F1 star ‘would love’ to race in NASCAR – and rule | Sports News

Newly-promoted Red Bull driver Liam Lawson could also be competing in his first full season in Formula 1, however the 23-yr-previous is already dreaming about doubtlessly racing regularly in the United States.

Lawson spoke about his need to compete in NASCAR during a current assembly with Cup Series driver Noah Gragson, the place he raced in a Ford simulator. Lewis Hamilton becoming a member of Ferrari wasn’t the one roster change forward of the 2025 F1 season, as Lawson has develop into teammates with Max Verstappen after changing Sergio Perez at Red Bull. Lawson has wins in F3, F2, and at Super Formula degree, and his monitor report has seen him promoted within the ranks.

Ahead of the 2025 season, Lawson met with Gragson on the Ford Performance Technical Center in Concord, North Carolina due to a future partnership with Ford and Red Bull. Lawson raced on the Circuit of the Americas and at Bristol Motor Speedway in the simulator, and impressed Gragson.

Lawson’s first attempt noticed him full a lap in two minutes and 15 seconds, which was 4 seconds off the back-of-the-grid average in 2024. Following his first style of NASCAR motion, Lawson stated: “Dude, I would love to do a race in America.”

When Gragson requested him to affirm that he meant NASCAR, Lawson replied: “Yeah, 100 percent.” Thanks to a controversial new exemption rule in NASCAR, the driving force from New Zealand could have the possibility to get behind the wheel of a stock car.

The well-known Daytona 500 race was stuffed with controversy this season as some fulltime drivers had been upset with a new NASCAR ruling. The new ‘Open Exemption Provisional Rule’ permits NASCAR to award a assured begin to a “world-class” driver regardless of their qualification efforts.

Former F1 driver Kimi Raikkonen has beforehand raced in NASCAR, however the beneficiary of the new rule this yr was veteran Helio Castroneves. While NASCAR is trying to shake issues up and additionally encourage more worldwide drivers to compete by utilizing the exemption, it hasn’t gone down nicely with a number of fulltime drivers.

“We didn’t know about it until the rule came out,” NASCAR legend Jimmie Johnson stated. “Evidently, it was buried in the charter agreement that came out. But when the rule came out, I forget the time of the morning, three minutes later, we were on the phone with NASCAR.”

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Denny Hamlin accused NASCAR of being “desperate” with the new rule, and added: “I mean I just think it reeks of desperation. I don’t know how else to say it. I don’t know how nice you can really say it.

“It simply feels such as you’re attempting to get any variety of headline you possibly can to be related and I do not adore it. To me, it’s a short-term gain, long-term loss. I simply assume that you’re premier Stock Car sequence in the U.S. The premier racing sport in the U.S.; be the large boys and power people to come in right here and get their credentials and do it the natural means.

“I don’t think it is going to be a big factor anywhere other than Daytona. But just simply put, saying that someone has a name that interests you and that they are going to have an automatic bid in the highest form of motorsports in the U.S. – I don’t love it.”