Rolex 24 at Daytona, Finally!

Rolex 24

How did I let this one sit on the bucket list for so long?  I guess in some defense, it is on the other side of the country, but…  The Rolex 24 is an event that every race fan needs to experience, especially anyone who likes the sights, sounds, and smells of sportscars.  My trip to Daytona came together on very short notice due to a well-timed and placed business trip.  Surprisingly it was easy to arrange: tickets are cheap ($95 for 4 day pass to just about anywhere except the luxury suites), a comfortable hotel was available less than 30 minutes away in Flagler Beach, and that along with a variety of layers for the unpredictable weather is about all you need.

Access is surprisingly easy.  Daytona International Speedway is just off I-95, and 3 hours before scheduled green flag time, even surface street traffic was pretty light.  Since I was essentially winging it, I had no infield or reserved parking.  Nevertheless, I managed to get into the free lot on the northeast corner of the grounds.  Great place to park at the last minute – just a hundred yards or so from the Turn 4 Tunnel that leads to the infield near the garages.  Just where I wanted to start the day.

Before heading to the track, as I was checking out the Rolex 24 website, I came across two lists: ‘Top 10 Spots to Watch the Rolex 24’ and ‘Top 10 Things First-Timers Should Experience’ on the Rolex 24 Things To Do page.  First thing to do: head to the garage area to be nearby when the Pit Lane opens for the Fan Grid Walk.

One of the particularly cool things about TUSC/IMSA is the access provided to pits, paddocks, cars, and drivers.  Unlike other series, for instance that one that begins with ‘F’ and ends with ‘1’, TUSC/IMSA makes a concerted effort at openness and actively fosters a connection between teams/drivers and fans.  Access and fan engagement is something that TUSC/IMSA has gotten right. The Rolex 24 Fan Walk, an hour of up close access to the pits, cars, drivers, and front stretch, start/finish banking is really something special.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Just before the marshals began clearing the grid I ran into SoCal’s own Connor De Phillippi as he was preparing to pilot the #19 GTD Porsche on its opening stint.  Connor would also be driving the #18 car, where he would be spending most of his time.

Rolex 24

About 30 minutes before roll off, the grid was cleared.  I decided to make my way to the infield kink for the race start.  At the Rolex 24, it’s open seating in all the stands, and I never had a problem finding a place to sit or stand where I wanted to.

The roar of engines marks the green flag drop, and it’s just seconds until 53 cars enter the infield.  Scott Dixon in the Chip Ganassi Racing #02 car was off to a quick start leading out of the International Horseshoe.  The kink is a very fast part of the infield, and with how close you can get to the track, you can really appreciate the speed.  Sights and sounds are fantastic!

Rolex 24

After watching at the kink for a bit, I headed over the Turn 2 (inside) stands to watch the cars come of the NASCAR Turn 2 banking while the sun was still high.  Along the way, I checked out a few of the car corrals and party scenes and stopped in the PCA tent. The PCA tent had two big screen TVs set up: one showing the broadcast action, the other showing the full timing and scoring. Nice!

Rolex 24

The Turn 2 stands are about as far away in the infield that you can walk, and there were just few of us there surrounded by a sea of RVs. Great place to relax a bit. While at Turn 2, the Prototypes began to catch up with the GT Daytona class cars. As cars launch out of the infield onto the banking, a fair amount of passing gets done between NASCAR 1 and the Bus Stop Chicane near the end of the backstretch.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Next, I wandered around the infield checking out the various vantage points. I ‘tuned in’ to radiolemans.com on my mobile phone to listen to their broadcast of the race and use my ear buds as hearing protection, and I pulled up live timing and scoring on the IMSA app.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Rolex 24, BMW Team RLL

For the first few hours of the race, there was lots of action but no big surprises: the Chip Ganassi, Action Express, Michael Shank, and Wayne Taylor Racing ran at or near the top of the Prototypes. Core Autosport and Starworks Motorsport headed the Prototype Challenge class. The usual suspects led the GT classes – Corvette Racing, Falken Tire Porsche, Risi Competizione Ferrari, RLL BMW, Porsche North America in GT Le Mans (GTLM) and Riley Viper, Scuderia Corsa Ferrari, GB Autosport Porsche, and Paul Miller Audi in GT Daytona (GTD). The fields were pretty tightly bunched and very competitive with numerous lead changes. The infield was a great place to hang out moving between the two horseshoes, the Sprint Fanzone with its food, drink, and big screen TV, the garages, and that deck on top of the garages.

