Tag: Team Penske

True Racer- McLaren Movie Review

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Just one more lap before lunch. Bruce McLaren, always looking for more from himself and his car, wanted to try a different downforce level.. He left the pits but didn’t return that day in June 1970, ending a meteoric rise from champion driver to successful car builder. A view of the accident scene comes at the end of the documentary, McLaren, a film making sporadic appearances in the United States. I had the good fortune to see it Thursday night.

The film chronicles McLaren’s life in chronological order from his humble beginnings in New Zealand. Bruce knew he wanted to be a race car driver by the time he was 5 years old. When he was nine, he developed Perthes disease, a disease that causes the head of the femur to lose blood flow and die. As a result his left leg was shorter than his right one. McLaren was bedridden for nearly 2 years as doctors tried to strengthen the hip and lengthen his left  leg.  While the hip got stronger, his leg did not get longer. Mclaren walked with a permanent limp.

He went to Europe to drive F2 in 1958 and won his first Formula 1 race the following year, the U.S. GP at Sebring. At the time McLaren was the youngest F1 winner in history, a distinction he held for 44 years. He drove as a teammate to Jack Brabham for Cooper.  Brabham won the World Championship the following year and McLaren finished second.   Both drivers  left Cooper and eventually each built their own Formula 1 cars.

McLaren’s greatest success came in the Can Am series.  In 1969, McLaren-built cars won every race on the Can Am schedule. The three McLaren  cars swept the podium twice that year.  Dennnis Hulme and Mark Donohue were McLaren’s teammates that year.

The movie contains interviews with many racing greats including Mario Andretti, Dan Gurney, and Chris Amon. McLaren’s family also appears, lending a personal view of the man. We also hear from several engineers and mechanics, mainly Robin Heard, who came to work for McLaren after helping design the Concorde supersonic airplane.  Many of the airplane’s aerodynamic principles, and some of the same materials, were applied to the cars.

My favorite segments were the vintage racing footage. The race films contain shots of Graham Hill, James Hunt, Jack Brabham, and many other drivers of that era.  We see Le Mans in 1966, Monaco in 1958, Sebring in 1959, and Spa in 1968.  Several things in the films stood out. Grand prix races used to start 3 wide and both F1 and F2  raced at the same time just as sports cars race today. It was great to see the traditional Le Mans start again, with drivers sprinting across the track to their cars. How would that work today?

Several McLaren home movies brought a personal touch to McLaren’s life. He would send film of his European races home and the family and their friends gathered to watch. I also enjoyed the movies of Bruce with his wife and young daughter.

McLaren is one of the best documentaries I have seen on any subject. It is a new, important contribution to preserving racing history. I’m hoping the movie returns in general release. Had there been a second showing last night, I might have stayed for it.  Look for its return, and go see it.

Toronto Preview: Home Win for Hinch or Dixon Rebound?

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The Toronto Honda Indy marks the official beginning of Indycar’s home stretch. It’s the first of the final 6 races and the last street race of the year.  This is a great event. I was fortunate to attend the races in 2013. I felt like I was at Indy.  The atmosphere and the buzz was that tremendous. This is a treasured event in Canada. I hope in the future Indycar can have as many as 2 more races in Canada.

I was surprised to see that this is the 50th anniversary of Indycar’s first venture north of the border. In 1967 Mosport (now Canadian Tire Motorsports Park) hosted two 100 mile races, both won by Bobby Unser.   I knew there had been races in Canada for a while but hadn’t realized it had been that long. This is the 33rd race at Exhibition Place.

The track at Exhibiton place has changed over the years as new construction forced alterations to the layout. It is a tight track with one good passing zone. Pit strategy is key here, as is usually the case with street races. There is a possibility of rain Sunday afternoon, which could really scramble the order.

Honda cars have swept the street races so far and there is no reason to believe this weekend will be different. James Hinchcliffe, from nearby Oakville, Ontario, is the sentimental favorite. He has one street course win this year at Long Beach. This is the race Hinch would love to win. his record here is not great. He has just one podium finish at his home track. This weekend could be a good one for him.

Graham Rahal swept both races in Detroit although Penske cars of Helio Castroneves and Josef Newgarden challenged him. Can he win his third straight street race? Rahal has driven well this season and should probably be at least two spots higher in the points. When he finishes a race, he is usually in the top ten, but DNFs have cost him points.

Scott Dixon was the last driver to win both parts of a doubleheader before Rahal’s Detroit twin wins. Dixon won both Toronto races in 2013. He did not have a great weekend at Iowa and his lead in the championship is down to eight points. Dixon and his team know how to win on street circuits and I look for him to bounce back from last week’s showing. In fact, Scott Dixon is my pick to win this weekend and extend his point lead.

