MECHANICSBURG, Pa. – After losing the race to rain on July 5, Williams Grove Speedway officials have announced the 31st annual Mitch Smith Memorial will be made up on July 19.

The Mitch Smith Memorial will be part of Thrivent Financial World of Outlaws Tune Up Night for the Lawrence Chevrolet 410 sprint cars.

Using the usual Outlaws format to set the starting field, the 30-lap main event will pay $8,080.80 to win, in honor of both the oval’s 80th anniversary racing season and the late Mitch Smith.

As another way of honoring Smith, there will be no increase in the scheduled admission for the special show, which will also be part of the Diamond Series for the sprint cars.

The rescheduling of the Mitch Smith Memorial will allow the prestigious race to continue its longevity at the oval, first run in 1989 and won by Stevie Smith.

Richard D. “Mitch” Smith was the original “Mr. Excitement” of Pennsylvania sprint car lore.

At Williams Grove Speedway, he ended his four-decade long career in 1978 with 27 sprint car wins and nine supermodified victories. Overall on his career, he had 179 triumphs.

Smith retired from the sport in 1978 and in 1988, at the age of 58, was felled by a massive heart attack.

Adult general admission for the Mitch Smith Memorial is set at $17, with youth ages 13-20 admitted for just $10. Kids ages 12 and under are admitted for free at Williams Grove.

The HJ Towing & Recovery 358 sprints will also be on the racing program.

The Champion Racing Oil Summer Nationals, featuring the World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series, will return to the track on July 26-27.

CONCORD, N.C. — With two more victories in the past week, Brad Sweet continues to lead the National 410 Sprint Car Rankings.

Sweet, who won at South Dakota’s Brown County Speedway and Wisconsin’s Cedar Lake Speedway, has 10 victories this season, including nine with the World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series.

Sweet’s average finish is 5.189 in 37 starts.

Donny Schatz, Danny Dietrich, David Gravel and Daryn Pittman wrap up the top five in the national rankings.

Lance Dewease currently owns a 5.111 average finish and is one start shy of the 20 starts need to qualify for the rankings.

Dietrich leads the Eastern region on the strength of 10 victories, while other regional leaders are Buddy Kofoid (Great Lakes), Billy Balog (Great Plains), Dominic Scelzi (West), Jacob Patton (Mid America) and Jack Sodeman Jr. (Ohio-PA).

The season has been hampered by rain and drivers in most regions have yet to run enough races to qualify for the national rankings.

Eighty-five drivers have combined to win 179 features run through July 7.

Dietrich and Sweet each have 10 victories.

To view the complete national and regional rankings, click below.

SLINGER, Wis. – Grant Griesbach was, in a sense, already a grizzled veteran of racing when he pulled into Slinger Super Speedway at nine years old to drive a Slinger Bee – the track’s 4-cylinder division.

“Yeah, who was the dumb dad who allowed that?” joked his dad, Jeremy Griesbach.

At 10 years old, Grant won a feature in the Slinger Bees division, becoming the youngest feature winner in track history.

At 12 years old, he moved into the track’s limited late model division, which is the second tier division to the track’s primary division – super late models.

Now a full-grown 17-year-old going into his senior year at nearby Pewaukee High School, Grant is gaining the respect of his competitors and showcasing to fans he is worthy of being in the super late model division.

He’s not only in the division, he’s also become a contender.

“He’s doing a good job; there’s no doubt,” said three-time track champion Brad “JJ” Mueller.

At Tuesday night’s 40th SUPERSEAL Slinger Nationals presented by Miller Lite, Griesbach’s result won’t show the competitiveness he displayed. By a little luck, Griesbach got the pole position.

In qualifying he was 14th quickest. The top 12 automatically qualified for the 200-lap main event. But, because two cars failed post-qualifying inspection, he and Ryan Farrell got to start the Slinger Nationals on the front row.

Grant said the break moved him from what would’ve been a start outside the top 12. And he didn’t flinch at the opportunity to flex his proverbial muscles, running with some of the nation’s best race car drivers such as Ty Majeski, Kenseth, Daniel Hemrich and others.

At one point Tuesday night, he was surrounded by those three drivers.

“I think he can run up there,” Jeremy said. “I really do.

“What I think he needs to learn is more on the car side, the set ups and be smart enough to do a lot of that.”

Grant is working hard to do that, Jeremy said.

One of Grant’s mentors is six-time super late model champion Conrad Morgan, who sets up his pit two spots down. Jeremy said Grant and Conrad have been working together, which Grant said has been beneficial. But it has, in a possible sign of Grant’s growth, become a relationship where they lean on each other.

