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Daly, Rossi Looking for Good Results at Gateway

August 18, 2021 thepitwindow

Indycar photo

Conor Daly and Alexander Rossi both enjoy World Wide Technology Raceway, and they are looking forward to good results Saturday. Both drivers said they enjoy racing there. Rossi is eager to race at the track near St. Louis after his team had a very good test there this year. Rossi is anxious to see how the one day event plays out.

” I love that we’re having the night race again,” Rossi said, “I think that’s critical for short
oval racing. Short oval racing but for the 500 is meant to
be raced at night, easier to follow cars. Everything about it is better. Looking forward to that, having the fans back. Yeah, I think it’s going to be an
interesting kind of experiment for us to do a one-day event.
See how that goes.”

Daly added, ” Yeah, it’s one of my favorite tracks. I
couldn’t tell you why. Ever since our very first test day with
Foyt, where we were quickest, we kind of all looked at
each other, This is weird, not really sure why this is
happening.
I love racing there. Love the way that track challenges us
as drivers and challenges these cars. It will be fun. I’m
just happy to be racing, honestly, which is nice.”

Alexander Rossi photo by Chris Owens, Indycar

Rossi talked about his season and how situations have prevented him from showing better results. the last three races have had mostly better results, and he is confident of a strong finish to the season.

” Yeah, I mean, the pace has been great; it hasn’t really
resulted in much. Obviously with the field now, every small
mistake and issue and mis-step in setup decisions from
session to session has a bigger effect than it used to. It
requires everyone to really be perfect throughout the
weekend.
It is what it is. I think the Indy GP, this past race was good.
Nashville we obviously had good pace, but it didn’t result
in anything. Yeah, I mean, I think it’s all down to some
circumstances ultimately/”

, who isDaly talked about the challenges Romain Grosjean driving his first oval race this season, faces.

“… it’s going to be tough without a doubt. I think when you show
up to, like, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it being your
first oval, there’s so much practice, right? There’s so much
testing. Romain obviously got to test, which is great.
When you’re out there, at Indy when we practice, you get a
lot of traffic, you get kind of a feel for what’s going on.
Realistically there’s so little track time in Gateway, he’s
going to be thrust into a very, very new situation.”

The Bommarito Automotive Group 500 is scheduled for a green flag start at 8:40 pm EDT Saturday night.

BC39 Returns Tonight; 74 Entries

August 18, 2021 thepitwindow

IMS Photo

Indianapolis Motor Speedway continues a busy week of racing tonight with the two day BC39 USAC midget race. The event returns after a oe year absence due to COVID-19. 74 entries will try to make tomorrow night’s feature race.

Conor Daly is the lone Indycar representative, while NASCAR drivers Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, and Ryan Newman will also attempt to make the feature.

Today’s Schedule:

4:00PM -10:00PM Gates Open

5:00PM Hot Lap Sessions (12 Groups)

7:15PM Heat Races (12 Races) 10 laps each

8:00PM Stoops Pursuit 25 laps run in 5 lap segments; cars that have lost positions in each segment exit the track.

24 cars- the heat winners plus the car gaining the most passing points in their heat- make up the field for the Stoops Pursuit.

In 2019 the Stoops pursuit ended with the three cars remaining in the last segment all flipping on the last lap. Kyle Larson was declared the winner.

Indycar Notes

Indycar will have a press conference tomorrow at 11 am with Bobby Rahal, Roger Penske, and Randy Edeker, CEO of HyVee. The rumor is that Iowa Speedway will return to the Indycar schedule in 2022. I truly missed Iowa this year. It is a great track for Indycar, which is sorely lacking oval races.

Bob Jenkins Memorial Streamed at 10 AM Today

August 16, 2021 thepitwindow2 Comments

From the Indianapolis Motor Speedway:

Robert F. Jenkins
September 4, 1947 – August 9, 2021
A memorial service will be held virtually at 10:00am EST, Monday, August 16^th. The service will be streamed globally at https://bobjenkinsmemorial.com
Memorial contributions may be made in Bob’s name to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum, a 501 (c)(3) non-profit organization. Bob was a true friend of the IMS Museum and he will be missed.
Click here to donate now or via mail to:
Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum’
4750 West 16th Street
Indianapolis, Indiana 46222
In his own humble words: “A race fan that got lucky” ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

Final Thoughts- Big Machine Spiked Coolers Grand Prix and the Shared Weekend

August 15, 2021 thepitwindow

First, a few more thoughts on the race:

Romain Grosjean will win a race on the IMS road course next year. His 2021 statistics show he figured this track out very quickly- a pole, two second place finishes, and a third place starting spot. He is just seven points behind Scott McLaughlin for Rookie of the Year despite missing three races. I think Grosjean will end up winning the honor. He has performed better than McLaughlin most of the year.

Alexander Rossi’s fourth place finish was his best of the year. he was heading for a top five last eek in Nashville when he tangled with Pato O’Ward. Rossi finished fifth at Mid Ohio before the break, so he could have had three top fives in a row. I look for him to finish the season strong and maybe win one of the last four races.

