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Indycar 2019


relapse98

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Anyone else going to COTA for Indycar practice tomorrow, Tuesday February 12th?

https://www.facebook.com/events/1970979829687860/

I'm not a huge fan of the $20 ticket, but at least the parking is free. 

Gates will be open 9am-5pm, 1st session is 10am - 12pn and 2nd session is 2:30pm - 5:30pm.
Wednesday they will also be testing but that won't be open to the public. And they will broadcast all 4 sessions live on Facebook, Twitter and Youtube.
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That's a big break from noon to 230. Maybe I'll just go for the afternoon. Re: the $20 tickets, it's free if you have tickets for the race. You have to go to their site and sign in to get em though. Free parking in A. Track open thru the first sector + Main GS, Turn 1, Paddock, & Paddock Lounge.

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Just got back - that was pretty cool.

Got there around 9am, found my friend, he had a free ticket, I had to pay $20 (I'll probably be at the race in my normal sponsor RV spot). We walked in and found some seats in the main grandstand and watched whoever was on track at 9am(*), and wondered who was on track at 9am, then wandered under the tunnel to the paddock. You pretty much had full paddock/pit access (not sure if the pit was appreciated, but we went behind the pit boxes. My general rule - don't make an ass of yourself and usually people are cool with you wherever. Looked at all the garages and cars, saw a couple of drivers. Then we went into the paddock building up to the second level and found some seats and they started IndyCar practice. We were down at the very end of pit road at that point. Sat there a bit and then went towards the bridge, friend got a lot of good pictures from the bridge, went down the other side and sat in the Turn 1 grandstands for a good bit and finished the morning practice there. At that point they cleared all the cars out so we wandered back to the paddock and bummed around, then the friend had to leave so I grabbed some food, found a seat towards the middle of pit road in the paddock building and watched whoever was on track around 12:30pm(*). They finished and at 2pm all the IndyCar teams hustled back and watched most of that practice before I had to leave to deal with a work issue.

(*) The mystery was Indy Lights. They had maybe 8 cars there. Sounded different, ran Cooper tires.

And whoever Marcus Ericsson is currently dating is a cute blonde. She sat in the paddock above his pit.

Here's pit road:

AqW1Bh2.jpg

Edited by relapse98
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Pretty impressive what they do on that budget imho. Quickest time I saw today was a 1:47.10, and I think it was 2nd quickest. Dunno what was the quickest time. Spoke briefly with Bobby Rahal out on the T3 bridge. Didn't even realize it was him til after I started talking. Nice guy.

Edited by wood
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Anybody know what the approx. schedule will be in March?  Trying to coordinate some visitors for Saturday and Sunday, but no real idea of run-of-show.  U.S.G.P. is times down to the minute so it makes things easier, just looking for a general timeframe.  Thanks.  

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McLaren taps Carlin for Alonso Indy assist. Mc to take much bigger roll than 2017 when it was more a tangerine andretti machine.

 

https://www.indystar.com/story/sports/motor/2019/02/13/mclaren-carlin-forge-alliance-alonsos-indy-500-program-develops/2859574002/

 

 

 

 

 

Looks like it was a 1:46.6 by Colton Herta. Damn. 

 Only a second and a half slower than I predicted for fast racing lap back in Sept/October. Already faster than the LMP1 record. They'll find that and more come 3/24. Keep in mind the GP race lap record is 5 seconds slower than qualifying.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Right on! My dude is almost 4, so we need a more open, free-range situation than the confined and widespread chaos of Indy. 

Camping inside the track from Thursday night or Friday morning through Monday morning at RoadAmerica. Last year we went Saturday through Monday and had a blast - hope we have good weather... 

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  • 2 weeks later...

WTF is NBC Sports Gold?

Quote

FRIDAY, MARCH 22
-- NHRA in 30, Gainesville, Fla.; 1 a.m., FS2 (T)
-- Indy Lights practice, Austin, Texas; 9 a.m., RoadtoIndy.tv (L)
-- NTT IndyCar Series practice, Austin, Texas; 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., NBC Sports Gold (L)

 

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9 minutes ago, elfenix said:

extra.  i think there's even sub-subscriptions within it (for example, there's a cycling pass, an indycar pass, etc). 

Jesus. 'Extra' is the future, or I guess really it's the present. Everything is fucking extra.

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3 minutes ago, wood said:

Jesus. 'Extra' is the future, or I guess really it's the present. Everything is fucking extra.

the critics of cable debundling always claimed you'd end up paying just as much or more.  they may have been right (not that we got a lot of cycling content in the US at all). 

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11 minutes ago, elfenix said:

the critics of cable debundling always claimed you'd end up paying just as much or more.  they may have been right (not that we got a lot of cycling content in the US at all). 

Yeah they're gonna get our  money one way or another...

Edited by wood
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6 minutes ago, wood said:

Great article here re: the 1997 IndyCar race at Texas Motor Speedway. I was there that day. AJ Foyt is a lot of good things, but he won't often be accused of being overly rational.

Texas, IndyCar forever linked by Foyt's 'backhand' https://motorsports.nbcsports.com/2019/03/20/texas-and-indycar-forever-linked-by-foyts-backhand/

IRL's only real team owner and only real driver at the time got into a fight because IRL eeerrrrrt USAC was amateur hour at counting how many times a car drove in a circle.  i remember that well. 

Edited by elfenix
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2 hours ago, elfenix said:

the critics of cable debundling always claimed you'd end up paying just as much or more.  they may have been right

I've been saying that for a decade. You wanna "cut the cord"? It's still gonna  cost you one way or another depending on what you want to watch. Hulu, Netflix, Amazon on and on.

Edited by relapse98
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been looking forward to this race since 2012 and don't think i'll be going because my car got backed into on monday and they've only gotten me referred to a body shop this afternoon (i rejected having the claim be on my insurance on tuesday).  won't be getting a rental until tomorrow at the earliest and driving up and back in one day kinda sucks. 

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6 hours ago, elfenix said:

been looking forward to this race since 2012 and don't think i'll be going because my car got backed into on monday and they've only gotten me referred to a body shop this afternoon (i rejected having the claim be on my insurance on tuesday).  won't be getting a rental until tomorrow at the earliest and driving up and back in one day kinda sucks. 

Damn, man. That sucks.

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Just finished watching qualifying. Anyone know the thinking behind why they put the timing line where they did? Why not just use the start/finish line?

 

I haven’t watched, but it just depends on the track. The finish line is where race control is. The start line is further up to fit all the cars on the grid. On some tracks they can be the same, others not.

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3 hours ago, Hawndoh said:

They put the timing line just before turn 17? I think. Right after the exit of the big triple Apex right hander that goes around the tower. 

That would be after T18. I wasn't paying attention but my kid said it was after T19.  I'll look at the Qualifying show & see. Nobody else has ever done that at COTA that I can remember.

Really sucks that they're not enforcing track limits at 19. I can't find a way to understand it when any major series does that shit.

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13 minutes ago, Gil Bang said:

IIRC the org was started by Robby Gordon.

 

You are correct. He owns it and I think he's really onto something. These guys really put on a helluva show, with Robbie leading the way. Dude's an amazing driver and quite a showman.

Edited by wood
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So apparently the line is just before 19, and they put it there to allow drivers to enter the pits immediately after setting their time & avoid people having to go all the way around again. Not a bad idea, really.

Edited by wood
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So apparently the line is just before 19, and they put it there to allow drivers to enter the pits immediately after setting their time & avoid people having to go all the way around again. Not a bad idea, really.


A friend of mine said that Indy does this all the time. I was unaware. They use the regular one for the race. Makes sense, though.
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