Q: Hear me out on this: F1 is the juggernaut. I feel the pathway for U.S. racing in the modern era is to continue to get guys like Larson to do the double. Pato, Newgarden and Herta should give the 600 a try and go over and steal some NASCAR road course wins, too. I smiled when I heard a commentator compare Larson to Verstappen this week. If IndyCar and NASCAR can both promote successful crossover drivers, it gets more eyeballs, and a niche to argue that the best all-around drivers are over here in the U.S.. Especially if one or two can emerge as a modern day Gurney or Parnelli. Thoughts?
Ben, California
MP: I love the idea. I’m sure Pato would be up for it. Not sure if Colton gives a crap. And Josef is very single-minded about winning an IndyCar championship, so I don’t know if the timing is right to make that Cup invitation right now. But Scotty Mac and Pato would be a blast to watch.
Q: With Team Penske’s domination of qualifying this weekend, we have some fans who seem more interested in manufacturing conspiracy theories than following the actual racing. There have been a lot of comments suggesting that Penske gets better engines from Ilmor because he owns the company. What do you know about the engine distribution process? I have to believe that it is random, or at least very transparent to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest?
Alan, Orlando, FL
MP: They’re randomly assigned by Jay Frye’s IndyCar operations team for both Chevys and Hondas.
Q: At the conclusion of Saturday’s session, was Graham Rahal really on the track in time to take a run? It seemed like the gun had sounded by the time he was moving. I’m thinking that it was a good thing that he was slow; it seemed like there might have been some controversy if his time had been good enough to place in the top 30.
A math question, one I’ve actually had for some time: When focused on the live-to-the-second mph speeds shown on the scoreboard at Indy, it seems like the cars spend a lot more time at a number that’s higher than the resulting average speed than they do below it. The straightline speeds have a greater delta over the average speed and a for longer period, than the delta between the slower speeds and shorter distance in the turns vs. the average speed. Make sense? Basically, it seems like the live speed numbers are inflated a bit — or is there something else going on that creates this perceived mismatch between the live trap speeds and the average speed?
Mark, OH
MP: The big MPH numbers or smaller MPH numbers do tell the story, but not by how big or small they are, but by how long it takes to achieve those numbers.
Driver X fires into Turn 1 and hits 241mph, which is amazing. But how much of that 241mph can they hold through the corner and what is the smaller number waiting at the exit of Turn 1, and exiting Turn 2? Seeing the giant MPH numbers entering Turns 1 and 3 is cool, but in qualifying, I’m looking for the Turns 2 and 4 exit MPH to see where they dip down to and how much time it will take to accelerate and pull that number up before they get to Turns 1 and 3.
It’s the recovery period where the motors have to try and regain the lost MPH where the real lap speed average comes into play.
Q: In your article about this year’s Firestone tires, Cara Krstolic says that Firestone measures all the tires so that “…we have good stagger for the race teams, trying to get everybody a consistent left- to right-side tire difference.”
I recall that drivers back in the 1960s and ’70s, like Mario, would have the mechanics measure the tire diameters so that they could find the stagger that would help them turn left/find speed on the ovals. Sounds like this is now being done by Firestone. Within their allocated sets of tires, can teams mix and match within their black sets (and within their red sets) like days past? Are there rules saying they can or cannot?
Glenn, Renton, WA
MP: Back in the day when the tire constructions were comparatively primitive, teams would inflate the hell out of the right-rear tires in the garages to get them to stretch and increase stagger, but that’s no longer possible (I tried) with Firestone’s Speedway tires so Cara’s team designs in the intended stagger for the rear tires, measures and validates them, and provides them to teams. Each team’s tire technicians do their own confirming stagger measurement to add another layer of confirmation.
I found nothing in the tire rules that would prohibit a team from taking the primary left-front from Set 2 and using it as the primary left-front in Set 5, for example.
Q: There is a lot of interest in IndyCar here in Sweden right now with all of the Swedish drivers competing in the series. How do you rank the Swedish drivers, both among each other and also among all the drivers in the field right now? Felix has started the season strong with his new team while Marcus been struggling for form and Linus and Tom are newcomers to IndyCar. It’s interesting to see what you guys think about our drivers, since you are maybe not hardcore fans of them like most Swedes are.
Emil, Sweden
MP: Tom refers to himself as a Kiwi, FWIW. Felix is showing us what he brought as a rookie with Ganassi; super fast and consistent. I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t get a win this year and have Meyer Shank Racing in the top 10 at the end of the championship. Marcus is capable of winning and being in the top 10 for Andretti, but needs a swift change of fortunes for that to become more realistic. He’s sneakily good. This is just a rough patch for him. Linus has tons of talent but suffers a bit with inner confidence. He should be in a much stronger place a year from now. It’s too soon to tell if he’s title-winning material. Outside of reporting and the professional part of what I do, the three Swedes are among my favorite people in and out of the paddock.