First test for IndyCar's 2018-spec car

Slowly coming around to the new car

Sebastien Bourdais' road and street course aero kit Chevy

I have made my opinion known from the start, I have not been sold on the new Dallara chassis. I've called it a "joke", "ugly", and a "POS".

However, I have to admit I am starting to warm up to the new car........slowly.

If it can somehow keep the costs down, if the "aero kits" are consistently tinkered with and improved upon, if it provides competition between Chevy and Honda, and if it creates good racing with the little guys at times fighting up at the front, then I am all for it.

I think we have seen that so far this year with 7 different winners out of 8 races, with Chevy showing a superior car to Honda, and with Juan Pablo Montoya coming from 30th position to win the Indy 500 thanks to "tweaks" made to the car during the race, I am becoming a believer.

I am not completely on board yet, I think the rear bumpers need to be done away with for road and street course races seeing as they provide no protection against wheel-to-wheel contact since they break off at the slightest touch. They are completely useless and do nothing but provide work for the clean up crews since they are constantly out picking up pieces which slows the race down and frustrates the fans.

I can see a benefit however for the rear bumpers on oval races. If they improve the aerodynamics, which I think they do, then we can see higher speeds on ovals but at the same time we are getting a safer car.

Stefano Coletti's oval aero kit Chevy

We still have a long way to go but I can see progress being made, I just hope it is not too late.

I'd like to see IndyCar succeed, even after all the negative things I have said over the years. But my love for open-wheel racing in America trumps the past and the open-wheel war that is over. I am on board with the new as long as they don't repeat the stupid mistakes of the past.

Working with the new car and making improvements is priority #1 and I can thankfully see that happening.

Marco Andretti's original street course Honda



Carlos Munoz' modified street course Honda in Detroit

New Indy car still needs work

(by John Oreovicz espn.go.com 12-22-11)

What do you get when you design a race car by committee and build it to a price?

The Dallara DW12 Indy car, which has an alarming number of people involved in the Izod IndyCar Series only half-joking that Dallara is Italian for disaster.

The car is named after the late Dan Wheldon, who handled the initial shakedown tests of Italian race car manufacturer Dallara Automobili's first new Indy car design since 2003. But Wheldon was maybe too diplomatic, a PR-minded party-line kind of guy, so he never played up the car's shortcomings. There are many of those, a fact that became obvious when testing moved on to the engine manufacturer phase and the car scared the likes of Dario Franchitti and Tony Kanaan while resolutely refusing to top 216 mph at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Following another round of testing at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., Scott Dixon gave the most honest assessment of the car to date, calling it "a bit of a pig" with an even more pronounced pendulum effect than the current Dallara IR03, which is already a tail-heavy car. The numbers don't lie; the DW12 has a weight distribution of 41 percent front, 59 percent rear, as compared to the IR03's 45/55.

The car's handling got better during the most recent round of testing at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but the improvement came from an extreme measure: Placing 26 pounds of lead ballast in the nose of the car to balance out the weight distribution.

Although he admitted he was discouraged by some aspects of early testing of the DW12, Franchitti generally isn't worried about sorting the car out prior to the season-opening Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on March 25.

"Working with the car has been a little bit frustrating," Franchitti said. "Scott says they're starting to make some progress now. But for me, it's very important that the series allows us to fix the car and to work with the car and not paint us into too tight a box. It's important the series allows the latitude to adjust the car to different driving styles. I would say that's the one thing that's kind of concerning me.

"Hopefully they can come up with an elegant engineering solution to fixing the problems of the handling imbalance the car's had."

After initially blaming suppliers for suspension and gearbox components that didn't meet target weight goals, Dallara is finally reacting to the crisis. Revised suspension geometry will help shift the weight forward, and a completely new oval track aero package (floor, sidepods, wings) is under development.

"As requested by INDYCAR, Dallara will design an alternative set of suspensions to move back two inches the front wheels and one inch the rear wheels," stated Andrea Toso, head of research and development and U.S. racing business leader for Dallara Automobili. "Both front and both rear suspensions will be available for the teams from the catalog and can be utilized in any combination front to rear at all the events."

Toso hinted that the Honda engines that powered the initial development car that Wheldon drove were as much as 30 kilograms heavier than anticipated, a situation he said resulted from INDYCAR's insistence on tight price caps and extreme durability standards for the league's engine suppliers.

The updated suspension was not available when the initial batch of 15 cars was delivered to teams on Dec. 15, but the pressure is not as great as it could be because the first oval activity of the 2012 season won't happen until the month of May at Indianapolis. Still, the oval package will essentially be starting at ground zero when testing resumes in the spring.

Dallara is ramping up for a total build of around 60 cars.

"Teams will take delivery of their cars with the current set of suspensions and, should they decide to start the season with the alternative set, they can get free of charge replacement based on the return of the current set," Toso said.

This late redesign represents an opportunity for Dallara and INDYCAR to overcome the universally negative reaction to the DW12's appearance. A poll of more than 6,000 fans at AutoRacing1.com resulted in 98 percent expressing dissatisfaction with the look of the car, especially the bulbous sidepods that shroud the rear wheels.

"Everyone has an opinion," shrugged Will Phillips, project director for INDYCAR's 2012 car.

How could Dallara have gotten it so wrong? There are a number of factors. For starters, it's been nine years since Dallara created a new Indy car chassis, and the IR03 was in many ways an update of the company's 2000 car, albeit with a major change in front suspension philosophy. The key is that since 2003, development of the IR03 was almost exclusively handled by the teams, with little or no factory involvement. As such, Dallara was already somewhat out of touch with its own most recent design.

Dallara had an extremely tight box to work in, courtesy of the requirements made by INDYCAR's ICONIC Committee. Most of those mandates were made in the interest of safety even before Wheldon's death at Las Vegas Motor Speedway (in a Dallara IR03) on Oct. 16, but it appears some of them -- chiefly, the wider floor and sidepods that extend all the way to the outer edge of the rear tires and the rear bumper pods mounted behind the rear wheels -- are contributing to the car's higher-than-anticipated drag and high-speed instability on ovals.

Phillips said the car's controversial sidepods were created in the interest of safety, but he believes they are not the cause of the car's higher-than-anticipated drag.

