The RACER Mailbag, August 2

Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. Due to the high volume of questions received, we can’t guarantee that every letter will be published, but we’ll answer as many as we can. Published questions may be edited for length and clarity. Questions received after 3pm ET each Monday will appear the following week.

NOTE: Thanks to everyone who sent letters in response to the recent Guest Mailbag by IndyCar president Jay Frye. Your feedback has been forwarded to IndyCar – MG

Q: What are the ramifications of disqualification from an IndyCar event once it is underway? It makes sense that the driver would score no points for that event, but what other outcomes are associated with a disqualification?

Leslie Bissell, Kansas City, KS

MARSHALL PRUETT: All depends on the disqualification. If it’s the two rookies at Iowa, they both scored points — five apiece — because IndyCar pays points for every position. But there’s a distinction here where they were disqualified from competing in the race which, in my best Buxton-esque Drive To Survive voice, means they were no longer allowed to participate in the race while it was happening.

That’s different than being excluded from the results, which is a post-race penalty that treats the offending team or driver like they were never there, and for that to happen, it would need to be a huge violation of whatever sorts.

Foyt’s Pedersen was parked for being too slow, so the DQ was the penalty. To his credit, he learned from his mistakes while being lapped at Mid-Ohio and didn’t put up a silly fight in the second race as the field streaked by. For Coyne’s Robb, they were the cause of the penalty for sending him without a wheel attached to the car, and then failing to tell him to stop. Robb paid the price for their errors, and if there was an unpublished monetary fine assessed to the team by the series, we shouldn’t be surprised.

Q: I have always admired and supported Roger Penske. He and I grew up a few miles from each other, although I was on the wrong side of the tracks. I admired him as a driver and then, of course, as an amazing team owner. I was elated when he bought IndyCar and IMS, and I truly believe he has saved the series.

Having said all that, I must complain about the excessive amount and length of the commercials during the Iowa doubleheader. Before I retired, I was a chief financial officer at several organizations for 40 years, so I understand the importance of revenue streams. Even so, the TV commercials, especially for the Sunday race, spoiled the entire viewing experience. From the time the green flag dropped until the checkers waived, there were 12 commercial breaks in a short race! The split screen technique does little to help, especially when the only sound you can hear is the overly loud babbling of the commercials.

Contrast that with the Formula 1 race broadcasts which run without commercials.

Penske is brilliant and surrounds himself with smart people. Can’t they do something to produce a better experience for the TV race fans?

Bob Isabella, Mentor, OH

MP: Roger Penske and IndyCar do not place commercials in the NBC broadcasts, so I’m not sure what else to say here, Bob. It’s like blaming NBA commissioner Adam Silver for having too many commercials during a basketball game on ABC.

Roger Penske’s influence is far-reaching, but it doesn’t extend to controlling commercial breaks on NBC. Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment

Q: I know IndyCar is very cost-conscious, but are there any plans to expand the schedule? I saw your article about wanting more short tracks, which would be great. But is there any desire among the teams and/or IndyCar to expand the schedule to 20 or more races?

If so, I’ve heard a lot of negativity about Watkins Glen. It seems like a great track for IMSA; wondering whether IndyCar would be interested in returning?

Patrick H

MP: I’ve gotten conflicting messages when I’ve asked about a calendar expansion, so I’m not sure. I would say that from a practical standpoint, many teams — but not all of the teams — are stretched to their financial limits at the current $6-8 million it costs to run a car for a 17-race season, so the idea of taking it out to 18-20 would come with a need to increase the Leaders Circle contracts to help offset things.

There’s another item to consider with the growth of the grid to 27 full-time cars, and no increase in the size of the Leaders Circle — it was cut, actually, by $150,000 this year to $910,000 — with the series’ owners holding firm to offering 22 Leaders Circle contracts. Doing more races, which costs the teams more operationally, and would increase engine lease and tire lease prices due to the added mileage, would only widen the gap between the series-assisted 22 and the other five or more entries who don’t receive the subsidy.

