NihonTiger90
Member
Made one last year and it's a big enough event ... so eh, why not?
Important info
Date: Sunday, May 26, 2013
Time: Noon EDT (9 a.m. PDT, 4 p.m. UTC)
Length: 500 miles (200 laps)
Track length: 2.5 miles (4.023 km)
Defending winner: Dario Franchitti (Chip Ganassi Racing)
Forecast: Mostly cloudy with a 30 percent chance of showers/storms after 2 p.m.; calm winds; high temperature, 67 F
Television: United States - ABC (tape delay until the evening in Indiana); International - check locally, but probably whoever does IndyCar coverage
Radio: Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network; Armed Forces Network; Sirius channel 212/XM channel 94
Pace car: This bitchin' 2014 Corvette Stingray:
Niiiiiice.
Starting Grid (left to right = inside to outside)
I haven't paid one bit of attention to anything going on this year. Recap?
Sure. We're four races into the season and it's been wacky.
Your points leader is Takuma Sato (#14). Not a single one of you said that'd happen so don't even say you saw it coming. Most folks didn't expect much to come from Sato joining perennial midfield team AJ Foyt Racing, but Sato's won once this year (Long Beach) and nearly won again at Sao Paulo, except he got out-Sato'd in the last corner by ...
James Hinchcliffe (#27), who also won the season opener at St. Petersburg to win his first race ever. The Mayor of Hinchtown is 4th in points, though, due to two 26th place finishes in Alabama and Long Beach. He's yet to win on an oval of any sort, though.
Will Power (#12), on the other hand, is not having a wonderful time. His best finish is 5th, and he has three finishes of 16th or worse this year. It's very un-Power like, as he usually starts the season out by dominating the field and then runs into issues in the second half of the year, when he inevitably loses the championship he was almost a lock to win. An Indy win could do wonders for him, for once.
Who's on pole?
That would be Ed Carpenter (#20), the stepson of Tony George (the former President and CEO of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the man half-responsible for the idiotic IRL-Champ Car split). He qualified with a speed of 228.762 mph (368.157 km/h), the fastest since 2006. It's been a bright spot in what has been an otherwise crappy start for the driver-owner.
Is Danica-
NO.
Who are the favorites?
Beyond Hinchcliffe, Power, and Sato (because you can never count him out until he's in the wall), there's a few notable names to mention:
Marco Andretti (#25)
Laugh all you want, but Marco and his teammates have been incredibly fast all weekend long. He's also had a good season, finishing no worse than 7th, which sits him second in points. He must still overcome the Andretti Curse (which got him in most notably 2006), but Marco starts 3rd. The lowest starting spot for an Andretti Autosport machine? Hinchcliff, who starts 9th. Speaking of teammates ...
Ryan Hunter-Reay (#1)
The defending series champ will start 7th, and an Indy win is one of the big things missing from his resume. Like Hinchcliffe, he has two big ugly finishes keeping him from being a little closer to the top of the points battle, but discounting him due to past Indy shortfalls is dangerous. Heck, discounting RHR at all is pretty dangerous.
Helio Castroneves (#3) and Dario Franchitti (#10)
Two three-time winners, both hoping to join the elite four-time-winners club with AJ Foyt, Al Unser Sr. and Rick Mears.
Castroneves - known for both his Dancing with the Stars win and the tax evasion case he went through (he was acquitted) - is a yearly contender because no matter how his season is going, he always, always does well at Indy. Considering he's third in points this season, I would say he might be quite a big threat to the rest of the field.
Franchitti - Ashley Judd's ex-husband and cousion of Paul di Resta - returns as the defending champion ... but it was his only win of 2013. Rumors are abound that he's considering retirement from IndyCar, and a fourth win would make for a pretty good storybook ending, right?
AJ Allmendinger (#2)
After his drug test failure last year in NASCAR, Dinger has returned to the IndyCar series with Penske Racing on a part-time basis. If he can provide The Captain with a win here, he just might stick around a little longer. So basically, he's driving with a job on the line.
Carlos Munoz (#26)
A wildcard, Munoz is a Colombian rookie from the Indy Lights series making his only start at Indy. He's with Andretti Autosport and he's been incredibly fast throughout the month of May; in fact, he's starting 2nd for the 500.
J.R. Hildebrand (#4)
Starting in 10th, he's got the speed and the motivation: two years ago, he crashed in the final corner while leading and Dan Wheldon drove past him to win the 500.
Scott Dixon (#9)
Always a bridesmaid at Indy, Dixon has had two runner-up finishes to Franchitti and has been in Dario's shadow since the Scotsman came over to Chip Ganassi Racing. This year might be the year that changes ... as long as the two Ganassi boys don't wreck each other going into Turn 1.
Note: For Monaco Grand Prix discussion before the Indy 500, head over to the F1-GAF thread. It'll be on NBC at 7:30 a.m. EST for those of you in the U.S.
Regular IndyCar discussion is over in the Other Motorsports thread in OT Community.
Important info
Date: Sunday, May 26, 2013
Time: Noon EDT (9 a.m. PDT, 4 p.m. UTC)
Length: 500 miles (200 laps)
Track length: 2.5 miles (4.023 km)
Defending winner: Dario Franchitti (Chip Ganassi Racing)
Forecast: Mostly cloudy with a 30 percent chance of showers/storms after 2 p.m.; calm winds; high temperature, 67 F
Television: United States - ABC (tape delay until the evening in Indiana); International - check locally, but probably whoever does IndyCar coverage
Radio: Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network; Armed Forces Network; Sirius channel 212/XM channel 94
Pace car: This bitchin' 2014 Corvette Stingray:
Niiiiiice.
