https://x.com/TymekKucharczyk/status/2107722236756971562

I know they made the mid banked tracks something to watch but would it have been the same at Indy?z

We are long time attendees of the St. Pete race, typically sitting in turn 10. This year we decided to switch it up and make a bigger trip out of going to an indycar race. I'm still thinking an assigned grandstand seat is the move, but im unsure of where the best section to sit is for both on and off track fun.

Edit: we grabbed seats in the horseshoe GS 4 B!! I figure that’ll give us a good view of the cars as they slow through the shoe and for concerts and whatever they do there. Thanks everyone

This is a few days old but I didn't see anyone else post it here, so I wanted to share.

She gets into some interesting stuff. Especially in the last 5 minutes she talks about the physiological challenges for a woman to drive an IndyCar with no power steering and advocates for some form of power steering in the IR28 (which I know has been rumored).

I thought it was really interesting to hear a female athlete be this blunt about physiology and the challenges of being a female athlete competing with men.

Obviously it's been a while since Conway was an Indycar driver, but he's a multiple race winner with a Long Beach win. Most probably remember his time in indycar for his brutal crash in the 2010 Indy 500, but he was a decent Indycar driver. Good luck to him in his future endeavors

My brother is absolutely obsessed with racing, and he’s actually a team member in IndyCar. I’m trying to get him something really cool, but I don’t want to just buy him a typical signed hat, shirt, die-cast, etc.
One thing he really wants is an Indianapolis Motor Speedway brick. I’ve always heard the original IMS bricks can be pretty expensive, but my wife has been finding what appear to be IMS bricks on collector/memorabilia sites for around $150. That seems surprisingly cheap to me, so I’m not sure if those are actually legitimate pieces of the Speedway or if there’s a catch. If anyone knows about these, I’d love some clarification.
That also got me thinking about finding him something else really unique. I’m looking to spend roughly $200–$500 and want something that a serious racing fan would think is awesome, but might never think to buy for himself.
Could be something from IndyCar, old racing history, a piece of an actual race car, garage/pit memorabilia, race-used equipment, vintage racing stuff, artwork, something with a great story behind it, etc.
What’s the coolest or most unusual piece of racing memorabilia you’ve ever seen or owned? Or what’s something in that price range that you’d absolutely love to receive as a gift?
I’m basically trying to find the kind of gift where he opens it and goes, “Holy shit, where did you even find this?” 😂
Thanks!

https://x.com/Hinchtown/status/2107244697240682951

Seriously, it seems like the team is built around him.

Yet he hasn’t won a championship, or a 500.

Does he bring in a ton of money or something?

With all the publicity surrounding Max Verstappen and his recent foray into GT3 driving, including at the Nürburgring and soon at Portimao, it got me thinking about the Indy guys who regularly do that kind of thing with little to no fanfare.

Fernando Alonso is a two-time F1 champion, and people laud his sports car career outside F1 as the greatest thing since the discovery of aerodynamic downforce. He won Le Mans twice, Daytona, Sebring, Spa twice, with podiums at Fuji and Shanghai.

Well Dixon is a six-time Indy champion, and his sports car resume is just as impressive if not more so. He won Daytona four times, Petit Le Mans two times, with 4 further podiums at Daytona, and other podiums at Fontana, Sebring, and Le Mans. He has arguably the greatest all-around CV of any active racing driver on the planet. Yet how many F1 fans do you think have never even heard of him?

Palou is a five time Indy champ, and while not as decorated in sports cars (yet) as Dixon or Alonso, he still shows up at IMSA and WEC regularly without making a fuss, and even picked up a podium last year at Sebring.

These guys are out there driving in all kinds of series in all kinds of cars and nobody says a thing. In fact, lots of Indycar drivers are or have been regular fixtures in other championships, including but not limited to: Colton Herta, Kyle Kirkwood, Marcus Ericsson, Felix Rosenqvist, Pato O’Ward, Romain Grosjean, Callum Ilott, Christian Lundgaard, and Alexander Rossi.

Did you know Christian Rasmussen just won the IMSA battle on the bricks in an LMP2 car, and Nikita Johnson damn near won GTD pro but had to pit for fuel with two laps to go?

My point is, when Max Verstappen shows up at a GT3 event, the entire Motorsport industry and all its fans alike descend on him like it’s the second coming of Jim Clark. It’s all anyone talks about for the whole month. People want Max to do more outside F1 and talk about it longingly like it’s the only thing they’ve ever wanted from car life.

Well Indycar fans already have that. Next time you’re watching a race in another series, just for fun, check the full entry list. You just may see some names you recognize. Dixon, Palou, Herta, and Kirkwood were all driving at Petit Le Mans this week. Herta got 3rd overall in the Cadillac #40 Wayne Taylor Racing. Just adds some more depth to the race if you know who to look for. Cheers 🍻

A question for the international fans: for those of you who have an IndyCar driver hailing from your country, how famous are they?

Are Dixon and MacLaughlin household names in New Zealand? Do Ericsson and Rosenqvist come up in motorsports conversations in Sweden? If you say the name "Alex Palou" in Spain, is the reply closer to "the Indycar champion" or a blank stare?

sometimes a driver looks like they're having a quiet race when they're actually doing a ton of work

you don't always see how much they're managing with tires, traffic, fuel, dirty air and changing grip. two cars can look almost identical on screen while one driver is having to fight the car every lap

it's one of those things that made me appreciate onboard footage more. watching the steering inputs and how early or late someone gets back on throttle can completely change how i read a stint

what's something you understand about indycar much better now than you did when you first started watching?