I know, something simple like schedule expansion comes with a bunch of other factors that kill the fun… All that aide, who wouldn’t want to go back to The Glen? The track has a new president, so never say never.

Q: Instead of asking when we will race at (insert the track name), what tracks in the U.S. could IndyCar run on that they aren’t racing at now? Car most likely go to? Got a favorite?

Steve Coe, Vancouver, WA

MP: If I had my say, and because I love anarchy, we’d revive the two Evel Knievel street races with built-in jumps at San Jose and Baltimore. But since that ain’t happening, Watkins Glen stands out as one that could have greater success today with IndyCar than it did when small crowds took it off the calendar after a two-year return from 2016-17. I base that on the noticeable increase in attendance for June’s IMSA race, so if the same crowd or bigger appeared, I think the track and IndyCar would be pleased.

We have the usual suspects with Milwaukee and whatnot, but if we’re looking for turnkey places, WGI is where I’d start.

Q: With the Nashville race moving to the season finale for 2024, and Laguna Seca moving to March, that leaves a big void on the West Coast. It puts Portland out west all by itself. Any possibility of Sonoma being added to the schedule? And the talks of Milwaukee replacing the second IMS road course race… that’s just typical IndyCar. Instead of expanding the schedule, they just replace venues. All we hear is they want a 20-race season, but they are stuck on 17.

AE, Danville, IN

MP: Not sure I follow. We’d have the same amount of West Coast races, but instead of two of them being stacked at the end of the season with Portland and Laguna, we’d have two stacked towards the beginning with Laguna and Long Beach, and then a late return to Oregon.

Sonoma was a ghost town on our last few visits, and I can’t see why that would change unless the track and IndyCar spent a fortune to promote it. We barely have enough people at Laguna, which is a longer drive from the Bay Area than Sonoma, so we’d probably lose some people from one to barely boost another. I’d be the happiest guy here if both of my home tracks were capable of drawing meaningful IndyCar crowds, but since that’s not the case, I’ll keep hoping Laguna recaptures more of its former open-wheel glory. Having been there for its peak CART years where it took an hour or more to get into the main gate because race traffic was backed up for miles, I hate being able to cruise in on race day with no delays.

Some significant expenditures are on the way for 2024 with the move to hybridization, and that’s not just the engines, but also some major component updates for each entry that aren’t cheap. In a year where off-season costs will spike, dialing up the running costs by pushing the calendar out to 20 would have a lot of team owners hitting local dispensaries for items to calm their nerves.

Q: I know Colton Herta is not having a great year. A lot of it is bad luck mixed in with some bad team strategy… and a few of his own mistakes. But when he’s on, he is as fast as anyone. I would love to see him in F1, not only representing American but representing IndyCar. For the life of me I don’t understand why he didn’t do a winter regional formula series to gather the required Super License points. Yeah, I’ve heard all about how he shouldn’t have to do that, but the fact is he did need to do that.

As much as I love IndyCar and think it’s more competitive, it’s not the top level of motorsports.

Ken, Lockport, NY

MP: Don’t underestimate the value of being taken seriously. A desperation move where a race-winning IndyCar driver competes in the equivalent of Little League games in the hope of making it to F1 generates life-long headlines that are nothing but embarrassing. If you have to get on your hands and knees and beg and demean yourself to get someone to marry you, is that a marriage worth having? Maybe if that marriage is to Red Bull or Ferrari or Mercedes. But would you become a joke just to marry an AlphaTauri or Alfa Romeo? Come on, man.

And if F1 meant that much to him, he could have and would have done it, but since he didn’t, we can assume his need to do F1 rates below your need for him to do F1.

As for where IndyCar sits compared to F1 since I’ve been alive, we had a brief period in the early 1990s where the CART IndyCar Series scared F1, but other than that blip on the radar, nobody with a proper sense of the past and present would claim IndyCar is the top level of motorsport, and that’s nothing new.

