Vroom Vroom with Taylor Hagler
The first woman to win an IMSA Michelin Pilot race joins the podcast, plus some playoff basketball notes
On the new Vroom Vroom podcast, we’re thrilled to welcome Taylor Hagler, the driver of the No. 77 Hyundai in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge and the No. 19 Lamborghini in ADAC GT Masters, to talk about the differences racing in Europe and America, the similarities between auto racing and show jumping, and the challenge of making your way as a racer without generational wealth. Plus, we hear from NASCAR and ARCA drivers Ryan Ellis, Parker Retzlaff, Zachary Tinkle, Lavar Scott, and Connor Zilisch about the experience of driving a regular car, away from the track, as we continue to share our conversations from Dover.
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This week, Taylor will be driving her TCR Hyundai at Laguna Seca, where she helpfully ran a demo lap a couple of years ago. Her race in the Michelin Pilot Series, the Weathertech Raceway Laguna Seca 120, is scheduled for Saturday and available on Peacock.
Since we had a guest, we didn’t talk a ton about the weekend in racing, which saw the closest finish in NASCAR history…
…and Lando Norris getting his first career F1 win.
On that front: it was the first win for McLaren since Daniel Ricciardo at the 2021 Italian Grand Prix, and the first win for a British driver in a British car since Jenson Button won in Brazil for McLaren at the end of 2012.
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Norris’ win had significant implications for our podcast’s F1 bingo game. Everyone can get bingo next race, it’ll just take a Charles Leclerc victory for Addy, Carlos Sainz P2 for Jesse, Norris P4 for Katie, and Ricciardo P10 for Britt.
As we were recording this episode, Jalen Brunson was beginning his latest masterpiece, pouring in 43 points to lead the Knicks to a Game 1 win over the Pacers — Brunson’s fourth straight 40-point game to tie Michael Jordan and Bernard King for the second-longest such streak in NBA playoff history, behind Jerry West.
Also, per Stathead, Brunson has scored 256 points in seven playoff games, which already puts him 29th all-time for a single Knicks playoff run. The team record is 547 by Patrick Ewing in 25 games in 1994, with only Willis Reed (426 in 18 games, 1970), King (417 in 12 games, 1984), and Latrell Sprewell (407 in 28 games, 1999) having reached 400.
Knicks-Pacers is the first series ever to start with a 121-117 game. The last time we saw that score in the playoffs was 1984, when the Nuggets bested the Jazz in Game 3 of a first-round series that led Woody Paige to write “the Jazz have no heart,” and the Jazz to win the next two games and the series.
Speaking of embarrassing turns of events for the Nuggets, losing by 26 points at home to the Timberwolves to go down 0-2 stings, but in both 2021 and 2022 the eventual NBA champions suffered 39-point losses in the second round, including the 2021 Bucks going down 0-2 to the Nets.
Milwaukee was going back home, though. Only one team has lost as badly at home as the Nuggets did in Game 2 and gone on to win the championship: the 2000 Lakers lost Game 2 of the Western Conference finals to the Trail Blazers, 106-77, before going on to win that series in seven and the first of their three straight chips.
The last time the defending NBA champions lost a playoff game this badly on their court was the end of that Lakers run 2003, when Tim Duncan scored 37 and the Spurs rolled, 110-82, to close out their second-round series in six games.
San Antonio went on to win the title, which has to be an encouraging factoid for Minnesota fans looking for confirmation that what we’re seeing is real.