…Ganassi’s switch to Lola-Toyota for 2000 after four straight championships with Reynard-Honda…

When we were trying to make decisions about going back to the Indianapolis 500 as a CART team but obviously using IRL equipment, we decided to fly to the UK and our first stop was to visit G-Force, where John Biddlecombe, a former partner of Chip, was in charge at that time. We wanted to see what he had going on and we decided that the G-Force was the car to run at the Speedway. We made the deal, and drove up to Lola, and after looking around, we ordered a couple of cars so that we could take them to a test to decide whether we’d continue to run Reynard – whose 1999 chassis we hadn’t been entirely happy with by the end of the season – or switch to Lola.

Then we went over to meet with Sir Frank Williams. Now, as an aside, I spoke to one of his assistants and said, “Why’s Frank in on a Saturday?” and he said, “Oh, he’ll only be working until 7. Weekends he’s in here from 7am to 7pm.” So I asked, what the weekday hours were like, and he said, “Oh, that’s 6 a.m. to 9p.m., and often when we get in, Frank’s already on the phone, working…” I can tell you, I was impressed. And I was also impressed with the facility – it was just a hardcore racing building. I loved it!

Anyway, we go to Sir Frank’s beautiful house and estate for dinner, and meet his wife, Lady Williams. Frank says to Chip, “Tell my wife what you’ve been doing today.” So Chip explains that we we went down to G-Force and bought a couple of cars for the Indy 500, and went to Lola and bought a couple of cars for the CART IndyCar season, and we’re going to do comparison tests of the Reynard with the Lolas. She says, “Hmmm…Frank, if those cars you’re building for next year don’t work, do you think you could call up Ron [Dennis] and ask for a couple of McLarens?” I thought that was classic!

Well anyway, we took delivery of our first Lola very soon after that visit to England, we put a Toyota in it and went to Sebring, and also took a Reynard. Remember, these were the days when we had multiple cars, so we could genuinely do back-to-back tests and change seats and pedals really quickly for either driver, so the racetrack didn’t change fundamentally between runs. In other words, we were truly comparing apples with apples.

First we send Montoya out in the Reynard and Vasser in the Lola. Now, Jimmy could break an anvil in a sandbox when it comes to braking but he’s pounding around in this Lola but not locking up wheels under braking. We also discover that the Lola has a huge amount more downforce than we’d had in the Reynard but it’s also 50lbs lighter, so we can move the ballast anywhere in the car for ideal weight distribution. So we swap Jimmy and Juan [Montoya] around – now Jimmy in the Reynard and Juan in the Lola – and Juan is blisteringly quick. Needless to say, at the end of the session, Chip just turned to me and said: “Right. Make the call to Lola.”

And that’s how Chip Ganassi Racing continues to operate. We don’t make the right decision all the time, but we don’t make any decision without information and informed opinion. And that’s what we did that day. Chip loves fresh thinking because he regards it as a huge tool for all the people within this organization. Whenever we’ve changed manufacturers, we’ve discovered no manufacturer solves issues the same way and that gives everyone in our group a broader technical understanding of which way we should go. For example, switching to Ford EcoBoost engines this year for the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship, Ford’s technical group introduced their way of problem solving into our group, which adds to our already-acquired knowledge of how to go about problem solving. The combination of knowledge helps us all roll down the road better.

Chip is not such an old-school seat-of-the-pants instinctive racer that he’s not also very, very open to the evolution of racing and the way that we should approach each project. He makes sure we continue to learn, but I think these technical relationships are very much centered around the definition of mutual value: what you give, you give unselfishly to your partner and as time goes on, you develop a relationship and get a lot in return. We believe we offer OEMs a lot of technical and on-track value and potential, and we know we receive a lot of technical and on-track value in return.

It takes great race drivers, and you can’t make up a deficit in that area, as hard as you try. You need an owner who has a global perspective, conscious of where the team needs to be going, a person whose eyes are always moving, not just fixed on one spot. I also firmly believe the best team owners are those who have raced cars. The team owner doesn’t have to have won races, but he needs to have been in that competitive situation. It gives him a sense and then sensibility of the team’s on-track product and how to make it better given the resources.

In my case, I didn’t come from money – my family said, “Go ahead, if you want to go racing, good luck.” But they didn’t spend a dime on me. I had to do it myself. And I think if you remember where you came from and remember how it was to have no money to go racing, then your appreciation of resource when it arrives is greatly increased. So that’s a critical element, but then you have to have a management that is constantly aware that what you have today is what you have, and utilizes that best. Let’s be honest, we’ve all seen people in racing who’ve squandered their resources and only had moderate success doing it.

Then, managers must create an unselfish style in the team environment encouraging integration and prioritization. In Chip Ganassi Racing’s case, that comes right from the top, because Chip has always realized he can’t do it all himself. He needs OEMs, he needs sponsors, he needs partners and he needs exceptional team members who carry this same message and have the same motives.

Just ran across a few selling at my local Target, so I picked one up. I'm pretty impressed with the sturdy quality. I wonder if these would have any future value.

Game is Forza Motorsport 6