News and Notes:

Sebastian Saavedra will replace Mikhail Aleshin in the #7 Schmidt Peterson entry this weekend. The car will carry sponsorship from AFS, a long time Saavedra sponsor. I suspect a funding issue is the reason for this switch, mainly due to Aleshin using up his crash repair budget. Aleshin will be at the track this weekend, so he apparently hasn’t completely lost the ride yet.

Sebastian Bourdais will make his first appearance at a racetrack since his crash during qualifying at Indianapolis. Bourdais has recovered incredibly fast. He plans to race again at Watkins Glen and Sonoma this year. I continue to marvel at how quickly drivers return from horrific debilitating injuries.  They are wired differently than I am.

Team Penske’s entry into sportscars next year with the new Honda DPi car appears to signal the end of Castroneves’ full time Indycar career. He will team with Juan Pablo Montoya running the IMSA circuit full time and both drivers will have one-off rides for the 500. Penske is expected to field just three cars in Indycar next season.  Drivers of all talent levels enter and leave the series constantly. Castroneves has had a great Indycar career. It is sad when one of the most popular drivers leaves.

Ganassi is also likely to have three entries next year, as Tony Kanaan’s ride is in doubt. NTT Data will switch full time to Dixon, leaving TK without a sponsor.

Tonight I’m seeing that Andretti is thinking of a sportscar program with Marco Andretti as one of the drivers. I am skeptical about this one. It’s difficult to imagine an Indycar season without an Andretti in it. Also, how much thinner can Michael spread his resources?  Are they planning on dropping to three cars as well?  There are also whispers about AA switching to Chevy power in 2018, which would mean Takuma Sato would be the car dropping off.

It’s been a wild, unpredictable season so far, and the offseason is shaping up to continue the same way.  We may not know what next year’s grid looks like until the cars get on track March 9 in St. Pete.

 

 

Iowa Preview- Penske or Carpenter?

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0710161242Editor’s note: This post is my 100th on this site. Thanks to all of you who have read. It’s a lot of fun.

 

If the Iowa Speedway were a candy bar, it would be called Fun-size. It’s the smallest track on the schedule at 7/8 of a mile. It is also the most fun race of the year.  Lightning quick laps create a bullring atmosphere for Indycars.  There are virtually no straights. The cars are turning constantly.

My favorite year at Iowa was 2012 when the USAC Midgets ran as part of the program.  It was a great show as the fun size cars zipped around the fun size track. I’d like to see them back here someday.

The Iowa Corn Producers use the race to promote ethanol. They are a dedicated state wide group justly proud of the success this race has. They have exclusive t-shirts proclaiming “This is Our Race”. I know they’re exclusive because I asked someone where I  could buy one.

The only thing that could make this event better would be returning it to a night race. The racing was better and the crowd was better. Attendance has been hurt by the late Sunday afternoon start. Surely the track could work something out with Knoxville Speedway for one Saturday a year and change the date by a week to avoid conflicting with the night race Nascar has this weekend.

The strangest thing about this track is that a Penske car has never won here.  Ed Carpenter Racing meanwhile has last year’s dominating win by Josef Newgarden which was the team’s third consecutive podium at Iowa. Andretti Autosport has won seven of the ten races here, with Ryan Hunter-Reay winning three times. Look for a Penske or a Carpenter car to win Sunday.  Chevy should have a big advantage on this track, which is not good news for  Andretti drivers.

Any aero advantage of course can be negated by how cautions fall. The race has been decided more than once by untimely yellows. That may not be enough to help Hunter-Reay, whose luck this year has been awful. Potential good finishes have disappeared for him several times this year.

I think the race comes down to one of the Penske drivers, likely Newgarden, or Carpenter’s lead driver, J. R. Hildebrand.  Newgarden has three straight podiums in a Carpenter car here. Hildebrand is now driving that car. Is ECR the new Andretti at Iowa? I’m looking for Hildebrand to get his first win Sunday.  A Penske car will probably be on the pole. No driver has won this race from the number 1 staring spot. Newgarden started second last year, but took the lead on the backstretch of the first lap and cruised to victory.

The Greatest 33 Non-Winners: Final Grid

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What a fun project this turned out to be! It was fascinating seeing how much those who submitted grids both agreed and disagreed. Some drivers got just one mention, while others appeared on every ballot.  There was near unanimous placement for some drivers, and some drivers were near the front on some grids and near the back on others. The driver nearly everyone agreed should be on the pole is Michael Andretti (pictured above, from 1992).

I  noticed the rankings were along age lines. Older fans close to my age seemed to have near identical grids,  and younger fans as a group submitted similar lineups.  Many drivers from long ago in general fared better on the lists from the older group. I was surprised how well the current drivers stacked up against the racers of the past. Another interesting detail is that all 50 driver finalists had at least one mention. I didn’t expect that.

