The RACER Mailbag, May 17

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.

Q: I was watching some YouTube videos showing the Indy 500 during the 1970s and wished to make a comment about Johnny Rutherford. This man is right up there with all the great legends of the Speedway, and during the filming of this documentary Johnny was featured as a main commentator, not only about his own 500 wins, but about the other drivers.

I noted that Johnny has always been most complimentary when talking about any of his competitors, and in my mind this man sticks out as one of the great ambassadors of the sport. I wish he would appear on more broadcasts, if he is willing and able.

As I sidenote, as an avid collector of IndyCar 1/18 diecasts, I inquired recently to Replicarz about a release of the 1969 Foyt Coyote Indy pole winner. I was informed that no diecasts for A.J. were in the works as he wanted too much money. Very disappointing. Megabucks times zero is still zero, right A.J.?

James Herbert Harrison

MARSHALL PRUETT: Lonestar JR is just a delight. I’m sure it would make plenty of IndyCar longstanding fans happy to hear him on the many hours of 500 coverage on Peacock. As for A.J., he’s a highly particular man who could buy Replicarz a thousand times over, so pocket change isn’t going to be a motivator. He’s spent most of his life accommodating the desires and needs of fans. I’m sure there comes a point where that loses its appeal.

Q: I had never heard of the Congressional Motorsports Caucus before. Interesting how bipartisan groups can actually come together when they want to. Contingents from NASCAR, IndyCar, SCCA, USAC and IMSA participated. This was the NHRA article and contingent. Sad to say that there was no mention of this meeting on the IndyCar site that I found. After investing in sending a contingent to Washington, it would seem to be a no-brainer to post an article. I think the teams should demand that the sanctioning body give back the money that got shifted to marketing and promotion since they missed this layup…

Don Hopings, Cathedral City, CA

MP: Time to warm up that typewriter, IndyCar.

Rutherford is a national treasure. Matt Fraver/Penske Entertainment

Q: I have to admit that I enjoyed the first two episodes of the “100 Days to Indy” series more than I thought I would. (I’m a member of the non-target audience, white male over 50 or WMOF.)  But one thing that came to mind that makes IndyCar unique is its diversity. It has the most diverse tracks, the most diverse crews, and the most diverse drivers of any major racing series. What other sport can boast of having men and women compete on an equal footing at the highest level?

I was there in 2005 when Danica Patrick led the Indy 500 and listened to the crowd go absolutely bonkers.  It seems to me that a good storyline for the show, and indeed IndyCar itself, would be to emphasize how diverse the series is. Just a few topics could be Beth Paretta Autosport, the return of Katherine Legge, and some home background stories on two of the most popular drivers that happen to be from Brazil and are about to hang it up.

For those old guys that remember The Split like me, one of Tony George’s founding principles of the IRL was to use more American-born racing talent. I always found that offensive — why wouldn’t you want the best talent? A fundamental strength of IndyCar is that it has the most diverse drivers with the most diverse tracks in the world. And its marketing needs to make sure that everyone knows that.

Ed, Hickory Hills, IL

MP: The second episode was far more cohesive and on point. Viewing it through that new-and-younger audience lens, I did wonder why Colton Herta was portrayed as such a vanilla character; he’s a 23-year-old IndyCar driver who plays the drums in a punk band, which sure seems like something to share, but instead, he was depicted as a one-dimensional personality. That he and Pato O’Ward, the episode’s other star, were Indy Lights teammates, fought like hell, went down two different paths when their IndyCar team chose Herta over Pato and Pato was left out in the wilderness, was another significant point that seemed obvious to include, but maybe I’m wrong.

Kat’s turn in “100 Days” is on the way. You’ll also see Myles Rowe.

Q: As someone who drives past the site of the future Andretti HQ on a daily basis, I can’t help but notice there has been very little construction activity since last year, seemingly. This is just a shot in the dark with my question, but any insight on their construction situation?

Todd S., McCordsville, IN

MP: I’ve heard nothing from the team regarding a change in construction plans.

Q: I’d like to point something out regarding IndyCar’s marketing this season: Even ignoring “100 Days to Indy,” it’s demonstrably been stepped up. I see advertisements for the next race on the schedule regularly — very good ads, featuring the drivers and hyping up the track. Good enough to catch the eye of the modern potential audience? I can’t say that, I’m too far outside of it (I turn 40 in a few months), but they’re better than pretty much anything I’ve ever seen in my adult life as an IndyCar fan.

Now, as a major motorsports fan my data is a little skewed as algorithms tend to feed me racing ads whenever they can, but I used to see IndyCar ads once in a blue moon, and only as banner ads on websites. This year, if I load more than two videos on YouTube, I am 90% certain to see an IndyCar ad, and even on the local news seems to run one every ad break, at least on the local NBC affiliate — and again, that was nearly unheard of in years past. Even taking into account that my likelihood of seeing an IndyCar ad is higher due to algorithms, I’m seeing so many IndyCar ads this year that there’s zero chance they aren’t considerably more frequent in general.

