Owner-driver Ed Carpenter outran the Penske and Andretti megateams to earn the pole position for next Sunday’s 2013 Indianapolis 500. Get this news and more in the Executive Briefing. Tom Cote photo for Indianapolis Motor Speedway
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+ CEO Dan Akerson says General Motors will soon reclaim its investment-grade credit rating and rejoin the Standard & Poor 500 Index. More here at the Detroit Free Press.
+ New car sales in Europe inched up 1.7 percent in April, posting the first gain in 19 months. More here at Businessweek.
+ A federal judge in Kansas City has ordered Dow Chemical to pay $1.2 billion in a price-fixing case involving automotive urethane materials. More here at Thomson Reuters.
+ A Birmingham, Michigan developer wants to turn the site of a former GM factory in Pontiac into 300 Car Condos for automotive enthusiasts. More here at The Detroit News.
+ Ed Carpenter put together a nearly flawless four-lap average of 228.762 mph in his Dallara-Chevrolet to claim the pole position for next week’s Indy 500. More here at ESPN.
+ With a new plant in Hunan province, Volkswagen hopes to increase its annual production in China to four million units by 2018. More here at The Detroit Bureau.
+ A unique Bertone-bodied Aston Martin DB4 Jet coupe sold for a record $4.85 million at the Bonham’s Newport Pagnell auction. More here at Bloomberg.com.
+ Jamie Whincup won the money round at the inaugural race for Australia’s V8 Supercar series at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. More here at Motorsport.com.
For the previous Executive Briefing from May 17, click here.
That’s a very attractive livery, I wouldn’t mind seeing it in Victory Lane. The problem is that Carpenter is Tony George’s stepson and so I have to cast my vote against him.
My favorite for the 500 is Takuma Sato. I’d much rather see AJ Foyt celebrating a win than Tony. You just know that if Sato is near the front he will make the race exciting by taking unreasonable risks. As a bonus, it will spit in the eye of the many Japan-haters among NASCAR fans.
The 500 is such a great race. I hope they don’t water it down by running a Fall race there. I’m opposed to running the 500 under the lights too. For no other reason than prime time broadcasts bring in more money for commercials and greedy ABC execs will turn the show into an ad-fest like Fox’s NASCAR broadcasts.