"Dallara spent an awful lot of time looking at what happens when the old car 'yaws,'" Phillips said, referring to how the car reacts when it snaps sideways from its center axis. "As the car goes into yaw and runs down the track sideways, it can have a tendency to fly. The features of the new car are designed to specifically reduce the yaw characteristics of the car. The new car is roughly 50 percent less likely to have an overturning moment around the center of gravity through a yaw-induced effect."

The worrying thing is that INDYCAR quietly concedes it doesn't know why the DW12 is not working the way the computer simulations say it is supposed to. It's almost as if Dallara was so concerned about how the DW12 would perform if it got sideways or up into the air that it forgot to pay attention to how the car would run in a straight line or through corners.

The 50 percent wind tunnel model of the DW12 was recently retested in an alternate wind tunnel with known characteristics, and the results backed up Dallara's initial numbers. The next step is to take a full-size IR03 (donated by Ganassi Racing) and a DW12 to a 100 percent tunnel and compare the results using real cars.

"We're trying to identify why the theoretical world doesn't match the real world at the racetrack," Phillips admitted. "At very high speeds, we have disparity in the data."

The good news is that the drivers have been generally positive about the DW12 in road racing trim and the car is reportedly already slightly faster than the outgoing car, which admittedly was originally designed exclusively for oval competition.

Championship-winning team owner Chip Ganassi is convinced that Dallara and INDYCAR will get the DW12 right, although it may take more time than expected.

"Everybody has questions about the new car, but I think you have to think back to the car we're retiring now," Ganassi said. "When that car was developed, it took two or three years to get that car right. When we were getting new cars every year in CART, they were just evolutions of a previous car. This new car is somewhat of a revolution. It might take a little extra time to get it what I would say is right for everybody, not necessarily right for just one or two teams.

"I think INDYCAR is keeping an open mind," Ganassi continued. "They've already come out and said, 'OK, we need to change the testing rules.' They seem open to changing things when we need to. So hopefully they'll keep that attitude going forward. It's just a process we have to go working through. The mere fact that the car didn't come out of the box at the current performance level of a car that's been being developed for 12 years, I don't think that's the end of the world. We just need to buckle down and get to work on it."

The Dallara DW12 is not the first bad race car, and it certainly won't be the last. It's a bit disheartening that INDYCAR had nine years to come up with a new car and managed to legislate itself into what looks like a dud so far. But the performance of the car can and will be fixed -- even if it means running 25 pounds of lead weight in the nose.

Here are a few other notable Indy car disasters from the last 40 years. Not all of them had unhappy endings …

1. The 1972 Parnelli "dihedral" car: Parnelli Jones tapped Lotus F1 designer Maurice Phillippe to design an Indy car and Philippe definitely started with a clean sheet of paper. His design featured torsion bar suspension and wings that sprouted at a 45-degree angle out of the sides of the car. Al Unser said it was the worst new car he'd ever driven and Mario Andretti said it wouldn't even go down the straight correctly. The car was slowly converted into a more standard design and while never ultra-fast, it delivered Joe Leonard to the 1972 USAC championship.

2. 1986-87 Penske PC15 and PC16: Roger Penske began building his own Indy cars in 1977 and they were often more competitive than customer cars from Lola or March. Penske hired F1 designer Alan Jenkins to pen a car around the new Ilmor-Chevrolet engine. The resulting PC15 and the updated PC16 were beautiful cars, but they were dog slow. Rick Mears abandoned his PC16 at Indianapolis in 1987 and immediately picked up 8 mph in a year-old March. The team finished out the '87 season in Marches; new designer Nigel Bennett's Penske PC17 design was the class of the CART field in 1988 and Bennett-designed Penskes were front-runners through 1995.

3. March 88C: March dominated the customer car market from 1982 onward. But Lola's 1987 challenger was very successful in the hands of Mario Andretti and Newman/Haas Racing, so other teams started switching to Lola in the winter of 1987-88. When Al Unser Jr. was the only driver to extract speed from the 1988 March design, several teams switched to Lola at midseason and by 1989 March was out of the Indy customer car business.

4. Lola T97/00: Reynard arrived on the Indy car scene in 1994 and quickly ate into Lola's customer car base. Lola's new 1997 design had immediate problems in testing, prompting several teams to make a panicked switch to Reynard just before the season. By 1998, Lola had just one car on the CART grid, but designer Ben Bowlby made continued improvements and Helio Castroneves was often very competitive on ovals in 1999. Bowlby did a major update in 2000, prompting Ganassi Racing and Newman/Haas Racing to switch to Lola. By 2002, Lola had recaptured 95 percent of the customer car market and Reynard had faded from the scene. The 2002 Lola became the de facto spec car of the Champ Car World Series, serving for five years, and it could directly trace its roots to the unloved T97/00.

Is next-generation IndyCar race car safer than the previous one?

(by Brant James si.com 12-8-11)

One week from today a gleaming present is scheduled to arrive in race shops around Indianapolis. It will be fawned over for a few moments and then prepared for a much-anticipated, much-needed on-track testing in January. The delivery of the Dallara DW12, the next-generation Izod IndyCar Series race car, to individual teams will mark the next phase in the implementation of a vehicle designed, according to the series, to be innovative, competitive and cost-effective.

It will be more stylish, more adaptable, more affordable and, in ways, safer. But it could have been a lot safer, said Dr. Terry Trammell, an orthopedic surgeon and pioneer in motor sports medicine and injury prevention. The series, he said, missed a rare clean-sheet opportunity to make the advancements he and others in the medical community advised. Whereas NASCAR constructed a sort of rolling armored personnel carrier with the debut of its new car in 2007, IndyCar's seven-member ICONIC committee, Trammell said, recommended a Dallara-designed chassis with improvements, but not sweeping advancements in driver safety.

"The car was not built [with] all the safety innovations that we'd hoped for," Trammell told SI.com at a global safety symposium at the annual Performance Racing Industry trade show. "The [medical] people working in this literally asked to be able to position the driver the way we wanted him, with the seat around him the way we wanted him and then hand them [IndyCar] that and say, 'Ok, build the car around it.'

"Didn't happen. They did what they could within the envelope they were working with. They tried to accommodate the needs that we had, but it's still not optimal for every size driver. If you're little, it's better. But there were a lot of tradeoffs in order to come up with a chassis that is similar to what we have in size and shape."

There is a poignancy in the alleged shortcoming, because the new car bears the initials of Dan Wheldon, its original test driver, who was killed in the final race of the IndyCar season, utilizing the old car at Las Vegas on Oct. 16.

