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Any of you guys at Indy, any chance you could grab a top down static photo of a tyre and wheel? Higher res the better

Something like this:
[spoiler][/spoiler]

Doesn't have to be bolted onto the car or anything, can just be lying on the ground.

Thanks.

Well, with all the penalties at least it means the teams are trying real hard to extract any and all speed out of these things.

If we ever get a to a point where they can challenge for the outright track record again, expect pole day crowds to come back. In the heyday, 200K for pole was not unheard of. I don't think we'd get back to that, but with honest shots at breaking the track record on the line I could see about 100K showing up. Need methanol and more boost.

If they gave them those 700bhp that they have on road and street tracks then they could get close to track records.

Hopefully someone warns Alesi about the dangers of starting in the back of Indianapolis grid. It must be tough for a beginer there (of course beginer at Indy) and at the age of 47.

I remember when Emmo Fittipaldi described his first ever experience starting in the last rows at Brickyard. He said he always heard people telling that you don't have oxygen when starting in last positions, "I never understood why people told that, how can you not have oxygen in the race? Then I had my first experience starting in the back, it's indeed extremely dangerous, all the dirty air brought me incredible lack of oxygen, my eyes started tearing hard, I almost get disoriented...five 5 laps later, all came to normal, but it's very easy to lose control in the first laps"

I don't think Alesi would worry about starting at the back. Lotus sucks so much that he's gonna be a non-factor anyway.

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Ducks Angels Sounders Spurs

if Alesi survives 5 laps, he will be lapped by then.....Shitty lotus. He probably would have done much better with a Honda or Chevy engine.

Alesi's Lotus won't make it past 50 laps.

Simona may do better but that's up to the car.

This is the very sad part, by the way.

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Ducks Angels Sounders Spurs

Anyone catch in the qualifying show that they mentioned that the Lotus is thought to be 90bhp off the Honda/Chevy's.

I think Alesi will get an updated engine for the race which produces an extra 30bhp. Simona ran an updated unit in qualifying. There also still hoping they will be allowed to keep qualifying boost levels although they will still be 8-10mph off the fastest, Would give them a shot at staying within the 105% limit though.


Robin Miller also made the point on Wind Tunnel that the Pace car this year will have more bhp than any of the race cars

LMAO, but also kinda sad.

And that in itself is a problem.

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-Joe.
Atlanta United FC | Cincinnati Reds | Atlanta Falcons | Tennessee Titans

And it's a decision by the series. Tuning the cars wouldnt cost that much money. A higher bosst level and some better spec parts like turbos and stuff can raise the bhp significantly.

Yeah. I think NASCAR may have suffered that indignity at the Daytona 500 a few times as well (restrictor plate era of course).

It is their philosophy since day 1 of the IRL and now into the Indycar era to give their drivers a hell of a lot of grip and not too much power.
They believe that is the recipe for good racing, for whatever reason, without doing any market research that would lead them to finding out that the majority of fans would prefer the exact opposite.

It's fine for a junior series such at FBMW when the drivers are still learning their trade, but not a supposedly top level Open Wheel series....

That speaks more than any market research. It was the same formula, even has the same Dallara chassis. The formula can, and does work. But they've messed with it too much. I thought the new car would solve it but it hasn't. If IndyCar produced racing like this now, we'd all love it.

Not to me really.

While that's the early stages of their downforce dependence, the cars were designed to do that and they're stuck side by side because they're stalling out.
If they could actually make a pass occasionally it'd have been great but being stuck in one big pack isn't what I want to see, particularly after Vegas.

I just spent all those races wincing when they ran around in a pack instead of enjoying it.

When Champcar did it at the famous JPM/Andretti Michigan in 2000 it was a damn fluke and that's what made it such a legendary finish that still comes up to this day.
IRL doing it on every oval race isn't remarked upon so much because it was kind of expected, rather than surprising.

Maybe this is just the first signs of me getting old and not liking the way racing is heading.
It's not like Indycar, Formula 2, Formula 3 and a few other series aren't all heading in the "Too much downforce, not enough power" direction already and maybe the formula I enjoy most, drivers struggling to control the amount of horsepower under their right foot with leery oversteers and such is becoming old fashioned, so maybe I should just get used to it, I can hear the angry replies already lol

So I don't care if it's old fashioned, proper racing cars should have more power than grip....

Now to perfect that time machine so I can head back to the 60s and prevent anyone from coming up with this wonky "downforce" idea in the first place!

Disagree and Disagree. The cars are stalling no more than the CART Handford races. It is the *exact* same effect we're seeing here. And whilst the finish to the Michigan 2000 was a fluke, the racing was most certainly not. The racing was extremely similar every time they ran the Handfords, it just happened to not give a great finish every time by coincidence.

And remember that it isn't quite as easy as "less downforce and more power is better". When CART ran at Gateway they tried 2 completely different aero packages in 1997 and 1998, and both sucked massive amount of balls. In fact a lot of CART races weren't fun - the best ones were Handford ones, which provided stalling cars and easy passes.

If that finish wasn't for you, might I suggest that you just don't like IndyCars?

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Why the hell are you in the Indycar threads? Getting real tired of all your bullshit!

Please don't make me repeat the tired old cliche of this being a discussion forum and not a hive mentality where we're all expected to think the exact same opinion at the exact same time.

I'm here because of the potential of what it could be rather than the reality of what we have now.
In the long and short of it, any "era" in any form of racing is just a phase and comes and goes, maybe this era isn't to my taste but I still love the history of the sport and what it could one day become again.