Formula One’s first Las Vegas Grand Prix in decades didn’t get off to a good start Thursday night. A drain cover came loose less than 10 minutes into the first practice session and seriously damaged Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari. After later inspection, Alpine stated it had to replace Esteban Ocon’s chassis as a result of damage from a loose drain cover.

Free Practice 1 was cancelled as a result after just nine minutes of running. Free Practice 2 was delayed to 2 a.m. local time and extended to 90 minutes after crews made repairs on track, but fans were not allowed back to watch the second session of the night.

After Ferrari made significant repairs to his car, Sainz was given a 10-spot penalty for the race.

Formula 1 CEO Stefano Domenicali and Las Vegas Grand Prix CEO Renee Wilm released a joint statement Friday afternoon in the wake of the multiple problems. The statement specifies the session stopped due to a water valve cover that broke on Las Vegas Boulevard and crews inspected the rest of the track.

“The decision to run the second Free Practice session at 2:30 AM PT was supported by all parties to ensure the sporting integrity of the remainder of the event,’ the statement read. “We would like to thank the drivers, mechanics and all the teams for their patience and commitment last night to ensure that we could run the session successfully.’

The statement details the decision to send fans home was because of concern for ‘public safety and security officials who had been in service for a long time,’ for transportation employees driving fans back to hotels who were ‘bumping up against the amount of time they can legally and safely drive buses,’ and hospitality staff needing to clean and resupply guest areas for the fan experience.

Those decisions plus delays, closing for fans, empty restaurants, and blocked views caused a reaction from fans on social media.

F1 fans react to Carlos Sainz penalty

This isn’t the first time drain covers have been a problem in Formula 1. The most recent drain cover damage happened during the 2019 Azerbaijan Grand Prix when George Russell ran over one during Free Practice 1 in his Williams.

But Sainz receiving a penalty for repairing damage caused by the circuit led to pushback from fans.

Formula 1 teams, fans confused and disappointed by delays, closings

Fans weren’t the only ones confused by the delays into the early hours of Friday morning. Even Williams’ and Alpine’s team accounts on X, formerly known as Twitter, got into a game of tic-tac-toe to pass the time.

Empty restaurants, street views blocked next to the Las Vegas Strip Circuit

With Formula One in town this weekend, local restaurants were expecting to be busy starting Thursday night. But that wasn’t the case in some spots on the Strip.

Walkways along the track were impacted, too, with black tarps and work lights deterring passersby from staying to watch.

What changes is F1 making for the rest of the Las Vegas Grand Prix?

Domenicali and Wilm’s statement says other events in F1 and beyond have been cancelled or affected because of weather or technical issues and the organization hopes people will understand.

For Friday night’s Free Practice 3 and Qualifying sessions, the statement reads that F1 officials ‘have worked overnight to adjust our staffing plans across security, transportation and hospitality to ensure that we can function and serve fans with the best possible experience in the event of an extended race schedule.’

Free Practice 3 starts at 11:30 p.m. ET and will be broadcast on ESPNU. Qualifying starts at 3:00 a.m. ET Saturday morning and will be broadcast on ESPN.

PULLMAN, Wash. – The president of the NCAA wants to restart discussions about getting helmet radio technology in college football as a way to avoid the controversy currently engulfing the Michigan Wolverines.

Charlie Baker, the new NCAA president, told USA TODAY Sports in an interview Friday that “my goal is going to be to try to get it back on the agenda” after previous discussions about it at the NCAA level didn’t go anywhere.

He declined comment on the NCAA’s investigation into Michigan, which is facing allegations that it violated an NCAA rule prohibiting in-person advance scouting of opponents to steal play-calling signals. Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh this week accepted a three-game suspension as punishment for it as part of a settlement with the Big Ten Conference.

“Michigan has been a very collaborative partner all the way through the process, and we’re gonna pursue it until we finish interviewing everybody that is scheduled to be interviewed and review all the documents that we’ve asked for,” Baker said Friday here at Washington State University, where he was visiting.

