and staff set to receive access to the stunning health facility. Larson reposted Gordon’s post and wrote on X: “Canceling my gym membership now.”

Larson won the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series and is set to be in even better shape heading into next season. Atrium Health already supports more than 20 professional and collegiate teams, over 100 high schools across North Carolina and South Carolina, and now, Hendrick Motorsports.

The new Atrium Health Motorsports Athletic Center will be located on the team’s campus in Concord. The facility includes a “high-performance gym with the latest training equipment, modern locker rooms, a team operations center for race-day competition operations, a nutrition area, athletic meeting and film rooms, and dedicated spaces for physical therapy, hydrotherapy, and recovery.”

The facility also has a dedicated space for sports science research, and features a closed-loop pit stop practice circuit that can accommodate two teams, allowing Hendrick to perfect its craft. In return, Atrium Health will have logo placement on driver fire suits, crew apparel, athletic training gear, and track equipment.

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“The demands of NASCAR are different from any other sport – the schedule is relentless, the margins are extremely tight, and performance is about preparation as much as it is execution,” Gordon said. “This new facility allows our coaches and staff to work side by side with Atrium Health clinicians, ensuring every aspect of training, recovery, and readiness is aligned.

“Everything in this space is designed around our athletes and our teammates. At the end of the day, it always comes back to people, and this new partnership reflects a shared commitment to supporting them the right way every day.”

Hendrick Motorsports owner Rick Hendrick added, “People are the foundation of our organization, and supporting their health and performance is essential to our success. Our new partnership with Atrium Health brings best-in-class clinical and performance resources directly to our campus.

“There’s no facility like this in the world of auto racing. It’s a game-changer. The Atrium Health Motorsports Athletic Center will help our athletes perform at their best and give our teammates convenient access to high-quality health care.

“We value the shared commitment to people that defines both of our organizations, and we look forward to a truly incredible collaboration in the coming years.”

Larson is extremely excited about the new facility, but he isn’t the only driver who will benefit from it. Chase Elliott, William Byron, and Alex Bowman are also on the Hendrick Motorsports roster.

In 2026, Honda will newly enter the FIA^*2 Formula One World Championship (F1) as a factory power unit supplier to the Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team (AMAF1). Honda’s motorsports operations arm, Honda Racing Corporation (HRC), will be responsible for the core activities of F1 participation, including the development, manufacturing, and trackside operation of the power unit (PU).

The 2025 season marked the final year in which Honda provided technical support and marketing collaboration as a team partner to Oracle Red Bull Racing and the Visa Cash App Racing Bulls. At the final round of the season, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Max Verstappen achieved a pole-to-win result, providing a fitting conclusion to the eight-year partnership. From 2026 onward, Honda will take on a new challenge together with AMAF1, aiming once again for the pinnacle of the sport.

In Japan-domestic racing, during the 2025 All-Japan Super Formula Championship^*3, TEAM MUGEN driver Ayumu Iwasa claimed the Drivers’ Championship. Meanwhile, DOCOMO TEAM DANDELION RACING, represented by Tadasuke Makino and Kakunoshin Ohta, secured the Teams’ Championship. The team will once again target a double title in the 2026 season.

In the SUPER GT Series^*4, STANLEY TEAM KUNIMITSU, with Naoki Yamamoto and Tadasuke Makino, finished second overall in the 2025 season. For 2026, Honda will introduce the all-new HRC PRELUDE-GT, based on the Prelude.

From an operational standpoint, Honda will appoint a new Technical Director to provide cross-team support for the five teams campaigning the HRC PRELUDE-GT. This structure will strengthen collaboration among teams and drivers while improving the quality of technical feedback to HRC’s Sakura development division. In addition, Car No. 8 will compete under the newly named Team HRC ARTA MUGEN, with multiple dedicated HRC engineers assigned, further deepening HRC’s direct involvement. Through these initiatives, Honda aims to reclaim the championship title.

Furthermore, Yuto Nomura, champion of the All-Japan Super Formula Lights Championship, will step up to Super Formula with San-Ei Gen with B-Max, and will also compete in the SUPER GT GT500 class with Astemo REAL RACING.

In North America, Honda will continue supplying power units to five teams competing in the IndyCar Series through Honda Racing Corporation USA (HRC US). In the IMSA^*5 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, two Acura ARX-06 entries supplied by HRC US will compete in the top-tier GTP class. Continuing its partnership with Meyer Shank Racing, Car No. 93 will again see HRC US engineers responsible for key aspects of team operations, further accelerating both human resource development and technical advancement.

In addition, Kakunoshin Ohta, who began competing in IMSA last year, will once again contest two events with the team this season, including the 24 Hours of Daytona.

