2024 Indycar season

Six minutes racing.  Two minutes commercials.

Repeat, ad nauseum.

I can hardly wait for Indy and Nascar to launch an F1tv style streaming service. It's gotta come...

Nice battle for the last stint and a half.  Passing is very, very hard to come by at an Indy road course.

Only one failure in the first race with the hybrids.  That's pretty good.

Absolutely fantastic race today to kick off the hybrid era.

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

Mid-Ohio is a tough track to pass on no matter what class you're racing.

Streetwiseguy said:

Six minutes racing.  Two minutes commercials.

Repeat, ad nauseum.

I can hardly wait for Indy and Nascar to launch an F1tv style streaming service. It's gotta come...

Yeah, there was a stretch in the middle that was really bad. But, to their credit, I think the last 15 laps of the race, which were by far the best part, were commercial-free.

Just watched the highlights of the two Iowa races...

Question about the yellows- last night, a yellow was thrown when Herta got it sideways.  Immediately- even though he recovered and nothing happened.  But today, another car spins and gets into the back infield, and it took a long, long time for the yellow to be thrown- even though the car was stopped way from the inside wall.

What gives with that?  It seems that both were influenced by the race situation- last night to tighten the field for another restart, and today to not "penalize" drivers during the pit stop sequence.   It should be about the risk to drivers- where Herta's power slide results in nothing and a car stopping within the walls of the track should be immediately.  

Odd.

I don't think there's an explanation. It's just inconsistent officiating.

Also, the repave turned Iowa into a one-lane track, which led to bad racing. Need to do something different for next year.

I'm sure there are times when the fantasy caution comes out, but in most cases, I mark it up to humans. 

It's like standing somewhere, and somebody just walks past you, and scares the hell out of your not paying attention ass.  "Aaahhh!  Throw the flag!". 

Alternately,  "Hey Bob, did you notice that car sitting sideways down at the other end of the track?"

Also, minor rant.  Without mentioning any specifics, you don't know bugger all about the big news that just happened, and you wont know anything for hours.  A stll shot of a police cruiser is not telling anyone anything.  I can't get CNBC, or whatever podunk channel you shifted the race to.  I presume the same happened this morning, because yesterday, the second race was scheduled on my dvr.  This afternoon, doodley. Or, my dvr lost its mnd, but I'm watching Pocono right now, so...

Berkeley the 24 hour news cycle.

Stingray sure did take a ride.

Streetwiseguy said:

Stingray sure did take a ride.

Back in the day I was a huge IndyCar fan but after the "divide" and becoming a spec car series I rarely watch it.  The crappy TV package doesn't help either.  But every time I do try to watch it I see Stingray Robb spinning, crashing or upside down.  Is this guy any good when I'm not watching?

In reply to triumph7 :

Well, seeing as Rossi was being a d-bag by staying on the line while he ran out of gas... 

In reply to racerfink :

Carpenter said that his Crew Chief told him 3 laps before the accident that Rossi was running out of gas and to pass him with caution. Rob obviously missed judged and Rossi was on the race line when he sputtered. It sounds as though Rob is okay.

Overall I thought it was great racing and I am glad that I watched it on Peacock ( I don't have CNBC). Indycar really stepped it up with the popular artist for the concerts. I don't know what else they need to boost ratings but after watching some of a Nascar race last week (too boring)  and every F1 race, indycar really puts on the better of the shows, even though Penske and CGR and pretty much the dominant teams. Throwing in the Hybrid system towards the end of the season could have been a complete disaster, but they have really handled it well so far. 3 oval races (2 at Mil), 2 street courses, and Portland on the calender. They should probably make some calls to make some more parts before the seasons end.

trigun7469 said:

In reply to racerfink :

Overall I thought it was great racing and I am glad that I watched it on Peacock ( I don't have CNBC). Indycar really stepped it up with the popular artist for the concerts. I don't know what else they need to boost ratings but after watching some of a Nascar race last week (too boring)  and every F1 race, indycar really puts on the better of the shows, even though Penske and CGR and pretty much the dominant teams. Throwing in the Hybrid system towards the end of the season could have been a complete disaster, but they have really handled it well so far. 3 oval races (2 at Mil), 2 street courses, and Portland on the calender. They should probably make some calls to make some more parts before the seasons end.