As the sun set and nightfall came, I settled in at the West Horseshoe and the small grandstand near Turn 6 (where cars exit the infield and onto the banked oval.

Rolex 24, Tequila Patron ESM

Rolex 24, Team Falken Tire

Rolex 24, SpeedSource

Finally, after standing at the top of the Turn 6 stand for a while with it fully dark, I began to shiver in my t-shirt and shorts. Time to head back to the car for jeans and a fleece and a hot cup of coffee along the way. Another cool thing about this place and this race: there are plenty of places to get food and drink and the lines are never too long. A brisk walk thru the garages, out the Turn 4 tunnel, to the car and back, and I was back in the infield but a lot more comfortable!

Rolex 24

Rolex 24, Risi Competizione

The first North American Endurance Cup bonus points were awarded at the 1/4 point of the race with class leaders #01 Chip Ganassi with Joey Hand behind the wheel in Prototype, #54 Core Autosport in Prototype Challenge, #3 Corvette Racing in GTLM ,and #93 Riley Motorsports in GTD.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

As midnight approached and the race seemed to quiet down a bit, decided to grab a few more shots and start heading back to the car.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24, Tequila Patron ESM

Along the way, the Ferris Wheel caught my attention, so I decided to check it out. With almost no line, that would be the last stop before heading back to the hotel.

Rolex 24

Rolex 24

The plan for Sunday was to check out the main grandstand and the viewing from there, so I parked in the lot of the big NASCAR building right across the street from the track. Once again, easily in and parked, and I was in the grandstand in no time. The most significant events during the night were the two factory Porsches taking each other out in the infield, the Team Falken Tire Porsche experiencing a crank case failure, and the Risi Ferrari retiring with electrical problems, so there were no Porsches or Ferraris left in the hunt in GTLM, which seriously degraded the battle in that class. The factory Porsches (#911 & #912) both eventually made it back into the race and the #911 was running at the end, but they were never in contention after their crash. So it was a bit of a different race come Sunday morning.

Watching from the main grandstand far exceeded my expectations. You can still get pretty close to the action, and you can also get high to see the entire track – whatever your preference.


Is this the last racing series with both exciting and varied engine sounds?

On the first green light lap following a Full Course Yellow (FCY) with just over three hours to go, the #4 Corvette tagged a back marker prototype car that wiggled in Turn 6 coming out of the infield and caused enough damage to drop the #4 from contention following a fairly lengthy pit stop for repairs that cost 4 laps.

With two hours to go in the 2015 Rolex 24, there were still close battles going in all but the PC class, where the #54 Core Autosport seemed to have things under control. In the Prototype class, the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing car driven by Max Angelelli led the Chip Ganassi #02 piloted by Scott Dixon and the #5 Action Express car with Sebastien Bourdais at the wheel. In GTLM, it was down to the #3 Corvette Racing and #25 BMW Team RLL cars, and in GTD, it was the #93 Riley Motorsports Viper leading the #22 Alex Job Racing Porsche. All other cars running with laps down in class at this point.

Rolex 24, Action Express Racing

Rolex 24

The #02 Chip Ganassi car and the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing car were running nip and tuck for the last couple hours of the race. Scott Dixon’s ability to drive fast while ‘making fuel’ in the #02 and Jordan Taylor’s hard charging in the #10 made it likely to come down to the wire.

Rolex 24

In a dramatic twist, the PC class leader #54, driven by Colin Braun, clobbered the wall coming out of the bus stop chicane with just under 20 minutes to go and ultimately finished third in class.  During the ensuing FCY, in another twist, the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing car pitted suddenly for a driver change – apparently to avoid a drive time violation for Jordan Taylor.  Sadly, the team still missed the mark, perhaps by 1 lap, and were disqualified.

Congratulations to class winners #02 Chip Ganassi Racing, #3 Corvette Racing, #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports, and #93 Riley Motorsports!

Thank you IMSA and Daytona International Speedway for a great race and a fabulous experience.  I’ll be back!