Other forms of sign-stealing are not against the rules, such using game film to decipher signals. But using video recordings to decode coaches’ signals from the sidelines is illegal under NCAA rules. So is in-person advance scouting, which violates an NCAA rule instituted in 1994 that prohibited it as a way to keep costs down for those who couldn’t afford such an operation. Some have argued the rule is antiquated because it’s no longer hard to afford in an era of $77 million coaching buyouts and conference realignment driven by lucrative television contracts.

What can the NCAA do about this?

Helmet technology could make old-fashioned handmade play signals obsolete with the use of audio communication from coaches through players’ helmets, which is used in the NFL. Such communication couldn’t be stolen by scouting a team in person to steal hand signals and signs made by coaches on the sideline to their players on the field.

“I think it’s a rule that people expect schools to comply with,” said Baker, who started at the NCAA in March and previously served as the governor of Massachusetts. “What I will say is I’m looking forward to having a conversation at least with the (Power Five conferences) about trying to create a framework and a structure around the helmet technology. There’s a lot of work you’ve got to do around your stadium, and it’s a complicated process. I’m not sure it would work for everybody in Division I to go there, but I think this a pretty good opportunity for us to engage the (Power Five) folks and try to figure out a way to make the helmet radios work because that would take this issue off the table.”

Baker said he’s not exactly sure why such technology has not advanced at the college level, but he hopes to change that.

The NCAA could play a role in it, he said, because “you need rules.”

“The NFL has rules for both how you use them and how you can’t use them, what you use them for, and you’d also want to come up with some sort of universal design for how you’re gonna do this stuff around the stadium,” Baker said. “You need a framework for it.”

Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

LSU women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey declined to give a reason for star player Angel Reese’s absence during the Tigers’ 73-50 win against Southeastern Louisiana on Friday.

Reese did not suit up as LSU (4-1) traveled to University Center in Hammond, Louisiana. Mulkey was direct in confirming that Reese is still part of the team without giving a specific cause for her absence.

‘Angel was not in uniform,’ Mulkey said. ‘Angel is a part of this basketball team, and we hope she’s back with the team soon. I’m not gonna answer any more than that.’

Reese, a sparkplug in last season’s national championship run, was benched for the second half of the Tigers’ previous game against Kent State, a move characterized by Kim Mulkey as a ‘coach’s decision.’ Reese played a season-low 14 minutes in the 109-79 win over Kent State and produced a season-low 11 points with five rebounds.

After LSU’s season-opening loss to Colorado, Reese bounced back with a 28-point, 14-rebound performance against Queen University in the second game of the season.

Reese is averaging 17 points and 10.3 rebounds per game after making appearances in each of LSU’s first four games. She’s shooting 46.9% from the field but has missed all of her five 3-point attempts from beyond the arc.

Ball, 22, has the initials ‘LF’ tattooed – short for his middle name LaFrance, which doubles as the name for his apparel company – in red ink behind his left ear. Ball also has the same tattoo on his right hand, although that’s not the tattoo in violation of the league rules.

‘Per the (collective bargaining agreement), players are prohibited from displaying commercial logos or corporate insignia on their body or in their hair during games,’ NBA spokesman Tim Frank said in a statement to USA TODAY Sports on Friday. ‘We try to enforce the rule reasonably, in accordance with its purpose, and taking into account players’ efforts to express themselves in a non-commercial manner. But LaMelo Ball’s neck tattoo is in obvious violation of the rule and, accordingly, he’s required to cover it.’

Ball, who is averaging 22.2 points, 5.4 rebounds and 8.6 assists this season, wore a bandage over his neck tattoo on Tuesday during the Hornets’ 111-105 loss to the Miami Heat to avoid any fines from the league, ESPN reported.

According to the outlet, representatives for Ball argued that other players in the past had tattoos that could be considered corporate logos, from the Jordan brand to Michelin, but the NBA said those players didn’t have endorsement deals with those companies.

Ball signed with Puma in 2020 ahead of the NBA Draft, where he was selected by the Hornets with the third overall pick. Ball released a LaFrance x Puma collaboration last month.