Trammell said a narrow timetable for selecting and announcing a new car for 2012 also impacted safety implementations.

"The rapidity of getting it into production and out onto the track was also part of the rush," he said. "So we didn't have all the time we would have liked."

The formation of the ICONIC committee, which included series chairman Randy Bernard, then-president of competition Brian Barnhart and 2012 car project coordinator Tony Cotman, was announced in April of 2010. It recommended the Dallara "safety cell" from among a host of hopefuls. The pacing, Trammell said, felt brisk.

"I'll put it this way: Would you want me to be in a big hurry when I'm operating on you?," he posed. "That's kind of the analogy. I would have liked to have had more time and been able to do more crash research. We're doing things that we think are going to be effective, but we haven't tested it."

Bernard did not immediately respond to an interview request.

The advisory committee's name was an acronym formed from the words "Innovative, Competitive, Open-Wheel, New, Industry-Relevant, Cost-Effective." Note that "safer" was not among. Gil de Ferran, a two-time CART champion and former Indianapolis 500 winner elected to the committee by the series' owners, said he had not seen data from testing of the new car, but he was sure "it must be an improvement" safety-wise.

"The committee didn't design the car. What we came up with was, in the end, a concept that I still think can address and in a way has addressed some of the issues facing the series, including reducing costs and trying to increase the framework to bring in new manufacturers," de Ferran said. "That was really the role of the committee, to create a new technical framework whereby that was a possibility. I think the engineers that were in charge of designing the cars, I don't know if they have or they haven't consulted with the various safety experts around the globe including Mr. Trammell -- who is a beacon of light, in that sense -- but I am sure they must have to, to some extent."

Trammell deemed the DW12 "better," mainly because of increased room and standard padding in the bottom of the car that better positions and protects most drivers in their seats. Taller drivers such as Justin Wilson and Graham Rahal, Trammell said, will benefit from the improvement, but remain more vulnerable.

"For Justin it's still not enough and we've tried to monkey around to try and get more [protection] for him. You just can't make him fit. Rahal the same way," Trammell said. "It's better, but still not ideal. The rest of it is very, very similar to the old car. If you overlay a tracing of the old car with the new one, there's not a whole lot of difference in the top contour heights and so forth. There's more room in the bottom."

Trammell said the new car would have likely prevented the broken leg Mike Conway sustained in a crash in the 2010 Indianapolis 500 when his car flew bottom-first into the catch fence.

"He had the leg injury from a penetration of the bottom of the tub by a metal fixture and the impact that broke his back was probably from the pull from the bottom of the car with the padding and the structure," Trammell said. "He would have at least mitigated that impact to a lesser load. He was right at 70 Gs so that could have been no break. The side panels are part of the car, they're not added on, so that gives you a layer of structural integrity the old car didn't have."

The DW12, Trammell said, would not have saved Wheldon because he, unlike Conway in 2010, impacted the catch fence with the top of the car and the exposed cockpit.

"It wouldn't have made any difference at all," said Trammell, who is part of the IndyCar investigation into Wheldon's death. "His injuries were such that, with an open-cockpit car, it's going to be the same problem. There was no failure of the car that caused his injury as best we can say now."

It is unclear whether the DW12, which features bumper-style covers around the rear tires, would have prevented Wheldon from going airborne.

Closing the cockpits on IndyCars is not viewed as a palatable or effective solution by most.

"A canopy would be similar to what they did in off-shore power boat racing," said Dr. Steve Olvey, the CART medical director for 22 years and an associate professor in the department of neurological surgery at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. Along with Trammel, he was also a founding fellow of the FIA Institute. "There were three power boat racers killed [four] weeks ago in Miami [due to] offshore racing. I don't think that [a canopy] is the answer. If a wheel and tire assembly goes up the front of the car and hits the canopy, it could easily launch into the crowd. If a car hits head on it, it may make it more likely to become airborne and all bets are off if that occurs.

"It's not the end-all answer. I think open-cockpit racing has been around for years and will continue to be. I don't think making them closed is much of an answer."

Finding a humane compromise for driver and spectator in catch fence design is a current priority within FIA, IndyCar and NASCAR, Olvey said. Dr. Dean Sicking, one of the innovators of the revolutionary Steel and Foam Energy Reduction (SAFER) barrier credited anecdotally with saving scores of driver lives and preventing even more injury, told SI.com this summer that pit wall and catch fences were the next main improvable areas of a racetrack.

"There has not been a tremendous amount of research in that area and there's been debate on what method would be best," Olvey said of catch fences. "And there's also question of whether there are newer materials that would serve the purpose of protecting both the participants as well as the spectators to the same level. You can't risk endangering the lives of the people that go to watch the race. The drivers know it's a risky business. Anytime you're racing wheel-to-wheel at 224 mph, there's a lot of risk involved, but it's been that way forever and it'll continue to be that way."

But there are answers to be had, de Ferran said.

"In general, my view on safety is quite simple," he said. "There are a lot of clever people out there. There's a lot of knowledge and a lot of research that has happened in the field of safety and continues to happen worldwide. Everyone that is involved in motor sports has almost a duty to continue to make the sport safer, to improve the cars, every time there is a technology that provides a breakthrough. That's a commitment.

"Racing is racing, so there is an element of risk there you will never be able to wipe completely clean. Never the less, it doesn't mean everyone who is involved, in every capacity, shouldn't have a very strong commitment to keep making it safer and safer."

Whether IndyCar went far enough with its next-generation race car remains to be seen.

95 Reynard

Now there is a rocket of a racecar. Funny how we can't seem to get back to that.

What might have been

With the 2012 Dallara now on track for testing and the ugliness that has insued I yearn for what might have been with the Swift proposals.

Alternative aero kits delayed until 2013

(by Dave Lewandowski indycar.com 8-14-11)

All IZOD IndyCar Series teams will utilize the oval and road/street course bodywork that is part of the Dallara Automobili chassis package with the next generation car for the 2012 season.

INDYCAR CEO Randy Bernard told team owners of the decision to delay alternative aero kits during a meeting at New Hampshire Motor Speedway primarily because of cost concerns cost they expressed in May.

The rolling chassis -- dubbed the IndyCar Safety Cell -- remains on target to debut in competition at the start of the 2012 season. The sidepods and engine cover will be universal for the diverse set of racetracks, while Dallara-designed and -produced front and rear wings will be different for the ovals and road/street circuits. The 2012 schedule is expected to be announced by mid-September.