With a new NASCAR season so close and sweeping changes already in motion, from horsepower adjustments to an updated playoff format, Hendrick Motorsports has moved to strengthen its foundation away from the racetrack as well. After publicly backing the new Chevrolet body unveiled in December, the organization has turned its focus inward, emphasizing the physical demands on its people as speed increases and the calendar tightens.

To that end, Hendrick Motorsports (HMS) has partnered with Atrium Health, one of the largest hospital networks in the southern United States, to provide integrated medical, wellness, and sports performance services for more than 50 pit crew athletes. The collaboration will also extend care and resources to HMS employees based in the Charlotte area, a move that Jeff Gordon believes could play a significant role in the team’s long-term development.

The partnership includes the construction of a 35,000-square-foot facility, the Atrium Health Motorsports Athletic Center, which is scheduled to open later this month. Sports facility design firm Forty Nine Degrees played a key role in designing the space. As part of the agreement, Atrium Health branding will be featured across HMS assets, including driver fire suits, team apparel, and track equipment.

Explaining why the collaboration struck the right chord, Gordon, vice chairman of HMS, emphasized that progress in the sport constantly circles back to people. He said, “We’re always looking at how can we make our race teams stronger and better, and it always falls back to people… I love that Atrium is interested in how our athletes train.”

Gordon noted that NASCAR places a unique strain on the body, unlike traditional stick-and-ball sports. “It is different than other sports. It’s a different discipline on your body. Performance, execution, and recovery after an event, you need the experts in those fields to be able to do that properly,” he added.

He further stressed that NASCAR’s grind leaves little room for error. The schedule offers no real pauses, margins remain extremely thin, and success depends as much on preparation as on what happens in the car or over the wall. By housing coaches, performance staff, and Atrium Health clinicians under one roof, the new center would allow training, recovery, and readiness to move in lockstep.

The layout places athletes and team members at the center, reinforcing the belief that sustained performance is built on consistent, comprehensive care. From HMS’s perspective, the partnership reflects a shared commitment to supporting its people the right way, every day.

Inside the new facility, HMS athletes will have access to state-of-the-art training equipment, modern locker rooms, a race-day operations center, nutrition and recovery spaces, film rooms, therapy and treatment areas, and dedicated sports research zones. The center also features a closed-loop pit stop practice circuit designed to accommodate two teams simultaneously, further enhancing preparation and efficiency.

In fact, support for the partnership arrived quickly from the HMS driver lineup as well. Kyle Larson publicly endorsed the move, resharing Gordon’s post that offered an early look at the facility, including the gym and swimming areas. Larson punctuated his approval with a short message: “Canceling my gym membership now .”

Atrium Health’s ties to NASCAR extend well beyond this agreement. The organization has supported the sport for years through efforts such as the NASCAR Day Giveathon and by providing sports medicine coverage at marquee events, including the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Team owner Rick Hendrick and his wife Linda have also maintained a long history of philanthropic involvement with the health system.

HMS President Marshall Carlson serves on Atrium’s governing board executive committee, further strengthening the relationship. Atrium Health operates as part of Advocate Health, a nonprofit system ranked third-largest in the United States, serving nearly 6 million patients.

The GR Yaris MORIZO RR is a special-edition model created with Toyota Motor Corporation Chairman and Master Driver Akio Toyoda, aka Morizo, by applying insights gained through the challenge of competing as TOYOTA GAZOO ROOKIE Racing (TGRR) in the 2025 Nürburgring 24 Hours endurance race.

TGR, with its core mission of making ever-better motorsports-bred cars, and ROOKIE Racing, which hones GR vehicles, transcended organizational boundaries and came together based on roles rather than titles under Morizo’s leadership to form TGRR, aiming to further accelerate the making of ever-better cars.

In the Nürburgring 24 Hours, Morizo, as a team driver, took the wheel of the GAZOO Racing Direct Automatic Transmission-equipped No. 109 GR Yaris fielded by TGRR, logging more laps than scheduled despite the course’s grueling conditions. Upon the team’s successful completion of the race, Morizo was quick to convey how good he found the GR Yaris to be, and he credited its 8-speed automatic transmission with enabling him to conquer 15 laps.

The GR Yaris MORIZO RR is exceptional for its Nürburgring-cultivated delivery of car-driver unity for a high level of driver-vehicle interaction, its reliability and security, and its ability to make car-lovers smile and want to keep on driving it.

The GR Yaris MORIZO RR for the Japanese market is to be available in a total of 100 units from spring 2026, with purchasing lottery applications now being accepted via the TGR official smartphone application “GR app”. The model is also to be released in certain European markets in a limited run of 100 units.