Ball was spotted wearing a blue bandage on his neck during Friday’s game against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Ball’s older brother, Chicago Bulls star Lonzo Ball, was required to cover a Big Baller Brand logo tattoo on his forearm with tape while he was playing with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2018.

In 2018, Cleveland Cavaliers guard JR Smith had to cover a tattoo of the Supreme logo, a New York-based streetwear company, on the back of his back leg to avoid discipline from the league.

Smith went on social media to voice his displeasure at the time, writing in a now-deleted post: ‘So I was informed today that I would be fined every game if I don’t cover up my ‘SUPREME TATTOO’ on my legs during games!! These people in the league office are something else!’

‘I swear I’m the only person they do (expletive) like this to,’ Smith continued. ‘So you mean to tell me I have to cover up my tattoo for what? You don’t make people cover up Jordan logos, NIKE checks or anything else but because it’s me it’s a problem all of a sudden!!! (expletive) whack.’

A day after creating quite the sports media firestorm and significantly harming the reputations and credibility of hundreds of sideline reporters, both women and men, sports broadcaster Charissa Thompson has finally apologized. 

In an Instagram story Friday morning, the Fox Sports and Amazon Prime Video host tried to explain what she intended to say. It turns out that “I would make up the report sometimes” really meant “In the absence of a coach providing any information that could further my report, I would use information that I learned and saw during the first half to create my report.”

Wrote Thompson: “Working in media I understand how important words are and I chose the wrong words to describe the situation. I’m sorry.”

While her new somber words now retract her old flippant words, their timing was way off. 

On Thursday night, Thompson had the great honor of being on national television as host of Amazon Prime’s NFL game in Baltimore. She knew full well by then that she was being pummeled around the sports media landscape, rightly so, for saying she made things up and then reported those made-up things as facts. That’s a fireable offense in every newsroom and sports department in the country. 

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That was her moment: Thursday night, before the game, before her colleague, sideline reporter Kaylee Hartung, had to go out and do the job that Thompson had now so fully discredited.

But no. Thompson failed miserably in the moment. She said nothing. She let every viewer watching at home wonder if Hartung too was making things up. For that alone, Thompson should be suspended. She won’t be, but she should be.

Instead, she waited another 12 hours before finally trying to clean up the spectacular mess she had created. 

This Thompson fiasco was not good — not good at all — but some good has most definitely come from it. There now can be no doubt about how seriously members of the sports media take the ethical aspects of sports journalism. The sports media establishment spoke as one Thursday and Friday. The outrage was so tremendous that Thompson had to respond. This is good. 

“What this entire episode hopefully reminds all of us is that truth and accuracy are at the heart of every job in sports media,” Hall of Fame sports broadcaster Lesley Visser said Friday morning in a phone interview. 

Because many, but far from all, of the sports TV sideline jobs are held by women, there has been a natural inclination to turn this controversy into a conversation about women in sports media. Some have also decided to make it about the value of sideline reporting in general.

Let’s stop that right here. This was not a sportscaster problem. This was not a female sportscaster problem, or a male sportscaster problem. 

This was a Charissa Thompson problem.

PULLMAN, Wash. – Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders was knocked out of the game against Washington State here Friday night after he was sacked four times in his first 10 plays, including a brutal hit that appeared to injure his right throwing arm in the first quarter.

Sanders, son of Colorado coach Deion Sanders, returned after the latter hit to throw a 45-yard touchdown pass to receiver Travis Hunter. But then he came out of the game and headed to the locker room after a fumbled snap in the second quarter, when Colorado trailed 28-7. A Colorado spokesman confirmed he was out of the game for good after that.

He was replaced in the first half by freshman backup quarterback Ryan Staub as Colorado again struggled with pass protection, this time against a Cougars team that had lost six straight games. The Buffaloes (now 4-7) entered the game yielding the second-most sacks in the nation (49).