“The most important thing we can do as a series is look at what is in the best interest of both our long and short term,” Bernard said. "It is important that we maintain a high car count next year by ensuring we have cost containment for our teams. We must listen to our team owners and try to help. We don't want to see our car counts go from 26 and 27 down to 16 because of the aero kits. The manufacturers have told us it's very expensive and the team owners have told us it's very expensive.

"No one is more disappointed that I that we're not going to do it, but I feel this is by far the best decision for our series. The 2012 season will be exciting with the debut of our new car as we focus on relevancy and technology through engine competition, turbochargers and direct injection. From simulations we've seen on road and street courses that lap times are 3 seconds quicker and up to 15 mph faster."

INDYCAR announced plans for the car, which comes complete save for tires, the steering wheel and driver seat, in July 2010 after it reviewed multiple manufacturer concepts. It will replace the chassis that came on line in 2003 and was built solely for oval racing (the first INDYCAR road/street course race was in 2005 at St. Petersburg, Fla.).

There are cost reductions associated with the new car -- the $385,000 for the complete chassis package is about 40 percent less and the maximum engine lease agreement of $690,000 is about 30 percent less -- though the Firestone tire bill will increase $250,000, according to Bernard.

"We've got new engines and a new car next year so we can have another new story for 2013," Andretti Autosport owner Michael Andretti said.

New car project manager Tony Cotman said alternative aero kits will be introduced for the start of the 2013 season. All three engine manufacturers -- Honda, Chevrolet and Lotus -- have expressed interest in designing and supplying their own aero kits.

"By the time they get the new regulations and what is needed on the new car, they'll basically have a year to build and provide what's needed," Cotman said.

Reigning Indianapolis 500 champion Dan Wheldon was behind the wheel of the initial test of the prototype Aug. 8-9 at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio.

“We are extremely pleased with the results of our first test of the new chassis,” INDYCAR vice president of technology Will Phillips said. “Everything performed as we expected in this initial shakedown. All systems were sorted and checked, and we look forward to our next test.”

Fifteen other chassis test sessions, including four in the next 10 days, are scheduled through September. Engine manufacturers Honda, Chevrolet and Toyota -- each of whom has a chassis ordered -- are scheduled to begin testing their 2.2-liter turbocharged V-6 engines in early October. Teams are scheduled to receive their first chassis in mid-December.

Dallara's technology and manufacturing facility is under construction on Main Street in Speedway, Ind., where production of the new car is expected to commence early next year. Bernard noted that American manufacturers will be associated with the next-generation car.

"Quality and price are the primary objectives of everything we put on this car," he said.

On track for new era in 2012

(by Dave Lewandowski indycar.com 8-8-11)

There weren’t any speeches or pyrotechnics. No fanfare whatsoever, save for a few seconds of self-conscious applause. But the broad smiles of individuals involved in getting the 2012 IZOD IndyCar Series car on the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course for its initial test session neatly summed up the day.

Reigning Indianapolis 500 champion Dan Wheldon, as is his custom, patted the black and red-striped Dallara Automobili-built chassis with the road/street course prototype body kit three times before climbing into the generous cockpit for the first of 12 scheduled days of itemized evaluation on three road course and three ovals.

A few minutes later, the roar of the 3.5-liter normally-aspirated V-8 engine as cars exited the appropriately-named Thunder Alley less than 24 hours earlier during the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio was replaced by the smooth, higher-pitched sound of the 2.2-liter turbocharged Honda V-6 engine that will be among the three (Honda, Chevrolet and Lotus) implemented for the 2012 season.

“It’s a great day,” said project manager Tony Cotman, “to see the work of many individuals in a very short amount of time out on the racetrack. It’s the start of a new era for INDYCAR.”

Dallara’s proposal of a rolling chassis – a universal car dubbed the IndyCar Safety Cell that comes complete but for tires, the steering wheel and driver seat, and with different body coverings for ovals and road/street courses – was recommended to the sanctioning body by the seven-member advisory committee in July 2010 after it reviewed multiple manufacturer concepts.

It will replace the chassis that came on line in 2003 and was built for oval racing (the first INDYCAR road/street course race was in 2005 at St. Petersburg, Fla.).

The public will note the differentiation in bodywork on the variety of racetracks. Teams, according to Dallara U.S.-based quality control leader Sam Garrett, will appreciate the cost savings -- beyond the initial chassis purchase price -- in replacement parts.

"It's a lighter car, it has more horsepower and it has a lot less drag than the current car, so naturally on the right day it will go quicker and that's something that the fans have to look forward to," Cotman added. "I think it also will provide a different type of racing with different engine manufacturers, too. I will be interesting, it will be exciting and it will be a bit of a change."

A Dallara facility that will be open to the public is nearing completion in Speedway, Ind., where design, testing and production will continue.

“We’ve spent a lot of time trying to incorporate all the elements the ICONIC Advisory Committee asked for – safety, lower cost, something that looks unique,” Garrett added. “Our time has been focused on making the car safe and stable so that it is possible to put different bodywork styles on it to make it look unique.”

Systems confirmation will continue through the end of September, with the next test on the 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway oval.

“We need to make sure the parts from all aspects of the car are achieving their goals so we’ve got aero targets and straight-line speed targets that we’re looking to see,” INDYCAR vice president of technology Will Phillips said. “We want to make sure the basics are right first before we go pushing for those targets."

Engine manufacturers – each of whom have ordered a next-generation chassis – will commence testing in early October with their respective aligned teams. So far, Chip Ganassi Racing, A.J. Foyt Racing and Sam Schmidt Motorsports have signed on with Honda. Team Penske is the anchor team for Chevrolet.

Teams are scheduled to receive their first chassis in mid-December.

New 2012 Honda/Dallara Indy Car?

This spy photo was leaked to most automotive news outlets just days before the new 2012 car hit the track in Mid-Ohio for testing.

Dallara's 2012 oval aero kit concept

From the front pretty slick looking. From the rear though the back bumper makes it look like a joke. Hopefully they can redisgn the back and tone down the bumper, or take it off all together.

Dallara's 2012 road course aero kit concept

From the cockpit forward, not bad at all. From the cockpit back however, garbage. A fake airbox, a shark fin, and a back bumper. Nice try but fail.

And what is up with the covered car down the pit lane that wasn't unveiled?

