Author: thepitwindow

I'm a retired educator and lifelong racing fan. I hope to return to fostering greyhounds in the near future. Living mainly in Indy and wintering in Florida. I attend about 10 Indycar races a year as well as some sports car events

Fast Friday

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SCHEDULE (All times local):

10 a.m.-6 p.m.: Public gates open

Noon-6 p.m.: Open Practice Peacock

6:15 p.m.: Qualifications Draw, Pagoda Plaza

TICKETS: General Admission tickets are $15 for Indy 500 practice days. Children 15 and under are admitted free with paying adult.

PUBLIC GATES OPEN (10 a.m.-6 p.m.): Gate 1, Gate 2, Gate 3, Gate 4, Gate 6S, Gate 7, Gate 7S, Gate 10 and Gate 10A.

PARKING: Free parking for Indianapolis 500 is located in Turn 3 and Lot 7 (North 40), in the South Carousel Lot for motorcycle parking, and Lot 7 (North 40) and Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum parking lot for ADA parking. Parking is $10 in Lot 2, Main Gate and Lot 3G, and $20 in Gate 1. ADA parking is $10 in Lot 2 and Lot 3, and $20 in Gate 1. Bicycle parking is located outside Gate 1, Gate 6 and Gate 9.

All vendors and ticket sales are cashless. There are machines inside the track to convert cash to a card for purchases.

Today is the fastest day of the Indycar season. The cars get more boost for qualifying and Fast Friday is the day for practice with the extra power.

It could also mean the the drivers who were consistently at the top the speed charts yesterday and Tuesday could slide backwards today, and the drivers lingering mid pack or lower could shoot to the the front.

Today usually sees higher speeds than qualifying weekend because of the draft created by so many cars on track at once. Single car qualifying results in lower speeds.

Weather

Warm and windy according to @Indycar_Wxman

The wind

1knot equals 1.151 mph. a 30 knot gust is about 35 mph.

Things to Watch For

How many of Thursday’s top 15 drivers stay in the top 15? Which drivers will stay relrtively close to where they were yesterday?

Which drivers will break into the top 15 for the first time this week?

How many laps will each car run? Jimmie Johnson ran 166 laps on Thursday.

The no tow list is the key to who will succeed tomorrow. keep an eye on that. I will update that list often today on Twitter and The Pit Window’s Facebook page.

The Draw– The draw for qualifying order can have an effect on the results. If one of the favorites draws an early or late position, his run could be affected by the weather changes during the day. In the current qualifying format, it is less of a problem since multiple runs are allowed. The variable this weekend may be a possible rain shower interrupting Saturday. It takes about three hours to qualify 33 cars.

Have a fun day. remember sunscreen and water.

Sato Leads Again

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Takuma Sato kept the fastest lap of the day in leading Thursday’s practice as he did Tuesday. His best lap, 227.519 mph, was a bit slower than Tuesday’s best of 228.939 mph. Scott Dixon again was second after leading until the final half hour.

Sato at Tuesday’s post practice conference

The Dale Coyne team also had its second driver, David Malukas, with today’s third best time. Malukas was seventh on Tuesday.

In the final hour Romain Grosjean had three close calls with the outside wall. He did not make contact, but with tomorrow’s higher speeds Grosjean needs to be careful about drifting out on that far on corner exit.

A. J. Foyt Racing jumped into the top 12 with J. R. Hildebrand fourth and Dalton Kellett 11th.

The top 12, by teams:

Ganassi- 3

Coyne- 2

Foyt- 2

AMSP- 2

Carpenter- 2

Meyer-Shank-1

Although no Penske driver cracked the top 12, Will Power was the fastest on the no tow list. I expect Penske drivers to be in the hunt for the top 12 on Saturday.

Results:

After practice Ed Carpenter said no one knows who will be really good for qualifying

“…a lot of people haven’t shown their hand just yet. I don’t think Ganassi has really shown anything — there’s someone else,
McLaren I don’t think did any Q sims either today. So
there’s some big hitters that still are concealing what they
can do.” he said.

Ed Carpenter, Jimmie Johnson, and Kyle Kirkwood after today’s practice

Kyle Kirkwood said of the additional power that cars will have tomorrow and Saturday,

“For me it’s a little bit intimidating going
from qually sim and pulling out the downforce out and
feeling how light the car is there. It’s kind of like you don’t
really want to turn the wheel because you’re just unsure
what the car is going to do, and adding another 10 or 15
miles per hour to it is going to be less than comfortable, I
would have to say.
From the people that I’ve talked to they all say it’s not that
big of a step. It actually feels better because you get the
runs out of the corners and it’s not like you lose tons of grip
due to the speed. I guess I’ll let you know after I go
through Turn 1 the first time with more power.”