Lots more pics at Rolex 24 at Daytona 2015

Rolex 24 Podium Positions By Class

Pic Class Driver Team Car Gap
1 P S.Dixon, T.Kanaan, K.Larson, J.McMurray Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Riley/Ford 24h00m57.667s
2 P J.Barbosa, C.Fittipaldi, S.Bourdais Action Express Racing Corvette/Chevrolet 1.333s
3 P R.Westbrook, M.Valiante, M.Rockenfeller, G.Cosmo visitflorida.com Racing Corvette/Chevrolet 6 Laps
1 GTLM J.Magnussen, A.Garcia, R.Briscoe Corvette Racing Chevrolet 15 Laps
2 GTLM B.Auberlen, D.Werner, A.Farfus, B.Spengler BMW Team RLL BMW 15 Laps
3 GTLM O.Gavin, T.Milner, S.Pagenaud Corvette Racing Chevrolet 22 Laps
1 PC M.Guasch, A.Novich, A.Palmer, T.K.-Smith PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Oreca/Chevrolet 26 Laps
2 PC J.Mowlem, T.Papadopoulos, T.Drissi, B.Alder, M.Plowman BAR1 Motorsports Oreca/Chevrolet 27 Laps
3 PC J.Bennett, C.Braun, M.Wilkins, J.Gue Core Autosport Oreca/Chevrolet Not running
1 GTD B.Keating, D.Farnbacher, A.Carter, K.Wittmer, C.Lawrence Riley Motorsports Dodge 36 Laps
2 GTD C.MacNeil, L.Keen, A.Davis, S.Gisbergen Alex Job Racing Porsche 36 Laps
3 GTD M.Snow, J.Heylen, P.Dempsey, P.Eng Wright Motorsports Porsche 38 Laps

Rolex 24 Tips & Suggestions

  1. Go to the Rolex 24 website and check out the Top 10 Spots To Watch and Top 10 Things To Do.  Make a point to check out as many as possible.  Of these, my favorites, in no particular order:
    1. Various infield grandstands
    2. Infield scene in general
    3. Ferris wheel
    4. Front stretch
    5. Top of Daytona Rising
    6. Garage scene
    7. Fan Walk
  2. Get there early!  There is so much to see and do at the Rolex 24, and you’ll want to do it all.
  3. Get infield parking if you can, especially if you’re a local and you have a car you can take to one of the corrals or if you have an RV.
  4. Take clothing options and layers.  Over nighters have fire pits for a reason!
  5. Wear comfortable shoes; this place is huge!
  6. Take a pocket charger or extra batteries for your cameras, cell phones, and other gizmos.
  7. Make sure you have hearing protection.
  8. Get the Daytona International Speedway and IMSA mobile apps for your phone.
  9. Bring an earbud headset to listen to the race.
  10. Use Full Course Yellow periods to go move around and check out something new.  Since it takes a while to go thru the whole pit cycle, you won’t miss the action and you’ll probably like what you find.

Congrats to Will Power, IndyCar Champ

For the third year running, the IndyCar Champion was crowned at the season finale at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana.  And after finishing IndyCar runner-up three times, it was finally Will Power’s time to take the crown.

Will Power

Will Power came to Auto Club Speedway with a lead of 51 points over Penske Racing teammate Helio Castroneves and 81 points over Simon Pagenaud.  Helio’s pole reduced the lead to 50 points entering the race, and with the finale awarding double points – up to 103 with all the bonuses – Power’s lead was anything but secure, especially with his starting position on the last row.

In the first 10 laps, Pagenaud was losing places while Power gained a few as his teammates Helio Castroneves and Juan Pablo Montoya ran at the front.

At the halfway point, Indy 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay was leading from Montoya and Castroneves.  Power was running 7th in the thus far caution free race.  Hunter-Reay was steadily pulling away from Montoya just before pit stops around lap 140.  On lap 145, just after most had cycled thru the pits, Castroneves lead Tony Kanaan and Montoya.

On lap 175, Ryan Hunter-Reay spun, bringing out the first caution – a record run of green flag laps.  On the ensuing green, Will Power drove aggressively to the front from 5th like a man possessed.  He took the lead on lap 189.