2012 chassis unveiled to little fanfare

No fans in the stands, and only three on the tour bus. Long live the vision.

2012 car unveiled

(by Obi wan crapwagon.com 5-11-11)

The first time that O. Bruton Smith’s Speedway Motorsports Inc. (SMI) was the main support of the IRL (with oval races at Charlotte, Atlanta, Las Vegas, and two in Texas), Smith opined to the press that Indy cars needed bumpers to enhance both their safety and popularity. He implied that if the Idiot Grandson did not comply with his “suggestion” and put bumpers on the cars, that he might deem the cars too “dangerous” for his speedways. Of course the Pagoda was aghast about the NASCAR mogul’s sacrilegious demand but George and IRL director Leo Mehl were afraid to alienate the only member of the oval cartel supporting them; so they avoided making public comment themselves and trotted out unofficial IRL mouthpieces A.J. Foyt and Eddie Cheever to publicly shoot down the idea. Smith, however, wouldn’t give up on his notion and a meeting was held between Smith, George, and Mehl to discuss the matter. The public was never told the result of the meeting, other than a quick comment afterward by Mehl that “everything’s cool.”

Perhaps not so coincidentally, shortly after the meeting SMI track manager Humpy Wheeler – widely viewed at the time as Smith’s anointed successor – decided that the IRL was not a good “fit” for his Charlotte speedway and dropped their race from his schedule. Of course, plummeting attendance may have had a lot to do with it – Dover Downs dropped its IRL race for the same reason – but it was interesting timing, especially since Smith more or less simultaneously informed George and Mehl that henceforth his Atlanta and Las Vegas speedways would be track rentals. The only SMI track manager to stay on board with George and the IRL and actually pay the league a sanction fee was TMS’s odious Eddie Gossage.

This is the same Gossage who was part of the seven-man MORONIC rubber-stamp committee who “recommended” the 2012 car and who was no doubt delighted to pass on Smith’s “told you so” and possibly his renewed demands for bumpers on Indy cars. I don’t know for certain but Eddie probably reminded the Pagoda of what happened at Atlanta Motor Speedway during the IRL’s last race there in 2001. Specifically, a spectacular fiery crash on the 53rd lap that took out 11 drivers (and cars) at once, including the league’s Great White Hopes Al Unser Jr. and Sarah Fisher. Flying dentist Jack Miller’s car burst into flames and hurtled through the air, as did Casey Mears (minus the flames), and Robbie Buhl joined in the pyrotechnics when his car also caught fire when he slammed into the wall. The press proclaimed it a “miracle” that Miller was the only driver seriously hurt and transported to the hospital; where he was treated for a concussion and assorted bumps and bruises.

Amazingly (for anyone but the IRL), race officials decided not to bring out the red flag, even though debris was scattered all over the track. The yellow was out for 35 laps, slowing the average winning speed to 133.647 mph. At the end, only 13 of the 27 starters were still running. The next year Smith declined to rent his Atlanta and Las Vegas tracks to George and the IRL.

Now, flash forward and Smith and SMI have once again become the main oval cartel support of the League That Dares Not Speak Its Name – with races at their Texas, New Hampshire, Infineon, Kentucky, and Las Vegas tracks – and guess what? The new 2012 Indy cars have bumpers! Fancy that.

JMO

The current 2012 Dudlara timeline as outlined by Cotman

May 2011: Two completely different mock ups of the car will be on display at IMS to show the range of its possibilities (read extremes).

Would-be aero kit manufacturers are “open” to announce their “intention” to become aero kit manufacturers.

May 2011-late July 2011: The would-be aero kit manufacturers can try to sell their vaporware kits to potential customers; they better hurry because at some point Cotman threatens to impose a “hard deadline” on joining their ranks.

Somewhere in here the “brain trust” at 16th & Jonestown is supposed to announce which of three versions of the car’s specifications they are going with and hand them off (when “the time is right”) to the aero kit manufacturers.

Late June-July 2011: The Dudlara-Honda prototype takes to the track in testing to finalize the details of the production car. By necessity the prototype and its spare parts are manufactured in Italy.

Late August-September 2011: The engine manufacturers start their testing with the new car – which due to the fact that the Indianapolis Dudlara factory isn’t scheduled for completion until October-November 2011, will probably also be built in Italy.

November 1, 2011: The promised opening date for the Indianapolis Dudlara factory if there are complications (note: there are always complications).

December 2011: Each IICS team is issued ONE Dudlara safety cell and discounted aero kit. Every one of these will be manufactured in the Indianapolis Dudlara factory.

January-February 2012: The teams will receive their second and third Dudlaras; all presumably with the Dudlara aero kit (which won’t be discounted; i.e. get ready to pay 75 large).

May 2012: All the wonderful aero kits will debut at the Speedway. Hopefully, the Pagoda will have decided on the car’s final specifications by then.

I don't know, I just don't know

New car about revitalizing Indianapolis

(by John Oreovicz espn.go.com 7-14-10)

INDIANAPOLIS -- The IZOD IndyCar Series didn't unveil its car of the future Wednesday, but rather its concept for how cars will be distributed and developed.

In fact, the theme of the elaborate program staged Wednesday at the Indianapolis Museum of Art wasn't so much about Indy cars as it was about Indy car racing's future role in the economic development of the city of Indianapolis.

Stated more concisely, the new car was as much about business as it was sport.

Sure, it's important that Dallara Automobili was selected as the sole provider of the "Safety Cell" platform that will form the basis of the 2012 IndyCar. But what really matters is that the Italian company will build a new production facility on Main Street in Speedway, Ind., just a short chute away from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, that is expected to create 80 jobs.

Under the leadership of retired Air Force Gen. William Looney, IndyCar's seven-man ICONIC (Innovative, Competitive, Open-Wheel, New, Industry-Relevant, Cost-Effective) committee was responsible for the focal point of Wednesday's announcement. But the most important people in the IMA's Tobias Theater were the politicians who confirmed that the state of Indiana and the city of Indianapolis are making long-overdue investments in Indy car racing.

"Today is the biggest day by far in our motorsports restoration program in Indiana," Gov. Mitch Daniels said. "This sport is coming back to the state where it was born."

"We have tremendously skilled workers here, and we want to show our commitment to the speedway and the league," Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard said.

Dallara landed the IndyCar contract because it agreed to produce the car in Indiana, persuaded by the promise of tax credits and grants. Dallara and city and state officials said they believe a cottage industry of component suppliers will be revived in central Indiana.