O’Ward’s inconsistency will cost him the title. he seems to be good one race and bad the next. It will take a strong consistent run to win the title. We have yet to see that from him or the AMSP team.

How long has it been since the season champion won just twice? We may see that this year. There have been nine different winners in 12 races with just four races to go, and no one has won more than twice. I have a feeling we will at least tie the season record of 11 different winners, which leaves little margin for a third win by Palou or anyone else.

Sharing the Track

The Indycar/NASCAR shared weekend is a fine idea on paper, and IMS is one of less than a handful of tracks where it would work. But a new mindset needs to come into play on the scheduling.

Currently, this is NASCAR’s weekend at IMS. This weekend should be treated like baseball’s All Star Game, where both series get equal billing, and the home alternates each year.. I felt Indycar was treated as the lowest ranked series yesterday, going first before the minor league XFinity Series.

I think XFinity needs to return to Lucas Oil Raceway for a Friday night race and leave IMS to the two major series. NASCAR and Indycar should take turns being the Sunday feature race. It won’t be NASCAR’s weekend and it won’t be Indycar’s weekend. It will be a truly shared weekend. Obviously, both races would be on the road course.

It appears Roger Penske wants the Indianapolis 500 to be the only oval event at IMS. I applaud him for this appropriate stance.

The NTT Indycar Series moves to World Wide Technology Raceway next weekend for the final oval of 2021. It will also be the last race I cover in person this year.

The King Reclaims His Throne

August 14, 2021 thepitwindow

Photo by Kyle McInnes

Will Power in victory lane at the IMS road course. It’s a step back toward normalcy. Power won the Big Machine Spiked Coolers Grand Prix today, his first win in ten months. Gis 40th career win puts him two wins behind Michael Andretti on the all time career list. Power won for the fifth time at the IMS road course.

Tire strategy was key today. Power took the lead after the first round of opit stops. Pole sitter Pato O’Ward started on reds while most everyone else began the race on the primary tires. O’Ward switched to blacks on the first stop and power took on the faster red tires. He passed O’Ward and ran away from the field, building a lead of more than eight seconds over O’Ward and then Colton Herta.

The race was a mostly processional affair, with a couple of interesting battles in the field. Passing seemed difficult. After a caution filled race last Sunday, today saw the yellow flag come out just twice, the first time on lap 67. Alex Palou brought ourt the first caution when his engine let go. The DNF tightened the points race significantly. he now leads O’Ward by just 21 points. Rinus Veekay spun with assistance a few laps later and stalled, forcing another yellow.

Power is the ninth different winner in 2021. The series is just two different winners shy of the record 11 different winners with four races left.

Notes

Alex Palou had everything going his way. He was ahead of his three closest pursuers in the championship and he was less than twenty laps away from padding his lead. Then it was all gone in a puff of smoke.

Christian Lundgaard impressed this weekend. The 20 year old drove a good race, even getting the lead during a pit stop cycle. he finished 12th. I hope we see him again before the season ends.

Top Gun Racing and R C Enerson completed just 16 laps today, but the team did get to race for the first time. They have obtained some sponsorship, and plan to be at Gateway next weekend. I thought it was quite an accomplishment for them to get to do a qualifying run for the 500. they have come a long way.

Scott Dixon matched his worst finish of the year, 17th. Ironically both have been at IMS.

Palou’s poor finish hurt some, but with the days his closest competitors had, it didn’t hurt as much as it could have. His advantage is that O’Ward and Dixon keep swapping second and third, while Newgarden makes only minimal gains and has three drivers to overtake.

The crowd was decent today, although the place didn’t have a true race day vibe.

IMS had a beautiful tribute to Bob Jenkins on the video boards before the race.

I will be back tomorrow with some more thoughts on this weekend’s format tomorrow. Thanks for following along these past two days.

Warm up Results

August 14, 2021 thepitwindow

RANK	CAR NO.	DRIVER	TEAM	ENGINE	QUICK LAP	DIFFERENCE	TOTAL LAPS
1	8	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	Honda	1:11.3705	——	22
2	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	Honda	1:11.3895	0.0190	18
3	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	Chevy	1:11.4639	0.0934	22
4	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	Honda	1:11.4951	0.1246	16
5	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	Chevy	1:11.5760	0.2055	18
6	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Honda	1:11.6697	0.2992	20
7	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Honda	1:11.6743	0.3038	22
8	20	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	Chevy	1:11.6818	0.3113	20
9	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	Honda	1:11.7051	0.3346	18
10	51	Romain Grosjean	Dale Coyne Racing w/Rick Ware Racing	Honda	1:11.7573	0.3868	21
11	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	Honda	1:11.9089	0.5384	11
12	10	Alex Palou	Chip Ganassi Racing	Honda	1:11.9822	0.6117	15
13	3	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske	Chevy	1:12.0939	0.7234	21
14	4	Dalton Kellett	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Chevy	1:12.0952	0.7247	20
15	6	Helio Castroneves	Meyer Shank Racing	Honda	1:12.1239	0.7534	19
16	26	Colton Herta	Andretti Autosport	Honda	1:12.1262	0.7557	16
17	21	Rinus VeeKay	Ed Carpenter Racing	Chevy	1:12.1341	0.7636	19
18	45	Christian Lundgaard	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Honda	1:12.1840	0.8135	23
19	18	Ed Jones	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan	Honda	1:12.2053	0.8348	18
20	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	Chevy	1:12.2407	0.8702	18
21	14	Sebastien Bourdais	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Chevy	1:12.2719	0.9014	22
22	7	Felix Rosenqvist	Arrow McLaren SP	Chevy	1:12.2981	0.9276	22
23	5	Pato O’Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	Chevy	1:12.4092	1.0387	23
24	12	Will Power	Team Penske	Chevy	1:12.4183	1.0478	20
25	48	Jimmie Johnson	Chip Ganassi Racing	Honda	1:12.5416	1.1711	20
26	29	James Hinchcliffe	Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport	Honda	1:12.8564	1.4859	18
27	75	RC Enerson	Top Gun Racing	Chevy	1:12.9689	1.5984	15
28	52	Cody Ware	Dale Coyne Racing w/Rick