Shedeur Sanders suffered all but one of them and previously needed painkiller injections to finish games. Yet he never had to leave a game because of all the hits until Friday, when he appeared doomed from the start on a chilly autumn night here at Martin Stadium.

Washington State took a 14-0 lead with 5:14 left in the first quarter after forcing Sanders to fumble the ball on the hit that appeared to injure his arm – a helmet-to-shoulder blast from behind by Cougars defender Ron Stone Jr. Stone’s teammate Brennan Jackson then scooped the ball up and scored a 40-yard fumble return touchdown.

Sanders, a junior, dressed in warm-up gear and watched the game on the sidelines after halftime, when the Buffs trailed 42-7. He finished the first half with six pass completions in 10 attempts for 86 yards and one touchdown with no interceptions – enough for him to set Colorado’s single-season record with 3,230 passing yards, eclipsing Sefo Liufau in 2014 (3,200)

Statistical milestones never mattered to him, however. Colorado went on to lose 56-14 and finishes the regular season next week at Utah. 

The writers crafting the scripts for the NFL are definitely getting fired after this week.

They’d already ruined the year’s biggest storyline by having Aaron Rodgers get hurt less than five minutes into the New York Jets’ season. After they’d framed it up so nicely, too, with him running onto the field on Sept. 11 with the American flag and the Manhattan skyline in the background.

Didn’t help their case by writing off primary characters Kirk Cousins and Nick Chubb, along with promising new cast member Anthony Richardson, and giving Justin Jefferson a diminished role.

This latest plot twist, though, is simply too much. In addition to decimating nearly an entire division in a matter of days, they chose to take out one of the league’s biggest villains, Deshaun Watson, and one of its favorite heroes, Joe Burrow. Not even beloved character actor Mark Andrews survived.

At this rate, Roger Goodell better up his security detail because the next script surely includes him getting kidnapped and spirited away to an island controlled by the ultimate bad guy. Though Jerry Jones might fight his role being taken so far in that direction.

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This is, of course, all a joke. The NFL isn’t scripted and never has been, and any doubts about that have been firmly erased this season.

A scripted NFL would have had Rodgers taking the perpetually woebegone Jets to the Super Bowl in his first season in the country’s largest media market, not reduced to throwing a few passes during warmups while wearing dorky, orthopedic-looking shoes. A scripted NFL would not have had Richardson, who was already showing promise of being one of the league’s next young stars, shelved before anyone outside the Midwest got to know him.

A scripted NFL would have had Watson’s injury occur in Houston, the scene of both his early triumphs and the sexual violence that ultimately led to him being shipped out of town, not Baltimore.

And a scripted NFL most certainly would have featured a feel-good story of a backup quarterback coming in and playing so well he rescues both his injury-tested team and his own stalled career. Or at least had Zach Wilson doing a serviceable impression of an NFL quarterback. Which, as we all know, hasn’t happened. Though ‘the Passtronaut’ has promise.

The NFL is hardly the only league whose legitimacy gets questioned. The NBA hears it all the time, especially during the playoffs. But over the years it’s become, if not accepted, at least plausible that the NFL is playing out according to something of a plan. Calls can often seem to be tilted in a direction that benefits the league’s favored teams. More often than not, the big stars manage to salvage a game, and sometimes a season, with a spectacular play.

Even the offseason storylines look awfully convenient. The Cincinnati Bengals just happened to have the No. 1 pick the year Ohio native Burrow was coming out of school. Rodgers’ favorite offensive coordinator just happened to be in New York City.

The NFL used to fight the suggestion, knowing how ludicrous it was to think a game involving a ball and a lot of really large, really fast humans could somehow be staged. Or that a league with revenues to rival the GDP of some small nations would need to rely on subterfuge for its success.

At some point, however, the NFL realized it was never going to win over the conspiracy theorists and leaned into the joke. It rolled out a series of ads ahead of this season featuring Keegan-Michael Key as a producer going over script ideas with some of the league’s biggest stars.

The tagline? “You can’t make this stuff up.”