In addition, part of the state inducement package will allow Dallara to offer a $150,000 discount on the first 28 cars sold to teams based in Indiana. Ten of the 14 teams that comprise the full-season IndyCar grid are based in greater Indianapolis; the exceptions are Team Penske (North Carolina), Newman/Haas Racing and Dale Coyne Racing (both Illinois-based) and AJ Foyt Racing (Texas).

Dallara will produce the basic Safety Cell, which includes the monocoque, gearbox and suspension, in addition to expensive items like the fuel cell, wiring loom, electronics, headers and driveshafts that were extra-cost add-ons in the past.

"When we talk about the Safety Cell, we're talking about a complete car, less engine and seat," said Indy Racing League competition president Brian Barnhart, who was one of the seven members of the ICONIC committee.

The kicker is that Dallara will supply that rolling chassis for $349,000, or $385,000 with Dallara designed and supplied bodywork. That's a 45 percent reduction from the $700,000 it would cost to acquire similar current equipment from Dallara for 2010.

The ICONIC committee addressed the cry for variation between cars by allowing any team or manufacturer to develop its own approved bodywork -- front wings, sidepods, engine cover and rear wing. The caveat is that those body kits must be made available to all competitors for $70,000.

Teams will be allowed to select and utilize two brands of bodywork for any season, and the cars will be branded after the bodywork supplier.

So in theory, spurned suppliers Lola, Swift, BAT and even Delta Wing could design and market their own bodywork for the basic Dallara, turning it into their "own" car.

"Today is the result of listening to all of you," IndyCar CEO Randy Bernard said. "The decision we made was not easy. We had to be cognizant about balancing the cost to team owners and the fans' desire to see change.

"This is one of the most important decisions of the decade for the IndyCar Series, and it's a huge honor to know that in 18 months this car will be a reality."

Dallara and series officials said a prototype chassis will begin testing in October 2011, with the first deliveries scheduled for that December.

Current engine supplier Honda is expected to continue in the IndyCar Series, with or without competition. On Wednesday, IndyCar officials revealed that the 2012 engine will feature up to 100 extra horsepower in the "push-to-pass" function, and that prices for a year-long engine lease will be capped at $690,000 if there is competition between manufacturers and $575,000 if there is a sole supplier.

A current Honda engine lease is $935,000 annually.

Although it won't appease purists who were hoping for a fully competitive chassis market, the key to the overall future cost reduction is the sole supplier concept for the basic car. It is hoped that allowing external development of aero packages will create significant diversity between cars, which was identified as a key demand from fans.

"Aerodynamic bodywork is the key differentiating factor in racing car design, both visually and technically," said ICONIC committee member Tony Purnell, the former head of Pi Electronics and the Jaguar F1 team. "Clothing the safety cell can be done with a fraction of the development cost compared to developing an entire vehicle.

"It's a revolutionary strategy opening the door for many to rise to the challenge," he added. "We believe an industry-relevant approach will attract more manufacturers to the series. We want to challenge the auto and aerospace industry. This is an opportunity to test your technical prowess without breaking the piggy bank."

Gil de Ferran, who represented driver and team owner interests on the ICONIC committee, said the three-month process of deciding the future direction of the series was a fascinating and surprising experience.

"It's important that we didn't decide on a new car, but instead a concept that satisfied conflicting requirements," de Ferran said. "At the end of the day, this was democracy at its best. Our meetings became highly productive brainstorming sessions."

"I was a fly on the wall and it was amazing to watch these seven guys in their process," Bernard said. "Their ideas were 180 degrees different at the beginning."

Another key member of the ICONIC board was Tony Cotman, who was instrumental in the cost-effective development of the Panoz DP-01 chassis used in the last year of the Champ Car World Series.

"Initially it seemed like we were just choosing a car," Cotman said. "Instead we came up with a concept that seems to have addressed all of our stated goals while achieving the impossible -- cost reduction.

"With this plan, costs will remain under control, but teams will still have access to the latest and greatest. We started out with a simple choice and ended up with a concept that will revolutionize and re-energize the sport."

It didn't take long for the naysayers to flood social media, complaining that IndyCar looks likely to continue down the road as a Dallara-Honda spec series. But in the current economic climate, it was unrealistic to expect all-out warfare between chassis manufacturers to be allowed.

As Cotman and de Ferran said, the IndyCar Series seems to have come up with the best possible compromise under the circumstances -- a basic platform that can be dressed up and branded by anyone willing to take the financial risk involved with creating an aero package.

Getting more engine and tire manufacturers involved would be icing on the cake, and when Dallara's exclusive chassis supply contract expires after the 2015 season, perhaps IndyCar will be in position to open up competition again.

"We have to be realistic and not set our expectations too high," Bernard said. "Our goal was to look at the long term. It's going to be pretty hard to find engine manufacturers by 2012, and there's a deadline not too far down the road. But I expect we will see additional aero kits in 2013 for sure."

One constituency group that will happy to get into any new Indy car is the drivers. Current IndyCar Series championship leader Will Power of Team Penske came away impressed with what he saw on Wednesday.

"I'm very excited," Power said. "The car is going to be lighter; it's going to be faster. It entices other manufacturers to come in. I think the ICONIC committee did a fantastic job and this is the best direction that they could have gone.

"I don't think you could ask for anything better, and it's going to be fun."

IRL nuts? Too ambitious? Maybe both

(by Ed Hinton espn.go.com 7-14-10)

Are they nuts?

That's the thought that kept flashing -- in neon -- in my mind as Wednesday's stiffly choreographed, yet largely chaotic Indy Racing League "announcement" of its car plans for 2012 stumbled and stammered on and on.

Before the discombobulated display began, I'd thought the best possible scenario would be for the IRL to accept all five car designs that had been submitted. That would bring back diversity and innovation.

Worst possible scenario would be acceptance of only one of the designs. That would further mire the league in the kit-car, spec-racing formula that has left Indy car racing dwindling interest and attendance in recent years.

What was announced was worse than one car: no car.

Essentially, after all that buildup to the unveiling of a bold new design or designs, they continued treading water, put off the real decisions indefinitely.

Oh, they rolled out a rolling chassis. But that's a far cry from a full car.