Jimmie Johnson added, “Yeah, all of that, and then the only
thing to add is the last time I was in qualifying trim here
was in a Cup car, and we let off used little brake to get into
Turn 1.
So to feel the boost and the straightaway speed and look
down at that 90-degree turn and think that I’ll hold it flat, it’s
going to be an interesting conversation with my right foot.”

Thursday Midday Update

thepitwindow

What a difference a day makes. Today is sunny, beautiful, and 80 degrees. All 33 cars have been on track today. Some teams have had their cars run in groups to practice passing and drafting. The session has only stopped once for 11 minutes for a track inspection.

Scott Dixon has the fastest lap so far this afternoon at 227.335 mph, followed by Pato O’Ward at 226.048. More notable for qualifying are the no tow speeds and the trap speeds.

Will Power has the fastest no tow lap at 224.325 mph. Juan Pablo Montoya has the fastest trap speed on the front stretch at 237.625. Dixon is quickest through turns 1 and 2. Tony Kanaan has the best trap speed in turn3, and O’Ward is fastest in turn 4.

Kyle Kirkwood has run 66 laps today, the most of any driver. Alexander Rossi has turned just 16 circuits.

Sunday’s pole day qualifying has a slight tweak to help the cars in the Fast Six cool down for the final round. It will fit in the time window allotted for the pole run. It involves a five minute break to help cool the engines and two pace laps at 100 mph to bring the engines back up to peak running temperature. I will have more details later.

Some photos of today’s action.

Kyle Kirkwood (L) and Dalton Kellett play teammate tag
Pato O’Ward
Tony Kanaan
Graham Rahal

Ericsson Thrives in Chaos

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Marcus Ericsson doesn’t give up. He has a knack for getting back into contention after misfortune strikes during a race. Last year he won the Music City Grand Prix in Nashville despite an early incident which saw his car become airborne. In last Saturday’s GMR Grand Prix at IMS the Chip Ganassi racing driver came back to finish fourth after an off road adventure.

Ericsson talked about his knack for overcoming adversity.

“I’d like to be you know, running up front all day and having a steady race, leading the race and winning the race but yeah, it seems to be when there’s chaos we thrive so it’s just I don’t know, I think I have a you know, really good fit well, they’re, you know, good guys that are very smart and make good decisions and that helps us put us in good positions. And also for me, I you know, a driver can make a difference as well when it’s you know, harsh conditions and a lot of things happening and then it seemed to work in my favor.”

Passing was tricky on Tuesday, Ericsson said.

“It was pretty busy at times. There were some b ig packs running. And it’s always hard in practice because people are trying to blend out and drop back into field and it sort of gets- a few times where it gets tricky because of it but I thought our car especially towards the end of the day was really, really good, really happy in traffic. So that was promising. So looking forward to building on that again today and see if we can learn more.”

Marcus Ericsson talks to the media this morning

Today the Ganassi team may try some running as a group to get a sense of the draft and how difficult passing may be

“Yeah, I think since we are five cars, we’re gonna try and get out and do some, you know, some profit group brands. So that that is a plan, but as always, you know, we have to see how the day goes. But yeah, I think it’s one of our advantages for us being five cars that we can go out at a specific time together.”

Looking ahead to the weekend, Ericsson is wary of the weather changes and its effect on qualifying.

“It’s tough for me I find because especially around here that the weather and the temperatures really can make a car really good or really bad very quickly. So I think that’s something looking at the forecast for this week. Now. It was raining all day yesterday. I think the track is going to be pretty green to today, but it’s gonna warm up in the afternoon. So let’s see how that is. And even tomorrow is supposed to be really hot and windy. And then you look at Saturday and Sunday and it seems like it’s a cold front coming there. So I think it’s going to be quite tricky for all the teams and drivers to sort of try and get the get the car in the sort of sweet spots because around this place, you know, small changes makes a big difference. So yeah, it’s definitely a challenge and I think the experienced guys probably have a bit of upper hand there on starting you know, it’s my fourth year so I’m getting there but compared to hell, you and these guys I have a few years ago.”

I think Ericsson is a driver to watch in qualifying and the race. I have him as a dark horse to win.

Let’s Try Again

thepitwindow

SCHEDULE (All times local):

10 a.m.-6 p.m.: Public gates open

Noon-6 p.m.: Open Practice

TICKETS: General Admission tickets are $15 for Indy 500 practice days. Children 15 and under are admitted free with paying adult.

PUBLIC GATES OPEN (10 a.m.-6 p.m.): Gate 1, Gate 2, Gate 4, Gate 6S, Gate 7, Gate 7S, Gate 10 and Gate 10A.

