At the moment, N144KK is cruising at 45,000 feet, whistling eastward at more than 600 mph. Kalkhoven is leading a group of his associates and a handful of shell-shocked racing journalists in a round of “Moscow Martinis.” This involves slurping a lump of caviar off the back of one’s thumb and washing it down with straight vodka. Trust me, you will not find this on the drink menu at the Working Man’s Friend or Union Jack’s in Indianapolis.

Castroneves could often be a challenging interview, rarely deviating from programmed talking points and reluctant to reveal anything too personal. There was one fascinating exception. In 2011, I was asked to ghost-write a regular column for Helio that was posted on ESPN.com.

On Thursday, we drove back to Melbourne on the Great Ocean Road, Australia’s equivalent of California Highway 1. Great scenery, including the Bay of Martyrs, the Twelve Apostles, and Bells Beach, one of the world’s great surfing beaches and scene of the climactic final scene in the Keanu Reeves movie Point Break.

Think of classic road courses as a portal into the past – especially on vintage racing weekends.

“Will the IRL attract more fans to St. Pete and its two additional road races [in 2005] than it generally has with its poorly attended events at ovals? If so, will that subsequently lead to oval venues being dropped from the IRL calendar, to be replaced by road and street races that the League’s drivers, sponsors and manufacturers seem to crave?”

It’s always fascinating to see how championships are decided as the racing season draws to a close, given the number of title-deciding formats that exist these days.  The NTT IndyCar Series finale…

I was given the opportunity to cover 10-12 NASCAR races annually for a few years for ESPN.com, and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. I can’t fathom being a NASCAR full-timer, with 38…

Tom Petty didn’t understand the power of his Wildflowers album when he was making it, and he never really did achieve peace with what he and many others believe is his greatest body of…

Some readers may be aware that my next book project is pretty much a post-war history of Indy car racing in the Hulman-George era.  I set out to write about the modern…

Another season of Indy car racing has drawn to a close, and despite the best efforts of Josef Newgarden and Team Penske, Scott Dixon has been crowned series champion for the sixth…