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Isn't one of the big problems in getting 33 engine supply? Honda and Chevy weren't willing to supply more than they needed to fill the field, especially if it might piss off their clients for the full year. This wasn't a huge problem immediately post-split, because there were loads of the old 3.5 litre engine floating around, and simply being one supplier meant that there wasn't an alternative if they ended up pissing off a full time team. It was the same thing after 2003 until reunification (made worse because there were only 17 full time cars rather than 26; which meant that they needed to find a bunch more cars)... I think that we'll only get 34 at Indy again this year sadly; but hopefully the 34th car will be close enough to make whatever qualifying day is used to fill the field semi-interesting - and at least we aren't needing to use cars 20mph off the pace to fill the field!
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Feb 10, 2014 15:31
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| # ¿ Apr 19, 2024 06:01 |
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I'lll laugh when JV finishes 20th at the 500...
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Feb 27, 2014 00:51
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No F1 driver will ever run the 500 unless they were crap and couldn't get a drive in BTCC or fifteen years past their best...
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Feb 28, 2014 15:51
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Also the schedules are simply much busier now than they were back in the 60 and 70s, so seat-swapping is pretty much impossible if you want to challenge for championships. F1 starts in March and is racing more weeks than not through to November; including on the day of the 500 and perhaps the qualifying weekend as well. Sure, IndyCar are only racing until August this year, but its still more racing than USAC typically had in the 70s; and when there were more events in the 60s, it was typical for the bigger guys to miss a few races. At the height of cross-over drivers from 1964-68; the 500 was not held on Monday and often ended up mid-week; which made racing both Monaco and Indy much easier, especially since the first weekend usually seemed to end up clear as well, because they weren't running races every fortnight at that point. Even by the 70s, running a full F1 year and the 500 was impossible - Mario missed Belgium in 1976 and Monaco in 1977 because of Indy, and didn't run at Indy in 79 because of the Monaco GP. Its 100x harder now than it was. In order for someone Vettel to theoretically run at Indy, you'd either need the FIA to clear the last two weeks in May for Indianapolis qualifying and the race which they wouldn't do; IndyCar to allow Vettel to qualify at some other time which they'd get panned for, or for them to return to two weekends of qualifying to allow a race to take place on the second weekend, which we'd all probably love but its a pipe dream. And lets be honest, the chances of four-time F1 World Champion Sebastian Vettel showing up at somewhere like Houston to run during the F1 August break is never going to happen unless IndyCar somehow surpasses pre-split IndyCar in terms of world popularity (although it probably would be very funny...) Not that it matters, because this is really a dumb thing to write about and I'm dumb for typing all these words about it. Can the season start yet so we actually have something interesting to talk about?
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Mar 2, 2014 05:14
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I was intentionally thinking of a dumb example that is racing in August this year; but now I'm imagining how good a Milwaukee race would be with all of the best drivers in the world...
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Mar 2, 2014 05:47
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I completely forgot about crapwagon until that post. Why does that place still exist? Like I can understand being a little annoyed about the split, but to have somehow survived for 6 years after the split end and feeling nostalgic about the last years of ChampCar? That's pretty loving desperate... Hell, at least trackforum had that thread where Arie Luyendyk's race engineer from 1996 explained how they were able to go so fast in qualifying that year...
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Mar 7, 2014 14:03
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I actually have BT Sports this year; so I'm actually getting to watch it on my big screen live!
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Mar 30, 2014 20:20
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Is it just me or do ESPN seem to be putting a little more effort into things this year? Might just be Bestwick or the fact that they have three commentators, I'm not sure...
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Mar 30, 2014 20:26
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Will Power's gotta get a penalty for that; or I lose all trust in indycar.
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Mar 30, 2014 22:04
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There talking about how he's "bringing them slowly to the Green" but he's clearly slowing down on the front straight before the restart zone. They shouldn't have given them the Green if they weren't in the restart zone; but its definitely all Will's fault...
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Mar 30, 2014 22:10
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Second closest finish in Indy history, apparently.
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May 25, 2014 20:33
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May 25, 2014 20:59
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Is this earthquake that's happened near Sonoma likely to affect the IndyCar race much? The impression that I get is that the track isn't damaged, but I wouldn't like to be anywhere near a car if there's a chance of there being an aftershock while driving at 150MPH...
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Aug 24, 2014 14:07
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For those who care, Dario is covering Formula E for ITV, which will be interesting
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Sep 12, 2014 19:04
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Formula E is just going to be a repeat of the last few years of Champcar, isn't it?
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Sep 12, 2014 20:42
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Myrddin_Emrys posted:Can I watch this on sky in the UK? It was on ITV4, so it'll probably be in the ITV player
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Sep 13, 2014 17:33
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| # ¿ Apr 19, 2024 06:01 |
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FuzzySkinner posted:Dodge/Fiat/Chrysler Just because they could build an engine doesn't necessarily mean that they would. The last time that Cosworth was in IndyCar (excluding ChampCar in this context) was with Chevrolet after they ballsed up their 2003 engine. It seems like they are hunting for someone for next year, and I'd imagine that if one of those companies wanted to be in IndyCar with a self-developed engine, they'd have started the process a few years ago. It'd probably be more cost effective and quicker for a Toyota to badge a Cosworth engine than have TRD develop something, especially if they haven't starting developing something. If we assume that IndyCar is getting a third engine manufacturer (which always seems to come up a few weeks after the season ends every year), I don't think it'll be anything VW Group related since they already have a fair few expensive things going on (Audi in the WEC and VW in the WRC), although they probably could do it if they really wanted to. You'd think that it would be one of the Japanese companies because people have been talking about Fiat for years now and you'd imagine that they'd have done something if they were interested, especially if there is this Cosworth design available. It'd make sense if it was Mazda because they support the feeder series, but they seem to be into the grassroots stuff a lot more than elite level stuff. There's also not much of a point talking up the chances of getting a fourth engine supplier when this Cosworth engine has apparently been available since 2011 with no takers...
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Sep 23, 2014 21:55
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