Whose rolling chassis? Wouldn't you know it? After all that hoopla about wide-open technology, IndyCar is back in bed with its old spec-car partner, Dallara Automobili. Deeper than ever this time, with Dallara agreeing to open a plant in Indiana to hire Hoosiers -- in exchange, of course, for various tax breaks and grants from the state and local coffers. All this to create maybe 100 jobs.

Onto this rolling chassis, the IRL will allow the attachment of various "aero kits" to be approved and announced … well … sometime in the future.

At first the open-ended aero kits seemed something of a way to please all the engineering firms that submitted car designs. BAT, DeltaWing, Lola and Swift are all welcome -- but not their original, highly publicized designs.

They're all welcome to -- er, ah -- resubmit designs compatible with the Dallara rolling chassis.

Also invited are any and all automotive, and even aircraft, manufacturers around the world. Come and bring your own aero packages and make Indianapolis Motor Speedway the cutting-edge proving ground it once was.

"So come on, Ford. Come on, GM. Come on, Lotus, Ferrari, Boeing, Lockheed," cheered British engineer Tony Purnell, a member of the IRL's ICONIC committee that came to Wednesday's recommendation.

Pardon me if it sounded like LeBron James' over-the-top counting last week of "not four championships, not five championships, not six championships, not seven championships …"

The idea that a Ferrari or a Boeing would spend big to develop an aerodynamics package for a 21st century racecar, only to sell it to competitors for a maximum of $70,000 per car, seems tenuous at best.

Every time the IRL lifts off toward new heights of innovation, it applies its same old ruinous brakes, severe cost controls.

Finally, after the Internet-streamed presentation circus abated and we got down to a teleconference, I asked IRL competition president Brian Barnhart if the league had undercurrent commitments from manufacturers, or if this simply amounted to one of the great leaps of faith ever in motor racing?

As for the aerospace industry, "It's kind of a natural to challenge that industry to get involved," Barnhart said. "With regard to the automotive manufacturers, we have had some preliminary dialogue, and it has been exceptionally well received."

The idea is that a Ford-developed aero kit could be called a Ford car, and pack a Ford-developed engine so that in the future, rather than driving a "Dallara-Honda," a driver might simply be driving a "Ford," or "Chevrolet," or "Honda," or whatever.

Which might leapfrog the IRL ahead of NASCAR in brand identification -- except that the "Ford" would really be a Ford on top of a Dallara chassis.

Randy Bernard, the IRL's new CEO, said manufacturers brought into the loop "have said it's very exciting that they could create brand identity with their cars."

Trouble is, "we haven't been able to talk with everyone because we wanted to keep everything as confidential as possible, so we were very selective in our first round," Bernard said.

See? There you go. It's a huge leap of faith, without strong commitments from several manufacturers. Bernard plans a trip to Europe next month to talk with engine manufacturers there, to discuss engine and aero packages that could be called simply "Mercedes" or "BMW."

But that's essentially a sales trip, to make inquiries and proposals.

As the marathon announcement wore on, and they began to make some sense, I decided they're not nuts, but they are very broadly wishful in their thinking.

Here's hoping that it works, that we might again see Indy unveil innovations upon innovations, as it hasn't since the 1920s when the genius Harry Miller and the Brothers Duesenberg were high-tech archrivals. Maybe at least, on the more realistic side, we could see at least the diversity of cars I encountered when I started covering Indy 35 years ago -- the Coyotes, Wildcats, McLarens and various "specials."

But during Wednesday's rambling -- hard to call it an "unveiling" because so much is still so veiled -- through such a lofty, nebulous, unfinished plan, well …

First I got this image of the IRL sprinting headlong toward a cliff and taking a flying leap off … then of it hanging in midair, flapping its arms with all due intensity.

I'm not saying it won't fly. But I am warning: Look out below!

What did we learn? Well ... not a lot

(by Terry Blount espn.go.com 7-15-10)

Months of buildup and anticipation. Tons of speculation. Glimpses of futuristic new designs for what the new Indy car could be like in 2012.

Finally, Wednesday was the day. A decision was made. Everyone was waiting with bated breath for the big announcement at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

And the new car is? Umm. We'll get back to you on that one.

And the winning chassis manufacturer is? Umm. The same guys who make the chassis now -- Dallara.

If you were expecting a curtain to go up and reveal the shiny new car of the future, you're still waiting.

There was no wow factor. If this was the game-changing moment for the IndyCar Series, it came in a whisper and not a bleat from a vuvuzela.

What will the new Indy car look like? Well, that depends.

Dallara will continue to provide the chassis, known as the Safety Cell, but the actual shell of the car is up for grabs for any manufacturer. Different body styles are welcome, within reason.

It's safe to say the new Indy car will look similar to how the car looks today. You won't see a Delta Wing body on the Dallara chassis.

"We want it to be evolutionary, not revolutionary," said Texas Motor Speedway president Eddie Gossage, one of the seven men on the so-called ICONIC committee that was formed to make the decision.

A Speed Racer car or the Batmobile or the actual Delta Wing (sort of a modern version of Craig Breedlove's land-speed record car) isn't coming. The designs for the aero kit must meet IRL approval.

"We want to leave the parameters and the box open as wide as possible," said Brian Barnhart, the president of competition for the IRL and a committee member. "The front and rear wings, the sidepods and the engine covers all will have as much freedom as possible so fans can distinguish the cars from each other."

What they will be exactly remains a guess. It's all still a gigantic gray area.

What league officials want is more participation from various manufacturers that will bring slightly different design concepts.

"We are dressing the chassis in different and sexy ways," said Tony Purnell, another member of the committee. "Come on, Ford; come on, GM; come on, Lotus; come on, Ferrari; come on, Lockheed; come on, Boeing. We want you to rise to the challenge without a major raid on your piggy bank. Bring it on."

Nice challenge, but I doubt Ferrari and Boeing are jumping at the chance to design cars for the IRL.

Randy Bernard, the IRL's new boss and the man everyone is hoping can lead Indy car racing back to the promised land, said he believes the several auto manufacturers who left the series will come back.

"We've talked to some [auto manufacturers] that are very excited about what we're doing and the possibility of more brand identity with the cars," Bernard said. "How much more [body] space will be available for sponsorship, no one can say because it depends on the design."

That's the point: We still don't know. But the IRL has about 18 months to figure it out.

The entire public presentation Wednesday was robotic, totally scripted without any dramatic moment at the end. It included a video of the committee members voting Wednesday morning (using handheld devices) on their choice among the five candidates for the new chassis.

