Good morning from a mnuch cooler Detroit. High today for the race should be around 78 degrees, a nice break from the high 80s and 90 degrees of the past two days..
The warmup should be interesting. No one wants to have a car damaged before the race. Indy NXT showed tha this track can produce a mostly clean, entertaining race. Will Indycar be able to have a race like Indy Nxt had?
The starting lineup:
I haven’t been able to get around the track as much as I had hoped yet, . I have no feel for the attendance. This track layout is very segmented and difficult to get from end to the other.
I will be back after the warmup. Here are some photos from yesterday. The first was taken by Kyle McInnes, qwho has produced outstanding work this weekend. The rest, which pale in comparison, are from the roof of a parking garage.
by Kyle McInnesScott McLaughlinScott DixonFekix Rosenqvist in turn 9Left side pits at the start of qualifying
What an incredible four weeks Alex Palou has had. He won the GMR Grand Prix, followed that the next weekend with the pole for the Indianapolis 500, came back after a pit incident to finish fourth, and today he wins the pole for tomorrow’s Detroit Grand Prix. Palou’s lap of 1:01.8592 beat Scott McLaughlin by three tenths of a second.Palou has now won a polreon each of the types of tracks Indycar runs on- an oval, a road course, and a street course.
Despite he carnage in the two practice sessions, qualifying was relatively clean with just a few light wall types. The only major issues came in the second round when Kyle kirkwood tore left front wheel off his car after hitting the wall. kirkwood will start 121th.
Andretti Autosport, which had won poles in theother two street course to date, only had one Fast Six representative. Romain Grosjean will start third. Colton Herta has struggled so far this weekend and will start 24th.
The Rahal team continues to lag. Graham Rahal will start 27th. Christian Lundgaard admitted the team is just not fast.
Someone to watch tomorrow is Simon Pagenaud. He starts eighth and has looked good every time out the last two days.
Notes
We are nearly halfway thriough the season and Will Power has yet to win a pole.
Chip Ganassi Racing has qualifying figured out. Team Penske is starting to catch up to them.
I never thought I’d miss Belle Isle. The past few years it had turned into a racy track. Will this course take 10 years to create a decent show?
Scott Dixon led another practice broken up by red flags. Five red flags fractured the practice into bursts of action.The most serious accident came with 10 minutes to go when Devlin deFrancesco hit the outside wall in turn 6. DeFrancesco was unhurt, but the car had severe damage.
Dixon’s time of1:03.2317 was slower than the fast time set by Pato O’Ward yesterday. O’Ward was seventh this morning.
Will Power was second quick today, and kyle kirkwood ended the hour third. The top 12 were within a second of Dixon’s time.
Callum Ilott finished ninth, his second top 10 of the weekend.
Yesterday was alearning day. Today we see how much the Indycar drivers learned. Will today be smoother?
Qualifying should be key here as passing opportunities will be scarce. With the amount of yellows expected during the race, someone may come through from mid pack.
Some teams were speculating about a one stop race if there are enough caution laps. That might be tough to calculate and hit just right.
Here are a few photos I took yesterday as I fumbled my way through this maze of a setup.
Seeing Canaqda without a passportThe pit area is wider than I thought. Any issues should be on exit
Pato O’Ward lwed tody’s opening practice for the Detroit Grand Prix this afternoon. The track proved a challenge for the entire grid as they learned the circuit.
“It’s definitely a unique track, I think it has a lot of characteristics from all the other street courses that we go to in terms of pavements, certain type of corners. Yeah, we rolled off strong,” O’Ward said.
Red flags stopped gthe session six times, including the final one for O’Ward. Many drivers found the runoff areas but were able to keep going.
Arrow McLaren placde all three cars in the top 10 with Felix Rosenqvisy fifth and Alexander Rossi sixth.
Callum Ilott rebounded from a difficult May to finish today ninth.
Indianapolis 500 winner Josef Newgarden was 15th today, trailing eammates Will Power, who was seventh, and Scott McLaughlin in 10th.
The opening practice for the Detroit Grand Prix saw several stoppages for cars stalled in runoff areas. Drivers are learning the byumpy narrow track with tight turns.
Pato O’Ward led the session with a lap of 1:03.0773. Scott Dixon was second and Alexander Rossi third. The top 10 cars are within a second of the leader. I will have a report later tonight with full results.
I arrived later than I anticipated, and I had trouble finding my designated parking garage. I ended upparking in another garage farther away. As a result, i have not had time to explore the track.
The media center, however, is one of the nicest I have seen. Maybe this track doesn’t need to be explored.
The split pit lane is wider than I thought and should not cause manyn issues within the pits itself. Blending back onto the track could be tricky. it is a blind exit. If a driver crosses the three foot wide strip separating the righ and left pits, they must drive through and reenter afetr another lap.
Pit assignments
Assignments based on qualifying for the GMR Grand Prix.
Racing returns to downtown Detroit this weekend for the first time since 1991. Formula 1 raced the downtown streets from 1982-1989. CART then took obver the streets for three years, then moved to Belle Isle.
CART left the island and the city after 2001. Roger Penske got the race on Belle Isle started again in 2007. After a couple of false starts, Indycar returned in 2012 nd raced there until last year, missing 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic.
The track is a new layout, nothing like the F1 or CART tracks. From what I’ve seen, it looks very narrow with few passing opportunities. I will have a closer look when I get there later today.
Another feature of the venue is the split pit lane, with cars pitting on both sides of drive. the cars will funnel into a single exit. The race off pitlane could be the most interesting part of the race.
Detroit is the fifth downtown street race on the Indycar schedule. There has been talk of a street race in Denver and possibly simne other cities. What is the saturation point? The street courses draw well, and they are likely profitable in the long run, but too many can get tedious. Street racing does not ususally produce the most exciting competition, especially in the first few years of a circuit. I would like to see the series stay at five or even go down to four races on city streets.
Traxck position and qualifying will be key for this race. I say that for every street race, but on this track it is doubly important I hope Sunday doesn’t devolve into an F1 style race.
Points Battle
Since the Indianapolis 500 is over, we can start talking about points again. Alex Palou leads Marcus Ericsson by 20 points. 37 points separate the top four.
Palou showed n winning the title in 2021 that he does what he needs to do each race to amintain his lead. His stiffest competiton may come from 500 winnerJosef Newgarden, who is fourth in points. Plou needs tio win another race soemtime in the next three events.
The Edge
Since the circuit is new to everyone, who has the advantage? Andretti cars have been strong on the street courses this season with two poles and a win.
On a new course I would give the edge to Team Penske and Ganassi. They seem to be the best prepared and ready to take on new situations.
This will be an interesting weekend. I thin Romain Grosjean will finally break through for his first series victory,.
The Pit Window by Mike Silver 