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Here's Al Jr. leaving pit road
today (Mon.), in order to get as much of a close up of the car
as I could, I cropped Al Sr. out of the shot.
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I had forgotten that Stephan
Gregoire was sharing some of the driving chores for the
two-seater program until Dennis sent me this picture
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Hey dad, look at me go... Dad?
Dad? Pay attention dad...
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***
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The ROP/Refresher Test days are
over. Weather
permitting, most of the Indy 500 entries will start
practicing tomorrow. Delta permitting, I'll be there as well.
Here's today's final T&S chart. T Bell won the day over
Michael Andretti. Marco Andretti ran 250 miles in two cars,
using his father's car for a while. From looking at the speeds,
I would guess that all drivers listed received
"passing" grades. See you tomorrow from Indy... On
edit, Dennis just E-mailed me that all rookie's have passes the
tests.
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Pos
|
Driver
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Best Time
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Best Speed
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Best Lap
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|
Last Lap
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C/E/T
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1
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Townsend Bell (90)
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40.6539
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221.381
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25
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67
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D/H/F
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2
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Michael Andretti (1)
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40.6643
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221.324
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8
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0
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D/H/F
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3
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Marco Andretti (1)
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40.6749
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221.267
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2
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8
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D/H/F
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4
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Marco Andretti (26)
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40.7776
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220.709
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21
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42
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D/H/F
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5
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PJ Chesson (91)
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40.9565
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219.745
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35
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36
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D/H/F
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6
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Al Unser Jr (31)
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41.1297
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218.820
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56
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57
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D/H/F
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7
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Larry Foyt (41)
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41.7129
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215.761
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47
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50
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P/H/F
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8
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Thiago Medeiros (18)
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41.9209
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214.690
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56
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66
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P/H/F
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9
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Arie Luyendyk Jr (61)
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41.9460
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214.562
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39
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51
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P/H/F
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***
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Almost everyone loves PDM, IndyCar's
true "little guys," but it's a good thing Dennis didn't shoot
anymore of the Medeiros car, unpainted as it is, that's a butt-ugly race
car. That's better than no car at all though, and the team will paint it
and make it run fast... Here's a better shot, shown below. Clearly
it was/is a Super Aguri Fernandez car that Kosuke Matsuura used. Kosuke
got a Dallara for the PIR open test, and has run very well since. If he
has been back in a Panoz I've not noticed it. It looks like SAF is dumping
their Panoz cars.
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***
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Here's the latest copy of the T&S
chart, with little or no changes. Medeiros could be through three phases
of his rookie test. The #41 of Larry Foyt could be a Panoz...
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Pos
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Driver
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Best Time
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Best Speed
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1
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Michael Andretti (1)
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40.6643
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221.324
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2
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Marco Andretti (26)
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40.7776
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220.709
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3
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Townsend Bell (90)
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40.9196
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219.943
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4
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PJ Chesson (91)
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41.4841
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216.951
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5
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Al Unser Jr (31)
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41.6497
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216.088
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6
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Arie Luyendyk Jr (61)
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42.5525
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211.503
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7
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Thiago Medeiros (18)
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42.9504
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209.544
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8
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Larry Foyt (41)
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43.4982
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206.905
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50 minutes into the practice session
(I'm at work) we are seeing only a small gain in speed by Michael Andretti
over yesterday's best run. I'm impressed with T Bell's numbers though, 12
laps into his "refresher," Bell was running 219's.Al Unser Jr.
has less than ten laps for two days running and is at 214. It's good to
see Thiago Medeiros on the track, I didn't want to see him with time
pressure. At 191, he still wasn't at phase one speed. I'm not going to
brag on Thiago this time like I did at Fontana, where he crashed, but he's
the best to come out of the Pro Series, including Simmons
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Pos
|
Driver
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Best Time
|
Best Speed
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1
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Michael Andretti (1)
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40.6643
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221.324
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2
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Townsend Bell (90)
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40.9196
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219.943
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3
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Marco Andretti (26)
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40.9619
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219.716
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4
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Al Unser Jr (31)
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42.0199
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214.184
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5
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PJ Chesson (91)
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42.2208
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213.165
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6
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Arie Luyendyk Jr (61)
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42.5525
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211.503
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7
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Thiago Medeiros (18)
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46.9898
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191.531
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***
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According to Sunday's trackside report both
PJ and Marco are finished with their test and free to run any speed they
find comfortable. That leaves Thiago Medeiros as the only driver that
still needs to run the four speed phases of the rookie test, and he needs
to get through three phases today. Medeiros' car should be ready to run
this morning. The four phases of ROP
are a minimum of ten laps at each of these speeds:
195-200 mph
200-205 mph
205-210 mph
210+ mph
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Arie Luyendyk Jr. in the ex-Adrian
Fernandez/Mo Nunn Panoz...
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PJ Chesson in the Carmelo/Hemelgarn
#91 ex-Panther car...
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Here's Townsend Bell and his #90 Rock &
Republic Vision Racing Dallara/Honda. From the look of the side mirror, I
think we have found another former Panther Racing car (or a new mirror
customer).
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***
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Seven drivers:#1 Michael Andretti (Andretti
Green Racing), #12 Jon Herb (Playa Del Racing), #31 Al Unser Jr., #41
Larry Foyt, #61 Arie Luyendyk Jr., #90 Townsend Bell and #97 Stephan
Gregoire must complete refresher tests.
Michael Andretti has probably been cleared to run. Jon Herb ran in the IPS
race at Indy last year, and raced in the 500 in 2001. Al Jr. hasn't been
in an Indy car since the Richmond race in 2004. Larry Foyt has ran in the
last two Indy 500's, so I am at a loss to explain why he has to run a
refresher test, unless it's because he crashed out of both of them! Arie
Jr. passed his ROP last year, albeit
not with flying colors, it's not clear whether he satisfied the officials
Sunday, since he never ran above 206 mph. bell only needs to show he can
run safely above 210 mph at IMS, because he has run in several IndyCar
events. I don't know how much racing Stephan
Gregoire has done lately, so he'll probably run a bit. The car should be
ready to go today, but 4th phase speeds don't have to be done during ROP.
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The Michael Andretti car in the garage.
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Marty Roth, now running full time in the
IndyCar Series
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A Team Cheever car in a
mostly empty garage.
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Ed Carpenter's #2o, after two hard crashes this
year, they still have car's.
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The Sam Hornish #6,
the probable winner...
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It's move-in at IMS,
here's Tony Kanaan's car, a potential winner...
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Tomas Scheckter's
#2...
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The transporter lot
is filling up, as is the field. The biggest saving grace for the
field of 33 this year is an abundance of "abandoned"
Panoz cars. While the former G Force might not be the best suited
cars for the big cookie-cutter's, they have always been good at
Indy. It's also a good road race car, and while IMS ain't one of
those, the speedway is kind to road race driver's because of the
need for precise "line's" through the turns. Perhaps the
old track likes road race cars too.
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