Q: I’ve been unfriendly towards Graham Rahal, but he claimed the pole at Portland and I was interested in how his race would go. He looked good from the get-go, but the next time I looked, he was down 20-30 seconds even though IndyCar timing and scoring showed all to be square on pit stops. I didn’t see why he dropped. What did I miss? And a comment, way too much expertise is conveyed by the NBC announcing team… just saying. If only they were out there?
Jack Woodruff
MARSHALL PRUETT: We covered off Graham above. On the broadcast side, Hinch, specifically, was in the Portland race two years ago, so I’m taking whatever he says as a fact. Townsend’s a racer. Dillon’s a racer. And Diffey’s called IndyCar races for 20 years.
Q: I saw the movie “Grand Turismo.” The movie didn’t touch on Jann Mardenborough’s adventures in open-wheel racing, and it many focused on him winning the GT academy and his racing in European GT and his race at Le Mans. Do you think he’s capable of driving an IndyCar, or stick with the IMSA GT3s?
Alistair, Springfield, MO
MARSHALL PRUETT: Jann’s got tons of talent. If he were motivated to come here and give Indy NXT a try, because he has no racing profile in the U.S. that would make an IndyCar team owner want to hire him, I’d bet he’d be exceptional.
Q: What is the attraction of Andretti Autosport over Chip Ganassi Racing for someone like Ericsson? CGR is a 15x championship team. Is it the illusion of an F1 seat?
Mark, Ohio
MARSHALL PRUETT: A big salary is the first item, and the feeling of being wanted is the other. He’s never spoken of seeking a return to F1 because he knows it’s not realistic. Like every IndyCar driver, he’s said he’ll happily go back if Horner or Wolff place a call, but that isn’t happening for him or any other driver in the series.
Q: Two quick questions: First, back in the day when the TV announcer said the team was putting sticker tires on, you would actually see the stickers on the tires for a few moments until they wore away. I don’t see those anymore. Do teams remove them, or does Firestone not apply them and there is some sort of bar code printed on the tire? Second, how many air guns do teams go through in a season? It seems like when the outside front tire changer throws the gun to the wall it takes quite a bit of abuse.
Rich, Woodstock, IL
MARSHALL PRUETT: The bar codes are on the sidewalls, and the big old-school stickers are no longer a thing. They’re smaller now, and most teams make the effort to remove them before the tires go onto the cars. Teams tend to work with primary (race) and practice guns. The race guns aren’t pulled out until warmup, and it’s common for this year’s race guns to become next year’s practice guns with new units coming in as the race guns.
Q: What do you think of this idea? R.P. or Jay Frye call Ed Carpenter in and say, ‘Your entry is welcome, but we are afraid if you are the driver there is a good chance your car will fail tech inspection every race.’ Call it the Carpenter Infraction of Rule 18.b, Paragraph 5, Section 108, Seat 4. Replace the driver with a decent sub and the Carpenter infraction will probably go away.
Jim Cox, Rock Island, IL
MARSHALL PRUETT: I know it’s easy to kick a guy when he’s down, and Ed’s had the worst run of his career over the last year or two, but he’s more than capable of running up front in a car that’s capable of being there. If Alex Palou is slow on a road course, I know it’s not because of him. The same goes with Ed on ovals. The difference here is whether Ed will make the necessary changes within his team to change his fortunes?
Q: What a great race at WWTR, cementing in my mind that Scott Dixon may well be the best of his era. Granted, it was a heck of a team effort, but he still had to drive and feather the throttle. If I am ever low on gas, I want Scott driving my car!
Two questions. As best as I could tell, Marcus Ericsson was on a similar strategy to Dixon and was, I think, five laps better on fuel after the last stops. Why did he and his team abandon that strategy when Dixie was looking like he would make it with five laps less fuel? Shouldn’t Ericsson have been able to get to the finish and on the same lap with Dixie?
While on Ericsson, can you explain the issue of having no backup car to go to after the wreck with Power? I appreciate that due to engine lease practices a team cannot show up with two cars fully ready to go in the hauler like they did years ago. But Palou’s team clearly had a backup to put together, and it got used by Marcus instead. Maybe this begs a bit more of a global question as to what teams can and do show up with in the way of backup cars and equipment for situations such as Ericsson’s?
Forrester L Morgan
MARSHALL PRUETT: The question about Ericsson is answered by your opening comments. Most drivers have learned to save fuel at a high level, but this was facing the Yoda of fuel saving and Marcus — or any other driver — weren’t going to match Dixie.
On the spare chassis side, you get what you negotiate for. There’s also the reality that if needed, a spare chassis can be deployed for use with any of the other entries.
Q: I love oval racing, and ovals are what made me an IndyCar fan back in the IRL days. I’ve been to Texas many times, the 500 twice, Milwaukee back in 2009, as well as the ill-fated 2011 season finale. I want more ovals more than most fans. But let’s be clear, going back to Milwaukee, which has failed multiple times, ain’t it. To keep it short:
• It’s been almost 20 years since MKE was last successful.
• The most successful new event for IndyCar has been Nashville (a street race in a growing, cool, popular city).
• F1 is holding street races in the U.S. in fun, growing cities which are proving popular despite the terrible racing.
• People always complain about the racing on the flat, short ovals because the racing is single-file more often than not. (I don’t even like them much myself.)
My point is, if I were calling the financial shots at IndyCar, and despite my love for ovals, the last move I’d make would be returning to an old track that’s failed multiple times that was last successful almost 20 years ago.
Ross Bynum
MARSHALL PRUETT: We’re kinda’ predictable that way, aren’t we? Milwaukee has failed more than once as an IndyCar venue this century, but it’s worth one more try. If this attempt doesn’t work, with a new promotional effort from Penske Entertainment (which is the new wrinkle), it will never succeed.