“But he’s making a lot of his own calls and his own decisions,” Jeremy said. “Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. When it works, he can run up there with those guys.”

The growth and development is noticeable. Grant led the first four laps of the feature – won by Matt Kenseth – and went on to finish seventh. However, that was his worst spot on the track. He was in the top five virtually all race long.

“He’s learning stuff on his own,” Jeremy said. “I think as he grows out of the teenage stuff and gets a little bit more attention to detail, he’ll be even better.

“He’s working at it; he’s busting his butt.”

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SPARTA, Ky. – Paul Menard and his No. 21 Ford Mustang will honor one of America’s racing heroes on Saturday during the Quaker State 400 at Kentucky Speedway.

Menard’s Quaker State-sponsored Mustang will carry a paint scheme reminiscent of the Quaker State colors that appeared on the No. 11 World of Outlaws sprint car driven by Steve Kinser in 2005, the year he won his 20th series championship.

The paint scheme was chosen in a fan poll that included Quaker State colors carried in NASCAR by Ricky Rudd in 1988, when his No. 26 Buick delivered Quaker State its first NASCAR win, at Watkins Glen.

Fans also had the option of voting for a design carried by Eddie Cheever and his No. 27 Lola in 1996, when he ran the fastest Indy 500 lap ever with a blistering speed of 230.103 miles per hour on the 78th lap of that race.

Menard said carrying Kinser’s familiar green Quaker State paint scheme is an honor.

“When I was a kid, Steve Kinser was at the top of his game,” Menard said of the legendary driver who won 690 Outlaw A-Mains in his career. “I definitely have a lot of respect for what he’s done.”

Menard also has a lot of respect for the Kentucky track, which he says can be a challenge – especially turn three.

“Turn three at Kentucky is the trickiest turn of any track we go to,” he said. “Turns one and two are pretty straightforward for a mile-and-a-half track, then (turn) three is flatter on entry.

“You’re loose on entry, then you pick up the banking as you go into turn four.”

Menard said that while Kentucky is flatter than most mile-and-a-half tracks, it makes up for it by being wider than most.

“It’s definitely a unique track,” he said.

CONCORD, N.C. — Once in a while, you find a gem where it is least expected.

We found such a jewel on Twitter in the form of the photo that accompanies this column.

Snapped during the NTT IndyCar Series weekend at Texas Motor Speedway, the image was posted by A.J. Foyt Racing with simple dialogue — Living Legends.

“Those are my guys,” I said upon seeing the photo of Johnny Rutherford, Rick Mears, A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti.

A simple photo generated a wide range of emotions. First, there was the joy of simply seeing them all together. Then, we realized how fortunate the motorsports world, and Indy car racing in particular, is that they are all still here.

Not only did they make it through racing’s most dangerous era, they’ve survived to live long and fulfilling lives.

But as Chris Economaki would have said, “They’re not spring chickens anymore.”

Foyt is 84. Rutherford (81) and Andretti (79) are close behind. At 67, Mears is the kid of this bunch.

When I first became interested in racing, they were the stars of the sport. I cheered for some of them louder than others.

When writing skills paved the way for me to work in motorsports, I was fortunate to meet all of them at one point or another. Through the years, the cheers were replaced by admiration for “my guys.”

But without a doubt, it was their contributions on the race track that first captured my attention.

One of the very first races I attended was a USAC championship dirt car event at the Indiana State Fairgrounds, which was won by Foyt. And, as the Kerchner family attended the Indianapolis 500 and Indy car races at Michigan Int’l Speedway for most of my youth, Foyt was the family favorite.

It seems we gravitated to the four-time Indy 500 winner as much for his passionate personality as his success on the track.

Rutherford won the first Indianapolis 500 I attended in 1980 aboard Jim Hall’s beautiful “Yellow Submarine.” It was Rutherford’s third Indy win and our favorite memory from the race came after the checkered flag when Rutherford picked up Tim Richmond, whose ride was disabled on the final lap, and “chauffeured” him back to the pit lane.

Rutherford’s “Lone Star J.R.” nickname and laidback personality were as appealing as the class he showed off the track.

Mears knew how to win and he did it in such an unassuming way that few were ever upset when the longtime Team Penske driver visited victory lane. With a combination of speed, skill and patience, Mears won four Indianapolis 500s. I was there for three of them.

The irony of Foyt and Andretti sitting together in this photograph was not lost. Bitter rivals during their racing days, their competitive fire often spilled over to the fans. If you were an A.J. guy, you weren’t a Mario man; and vice versa.

