Q: I only recently noticed that ‘SP’ no longer follows Arrow McLaren. So what is going on with Sam Schmidt now? It was always inspiring to see him trackside, but I can’t remember the last time I saw him at a race.
Angelo Mantas, Skokie, IL
MP: Spoke to Sam at St. Pete while he was dressed in his Arrow McLaren gear. He’s still involved.
Q: What happened with Devlin DeFrancesco? Despite rushing himself into IndyCar and being in over his head for the better part of his time with Andretti Autosport, he turned into a serviceable driver by the end of last season. Did his money dry up? Did Coyne not want him? I don’t think Devlin was ever going to challenge for a championship — or maybe even wins — but he wasn’t a backmarker. It seemed like towards the end of the 2023 season he had some momentum into securing a ride early for 2024. Then crickets. What’s up?
Also why do you think Carlin was never able to challenge in IndyCar? They had pretty good success in Lights after being a force in Europe for years. Charlie Kimball was a good enough driver to bring home podiums if he had the tools. And Max Chilton was at least decent enough to somehow lead meaningful laps at the Indy 500. For a team as accomplished as Carlin, why couldn’t they make it work in IndyCar?
Mike in St. Louis
MP: We recently went into depth on this topic with many of the same questions in the Mailbag. Might be worth finding it and diving in.
Carlin had a lot of potential but got off to a poor start when they spent their engineering development budget on aero instead of suspension. They rebounded fairly well, had their moments, and yes, on ovals, Charlie and Conor Daly were factors and Max had some really good moments, along with Pato O’Ward for a brief spell, but the team spent too much of its time in IndyCar trying to make big things happen on an ever-shrinking budget.
Despite the extreme wealth possessed by Chilton’s father, it wasn’t an open vault for the team to draw from, and in the absence of big sponsors, the team was unable to keep up with the front-running teams and, critically, was never able to land a front-running driver to help them evolve into a consistent threat.
Truly great people at Carlin, from top to bottom, who are missed, but we also have a number of the star crew and engineering talent employed at Juncos Hollinger Racing.
Q: Do you think it might have been a bit ridiculous, given what we’ve seen, that NASCAR didn’t want to let SVG run the Daytona 500? As a long-time fan of Australian Supercars I thought it was a bigger joke than F1’s super license gatekeeping — that NASCAR thought this world class driver needed to run ARCA before they’d even let him race in Xfinity at Daytona. I’m still bitter. Everyone is finding out first-hand why I’m bummed I didn’t get to see him in the Great American Race.
Ryan, West Michigan
KELLY CRANDALL: I think you’re mixing up two different races. Shane van Gisbergen was never entered for, nor potentially going to be entered into, the Daytona 500. He is full-time in the Xfinity Series, so yes, he needed to run the ARCA Menards Series race on the same weekend. It’s no different than what the sanctioning body has done to other drivers with elite credentials who have come to NASCAR. A few examples: Juan Pablo Montoya (Talladega 2006), Dario Franchitti (Talladega 2007; Daytona 2008), Ricky Carmichael (Talladega 2008) and Danica Patrick (Daytona 2010). They need to get track time and be approved, and NASCAR needs to see they are comfortable in the draft. In van Gisbergen’s case, NASCAR never doubted him but it is policy and they felt he would have no issues getting through practice and basically being approved right then and there. In a way, it was a formality but still required.
Q: Will we ever see a NASCAR championship finale on a road course?
Chris Fiegler, Latham, NY
KC: A few years ago, I would quickly have said no. But given how NASCAR has taken on a new mission of trying new things and changing its schedule, I’ll say that nothing is impossible. I do, however, think that is not something NASCAR and the drivers would want to do (wanting the championship race to be decided on a more traditional racetrack and not where someone necessarily has an advantage) and I think it’s highly unlikely it would happen.
Q: Is there any logic as to why the Richmond race was scheduled for 7pm ET on Easter Sunday? If I remember correctly, NASCAR used to avoid racing on Easter Sunday. I ended up turning the race on after the NCAA basketball games were over and wondered why the stands were so empty. Was it to avoid the NCAA basketball games?
A night race at the end of March in Richmond doesn’t seem like the smartest decision. I checked the forecast and it said it was 57 degrees with 90% humidity. But it could easily have been 40 degrees and flurries.
As for me, a late start like that had me shutting off the TV and going to bed before the end of the second stage or whatever it’s called. Having to work on Monday and the alarm going off early in the morning means I’m not going to stay up and watch the race. I don’t know how the TV ratings will turn out, but if I was the track owner, I would have been upset because of the lack of fans in the stands. I honestly don’t get the logic used to establish the start times these last few years. Late afternoon starts means I just usually miss the race entirely as I’ve committed my afternoon to something else and I’ve completely forgotten the race even existed.
John
KC: NASCAR has run on Sunday night of Easter for the last three years, but just did so at Bristol. It gives NASCAR the chance to be in the spotlight with no other major sporting events going against it, and more importantly, it’s something Fox Sports wanted. And as we know, TV pays the bills and they pay a lot. The same applies to your comments about late afternoon start times – television gets a big say in what they want and what works for them. Richmond has struggled mightily with its attendance for quite a few years now and racing on Easter wasn’t going to help. It used to be a track that was must-see and could sell out the place, but the sport hasn’t seen either of those two things at Richmond Raceway in quite some time.