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We all know that Dan drove away from the
field more than once during the Toyota Indy 300 a little over a week ago
at HMS, but why? Usually the IndyCars "suck-up" in a draft every
bit as well as the boxy but aero enhanced "stock" cars of
NASCAR. That said, sometimes in either series, a car is able to break away
from a pack and there is nothing the other drivers can do about it. There
could be several reasons for this, one being that for some reason, the
combination of ride height and aero adjustments just happens to
"dirty-up" the air behind the car enough to prevent a draft from
forming. Rarely is a "horizon job" or runaway caused by a
horsepower advantage, and I don't think that was the case at Homestead.
Yes, some engines, even when built to identical specs, have more
horsepower than the others, but you wouldn't expect more than a 10-hp variance
from the fastest to the slowest. Another factor to consider on tracks
where all cars run flat out is the amount of steering feedback a driver
has to put into the car to compensate for handling issues, all of these
adjustments eat up speed and power, a perfectly setup car might have made
the difference as well, but I don't think that is the reason either.
In looking at a replay of the race using
my TiVo, I watched the car being pushed into "Victory Circle"
and thought, 'that looks like the longer version of the Dallara
nose." You see, Dallara offers several "nose" options,
whereby you can move the front wings further forward, and in doing that,
use less wing angle to get the same amount or more downforce on the front
wheels with less drag. I have been told by friends that this has been
discounted by most teams as being hard to work with, but the view of the
Wheldon car caused me to wonder if he was using that setup, and perhaps
that is one of the reasons that the Penske Dallara's are faster than the
TCGR Panoz cars, using virtually the same engines. Yes, I know there are
other teams using the Toyota/Dallara combo, but even in the case of Team
Cheever, these are "lesser" teams, you would expect MTP and TCGR
to be on a par with one another. As is often the case, I have photo backup
to support my contention.
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This is a picture of the nose of the Wheldon
car taken at an earlier open test, you san see a faint vertical line that
indicates the attach point of the nose section and it's relationship to
the back of the wing. The same "line" can be seen on the 2004
Kelly Racing Dallara Scott Sharp used to drive, shown below, that wing
appears to be even further forward, but "scale" and angle may
make it hard to tell.
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Long before someone confirmed to me that
there were several versions of the Dallara nose, I took the picture below,
which may be of the "shortest" option, at the time, I wondered,
"what's all this about?" The picture below this one is the
"nose" they took off.
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Anyway, for what it's worth, perhaps
Andretti Green Racing used the farthest forward wing position available on
at least Wheldon's car, and nailed the setup. I have accused Honda of
"political placements" of selected engines in the past, and
stand by that, but the Homestead event was the first race of the 2005
season, far too early for those kinds of tricks. Whatever the reason, Dan
Wheldon drove away from the HMS field twice, and he needed the gap,
because Sam Hornish can do some amazing things with photo finishes.
As for Team Penske, I know that they are
an approved engine builder for the Toyota Indy engines, and it is possible
they can build more power into their engines then TRD can, but considering
how thorough TRD is, I doubt there are any big noticeable gains, unless
they have found something in the "mapping" of the engines.
One thing is for certain, this week at
PIR wings won't get the job done, neither will excess horsepower, it will
be a combination of good handling and best track position coming off the
last pit stop before the checkered flag that wins. because, unless a
mistake is made to allowing a following car to get underneath the leader.
the driver in the lead after the last stop will win. The race will be in
deciding who is in that position at the time.
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During the week after "the big
one" at HMS, both Danica Patrick and Ed Carpenter took quite a
beating in the internet racing forums, mostly because of poorly timed and
uninformed comments by race telecasters and Patrick's car owner Bobby
Rahal. If all of these people would have waited to see the countless
reviews of the race from several camera angles, none of this would have
happened. Gil de Ferran was a heck of a race driver, by all accounts, he
is also a good guy as well. Gil brings a lot of racing experience to the
booth, I would also hope that he would bring some of the patience he
displayed in his racing with him as well. If he did, he would have waited
for the in-car shot of the crash from Danica's car, where you can clearly
hear her getting off the gas. Rahal too is a fair man, who spoke in haste
in saying that "Carpenter was 5-laps down and 'parked' the car after
the wreck." While Ed was 4 laps down, there is no requirement in the
rules that lapped cars go to the back of the field on series mandated
single-file restarts. In addition, Carpenter was no more at fault in that
crash than Scheckter or anyone else. When Kosuke Matsuura attempted his
outside, off-line pass into the dust and marbles and lost control, cutting
in front of the cars of both Tomas Scheckter and Carpenter, it was
Carpenter that hit him first. Ed's right front wing and tire hit the left
front of Matsuura's Panoz, turning Kosuke back up the track and further
contact. Carpenter's car had sustained damage to the right front
suspension, and in slowing (who wouldn't) and after first drifting
up-track a little before arching slightly towards the bottom and being hit
by Patrick. Danica probably made the best choice in trying to go to the
inside, but was hampered in how low she could go by the abrupt transition
from the banking of the racing surface to the flat pavement at the bottom
of the track. She simply ran out of room. Luckily, the way she hit, she
tore of the right rear suspension rather than climbing over Carpenter's
left rear tire, that could have resulted in a big flip. Patrick's car continued
up-track and contacted the SAFER without the benefit of the suspension
pieces to dissipate the energy of the crash and cushion the blow. By some
accounts, Danica's hit was measured at 150 G's.
Patrick did far better then TCGR's heralded
rookie and former F1 test driver Ryan Briscoe at Homestead, Briscoe
crashed twice. In the first hit, he lost control on the pit entrance road
that caused trouble for not only his teammate Scott Dixon in the past, but
Ed Carpenter last year as well. The 2nd Briscoe crash came in the race
came in the race, and was a single-car incident, where the back end
stepped out on him.
While no one was placing the blame for
the crash on any of the rookies, HMS has been tough on rookie drivers in
the past. In addition, this kind of high speed, open wheel racing takes
its toll on rookies as well. Last year at Homestead, rookies, Carpenter,
Mark Taylor, Matsuura and Darren Manning were all involved in on-track
mishaps. Thomas Scheckter was involved in a crash with team owner Eddie
Cheever at HMS in his first IndyCar race as well. Every year rookies are
often criticized and second-guessed for there on-track actions and
mistakes. Last season Darren Manning took most of the heat, the season
before that it was AJ Foyt IV and Dan Wheldon, then there was Scheckter,
reams of content were written about his escapades. This series is, as I
have said, hard on rookies, but also hard on those that must race with
them and get caught up in their mistakes. That is why these team owners,
whenever they have chance, look to seasoned veterans as replacements
whenever they can. It is perhaps why Townsend Bell was chosen by
Panther/Chevy when they could no longer tolerate the carnage of Mark
Taylor last season.
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