It was funny both because it’s so obviously not true and because there are still some people who remain absolutely convinced it is. But this season should erase all doubts that the NFL is an elaborate setup. If the NFL was scripting things, it wouldn’t have made Dolphins-Jets its first-ever Black Friday game. Or put the Saints and Rams on ‘Thursday Night Football.’ Or given the Giants and Bears a combined nine prime-time TV slots.

And it certainly wouldn’t have put Kansas City and New England on ‘Monday Night Football’ next month. Imagine anyone coming up with the idea of the NFL’s resident curmudgeon, Bill Belichick, after years of winning, getting humbled on national TV by the heir apparent to the Patriots dynasty, Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs. With Taylor Swift likely in attendance, too.

C’mon. No one’s going to believe that.

Right?

Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.

The vision for the Las Vegas Grand Prix was born after Liberty Media completed its purchase of Formula 1 in 2017, with a goal to increase the global reach of the motorsport series.

When Renee Wilm went to the Clark County Commissioner’s office in Vegas with the idea of the night race along the iconic Strip, it was a pipe dream.

‘When we first came to town a few years ago and sat before everyone and said, ‘We want to close the Las Vegas Strip and we want to encapsulate 60,000 rooms, but it’s all going to be fine,’ they all sort of looked at us like, ‘What is this woman smoking?’’ Wilm, the chief executive officer of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, told USA TODAY Sports during an August interview.

‘But we sold them on the dream and just what we can bring to this town.’

What exactly the event brings is an estimated $1.2 billion economic impact, Wilm said, and an international audience.

Emily Prazer, chief commercial officer of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, relocated from London to take on the upstart project. She said unlike a Super Bowl or major league sports team, the race will bring eyes to the entire city and not just a single venue.

‘When you have a street race, it’s not specifically the Allegiant Stadium or the T-Mobile Arena. It’s the whole city with cameras and helicopters and everything else,’ Prazer said. ‘So it really does put them on that level of global stage.’

Early issues with the F1 Las Vegas Grand Prix

What the world saw early Friday morning during the first practice session of the Las Vegas Grand Prix was the difficulties of putting on such an event. Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz’s car was damaged when he drove over an unsecured drain cover. Formula 1 delayed the second practice session to 2:30 a.m. local time to allow officials to repair the track and ensure it was safe.

On Friday evening, Wilm and Formula 1 CEO Stefano Domenicali released a statement to address the situation.

‘Our top priority at Formula 1 is the safety and security of our drivers, employees, and fans,’ the statement said. ‘Responsibility for the oversight of a Formula 1 event falls with Formula 1 as the commercial rights holder of the sport, the FIA as the regulatory body, and the local promoter, in this case the Las Vegas Grand Prix.’

The executives gave reason as to why the remaining fans who waited to watch the second practice session were told to leave an hour before its start time. The statement said that the decision was made to manage the capacity of public safety officials, shuttle drivers and hospitality staff.

‘We know this was disappointing,’ the statement continued. ‘We hope our fans will understand based on this explanation that we had to balance many interests, including the safety and security of all participants and the fan experience over the whole race weekend.’

The race is set to take place Saturday night at 10 p.m. local time, which is 1 a.m. ET Sunday.

Leading up to the event, ticket prices for the race, which initially started at $2,000, fell as demand for the spectacle wasn’t met. Fans said the race didn’t connect with its core audience, and the weather is less than ideal. The race is projected to be one of the coldest in F1 history.

Wilm acknowledged the process of setting up the inaugural event has not been smooth sailing. Planning started during the COVID-19 pandemic, which meant Prazer and others were stuck in the United Kingdom during the early stages. Liberty Media is promoting the race itself and spent $240 million to purchase the land for the paddock and an estimated hundreds of millions more to build the track and event’s infrastructure.

‘We of course have bumps in the road, whether it’s traffic congestion or just working through what is the asphalting look like, hearing our local business owners, responding to their concerns around safety and transportation,’ Wilm said.