Thus, growing up I rarely cheered for Andretti. But age brought appreciation for what he accomplished and numerous meetings, including a day he spent at the SPEED SPORT office in New Jersey during the early 1990s, won me over. Through the years, the 1969 Indy winner and 1978 Formula One world champion has become racing’s greatest spokesperson.

Together the racing accomplishments of these four men are incredible, unfathomable in many ways. They won 12 Indianapolis 500s, two Daytona 500s, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, a world driving title and 15 Indy car championships.

But despite all of the success racing around the globe, none of the four lost the down-to-earth nature with which they approach life. While they often seemed larger to life to fans — me included — they always remained simply Johnny, A.J., Rick and Mario.

These are “my guys!”

Three-time Stanley Cup winner Matt Cullen announced Wednesday that he is retiring after 21 seasons in the league.

The 42-year-old won his first Cup with Carolina in 2006 and then captured back-to-back titles with Pittsburgh in 2016 and '17.

In an essay on NHL.com, Cullen wrote that his career almost came to a close before his last two titles.

Matt Cullen: his story, his words.https://t.co/rsL9o4yk1j pic.twitter.com/985mgUtqpk

— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) July 10, 2019

"The phone didn't ring on July 1, 2015, the annual start to NHL free agency," he said. "I had just finished two great years in Nashville, but my future was still unclear. I still wanted to play even at 38 years old, but I was pretty sure that it was the end."

Then he got a call from Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford.

"I just pinch myself and think about how close it was to not happening," Cullen said. "Those were probably the best years of my whole career and life with the Penguins. Going through all that with the boys and Bridget and that group of players, the whole organization, everything was perfect. It was beyond anything I could have ever imagined."

Cullen said that he has been "in a constant state of almost-retirement for the last few years" and that he knew this past season would be his last.

He spent three of his past four seasons in Pittsburgh, with the 2017-18 season back home in Minnesota.

"It was an emotional time, but I knew it was coming. It just felt right and I was really at peace with everything when it was over.

"I felt like it was only right to retire in Pittsburgh with everything that the organization had given me and done for me," he said. "I'm so happy I came back and finished my last year in Pittsburgh. I wouldn't trade that last year for anything."

A second-round pick of Anaheim in 1996, Cullen played for the Ducks, Hurricanes, Panthers, Wild, Penguins, Panthers, Predators, Rangers and Senators.

He finishes with 266 goals and 465 assists.

Real Madrid's presentation of new €50 million defender Eder Militao was cut short when the 21-year-old Brazil international complained of feeling dizzy and had to be helped away to recover.

The midday event at a sweltering Bernabeu was proceeding as expected, with the former Porto player having spoken of his joy at arriving at the "biggest club in the world" and promising to "give everything on the pitch" for his new team.

Video | Militão started feeling dizzy and had to end the press conference. pic.twitter.com/RZrIbxVNYo

— Real Madrid Info (@RMadridInfo) July 10, 2019

Then just as a reporter was beginning a question about the future of his international teammate Neymar, Militao began to loosen his tie and took a deep drink of water before saying: "I feel dizzy, I feel dizzy, it's so emotional. I can't do anything more."

Madrid's press officer immediately ended the news conference, and the player was quickly helped away from the room.

Divock Origi has become the latest Liverpool player to commit his future to the club by signing a new deal at Anfield.

The 24-year-old, who scored the second goal in the Champions League final as Liverpool won their sixth European Cup, agreed fresh terms on Wednesday.

- When does the transfer window close?

As reported by ESPN FC, the European champions were confident the striker would extend his stay on Merseyside beyond the 12 months he had remaining on a deal from July 2014.

Talks over an improved contract began last season, progressed during the summer and accelerated this week.

His decision was never going to be financially driven, with the player valuing minutes over money. He rejected the chance to depart Liverpool last summer and in January in order to fight his way back into the manager's plans.

That decision was vindicated as the Belgium international contributed five of the club's most important goals in 2018-19 -- two in the Champions League semifinal win against Barcelona, Premier League against Everton and Newcastle in addition to his strike against Spurs -- despite limited game time.

Origi reported back to Melwood for preseason training on Monday and signalled his desire to play a further part in helping Liverpool win silverware.

He joins Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane, Roberto Firmino, Jordan Henderson, Joe Gomez, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson who have all renewed their contracts with the club over the past year.

Virgil van Dijk has informed Liverpool he would be happy to sign an extension, while Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Joel Matip and James Milner are among those expected to be next in line to agree new deals.