Coming soon to a winter series near you. Or not. Motorsport Images

Q: Do you have any idea why IndyCar doesn’t make rock stars out of its drivers? F1, NASCAR, and even Formula E do it, and it seems like most of the fans eat it up.

Sanford, London

MP: It hasn’t been IndyCar’s strength for a good while, and that spans the old IRL, Champ Car, and today’s IndyCar Series. Romain Grosjean was IndyCar’s most popular driver the moment he arrived, but that was due to the crazy fire and death-threatnin’ story that went worldwide and traveled with him to the series. He’s been overtaken by Pato O’Ward, and you can thank his Arrow McLaren team and Pato’s big personality for taking him to the top.

I know some of the series’ most popular drivers have, in recent years, begged for race footage to share with their followers — many who aren’t based in the U.S. — to help grow IndyCar’s fan base and global footprint, and they’ve been met with responses asking for exorbitant rights fees.

Treating drivers like a profit center instead of the series’ best promotional allies who are armed with whatever they need to reach more fans to help the series is one of life’s great mysteries.

As an aside, Formula E has many excellent drivers, but like Josef Newgarden or Scott Dixon, they walk through airports and dine in restaurants without anyone noticing, and half of NASCAR’s Cup drivers would probably fall into that category as well outside of the series’ most popular regions. F1? That’s the silly part; even the worst drivers and team principals get recognized wherever they go, all thanks to Netflix…

Q: Do you see any chance of IndyCar using the green-white-checker that NASCAR employs? It seemed like in Race 2 at Iowa some teams were thinking of coming in for tires before IndyCar closed the pit lane. I know only a handful of cars were on the lead lap, but if they knew they were going to have a shot at restart that might have created some more drama and excitement for the end.

Andy

MP: I don’t. IndyCar has also said it has no interest in the GWC routine.
I’ve never cared for the approach where people can drive like idiots in the final laps with no concerns about their bad behavior shortening the race and taking away their chances of a good finish. I also like knowing a race is going to be however long a series said it would be, whether it’s capped by laps like in road racing or distance with ovals. If the Indy 500 is meant to be a contest to see who can cover 500 miles before anyone else, then it should be 500 miles long, not some vague amount that can grow to 505 or 512 and keep changing if drivers repeatedly cause mayhem. Just feels wrong to me to have endless do-overs.

At Iowa, there weren’t many, but we had enough laps to determine a winner under green and so they raced. All the cars on the lead lap had an opportunity to perform at a higher level than Josef Newgarden, but didn’t, and he won. Seems like the race played out naturally, so I’m satisfied.

Q: I am anxiously awaiting the release of “Lionheart” on HBO Max. Any idea when it will be available for streaming?

Melly, Ohio

MP: Last I heard, it was late this year or early next.

Q: I’m troubled by IndyCar president Jay Frye’s explanation in his Guest Mailbag that “we don’t have overtime. We don’t do that.”

IndyCar is trying to get the benefit of NASCAR’s overtime without implementing NASCAR’s procedure. I was never a fan of the NASCAR overtime, but it’s hard to deny that one or two attempts; it works.
When IndyCar tries to reverse-engineer — on the fly — a green-flag finish, it appears to most level-headed sports fans that they are making it up as they go along. ‘Hey, we may go red (at a time no other series would); we may close the pits for 10 laps (?!).

What’s next, one car is facing the wrong way so just have every car drive in reverse? Don’t say they wouldn’t do that, because I never thought they would just, you know, not open the pits for a while, or restart from pit lane.

Luke

MP: Even if it doesn’t seem like it, the procedures used at Iowa came from IndyCar’s rule book.

Q: Can’t say that Pocono was my favorite facility to attend, but I generally enjoyed the races on TV. For IndyCar however, it’s associated with much trauma and heartache. Is there just something inherently wrong with the track’s design or build that makes it so dangerous for open-wheelers?