On laps 198 thru 200, the Ganassi Racing pair of Tony Kanaan and Scott Dixon both passed Power.  Late pit violations for Helio Castroneves and Ryan Hunter-Reay put them both out of race contention and also ended Helio’s title hopes.  On Will Power’s last stop, a mistake was made on his front wing adjustment that made his car very difficult to handle.  Since Helio’s penalty essentially eliminated him from championship contention and Pagenaud had gradually lost several laps throughout the night, Power was able to nurse his car home while Tony Kanaan took his first and well-deserved win on the last race of the season.

We’re lucky in SoCal to host two of North America’s premier open wheel races – the Grand Prix of Long Beach and the season ending 500 miler.  For the third year in a row, we were treated to an exciting finale that crowned the IndyCar season Champion.  Not sure I am a fan of ending the season so early – it seems like we should be seeing these guys for at least another month.  That makes the off-season just that much longer as well.  I can’t wait until Long Beach in the Spring!

Conway Takes IndyCar Long Beach Win

 IndyCar Long Beach

IndyCar Long Beach What a 40th Grand Prix of Long Beach!

In an unpredictable, somewhat chaotic IndyCar Long Beach race, Mike Conway of Ed Carpenter Racing won with a clean and steady approach while those around him were banging each other, scraping the barriers, or running out of gas.

Conway was running 15th when the leaders began cycling thru the pits with 27 laps to go.  Up to that point, pole sitter Ryan Hunter-Reay had dominated the race.  Hunter-Reay and Andretti Autosport teammate James Hinchcliffe pitted together while running one-two on lap 53.  Hunter-Reay exited the pits just ahead of Hinchcliffe while Josef Newgarden pitted behind them from third.  Newgarden had done a great in-lap and with a clean pit stop, got out just ahead of Hunter-Reay into Turn 1, but naturally on cold tires.  Hunter-Reay and Hinchcliffe on warming tires were stacked up behind Newgarden around the fountain.  At Turn 4, Ryan Hunter-Reay made an over optimistic attempt to pass Newgarden and punted him into the left barriers.  The ensuing melee took out Newgarden, Hunter-Reay, and Hinchcliffe who were running one, two, three as well as Tony Kanaan and Takuma Sato who ran into the pile up from behind.

On the restart, the running order was Scott Dixon, Justin Wilson, Will Power, & Mike Conway.  Shortly after the restart, Dixon nudged Wilson into the barriers on the approach to Turn 8.  The impact was pretty light, but it was enough to destroy Wilson’s left front suspension.  Wilson was furious because even though Dixon had to stop before the end, Wilson was good on fuel and was well positioned for a win.

In earlier action on Lap 32, Will Power helped Simon Pagenaud into the tire barrier at Turn 6 while Pagenaud was running in second place as the sequence below shows:

IndyCar Long Beach

IndyCar Long Beach

IndyCar Long Beach

Pagenaud was about as upset at Power as Wilson was at Dixon. For his part, Will Power apologized, surprised that he wasn’t penalized.

Ultimately, Carpenter took a well-deserved checkered for running a clean and consistent race.

IndyCar Long Beach

The top 15 at the finish:

Pos  Driver              Team/Engine           Time/Gap
 1.  Mike Conway         Carpenter/Chevy  1h54m41.6418s
 2.  Will Power          Penske/Chevy          +0.9005s
 3.  Carlos Munoz        Andretti/Honda        +1.5591s
 4.  Juan Pablo Montoya  Penske/Chevy          +2.0226s
 5.  Simon Pagenaud      Schmidt/Honda         +2.8169s
 6.  Mikhail Aleshin     Schmidt/Honda         +3.8574s
 7.  Oriol Servia        Rahal/Honda           +4.9621s
 8.  Marco Andretti      Andretti/Honda        +8.1948s
 9.  Sebastian Saavedra  KV/Chevy              +8.9029s
10.  Carlos Huertas      Coyne/Honda          +24.2295s
11.  Helio Castroneves   Penske/Chevy         +30.0552s
12.  Scott Dixon         Ganassi/Chevy        +30.7310s
13.  Graham Rahal        Rahal/Honda             +1 lap
14.  Sebastien Bourdais  KV/Chevy               +3 laps
15.  Jack Hawksworth     Herta/Honda            +3 laps

Many more pics at IndyCar Long Beach.

2013 MAVTV 500 Wrap – Power & Dixon

IndyCar put on a great show for the last race of the season – the MAVTV 500 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana.  Even with Scott Dixon entering the weekend with a 25 point lead, his championship battle with Helio Castroneves was still in doubt until late in the contest.