To rank the drivers, I assigned points to the drivers corresponding to their spot on each person’s grid. A driver on pole got 1 point, the last driver got 33. If a driver was listed on pole on five grids, his total was 5. The lowest total won the pole. If a driver did not appear on someone’s grid, he/she was given 34 points. To my shock, there were only two ties. I resolved placement by averaged each driver’s highest and lowest rank of all the grades, with the lowest average getting the higher spot. One of the ties was for 32nd and 33rd. It was just like qualifying for the 1963 500.

The front row- Michael Andretti, Rex Mays, and Ted Horn, is strong. These drivers were in the top 10 on everyone’s grid. Andretti led 431 laps, the most by any non-winning driver. he started on the front row three times and had 5 top 5 finishes.  Rex Mays, in the middle of the front row is the only other driver to lead more than 200 laps and not win. Mays was on the pole four times. Ted Horn, on the outside of the front row, finished in the top five 9 times in 10 starts.

So here they are, the Greatest 33 Non-Winners of the Indianapolis 500:

Row 1

Michael Andretti

Rex Mays

Ted Horn

Row 2

Harry Hartz

Marco Andretti

Lloyd Ruby

Row 3

Gary Bettenhausen

Ralph Hepburn

Roberto Guerrero

Row 4

Scott Goodyear

Carlos Munoz

Robby Gordon

Row 5

Eddie Sachs

Tony Stewart

Jack McGrath

Row 6

Wally Dallenbach

Tomas Sheckter

Will Power

Row 7

Danica Patrick

Tony Bettenhausen

Joe Leonard

Row 8

Jimmy Snyder

Ed Carpenter

Danny Ongais

Row 9

Pancho Carter

Mel Kenyon

Kevin Cogan

Row 10

Vitor Meira

Russ Snowberger

Paul Russo

Row 11

Tom Alley

Johnny Thomson

George Snider

it’s kind of fitting that Snider is last on the grid. his trademark was jumping into a car on Bump Day and getting into the field starting near the back. Thanks to everyone who submitted a grid. I really enjoyed reading your thoughts and reasoning as to how yo put your grids together.

I will be back tomorrow with some 500 news and a report on my visit to the A. J. Foyt exhibit at the Speedway Museum. The cars were great to see, but the memorabilia was even more amazing to me. Thursday I will have my Indianapolis Grand Prix preview with my normally inaccurate winner’s prediction.

 

 

 

 

 

New Drawings of Next Year’s Car; News; Greatest 33 Non-Winners Project Quick Update

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First, some news from IndyCar:

Pippa Mann has been confirmed for the Indianapolis 500 with Dale Coyne Racing.  This will be her sixth Indy 500, the fifth consecutive with Coyne.  Mann will again drive car #63, raising awareness for the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

Ed Carpenter Racing announced an expansion of its partnership with Preferred Freezer Services. They had sponsored J. R. Hildebrand in the 500 the last couple of years. PFS will be the primary sponsor for the 21 car at Long Beach, the Indianapolis Grand Prix, The 500, and the Honda Indy Toronto.  They will continue as an associate sponsor at the other races.  No word on whether this gives ECR room for a third 500 entry for Spencer Pigot.And this morning (Wednesday) new designs of the 2018 car.

Now Wednesday’s big news:

Indycar released more definitive drawings of what next year’s Indy race car will look like. The overall reaction has been very positive. I love the design. Gone are the awful airbox and the hideous rear sportscar bumper. This looks like a proper race car.  My biggest concern is the short nose. The cars of the late 80’s and early 90’s had very short noses, result in many foot and leg injuries. Several drivers from that era still suffer from effects of crashing those cars. I can assume that technology allows this design with enough reinforcement to protect the drivers’ feet.  I like the outlined silhouette of this year’s car laid over the concept drawing. It shows how dramatic the change will be.  The big question. Will it race well?  Stay tuned.

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Greatest 33 Non- Winners Project-  Judging from the response I received yesterday, I will be getting a lot of grids. In fact I received one from a high school friend yesterday who did an interesting data analysis to rank the drivers. I will share his work in next Tuesday’s post.  Thanks for your interest in this project. I look forward to seeing what everyone comes up with.

 

 

 

It’s Not Where You Start…..

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A wild weekend ended with a surprise winner.  Street course winners don’t come from last to win.  Sebastian Bourdais showed strength in practice, but a qualifying crash put him last on the starting grid. I thought he had a strong enough car to salvage a top 10. He won by more than nine seconds, passing Simon Pagenaud for the lead on lap 37 and not looking back. He was out of the lead only for pit stops the rest of the way.

The first part of the race was one of the best street races I’ve seen. Multiple passes, including two for the lead, close racing throughout the field, and two caution periods in the first 30 laps helped make it quite a show.  The caution free last part caused the field to get quite strung out with an occasional battle here and there. Overall, it was an above average St. Pete race.

