GEARING UP

1 Veteran driver Adrian Fernandez is racing in a doubleheader this weekend that will take him from the streets of Long Beach to the streets of Mexico City.

Fernandez and Luis Diaz, his teammate at Lowe’s Fernandez Racing, will drive their No. 15 Acura prototype sports car in the American Le Mans Series race Saturday on the 1.97-mile Long Beach street course.

Then Fernandez will race in the NASCAR Nationwide Series race Sunday at his hometown circuit, the 2.5-mile Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez road course, driving the No. 5 Chevrolet owned by Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s JR Motorsports and Hendrick Motorsports.

With news conferences, practices, qualifying and actual races, Fernandez has to make multiple trips between the two cities this week -- 6,200 miles of travel, or 17 hours of flying time. “I should be fine and actually I like the idea of not waiting around,” he said. “You go there and do your job, which I like.”

To top it off, Sunday will be his 45th birthday.

2 At last year’s Nationwide race in Mexico City, another veteran driver, Scott Pruett, was leading late in the race when his teammate, Juan Pablo Montoya, spun him out and went on to win.

Pruett was furious after the race, but said this week that he and Montoya long ago put the incident behind them.

“I’ve been around racing long enough to see that even the best-laid plans . . . can go out the window,” said Pruett, a road-course specialist for the team of Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates.

But Pruett acknowledged that as he returns to Mexico City, “it’s a little bit more personal with what happened last year. I’m excited to get down there and see if we can win that race.”

3 The NHRA Powerade drag-racing series, looking to better promote and market the sport, formed an alliance with the sports and entertainment company IMG.

The pact calls for IMG to help Glendora’s National Hot Rod Assn. boost drag-racing’s brand awareness and sponsorship deals.

The series is off this week but resumes April 24-27 in Atlanta.

4 The AMA Superbike Championship, where racers reach speeds of 165 mph or more on motorcycles, stops in Birmingham, Ala., this weekend on its way to the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana on April 25-27.

The series is dominated by Suzuki teammates Ben Spies of Texas and six-time champion Mat Mladin of Australia.

Spies nipped Mladin by one point last year to win his second consecutive title, and both combined to win all of the series’ 19 races, an unprecedented sweep for a team.

Mladin also won this year’s season opener at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway.

Meanwhile, Auto Club Speedway, which recently changed its name from California Speedway, said it plans to hold a “garage sale” of merchandise with the old California Speedway logo during the weekend of superbike racing.

The items include event-related apparel, banners with the likenesses of certain NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers, backdrops used in Victory Lane celebrations and signage from the track.

5 In other local racing Saturday night, late-model stock cars will be featured at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale and at Perris Auto Speedway, while sprint cars head the program at Ventura Raceway.

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Have a motor sports question for Jim? E-mail him at james.peltz@latimes.com.