IndyCar has chosen an excellent race and venue for the season finale with the MAVTV 500 – a big track with multiple lines that’s tough on both drivers and cars.  In both of the last two seasons, the outcome wasn’t decided until late in the race, and ultimately in neither case did the season champion actually win the race.  If you’re anywhere near Fontana, CA, you really should see this spectacle in person.  Access to Auto Club Speedway is easy; with a paddock or infield pass, you can get very close to the action during practice and qualifying sessions; and the venue itself is a good place to watch a big race, in this case the MAVTV 500.

Will Power drove a great race to the top step of the podium.  If he drove such a race last year, he’d have been the reigning champion coming into this year’s race.  Scott Dixon drove a smart race – content to run in fairly open spaces mid pack for much of the race, saving fuel, and staying out of trouble.  Helio Castroneves clearly had to be aggressive, and he nearly pulled off a come from behind championship win.  He was competitive for the win throughout most of the race, meaning Dixon couldn’t afford to play it too safe.

Congratulations to Scott Dixon, 2013 IndyCar Champion!

MAVTV 500 Qualifying – IndyCar Championship

MAVTV 500 Qualifying

On a perfect SoCal day at Auto Club Speedway, the MAVTV 500 qualifying session set the stage for Saturday’s IndyCar championship battle.  Scott Dixon comes to the race with a 25 point lead, having erased a 49 point deficit to Helio Castroneves during the Grand Prix of Houston double-header.  Castroneves had a disastrous weekend in Houston while Dixon shined.

Castroneves’s teammate WIll Power denied both title contenders the single point pole position bonus by posting the fastest time during the MAVTV 500 qualifying.  When Power went out, Castroneves was on provisional pole with Dixon still to go, so Power had to set his best time to prevent Dixon from taking pole.  Power bumped Castroneves to second, and Dixon ended up qualifying seventh.  AJ Allmendinger, driving a third Team Penske car set the third fasted time after not having raced an IndyCar since his horrible weekend at Detroit in June.  Castroneves will have two strong wing men as he attempts to claw back the points he lost in Houston and win the season championship.

MAVTV 500 Qualifying

Alex Tagliani, subbing for the injured Dario Franchitti, will be Dixon’s teammate this weekend in the #10 Target car.  Tagliani actually won a CART race at Auto Club Speedway more than ten years ago.

MAVTV 500 Qualifying

Defending IndyCar series champ, Ryan Hunter-Reay, who won the 2012 title at this very race continued a challenging year by qualifying fifteenth.

MAVTV 500 Qualifying

The final results for the MAVTV 500 qualifying:

Pos  Driver               Team/Engine      Speed
 1.  Will Power           Penske/Chevy     220.775
 2.  Helio Castroneves    Penske/Chevy     219.677*
 3.  AJ Allmendinger      Penske/Chevy     218.894
 4.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dragon/Chevy     218.513
 5.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi/Honda    217.986
 6.  James Jakes          Rahal/Honda      217.979
 7.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi/Honda    217.979*
 8.  Marco Andretti       Andretti/Chevy   217.958
 9.  Ed Carpenter         Carpenter/Chevy  217.932
10.  Josef Newgarden      Fisher/Honda     217.871*
11.  James Hinchcliffe    Andretti/Chevy   217.798
12.  Tony Kanaan          KV/Chevy         217.566
13.  Alex Tagliani        Ganassi/Honda    217.419
14.  Carlos Munoz         Andretti/Chevy   217.050
15.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti/Chevy   216.898
16.  Simon Pagenaud       Schmidt/Honda    216.447
17.  Oriol Servia         Panther/Chevy    216.213
18.  Graham Rahal         Rahal/Honda      216.106*
19.  JR Hildebrand        Herta/Honda      215.967
20.  Tristan Vautier      Schmidt/Honda    215.207
21.  Simona de Silvestro  KV/Chevy         214.679
22.  Sebastian Saavedra   Dragon/Chevy     213.262*
23.  Justin Wilson        Coyne/Honda
24.  Pippa Mann           Coyne/Honda
25.  Takuma Sato          Foyt/Honda