Bicycle parking is located outside Gate 1, Gate 6 and Gate 9.

The weather should be much improved today. while qualifying weekend looks like a mixed bag. The latest from @Indycar_Wxman:

Teams have just one more day to learn about their cars before Fast Friday and more boost is added for qualifying. Look for some teams to do some qualifying runs and others to still work on race setups.

I plan to have a 3 pm update on track activity, and I will report any developments as they happen. I have a couple of excursions today and tomorrow which I will share as well.

Hope to see you at the track.

Time Change for Monday, May 23

thepitwindow

From IMS:

Indianapolis 500 Practice Time
Moved by One Hour Monday, May 23 
 Rain Washes Out Practice Wednesday
INDIANAPOLIS (Wednesday, May 18, 2022) –
The time will shift to 1-3 p.m. (ET) for the 106th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge practice session Monday, May 23 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Moving from the originally scheduled time of noon-2 p.m. will give teams that participated in Top 12 Qualifying and the Firestone Fast Six on Sunday, May 22 more time to change to their “500” race engines. Teams that qualified in the 13th to 33rd positions Saturday, May 21 will not turn laps on the 2.5-mile oval Sunday and will be allowed to change engines that day.
Peacock Premium will provide live coverage of the two-hour session open to all 33 qualifiers for “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing,” with coverage also offered by the INDYCAR Radio Network.
IMS public gates will be open from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. for the practice.

Kirkwood Comfortable on IMS Oval

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Kyle Kirkwood is excited to be in his first 500. I spoke with the A. J. Foyt Racing driver yesterday after practice.

“It’s a really cool thing,” Kirkwood said of driving in the 500 for the first time.

He was happy with his morning run when the number 14 car finished 11th.

Indycar photo by Joe Skibinski

“We did the most laps out of everyone. So we’re getting the critical things that we’ve got to take everything apart, put our car back together and we seem to be better than we started off for some reason. So we’re happy with everything works around.”

Kirkwood felt his car picked up where they stopped at the end of the open test last month.

“You know, it’s just starting off. Everyone’s kind of starting off slow because it’s such a long, such a long two weeks of testing and everything so it’s really just making sure we got all the big things sorted out and we’ll start fine tuning the car as days go on,” Kirkwood said.

“We feel good. I think the conditions are quite a bit different than they were at the at the open test. I think everyone out there seemed to struggle a little bit more in traffic, for whatever that reason,” he continued. “We’ve had some rain over the past couple weeks and the track might have been a bit dirty. Possible. . But we feel we feel okay at the moment.”

The team’s plan for yesterday afternoon was “We’ve got a big list of items that we need to get through this next week and we’re just hitting all this off gathering as much data together and then we’ll reconvene or go back over it at some point, either at the end of this week or next week and figure out exactly what we have and we’re looking forward to get through these types of items and hopefully ended up with a really good car at the end.”

At St. Pete Kirkwood mentioned that he didn’t have much oval experience. Racing at Texas seems to have helped his confidence on ovals.

“Yeah, I’m very comfortable. It’s a bit different than Texas is given how flat the track is. But I feel very comfortable in the number 14 Rokit Chevrolet. “

Kirkwood ended up 21st in the afternoon session. It’s not unusual to see cars slide backwards in the second practice session as the team tries different setups.

Notes From a Wet Track

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The image above looks as if it were taken last Saturday, but alas, I snapped it just two minutes ago. Some cars were on pit lane at 11:45 as a light sprinkle fell. The rain increased soon afterwards, and the cars returned to their garages.

Practice is on an indefinite hold. My weather app radar shows rain continuing through the 5 o’clock hour. I would say any track time today is doubtful. With every entry guaranteed to make the race, losing a day may not be as critical as it has been in the past. Most of the teams have the benefit of the two day open test in April.

Notes

IMSA at IMS? One of the first goals Roger penske set for the Speedway when he bought the track was to hoist a sports car endurance race. I think he was hoping for a World Endurance event, but it appears an IMSA race is more likely, probably a sprint event of 100 or 160 minutes.

Adding an IMSA event means IMS would host each of the three major North American series, something that is long overdue.

New at the IMS online shop In an email today the Indianapolis Kotr Speedway online store is offering a 1:12 replica of Ray Harroun’s Marmon Wasp, winner of the first 500. It can be yours for just $599.99.

Third OEM There is still no word about a third engine manufacturer for Indycar. I mention this because yesterday Lamborghini announced they will be joining IMSA’s GTP class in 2024 with an LMDh entry joining Cadillac, Acura, BMW, and Porsche.

I will keep you updated on the day here at IMS. Keep checking back. I will post at 3 pm Eastern or sooner if I hear something before then.