Jurgen Klopp and sporting director Michael Edwards have prioritised a policy of retaining players rather than making blockbuster moves this summer, confident that their no-waste approach allows them to strike if another "transformer" -- the word used at Melwood to describe Van Dijk and Alisson -- is within reach in future.

Liverpool's business in the window is forecasted to be minimal and largely centred around squad depth. They have edged out Europe's elite in their bid to sign Fulham's record-breaking midfielder Harvey Elliott, who became the youngest-ever Premier League player in May.

Liverpool have also added highly rated Dutch defender Sepp van den Berg,17, to their ranks.

NEW YORK -- Adoring fans lined New York City's Canyon of Heroes on Wednesday to praise the World Cup-winning U.S. women's national soccer team as athletic leaders on the field -- and as advocates for pay equity off it.

Construction workers sounded air horns above crowds chanting "USA! USA!" as the hourlong ticker-tape parade moved up a stretch of lower Broadway that has long hosted such celebrations for world leaders, veterans and hometown sports stars.

Co-captain Megan Rapinoe and her teammates shared a float with Mayor Bill de Blasio and U.S. Soccer Federation president Carlos Cordeiro. Rapinoe struck her now-famous victory pose, took a swig of champagne and handed the bottle to a fan. Goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher held the World Cup trophy aloft.

Aly Hoover, 12, of Glen Ridge, New Jersey, stood along the route with a poster of the face of Alex Morgan, another team star. "I just want to be like them," she said.

Garret Prather brought his newborn son "to celebrate how the American women made us proud on and off the field."

The team sealed its second consecutive tournament win by beating the Netherlands 2-0 on Sunday. It will get $4 million for winning the World Cup from FIFA, the international soccer governing body. The men's French team got $38 million for winning last year.

The U.S. women's team has sued the U.S. Soccer Federation for gender and pay discrimination. The women will get bonuses from the USSF about five times less than the men would have earned for winning the World Cup. The case is currently in mediation.

Kate Lane, who watched the parade, called the pay gap "massive" for the soccer players and "across the board" for most women.

"Especially in male-dominated professions," said Lane, of Limerick, Ireland. "Women put just as much commitment into their work as their male counterparts."

She is hopeful the younger generation is soaking up the message from the women's team, noting a girl about 7 years old wearing an "Equal Pay" T-shirt.

Earlier Wednesday, team members joined New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, as he signed a law expanding gender pay equality in the state. He said women's soccer players should be paid the same as male players.

#BREAKING: I just signed new pay equity legislation at the #USWNTParade.

The women's soccer team plays the same game that the men's soccer players play - only better. If anything, the men should get paid less.

Thank you @USWNT for helping lead this movement for change! pic.twitter.com/qHy2aYs2Tl

— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) July 10, 2019

U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat, introduced a bill Tuesday that would bar federal funding for the men's 2026 World Cup until the U.S. Soccer Federation provides equal pay to the women's and men's teams.

At a City Hall rally after the parade, de Blasio, also a Democrat, honored the team with symbolic keys to the city, saying it "brought us together" and "showed us so much to make us hopeful."

At the rally, Rapinoe noted the diversity of the team: "We have pink hair and purple hair, we have tattoos and dreadlocks, we have white girls and black girls and everything in between. Straight girls and gay girls."

The parade is named for the strands of ticker tape that used to be showered down from nearby office buildings. The tape has since been replaced with paper confetti, already drifting down from office buildings before Wednesday's parade started.

The Department of Sanitation said it will have 350 workers assigned to parade cleanup with trucks, backpack blowers and brooms at their disposal.

- Senator: No equal pay, no public '26 WC funds

The team had already started celebrating its record fourth Women's World Cup title. After touching down at Newark Liberty International Airport on Monday, players shared a toast and sang "We Are the Champions."

Team members appeared on ABC's "Good Morning America" in Times Square on Tuesday to show off their trophy and answer questions from cheering kids.

Rapinoe, the outspoken star who won the awards for the tournament's best player and top scorer, also appeared on CNN and MSNBC later Tuesday.

Rapinoe told CNN's Anderson Cooper that President Donald Trump's slogan "Make America Great Again" is "harking back to an era that wasn't great for everyone. It might've been great for a few people."

Rapinoe told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow that Trump had yet to invite the women's soccer team to the White House.

Trump had tweeted that he would invite the team, win or lose. Rapinoe has said she wouldn't be going to the White House. The team has accepted an invitation to visit Congress.