* 10 spot grid penalty pending

MAVTV 500 qualifying

More pics from MAVTV 500 Qualifying

Detailed information on the MAVTV 500

Motorsports Week – The Good, Bad, & Sad

This past week has been quite a mix – happy things, not so happy things, but lots of emotion nonetheless.  Starting last Sunday, on the good side, a SoCal racer named Charlie Kimball won his first IndyCar race at Mid-Ohio with an inspired drive in a back up car.  Staying happy, another couple of SoCal racers had quite a battle in the GT class of the Grand-Am race at Road America on Saturday.  Bill Auberlen in a Turner Motorsport BMW passed Patrick Long in a Park Place Motorsports Porsche late in the race to win the GT class. The Grand-Am – ALMS double-header at Road America was a great setup for sports car fans, and Sunday’s ALMS race was shaping up to have a fantastic finish across multiple classes, but a full course yellow with just under 9 minutes remaining left us with an anticlimactic finish under yellow.  Not so good.  But probably the worst part of the motorsports week was Sunday evening’s final broadcast of both Speed Center and Wind Tunnel as SPEED becomes Fox Sports 1 in the next week.

Motorsports Week – Charlie Kimball’s First IndyCar Win

In last Sunday’s Mid-Ohio IndyCar race, Charlie Kimball drove a fantastic race to take his first win in the series for the Ganassi Racing team.  He passed Simon Pagenaud on lap 73 of the 90 lap race for the final lead change of the race.  Kimball was on a different, and ultimately better strategy than his Ganassi teammates, Scott DIxon and Dario Franchitti.  Dixon and Franchitti were initially on a two stop, fuel save strategy, while Kimball was clocking off great times lap after lap.  He ultimately led 46 of the 90 laps.  The whole story was all the more remarkable because Kimball was driving a backup car due to a severe crash on Saturday morning practice.

Motorsports Week – Grand-Am Road America GT Race

Road America was the site of Grand-Am – ALMS double-header this weekend, which was quite a spectacle for sportscar racing fans.  In Saturday’s Grand-Am race SoCal’s Patrick Long and Bill Auberlen battled for the lead throughout the latter part of the race.  With just over 16 minutes to go in the 2 hour, 45 minute race, Auberlen got a good run on Long off of Turn 3 in his Turner Motorsport BMW and passed him for good under braking into Turn 5.  Long stayed close for the rest of the race, but ultimately finished second, still a great finish for his Park Place Motorsports team.  Also in Grand-Am race, Brendon Hartley and teammate Scott Mayer took advantage of a relatively late full course yellow and notched their first win for the Starworks Motorsport Daytona Prototype team.

Motorsports Week – ALMS Road America Race

Sunday’s Road America ALMS race was shaping up to a fantastic finish with tight battles across multiple classes and several leading cars getting low on fuel when a bad wreck by a GTC car brought out of full course yellow with about 9 minutes to go.  Unfortunately, as Johnny O’Connell said on the broadcast, ‘… I think they’re just taking too long here…’, and race control was not able to manage a return to green flag racing.  The set up for a tremendous finish was missed.  Even with a finish under yellow, Road America did not disappoint once again with a particularly tight battle in the GT class, which was ultimately won by the #91 SRT Viper driven by Marc Goossens and Dominik Farnbacher.

Motorsports Week – Farewell To SPEED, Speed Center, and Wind Tunnel

In both the bad and sad news of the week, SPEED broadcast their final weekend of racing, which also marked the end of Speed Center and Wind Tunnel, much to the chagrin of racing fans everywhere.  We’ve known about the Death of Speed for quite some time now, but that doesn’t make it any easier to take.  I must say that while I was watching the final episode of Speed Center and Wind Tunnel, I was both saddened and somewhat unbelieving that Fox Sports 1 decided not to continue these popular enthusiast programs. I’ll especially miss Dave Despain and his excellent guests and regulars like Robin Miller.  I hope all those effected find even better opportunities in the near future.  Thanks for the great fun and great memories!

Dario Franchitti & Scott Dixon at Auto Club Speedway

Auto Club Speedway (ACS) in Fontana will be hosting the IZOD IndyCar finale under the lights in September when the series returns to SoCal, and today, Dario Franchitti and Scott Dixon came to ACS to treat a small group of fans to a lunchtime visit that included interviews, Q&A, a photo session, and a sampling of their signature cuisine.