So yes, IndyCar is definitely doing a lot more marketing this year. Let’s hope it works.

FormulaFox

MP: Great to hear, and I’ve noticed similar things. IndyCar’s social media team is also delivering at a high level, but that’s not a new thing.

Q: When will the 2024 IndyCar schedule be released?

Eric

MP: The 2023 schedule was released at the end of September. I’d anticipate a similar late-to-end-of-season timing.

Q: I am a researcher and lecturer in sociology in the UK who is also a lifelong motorsport obsessive — a vanishingly small overlap on the Venn diagram of professions and interests — with a particular interest in what is considered to be “legitimate” within society; be it actions, ideologies or questions to motorsport journalists. Naturally this professional curiosity has merged into my passion for racing, leading me to contemplate over the past few weeks what makes someone or something “legitimate” within racing?

Initially I thought, given the ruthless competitive nature of motorsport it was all just about performance and winning — which it kind of is I guess. For if you win, that approach is legitimate.

However, I think this is too simple, for drives, teams or machines can win through ways which are either tinged with illegitimacy, such as rain-shortened races or lucky caution breaks, or can be deemed completely illegitimate by swathes of fans and other competitors — such as Shank’s win at Daytona this year (the less said about Abu Dhabi 2021 the better). If performance alone is the marker of legitimacy then Carlos Huertas would be considered to be a more legitimate IndyCar driver than, say Callum Illot or Romain Grosjean, by virtue of his win at a soggy Huston in 2014.

My working concept of legitimacy within motorsport revolves around the promise of performance, and then delivering upon it. This way a driver who takes a struggling team or car higher up the grid than would be reasonably expected, like Christian Lundgaard at Barber, is just as legitimate as a driver than those who win regularly or extract the maximum from superior machinery — i.e. the Dixons and Newgardens of this world — because there is an expectation of what would be a “good” performance and a result to judge it by.

In short, I’m curious to see what you think makes a driver, team or car/technology legitimate within racing and what you think constitutes legitimacy within the paddock itself? If any of my fellow readers have any thoughts on this I’d like to see what you think too.

On another note, I’ve written this on May 10th, before a wheel has turned at the Speedway and am declaring that it is going to be Scott Dixon drinking the milk. I also feel that Grosjean will break his duck at the GP.

Will, Cambridge, UK

MP: Consistency is a great legitimizer, Will. It makes Grumpy Cat’s (ED: Carlos Huertas, for the uninitiated) lone win — in a rain-affected timed race at Houston — something that is all but forgotten; there was no follow-up win, much less a podium at a race where there were no caveats.

It’s the thing that’s plagued Alexander Rossi in recent years. He won a bunch during those first few years, was expected to be up front wherever we went, and then that stopped happening and all the heat and fear he brought was diminished. I’m not saying he was solely responsible for all the unremarkable results, but when you go from being a beast to less than a beast while driving for the same team, the paddock tends to place the blame on the driver. It’s here where being a consistent threat placed Rossi on a pedestal, and once he became a less-consistent threat, the paddock’s view changed. You can apply the same thing to a team. RLL comes to mind in recent years, along with Andretti.

Grosjean certainly wanted to break things at the GP.

Bet none of you saw this one coming back in 2014. Phillip Abbott/Motorsport Images

Q: The question and your answer about Jamie Chadwick in the last Mailbag got me wondering why Indy cars don’t have power steering like F1 cars? I would be excited see a woman winning in IndyCar. It would increase media coverage and the fanbase more than anything else that I can think of, and I’m Trenton, Langhorne, and Robin Miller old. See you at the track in two weeks.

Pete, Tucson, AZ

MP: They’ve never been designed to have power steering. There are some IndyCar drivers who would welcome power steering, but most I’ve spoken with like the fact that they are the hardest to drive and not everybody is capable of rising to the physical challenge. I think of all the hours professional basketball and football players spend in the gym to transform their bodies to excel in their sport. IndyCar is no different. See you soon!

Q: Now that Miami has a world-class racing facility that is likely to go unused for most of the year, what prevents IndyCar from running a race there? Is there some sort of exclusivity clause in place in the F1 contract?  Maybe IndyCar could run there in late February or early March, well ahead of F1 but away from any football scheduling. It seems like the kind of place the series would love to use, but then again it dumped COTA, so….

John Card, Visalia, CA

MP: The part where the stadium and track owner is engaged in a long-term contract with F1 is the first reason that comes to mind. The other one is how we did that at COTA and had about three percent of the audience that showed up for F1, so unless there’s a reason for IndyCar to look weak, unloved, and unimportant in Miami, it’s probably not a good idea to try and race there.

Q: How is it decided who will have in car cameras for each race? It seems to be decided before the weekend starts, because whoever is chosen seems to have a camera for the whole weekend.

Do teams pay to have them? Or does NBC choose?

Craig