But she said the Clark County Commission and Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority have been supportive throughout the process. In February, local officials showed their commitment to Liberty Media by granting Formula 1 access to the Strip through 2032. That fall in line with the city opening its arms to sporting communities throughout the last decade, also welcoming the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders and NHL’s Las Vegas Golden Knights. On Thursday, MLB owners approved the move of the Oakland Athletics to Sin City.

‘This town is like no other in how the local regulators embrace events,’ Wilm said. ‘They understand the value it drives across the valley. … The commissioners have just been incredible partners to us as we work through what is an extremely complicated project.’

Austin and Monaco compared to Las Vegas Grand Prix

This season, Formula 1 has 23 races on five continents, each with unique identities. There are three races in the United States for the first time. Increased interest in the country has been fueled by the Netflix docuseries ‘Drive to Survive’ and social media, where fans connect with Lando Norris over video games or Lewis Hamilton over fashion. Beside the Las Vegas Grand Prix, the United States Grand Prix in Austin has been racing since 2012 and the Miami Grand Prix debuted last year.

Prazer has worked with F1 on race promotions since 2017 and said she understands the nuances that come with each race. She said the success at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin helped spur the belief the United States could sustain multiple races, especially since the distance between Miami and Las Vegas is comparable to that of London and the Middle East.

‘Austin’s been on the calendar for nearly 15 years, so they really set the precedent for us,’ she said, noting the goal is to find complimentary race markets in the U.S. that are far enough away from each other that they don’t impact each other’s value proposition.

The Singapore Grand Prix — another night race and street circuit — and the historic Monaco Grand Prix were referenced to help ideate the vision for Las Vegas. Monaco is known as the casino capital of Europe.

There was a race held in Vegas back in 1981 and 1982, the Caesars Palace Grand Prix, that was held in resort parking lots during day. Wilm said it can not be compared to the new race, held at night alongside venues like the Bellagio and the Sphere.

Organizers have also embraced the city’s culture with activations including a wedding chapel, performances from some of the biggest names in music and entertainment — Tiësto, John Legend, Thirty Seconds to Mars, Blue Man Group and Cirque du Soleil — and food and beverages curated by Wolfgang Puck’s catering company.

‘For us, Las Vegas has always been really the crème de la crème of where we wanted to race,’ Wilm said. ‘It is the perfect marriage of glamor and speed.’

Las Vegas Grand Prix spearheaded by team of women

The Las Vegas Grand Prix has several women in leadership roles, which is rare in the sports world. According to a study by the Sport Integrity Global Alliance published in March, women made up 26.9% of the leadership positions in international sports federations.

Besides Wilm and Prazer, the senior director of race operations for the Las Vegas Grand Prix is Silvia Bellot. Her father was a race enthusiast and she joined the Las Vegas team after spending 12 years with the FIA, the governing body of Formula 1.

Wilm, who has a background in law, is familiar with being in a male-dominated career. She recalled being the only woman in the room when Liberty Media acquired the MLB’s Atlanta Braves in 2007. She said it was a moment that taught her the importance of speaking up and embracing being different.

‘I just became probably pretty immune to it at an early age. And I actually think that it can be a strength,’ she said. ‘I always encourage the women who I’ve mentored over the years to be comfortable with their voice and to speak out. You get a lot of attention because people may not assume that you’re going to share your views so freely. So I’ve actually found it to be beneficial. And I do get attention when I need it. I’d say always just be yourself. Be genuine, be transparent. And that served me well over the years.’

Prazer said she took a ‘quite unusual’ path where she’s mostly worked with women in her sports career.

She reflected on how the Las Vegas Grand Prix team started in a temporary office in the Wynn and, as they’ve grown, they’ve stuck together through the process.

The camaraderie was evident as Prazer and Wilm spoke in front of a Las Vegas Grand Prix poster signed by members of the team and given to Wilm for her birthday.

‘There’s plenty of bumps in the road,’ Prazer said. ‘But working, pulling together, having each other to rely on, from my perspective — developing this incredible talent that I’m blessed to have — it really makes this a very rewarding project.’