Dario Franchitti

Scott Dixon

Gillian Zucker, President of Auto Club Speedway was the event host, and she did a nice job of interviewing and engaging the drivers with audience submitted questions. Both of these guys quickly make connections to a crowd and are approachable good sports.

Scott Dixon is currently 4th in the standings and 28 points behind IndyCar series leader Will Power with three races to go.  He has a chance of winning the Championship if he has a couple of good races at Sonoma and Baltimore heading into the finale – especially if Power (1st), Ryan Hunter-Reay (2nd), and Helio Castroneves (3rd) founder.  Dario Franchitti is currently 8th with no realistic chance of defending his Champion status.  Aside from a fabulous month of May that saw him win his third Indy 500, Dario has had a tough year in which just about anything that could go wrong, did.  Aside from trying to take wins, his main role for the rest of the season will be supporting Dixon, his Target Ganassi teammate.

Dario & Scott were having fun!

During the interview we learned that Dario’s family fled Mussolini’s Italy for the ‘place with the worst weather.’  His maternal grandmother is, in fact, Scottish.  Scott Dixon’s wife Emma was a former top middle distance runner for Great Britain.  Dario favors street courses, while Scott favors road courses.

Dario and Scott are both lukewarm on the push-to-pass. In the recent race, the 5 second push-to-pass delay made it confusing and difficult to use it properly at the start. How do you time the boost that will happen 5 seconds in the future when you don’t know exactly when the green flag will drop?  Everybody got it wrong.  Supposedly the delay is going away.

Both of them felt the finale will be an interesting race with changing conditions as the sun goes down – compromising vision – and the track cools off.  500 miles around the Auto Club Speedway will be exciting and tough.

After the interview and a picture session, fans were invited to sample Scott Tots and Franchitti Ziti – really.

The guys with Scott Tots and Franchitti Ziti

Both of these guys are passionate racers, and the fans love them.  They’re great ambassadors for the sport, and I wish them well for the rest of the season.

Scott Dixon & Dario Franchitti

So What About IndyCar Push-To-Pass?

Well after watching a few races under the revived IZOD IndyCar series push-to-pass system, I can’t say that I am a big fan – at least yet.  At Edmonton, most of the radio chatter in the last few laps of a competitive race was about when to use push-to-pass, how much to use, how much other guys might have left.  Helio Castroneves was able to hold off Takuma Sato, perhaps with the help of conserving his push-to-pass time throughout the race.  Too much like a video game for me.  This weekend at Mid-Ohio, there was a revision in that there would be a 5 second delay between push and effect.  I never heard an explanation for the change, but I would guess that it was to prevent push-to-defend: the overtaking driver would know where he wanted the push-to-pass boost and would push 5 seconds early, and the overtaken driver would not be able to respond.  At Mid-Ohio, it was not easy to determine the effect of push-to-pass on the race.  Winner Scott Dixon had great pace throughout and the Target Ganassi team executed flawlessly on pit stops.  I do have to give IndyCar kudos for how they reflect the use of push-to-pass on live timing and scoring – which is perhaps the best timing display in professional racing.

Personally I would rather see overtaking more dependent upon driver skill and looking after tires that performed more on the edge.  And I think the cars should have much more horsepower all of the time with less dependence upon aero.  Again this would put a premium on driver skill and car control.  Think of what a race is like in the rain.  In fact, on Twitter, there were folks rooting for rain at Mid-Ohio.  Opinions?

Congratulations to Dario Franchitti

In one of the most exciting Indy 500 races, Dario Franchitti took his place on the Borg Warner Trophy for the third time.  He withstood an aggressive challenge on the final lap from Takuma Sato, who spun after trying to pass Franchitti on the inside into Turn 1.  Franchitti traded first place with Target Ganassi teammate Scott Dixon multiple times over the last several laps.  Dixon ultimately finished a close second.  Tony Kanaan also mounted a challenge, leading the race as late as lap 193 of 200, and finished third.

The win was a significant vindication for both Target Ganassi and Honda after both had a disappointing qualifying session.  Only one Honda engine was in the top ten grid places at the start, but Honda engines were in the top two cars – Franchitti and Dixon – as well as five of the top ten.  The result was a major disappointment for the Chevrolet powered teams of Andretti Autosport and Team Penske, both of whom did well in qualification.

Dario Franchitti has now joined a very select group of three time Indy500 winners – including some of his heroes.