Global Rallycross

Red Bull Global Rallycross Heads Home To LA For Double Header Number Three

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After a three week break, Red Bull Global Rallycross heads to Los Angeles, California for the third double header event of the season in what is the series’ home town.

With only five races left this year, Ken Block leads the title charge by 41 points over Olsbergs rookie Sebastian Eriksson. Washington DC winner Nelson Piquet Jr. lies third in the standings after a breakthrough weekend in the capital where he took his first event win in the series as well as a brace of heat wins.

The quietly consistent Austin Dyne is fourth in the championship, one place ahead of his Bryan Herta Rally Sport team mate Patrik Sandell who after being struck by bad luck constantly in the first half of the year is currently enjoying a strong run of form which has seen his finish in the top two in the previous two rounds.

Red Bull GRC’s last visit to LA saw Scott Speed and Rhys Millen share the wins. Like Sandell, Speed has also had his fair share of bad luck this season, but after a tough weekend in DC the former F1 racer was confident that he triumph again at GRC annual west coast trip, as well as in each of the remaining rounds this season.

“I’m quite sure we’re going to end up winning the last five races,” he said. “I mean, we can’t have this bad luck every time.”

Millen however hasn’t raced this season, but his team will return to the Red Bull GRC Supercars field for the first time since the season curtain-raiser in Fort Lauderdale.

Brian Wong, a former NASCAR and sportscar racer, will be behind the wheel of a sole Hyundai Veloster Turbo being run by the Huntington Beach-based team.

Another team returning for LA is Subaru. The Japanese marque will be the event’s title sponsor and their Vermont Sports Car-run team is back with twice as many entries as when they last competed in Detroit.

Alongside Sverre Isachsen and Bucky Lasek in their new WRX STis, Travis Pastrana and David Higgins make their first starts of the Red Bull GRC season behind the wheel of last year’s hatchback Imprezas.

Brian Deegan will also be back for Ganassi after Jeff Ward filled in for the former X Games Rallycross gold medallist.

The course that the field will tackle in LA this season is different from last years, featuring 13 turns across 0.702 miles. The course will run counter-clockwise and will feature a crossover jump, marking the first time since 2012 that the figure-eight feature has been used.

The Kobalt Tools Joker Lap features towards the end of the course, while the dirt section, about halfway into the lap, features three turns and the jump – unlike the previous round in DC where the dirt section was comprised of a straight-away and the jump.

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Dominik Wilde is a professional motorsport and motoring writer that has covered events in both the UK and USA. His main focus for the Checkered Flag is covering Americas Rallycross and Nitro Rallycross.
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