I don’t think Graham Rahal and Charlie Kimball  will be having dinner together anytime soon. They collided at Watkins Glen last year and had a first lap incident yesterday. I’m still not sure who was at fault yesterday.  It just seems Kimball is becoming a part of more than his share of these crashes in tight corners.

Power outage.  Will Power won the pole Saturday and was a strong favorite to win the race. He took the lead at the start, but was passed by James Hinchcliffe soon after the restart on lap 5. He made an early pit stop due to a  flat-spotted tire, hit an air hose on the way out, resulting in a drive through penalty. He worked his ay back to third before the engine began to sour.

He is still in a better position than he was after last year’s race, where he didn’t start yet almost won the championship.  Last year he left St. Pete with the single point for winning the pole. Do not count him out yet.

Other great drives yesterday- Rookie Ed Jones finished tenth, running a very steady, clean race. It was a very nice debut for his first Indycar race.

Ryan Hunter-Reay lost his rear brakes in the morning warmup and crashed hard into the tires in turn 10. The accident reinforced everyone’s concerns about the brakes during the race, but except for Spencer  Pigot, there didn’t appear to be much of an issue. Hunter-Reay finished fourth, passing teammate Takuma Sato late.

Speaking of Pigot, before the brake issue, which happened as he entered the pits, he was having a great day. He moved to the top 10 quickly and was in position for a solid finish. He seems much more comfortable in his second year with the team.

Honda is definitely back in the game. They led all the practice sessions, just missed the pole, then dominated the race standings. There goes my theory that 2017 would be a 2016 rerun.

The Event

The crowd seemed to be stable, about the same as last year. It was wonderful to see and spend time with so many friends. It was just a great feeling to be back at an Indycar event.

The biggest issue was entering the track. I understand the need for security checks. This year the system was very inefficient, causing waiting lines of more than an hour according to some reports. I arrived later than I normally do on Saturday, a tale for another day, and was shocked at how long it took to move through the entrance. Some team staff were furious at having to wait to get in since they carried nothing with them. One said they were late for a meeting. They simply need more bag checkers and an express line for those with no bags. This was the worst it has been here.

The volunteer staff did their usual fine job. They are friendly and helpful. St. Petersburg is getting more and more community buy-in for the race. The mayor is fully behind the event.

Thursday I head to Sebring for my favorite sportscar race of the year, the 12 hours of Sebring.  I will be tweeting all weekend and have a report next week. I am anxious to see the midway upgrades they have done. They have also added a showing of the Steve McQueen movie, Le Mans. I think they should show half of it.

ICYMI: Power Restored in St. Pete

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After three practice session dominated by Honda, I heard a lot of discussion about whether Chevy was sandbagging. After qualifying, it does not appear that was totally true. Four Hondas made the Firestone Fast 6, a better representation than at any race last year. However, a Chevy won the pole. One thing we need to keep in mind is there are 13 Honda cars and only 8 Chevys. The odds are in Honda’s favor.  However, I believe given this same proportion last year, the first rows would have been all Chevys. Honda has definitely made strides this season. Scott Dixon beat Power’s track record in Round 2 today.

In the end, Will Power is again on the Pole. This is the 7th Pole here and the 45th of his career. When he retires, Power will go down as one the great qualifiers in IndyCar history. He has some unfinished business from last year, when he missed the race. Power has a good shot at finishing where he starts.

The two biggest disappointments in qualifying belong to Marco Andretti and Sebastien Bourdais.  Andretti led FP1 and was strong in the other practices rounds. He did not even advance out of Round 1, mirroring many of his results from last year.  Bourdais crashed in his qualifying group.  Some teams, notably Rahal, still experienced brake issues.

Brakes will be a concern tomorrow. I have seen many lockups in turn 1. Overheating brakes going into turn 1 could be a huge worry.  This is a heavy braking track. Failures and overheating will need to be monitored closely tomorrow.

It will be an interesting race. Josef Newgarden starts from fourth. He gets special mention because the winner has started from outside row 2 the last four years. A chance of rain late in the race will also mix things up. The forecast as of 10:30 Saturday night as I write calls for a 40% chance of morning showers, then cloudy.

Tomorrow when we wake up, we can finally turn to our partners and say those three little words, “It’s Race Day!”

Indy Lights Notes:

First, a salute to Carlin Racing for honoring John Surtees, who died Friday.

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The Indy Lights race today was one of the best I’ve seen from this series. There were many battles for position and several passes for position.  The star of the race was Colton Herta, who started fifth and fought his way to second. He had some tough battles to get by a couple drivers, but showed patience and made moves at the right time.  Aaron Telitz won the race going away. He led from start to finish with a steady pace and got through lapped traffic with little trouble.

My final race report will be out Monday. Enjoy the race. I think this season may be more fun than I thought.