Normally I'd agree with you, and still do overall. But neither of those Iowa races was particularly compelling, IMO. It was damn near impossible to pass except on restarts. And then when there were cautions, they lasted like 20 laps, which is almost 10% of the race distance. Which is a damn shame because the Iowa event overall is really good with the concerts and lots of local support and a strong buy-in from HyVee.

And I can't really blame NBC for cutting away to the news on Saturday night. That was a very significant event, even if there wasn't anything new to add.

As for Sting Ray, well, he brings a lot of money. 

For all the complaining about a lack of passing I bet Santino passed 40 cars between the two days.  Was it 'impossible to pass' or did some just not choose to risk it.

And all the Ed Carpenter's spotter stuff is laughable unless Sting Ray was using Ed's spotter as well (maybe he was with the scorching laps Ed was laying down).  And if you are running out of gas and know you are running out of gas, why stay in the racing groove?

I saw a lot of passing and I am not talking Nascar side by side highway driving, I thought there were some aggressive passes by Santino, Newgarden, Power, Paulo, Herta, ect... Cautions are part of oval racing.

If you are running out of gas, cutting across the track to the apron is probably just as stupid of a move as mis-judging and clipping someone. If it was F1 I am sure there would be a investigation and 20 spot grid penalty for Jenson Button 

There was a lack of passing:

This was proved by the stats for overtakes for position: There were 319 passes in 2023’s Race 1, down to 100 in 2024. In Race 2, there were 379 passes last year and only 95 on Sunday.

Palou called it "The most boring thing I've ever done", and Pato called it a "snoozefest".

trigun7469 said:

If you are running out of gas, cutting across the track to the apron is probably just as stupid of a move as mis-judging and clipping someone. If it was F1 I am sure there would be a investigation and 20 spot grid penalty for Jenson Button 

Rossi knew he was on fumes and backed it down quite a bit the last 10 or so laps, but stayed on the racing line, which at Iowa, is a singular groove now.  He should have been down with his left side wheels almost touching the apron.

Interesting news about McLaren Indycar.

McLaren making themselves very hard to root for:

“To be 100 per cent transparent, McLaren had signed me to a multi-year contract to drive with them in IndyCar,” Pourchaire explained in an interview with Auto-Hebdo and quoted by PlanetF1.

“And then, on the Tuesday morning before Laguna Seca, I learned from my manager that they had decided not to have me drive at Laguna Seca, as well as for the rest of the season.

“At first, I was very surprised, I didn’t understand, I thought it was fake. We had only signed a few weeks before. I was disgusted.”

Adding insult to injury, Pourchaire revealed that the full extent of his conversation with the team following the unexpected news was a one-minute phone communication.

“The team ended up calling me for a minute, around 11am that same day, the day before my planned departure for Laguna Seca, to tell me that I was excluded from the program,” he added.

“They didn’t give me the specific reasons.”

In reply to racerfink :

Hy-Vee rumor has been pretty consistent that its following Lundgard.

MP already reported that money was exchanged by Nolan's Dad and Mclaren (no, dollar amount confirmed), perhaps it's a upfront payment and moving forward, he becomes a paid driver, Honestly doesn't matter to me, but there are critics out there. Given the track record of McLaren if he is out next year or the money dries up I wouldn't be surprised if they dropped him unless he starts passing Pato and Lungard.

McLaren dumping drivers has been pretty consistent in Indycar, other then Pato. No offense to Theo but Nolan has stringed together a similar performance. Callum looked better, obviously has more experience then the both of them. Honestly they should have just been patient with David M. He is doing a great job with MSR and hopefully he gets the full time nod with them next year. However I understand that David is a paid driver so perhaps that was part of the dump and confirmation of finanical issues at McLaren.

Rossi broke his thumb in practice for Toronto.  He's also gone at the end of the year, so this could add to the Papaya drama.

It's worth listening to Hinch and Rossi from last Thursday.  Alex, uhm, aggressively defended his situation last week with regards to the fuel problem.

Streetwiseguy said:

Rossi broke his thumb in practice for Toronto.  He's also gone at the end of the year, so this could add to the Papaya drama.

And Theo is filling in for him. Honestly, you couldn't write this stuff. 

Interesting that he walked back his comments right before Rossi got hurt.

So the only way to watch today's race is to stream it?  Hopefully the switch means I can watch all the races next year...