Race Day- Firsts on the Line

August 14, 2021 thepitwindow

Photo: Pato O’Ward on his way to the pole. Photo by Kyle McInnes

Today’s NTT Series Indycar Race at the IMS road course, the Big machine Spiked Coolers Grand Prix, could set many firsts. Pato O’Ward looks to be 2021’s first three time winner. To do that he will have to win from the pole for the first time in his career. Will Power seeks his first win of the season from the outside of the first row.

This track generally produces the winner from the first two rows, although I am not giving Chrisyian Lungaard much of a chance in his first Indycar start. Romain Grosjean won the pole and finished second in May could also get his first career win today.

From Last night:

O’Ward Nip Power in Tight, Frantic Qualifying

https://thepitwindow.blog/2021/08/13/oward-nips-power-for-pole-in-frantic-tight-qualifying/

Josef Newgarden and Scott Dixon start 20th and 26th, respectively. They will need some luck and some alternate strategy to get to the front.

Today’s Schedule- Eastern Time:

8:45-9:15 Warmup on Peacock

1:00 Green Flag on NBCSN

The top 12:

O’Ward Nips Power for Pole in Frantic, Tight Qualifying

August 13, 2021 thepitwindow

Photo: Pato O’Ward by Matt Fraver, Indycar

So close. Will Power was so close to earning his first pole position of 2021, but Pato O’Ward nipped him at the line by 0.0067 of a second. O’Ward’s third pole of the year came at an opportune time for the driver third in the standings. Points leader Alex Palou qualified sixth and other title contenders Scott Dixon rolls off 26th and Josef Newgarden starts 20th. Dixon was penalized for spinning and affecting other drivers’ laps, and Newgarden has a six place penalty for an engine change to serve.

All three rounds of the shortened qualifying format produced drama as several drivers traded the top spot. But the star of the day was Christian Lundgaard, the Danish F2 driver in the RLL Hy Vee number 45 this weekend. Lundgaard impressed in the practice session, and he dazzled in qualifying, making it to the final round and leading the fast Twelve for a bit. He will start fourth. No matter how his race turns out, his weekend is already a success.

Christian Lundgaard. Photo by Chris Jones, Indycar

Notes

Colton Herta’s string of front row starts ends at four. He qualified fifth.

Romain Grosjean missed his second consecutive pole on the IMS Road course by just 27 thousandths of a second. He starts third.

.Ed Carpenter Racing had its best road course qualifying in a while. Conor Daly starts eighth and Rinus VeeKay ninth.

Newgarden and Dixon start in a part of the grid where there is usually trouble in the first turn. If they get through that, it will be interesting to see how far they advance wht strategy they use.

Palou Leads Practice; Herta Struggles

August 13, 2021 thepitwindow

Points leader Alex Palou had the fastest lap in the only practice before qualifying begins tonight at 7 pm for the Big Machine Spiked Coolers Grand Prix. Palou’s lap of 1:10.883 was 0.023 seconds faster than Rinus VeeKay, winner of May’s GMR Grand prix on the IMS road course. VeeKay also won the pole for race 1 of last fall’s Harvest Grand Prix.

Pato O’Ward, Jack Harvey, and Josef Newgarden rounded out the top five. Newgarden will have a ix place grid penalty for the race due to an unapproved engine change following the Music City Grand Prix.

The big surprise of the session was Christian Lundgaard, driving for Rahal Letterman Laniqan Racing. The Danish F2 driver was seventh in his first Indycar session, jus 0.030 seconds behind Will Power.

The practice round also saw Colton Herta, who has started on the front row for the last four races, struggle. He had a lockup, overshot turn one, aned had his car stall leaving the pits. Herta was 26th on the time chart, only completing 16 laps.

Qualifying this evening is the same format used in Detroit. The normal first round is followed bay a round of 12 to determine the pole. NBCSN will broadcast qualifying live

The top 12:

I’ll be back later tonight with a qualifying wrapup. Going out to buy spikes for my cooler. I want to look fashionable tomorrow.