Starting Grid (left to right = inside to outside)
Code:
Row 1
Ed Carpenter (20) Carlos Munoz (26)(R) Marco Andretti (25)
Row 2
EJ Viso (5) AJ Allmendinger (2)(R) Will Power (12)
Row 3
Ryan Hunter-Reay (1) Helio Castroneves (3) James Hinchcliffe (27)
Row 4
JR Hildebrand (4) Alex Tagliani (98) Tony Kanaan (11)
Row 5
Oriol Servia (22) Justin Wilson (18) Sebastien Bourdais (7)
Row 6
Scott Dixon (9) Dario Franchitti (10) Takuma Sato (14)
Row 7
Charlie Kimball (83) James Jakes (16) Simon Pagenaud (77)
Row 8
Townsend Bell (60) Ryan Briscoe (8) Simona de Silvestro (78)
Row 9
Josef Newgarden (21) Graham Rahal (15) Sebastian Saavedra (6)
Row 10
Tristan Vautier (55)(R) Ana Beatriz (18) Pippa Mann (63)
Row 11
Conor Daly (41)(R) Buddy Lazier (91) Katherine Legge (81)I haven't paid one bit of attention to anything going on this year. Recap?
Sure. We're four races into the season and it's been wacky.
Your points leader is Takuma Sato (#14). Not a single one of you said that'd happen so don't even say you saw it coming. Most folks didn't expect much to come from Sato joining perennial midfield team AJ Foyt Racing, but Sato's won once this year (Long Beach) and nearly won again at Sao Paulo, except he got out-Sato'd in the last corner by ...
James Hinchcliffe (#27), who also won the season opener at St. Petersburg to win his first race ever. The Mayor of Hinchtown is 4th in points, though, due to two 26th place finishes in Alabama and Long Beach. He's yet to win on an oval of any sort, though.
Will Power (#12), on the other hand, is not having a wonderful time. His best finish is 5th, and he has three finishes of 16th or worse this year. It's very un-Power like, as he usually starts the season out by dominating the field and then runs into issues in the second half of the year, when he inevitably loses the championship he was almost a lock to win. An Indy win could do wonders for him, for once.
Who's on pole?
That would be Ed Carpenter (#20), the stepson of Tony George (the former President and CEO of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the man half-responsible for the idiotic IRL-Champ Car split). He qualified with a speed of 228.762 mph (368.157 km/h), the fastest since 2006. It's been a bright spot in what has been an otherwise crappy start for the driver-owner.
Is Danica-
NO.
Who are the favorites?
Beyond Hinchcliffe, Power, and Sato (because you can never count him out until he's in the wall), there's a few notable names to mention:
Marco Andretti (#25)
Laugh all you want, but Marco and his teammates have been incredibly fast all weekend long. He's also had a good season, finishing no worse than 7th, which sits him second in points. He must still overcome the Andretti Curse (which got him in most notably 2006), but Marco starts 3rd. The lowest starting spot for an Andretti Autosport machine? Hinchcliff, who starts 9th. Speaking of teammates ...
Ryan Hunter-Reay (#1)
The defending series champ will start 7th, and an Indy win is one of the big things missing from his resume. Like Hinchcliffe, he has two big ugly finishes keeping him from being a little closer to the top of the points battle, but discounting him due to past Indy shortfalls is dangerous. Heck, discounting RHR at all is pretty dangerous.
Helio Castroneves (#3) and Dario Franchitti (#10)
Two three-time winners, both hoping to join the elite four-time-winners club with AJ Foyt, Al Unser Sr. and Rick Mears.
Castroneves - known for both his Dancing with the Stars win and the tax evasion case he went through (he was acquitted) - is a yearly contender because no matter how his season is going, he always, always does well at Indy. Considering he's third in points this season, I would say he might be quite a big threat to the rest of the field.
Franchitti - Ashley Judd's ex-husband and cousion of Paul di Resta - returns as the defending champion ... but it was his only win of 2013. Rumors are abound that he's considering retirement from IndyCar, and a fourth win would make for a pretty good storybook ending, right?
AJ Allmendinger (#2)
After his drug test failure last year in NASCAR, Dinger has returned to the IndyCar series with Penske Racing on a part-time basis. If he can provide The Captain with a win here, he just might stick around a little longer. So basically, he's driving with a job on the line.
Carlos Munoz (#26)
A wildcard, Munoz is a Colombian rookie from the Indy Lights series making his only start at Indy. He's with Andretti Autosport and he's been incredibly fast throughout the month of May; in fact, he's starting 2nd for the 500.
J.R. Hildebrand (#4)
Starting in 10th, he's got the speed and the motivation: two years ago, he crashed in the final corner while leading and Dan Wheldon drove past him to win the 500.
Scott Dixon (#9)
Always a bridesmaid at Indy, Dixon has had two runner-up finishes to Franchitti and has been in Dario's shadow since the Scotsman came over to Chip Ganassi Racing. This year might be the year that changes ... as long as the two Ganassi boys don't wreck each other going into Turn 1.
Note: For Monaco Grand Prix discussion before the Indy 500, head over to the F1-GAF thread. It'll be on NBC at 7:30 a.m. EST for those of you in the U.S.
Regular IndyCar discussion is over in the Other Motorsports thread in OT Community.