Do they really expect us to believe that decision was made this morning? It was like a bad reality TV show.

There was a brief look onstage, in holographic form, of what the car bodies might look like, but nothing that made anyone giddy with anticipation.

This was more about the steps league officials are taking to try to reach that big moment that can bring Indy car back to the good old days.

Some of the announced changes are huge steps in the right direction. The cost of buying these new cars, whatever they are, is about $385,000, 45 percent less than the current model.

Teams can choose two aero kits (body styles) a year. The kits cost a maximum $70,000, which may limit design options.

Dallara announced it will move its entire IRL operation to a stone's throw from Indianapolis Motor Speedway, which will add jobs to the community.

In theory, the plan presented by the committee has a lot of good points, but Wednesday's announcement left most still wondering what's ahead.

"Today is a result of talking to all of you," Bernard said in the presentation. "You've all had input, and we've listened. This is a huge moment to know in 18 months this car will be a reality."

But the reality is, we still don't know a lot of things about what that car will be.

IRL can right ship with new chassis

(by John Oreovicz espn.go.com 7-13-10)

INDIANAPOLIS -- Eight years is an eternity in race car design. Having the same generally unpopular car for eight years is an albatross for a racing series.

That's the situation the Izod IndyCar Series is in. The good news is that help is on the way, in the form of a new chassis formula set to be unveiled Wednesday at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. The bad news is that the "Indy car of Tomorrow" won't hit the track for almost two years.

That's not to say that the Dallara IC3 that was introduced in 2003 (and served as IndyCar's unofficial spec chassis since 2006) is a bad car. It has produced close, competitive oval racing, adapted well to road racing, and has a better safety record than prior chassis used in the Indy Racing League.

But it was never intended to be a car that would be used for nine years. More importantly, it was a car that no one ever really got excited about -- least of all the large portion of Indy car racing's fan base that remained loyal to CART and Champ Car until the bitter end.

About 10 years ago, Champ Car stalwart Paul Tracy famously dubbed IRL-specification Indy cars "Crapwagons," and the term stuck. At the time, the first two generations of IRL cars made by Dallara and Panoz/G-Force were indeed rude and crude compared to the cars raced in the CART series built by Reynard, Lola, Penske, Swift and Eagle. Cutting costs was one of the original rallying cries of the IRL; its Indy cars were built to a price, and it showed.

Champ Car devolved into a spec formula for its final few years, but its last car (the 2007 Panoz DP01) was much more sophisticated -- and less expensive -- than the Dallara IC3. But when the open-wheel split finally ended in early 2008, the IRL formula -- and therefore the already five-year-old Dallara -- won out over the recently implemented DP01.

The basic car is any racing series' identity, especially in a spec series. For 2012, IndyCar has the opportunity to have its car work in its favor instead of against it, which has pretty much been the case for the last decade or more. By moving production to America and dramatically cutting prices, Dallara is likely to remain involved, but the Italian manufacturer is likely to have competition for the first time since 2005.

Competition between engine and chassis manufacturers (and even tires from 1995-2000) was one of the things that made Indy car racing great during its most successful era in the 1980s and '90s. Having multiple engine manufacturers is more important from a marketing standpoint, but it would be a bonus if IndyCar opened up the field to at least two chassis makers as well. Visual differences between the cars give novice fans a way to tell brands of cars apart and gearheads a point for technical discussion.

IndyCar CEO Randy Bernard seems to understand that competition between engine and chassis manufacturers lifts the entire industry. The question he has to answer is whether in the current economic climate Indy car racing can sustain a market for multiple manufacturers. Bernard's toughest task might be convincing the Hulman-George family to finance the initial run of 2012 chassis so that a full and competitive field can be ensured.

We know from the previously announced 2012 engine regulations that the drivers will be granted their wish for more horsepower. The future engine specs call for turbocharged engines with up to six cylinders and 2.4 liters of displacement, tuned to produce between 550 and 750 horsepower depending on the type of track. The current normally aspirated Honda V-8 kicks out about 650 bhp.

Not surprisingly, championship leader Will Power is leading the call for more power.

"They've got to have 750 horsepower plus," Power said. "That'll make the racing better because it'll be harder to drive and the cars will look more spectacular. More horsepower will also mean the tires will go off, which makes them more spectacular.

"I remember when I was a kid going to the Surfers Paradise [CART] race when they had 900 horsepower and the ground would rumble," he added. "It was unbelievable, and it just looked and sounded fast. They revved to 17,000 rpm. It sounded awesome."

Other top Indy car drivers are hoping for a more agile car with more options for adjustability.

"For me, I think the car needs to be a ton lighter," remarked two-time IndyCar Series champion Scott Dixon. "The current car is a bit of a heavy thing. Being a lot lighter will make it a ton safer, too, because you won't hit the wall as hard."

"I'd also like to see a lot of the downforce created by the underwing, like Champ Car did," Dixon added. "That would be nice so you're not relying so much on the wings that are so massive. I think that would be an easy way to make the racing better. It would help us get close and make runs on the other guy. Adjustability is the key. All this specifying of the wing angle I think is just wrong. There needs to be room in the rules for adjustability so different drivers and teams are able to run different strategies."

Three-time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves was one of several drivers who said that the current package is just about perfect for Indianapolis Motor Speedway. But he'd like to see the rulebook opened up elsewhere.

"I'd like to see the rules not be so tight, with room for a little more flexibility on the part of the teams," Helio said. "I think you should be able to play a little more with the wings like we did in the past. Certainly horsepower is always fun to have, and I'd like to see the push-to-pass have a little more increase in power instead of just 5-10 horsepower."

Bernard occasionally has said that he would like to banish the corporate names "Indy Racing League" and "IRL" due to the negative connotations they carry from the days of the open wheel war. The long-awaited move out of "Crapwagons" and into sexy, technologically advanced new cars should be another step in the right direction for the IndyCar Series.

The future of Indy Car hangs in the balance

I've said many times that if Indy Car is going to survive and grow it needs a car that rivals those of F1. Wednesday Indy Car is going to have a press conference to announce its chassis "strategy." What in the hell is a "strategy" announcement? This was supposed to be the announcement of the new car that had been chosen, the new car that was supposed to replace the worthless piece of crap they are racing that the rest of the world laughs at.

I swear if Indy Car screws this up I will give up what little hope I have left for them.