Indianapolis 500 Pre-Race.

The Grand Prix of Turkey was also today, perhaps the first exciting race of the season, and of the new race formula. These cars are truly amazing...That they can develop so much horsepower from a

2.3 litre V8 engine, and run them at 18,000 rpm with few mechanical problems is commendable.

Man, I've been watching that race for a long time. And before that, listening to it. I can remember before it was televised. During the time I was in the service we moved around a lot. I'd search around the radio dial finding some station that broadcast the race. Before that, when I went away to college, the first year I had to find a station that did the broadcast.

Even when they did first televise it, it was a delayed broadcast, the evening of the race. I wanted to hear it live, so I'd still search for the broadcast on radio.

I remember Howdy Bell, Donald Davidson, etc. Each stationed at a given point around the track, and they'd follow the action around.

Forget where I found it, but there is a sound clip (.wav) on the 'net of Tony Hulman saying "gentlemen, start your engines." Also a clip of Tom Carnegie saying "and its a new track record!"

When did they decide to make Indy car racing even more boring than Nascar? As soon as the announcer described the "push to pass" button and the rules related to it's use, I realized this was just another over regulated, squash all innovation, parade race. What a pathetic joke. Push to pass my "*ss.

Ed

Actually, I thought IRL was the death of Indy racing. CART was still alive, but a lot of the money teams linked up with George and headed to Indy...

In the beginning there were three rolling stock manufacuters and two engines.

Now there are two (IIRC) chassis makers and ONE engine. Honda.

What this means: it comes down to the driver and the team. If you have a good team that can dial the car in, then the onus is on the driver. No more real Big Money teams; even though Penske, et al are in it, it's now a more level playing field. No more PC Penske chassis made in England with what once started out as a Chevy engine heavily reworked by Cosworth.

Innovation may take a bit of a back seat, but now it's a game of skill and not just money.

And think what Honda is learning...

Actaully what it means is teams spends thousand, sometimes millions, to tweek tiny things to gain a tiny advantage. I've seen this in Nascar. Driver skill means almost nothing. A team that manages to find one tiny advantage suddenly becomes unbeatable. A mediocre driver can look like superman beacsue his team hit on the perfect combination. All that accomplished by trying to legislate mediocrity is that anyone is is just a little less mediocre becomes champion.

No more big money teams? Come on, do you believe that? Who won? When was the last time a Nascar race was not won by a big money team?

Trying to control costs by legislating componets doesn't work. Instead of innovating, teams spend million polishing a turd. It also makes it difficult for outsiders to be successful. It is much better for the ruling body to create a set criteria and let the teams actually try to innovate.

They are learning almost nothing.

Ed

Well, they learned a heck of a lot in Formula I....mainly that they couldnt compete. A lot more is involved than simply the engine though.

Now, Mercedes, Renault, and Ferrari engines are about the only ones that can compete. Ford Cosworth is in the pack, but not doing very well.

"hls" wrote in news:8LadnekvG9muKZTRnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:

Hmm. Well not really. When the engine freeze happened, they dropped down the ranking and then the suits started to run the team. Very bad. All due to Max Moseley IMHO,

The engines mean nothing now. It's all downforce from the difuser. I even have my doubts whether they even adjust the wings anymore.

**** Yes, really.. A lot more is at stake, as I said, than the engine.

And this was the case with Honda, BMW, and Toyota, as well as the Cosworth powered units. Cosworth, in the past, HAD suffered an engine reliability problem. A big problem is talent to design and set up the cars correctly, and it is not a poorboy sport. Even some of the bigger and better funded companies had to drop out.

It is not just downforce. You can get all the downforce you want, but that limits straightaway speed. It is balance. And the engine has to pump out power reliably. Not all of them have done that.