2019 Indy Car

If it were that simple. Just let Ed know you're going to be partners....

McL approached Carpenter for this year. His answer to the proposal is obvious.

 

I in no way implied it would be simple, just offering an opinion.

 

McLaren's poor planning for Indy now explains a lot as to why their F1 team sucks.

 

This will sound morbid but- thank God none of McLaren’s incompetence physically injured anyone.

 

Not really. It only makes me question the integrity of the people who run these companies. If this is management's best, we definitely have a big problem. With Ford Motor Company kicking 7000 people to the curb due to lack of their performance, one must ask who is really running McLaren ?

 

Lack of performance, or the fact there were fewer cars sold in the US last year than at the bottom of the last recession? A lot of the people Ford are firing and engineers and R&D people. I guess Ford is going the route of GM and will be outsourcing everything to China.

 

Time for Zak to fall on his sword.

 

Understood. I didn't mean to imply you did. I was just making the statement as it would have been better but Ed said no.
I've been a semi Mclaren fan since before Bruce started the company (I was always a Bruce M. follower).

 

I don't think that anyone should be allowed to buy their way into the 500, or that anyone should be "guaranteed" a starting spot. It has always been a race for the (usually) 33 fastest cars, and that's the way it should remain.

Consider that after his colossal qualifying failure in 1995, Roger Penske made no attempt (to my knowledge) to buy his way into the field for the race.

 

There used to be a lot of horse trading in the 60's. Indy has this strange rule that the car is qualified and not the driver. I don't know any other race where you can say that.

 

May be a wet race day sunday

 

https://racer.com/2019/05/23/brown-vows-mclaren-will-come-back-fighting-in-indycar/

Pretty good response by Brown. Supposedly he repeatedly said "When we go back" and put no blame on Carlin but rather on McLaren.

If they are serious about racing at Indy, there are a couple of oval races coming up that would be good practice. Alonso doesn't have much going on (that he's made public at least) after LeMans so they'd be smart to make it happen since they have a car. They should stay away from Pocono though. That track is a death trap.

 

Did you see the way that Mike Tirico got to the speedway?

 

unfortunately, Texas is between the LeMans test and the race (and coming up soon), and I don't think Iowa or Gateway are really good experience for Indy. I agree about Pocono, that place has bad mojo for IndyCar.

it would be nice to see McLaren enter a few IndyCar races this year just to figure things out like procuring steering wheels and putting the right gearing in a car.

 

Would this require a seven figure salary guy, a former F1 champion and a host of characters for this? I find a competent chief mechanic and a gear board to be sufficient to resolve such issues. Spending outrageous sums of money and wasting vast amounts of time provides little in the way of value. But, if you wish to pay that type of funds......sign me up!

 

At the same time, back in the day, was the price of our beloved Cosworth and spending a whole month at the B'yard any different???

 

Why yes it was. We could see scantily clad women sliding in the mud. That alone was worth the price of admission. Now we see wealthy individuals incorrectly setup cars to send famous drivers home early. Not my idea of good racing.

But let us look back to all the fond memories of mud covered boobies ! Like all things in life.....that too must end.

 

....ready to go.....forward hopefully!!
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Road the shuttle out with many of those guys at COTA...they work really hard.

 

Wet Indy=No Indy

 

The rain earlier today made for some great racing with the damp track. Watching Marco be the first on slicks on the damp track was fun to watch as was the battle for the lead after the last caution.

 

I take that as Indycar's tribute to Niki Lauda:
They started the race on a wet track, to try to get it in the TV schedule window.
(Just like the '76 Japanese GP in the rain.)

It didn't fit in the window, though.
They had a program alert that the race would switch from NBC to CNBC at 6pm ....
... But I still get caught out remembering that they're talking Eastern time, and I'm in Central.

 

Pity about the rain in Detroit yesterday. A colleague was there mainly for the IMSA race and he was
texting me that as soon as the IMSA race ended, the skies opened up and it was a deluge.

They found refuge in some casino (?) there and evidently that's where they remained parked
the rest of the day.

BHW

 

Indycar the past couple years has been really good, I think. The cars look difficult to maximize, the deep talent seems to rise to the front most races, but it certainly doesn't look easy. And I think to the credit of the field, we've seen relatively few cautions in recent races. Marco on the wets was terrific to watch. Good racing, too bad about the overrun on broadcast time rather than delaying the news for the last 10 minutes. The NBC Sports Gold package has been an excellent over the top package, was able to watch the finish there.

 

'Switched to CNBC for the finish. 'Don't/won't subscribe; is the race coverage itself different or the same feed?