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I've
arrived at Kentucky Speedway for Saturday's Meijer Indy 300...
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Yes, I know I'm a day early, but it was
either that or hang around the Days Inn watching PGA Golf in weather even
hotter than it is here, if that's indeed possible. First, before I walk
across to the garage area and shoot some pictures, let me say how
impressed I am with the facility, it is indeed state of the art in every
way. Check back in a while and I'll have some photos up. Those of you familiar
with my work know that it isn't often I get to an event, so when I do I
work it hard. I don't care how warm it is, we'll talk to some people and
get lots of pictures. As you can see, 5 days after the devastating
equipment day at MIS, everyone is here and they're stringin' 'em up and
gettin' 'em ready. There's even a dario car, but I'm not too proud of the
picture I took. I'll go back and shoot another later. First let me
apologize for the picture quality, so poor that I couldn't even post half
of them. Upon further review, I couldn't have ruined that many shots. I
cleaned the camera lens with a special cloth that must have left a film on
the lens. I'll do better Friday.
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"It's good to see you sitting there on
the bike," I said to Dario Franchitti. "It's good to be
here," was Dario's reply. I asked him "if that was the repaired
car over there in the garage?" He said, "no, but they will fix
it." I then commented on him flying in on the "Franchitti family
flyer," shown below. "It's a quick and easy trip. I wonder if
he's commuting? I'll be at the track early enough Friday morning to find
out. (An update) I inserted a better picture, but it appears the chopper
is in the same place, so Dario isn't commuting. I guess I could have asked
him.
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"November 127 Dario Franchitti"
(N127DF), The Franchitti helicopter. The original intent in taking another
fuzzy photo was to show the "camper" had arrived. Always quick
with a smart Alex remark, before I got the shot they moved in several
more. As hot as it was (105 degrees), I hope the AC was working well.
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Dario has a fresh backup car at Kentucky
Speedway this week. This is also an updated photo taken on Friday morning,
they store the cars in the transporter overnight and move them back into
the garages in the morning.
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Last weeks winner...
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The Scott Dixon car, and no, I didn't ask if
it was the Michigan car, but they are putting fresh decals on some pieces.
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Sarah Fisher's car, Fisher, along with Jon
Herb and Darren Manning were in three of the single-car crashes last week
that were hard to understand. As you can see from the picture above, for
some reason I was photo-challenged yesterday and many of the pictures
turned out to be too fuzzy to use, the one I took of the Manning/Foyt car
being one of them. I did learn that the team shipped the car crashed at
MIS "back to Houston, to be repaired over the winter." While I'm
not going to go to every team and ask "is that the same car you
crashed in Michigan," given the opportunity in the context of a
conversation, I will check. Noting the absence of most of the decals on
the Fisher car, perhaps it was repaired during the past 5 days.
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This is the AJ Foyt IV car, Foyt was one of
three drivers that passed under the Franchitti car while airborne, Foyt
ending up with a tire "skid-mark" on his helmet.
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The Vision Racing #20 0f Ed Carpenter.
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Because of the amount of damage done to
Helio's car last week in the contact with Vitor Meira, and the time and
distance needed to travel between MIS and the teams Mooresville NC
facility and then back to Kentucky Speedway, I expect this is a backup
Dallara, as is the one the team has for Sam Hornish. I'll try to check
this out Friday morning and also see if the team shipped extra cars in
from Mooresville.
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Not everyone suffered through a bad week at
MIS, in desperate need for any kind of a decent finish, Kosuke Matsuura
finished 4th at Michigan, a bitter/sweet result for Panther Racing, it's
Vitor Meira #4 left without a visibly usable piece on the car.
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This HAS to be a backup car, there wasn't
enough of the Meira car last week for the TV crew to even identify the
other car in the Castroneves crash, and it was sitting in the infield at
the time.
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***
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Now for photos of the facility...
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First of all, we have all heard the horror
stories about getting in and out of Kentucky Speedway. This being my first
trip, I'm not sure what I'm seeing from this in-car shot, a re-pave or an
additional two lanes. If it is indeed a re-pave, the timing sucks. If it
is an additional lane, just being completed, either way I hope they hurry
up. About five miles from I-71 exit 57 the road widened from two lanes to
what becomes four in both directions. Regardless, all of this bottlenecks
at the highway exit, very close to track entrance roads. Lets hope things
work out better this time around, I assure you I'll be at the track early
on Saturday, and I'll be in no hurry to leave. Upset with the
quality of the pictures, I'll hold off on posting any more and redo all of
them this morning.
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