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@lennysracingprograms
Let's play spot the difference
by Lenny Sundahl Max Verstappen topped the timesheets on a relatively uneventful first day of Formula One testing in Bahrain, posting a lap
NGL when I called dibs on this I didn't realize that the session started at 10am Bahrain time... 8 hours ahead of Huntington. But I'm not gonna crap out on y'all...
By Lenny Sundahl In announcing his impending retirement at the 2023 Indianapolis 500, Tony Kanaan begins to put the wraps on 25 years at the
This almost became one of those long meandering things that I like to type up, but I noticed a common thread in Tony Kanaan's retirement press conference--everything kept coming back to the beginning...
By Lenny Sundahl It was with a mix of reverence for the past and optimism for the future that McLaren unveiled its 2023 challenger, the MCL6
Catching up
Had a few articles up at Pit Debrief that I haven't gotten around to sharing here! (incoming!)
There is only so much that can be gleaned from a testing session; generally speaking, the whole point is not to see who's fastest, but to make sure that everything's working right and fine-tune the team's operation before things start mattering. Yet, after last week's two-day test at the Thermal Club, a few things stood out--some no-brainers, but a few surprises as well... photo: Indycar GANASSI: FOUR CONTENDERS While none of Chip Ganassi Racing's drivers led a test session, 11 of their combined
A few months ago, I joined the staff of MotorLAT. A few weeks after that, MotorLAT announced they were shutting down.
This week, many of the exiles from MotorLAT launched Pit Debrief--myself included!
I’ll mainly be focusing on Indycar, including race recaps and maybe even some on-site work, but may also have a Formula 1 article here or there.
Been busy with a lot of things—which is why the card posts have stopped—but the Rolex 24 is today, and thus the official (for me) start of racing season!
Planning on going to anywhere from 1-3 races, not counting the arenacross events at Mountain Health Arena that I’m interning for. Indianapolis is NOT on the schedule this year, but hopefully I can make it out for 2024 and Kyle Larson (and maybe Robert Wickens?!).
Also I hope to have some news soon about my writing—which had stalled due to the demise of Motorlat—it may take a more F1-centric direction. Stay tuned…
Crosspost from Reddit: Boston Consulting, 10 years later
I had posted this at r/Indycar earlier, and figured I should share over here as well.
A David Land tweet brought to my attention--and I don't remember if I'd even seen it before--to an AP story from early 2013 about the results of a report commissioned by Hulman and Co. regarding the future direction of Indycar. Particularly timely given the current offseason theme of "what is/isn't Indycar doing right", I thought I'd take a look at the points made and whatever happened to them.
oops
Sorry I’ve fallen off as far as keeping up with this. Too many things being juggled around. I do have the rest of those cards to do, but also I’m going to be putting more actual writing up here. Like the next post
McLaren opened the season as strong as ever, with Ayrton Senna winning the first four races to open up a commanding lead in the drivers’ championship that he would not relinquish. He would clinch in Suzuka, a race where, after final title rival Nigel Mansell spun out, Senna cordially swapped places with teammate Gerhard Berger to hand the Austrian the win.
It had not been an easy going for Berger, however; four straight retirements earlier in the season kept him down in 4th in points even with the win, and this, combined with a revival of fortunes at Williams, meant that Ron Dennis’ squad wouldn’t clinch the constructors’ title until the final race at Adelaide, where Senna and Berger sandwiched Mansell for a rain-shortened 1-3 finish.
I’m resurrecting this page as a companion to my existing Instagram page! Thus, you will all be along for the ride as I go through this box of the 1992 Grid F1 trading card set:
I’m missing one card, but otherwise it’s intact and in pretty good shape for sitting on a shelf at my mom’s for a decade.
Red Bull GRC: 2016 AB (After Block)
While Ken Block continues on the magical mystery tour that is running a Focus in World Rallycross, (most of) the rest of the Global Rallycross crew resume action this weekend.
The frontrunner remains the frontrunner, as Volkswagen-Andretti returns with defending champion Scott Speed and former champion Tanner Foust, who has won at least one rallycross final every year since 2010 and managed to sneak into dark-horse contention by the end of the season as the Beetles, after myriad teething issues at the start of the season, kept it together in the final three weekends.
This would look nice in @RedBullGRC, jus'sayin'... (ht @Jalopnik) http://t.co/TvJtlwLFkD pic.twitter.com/FlPLiVUKZX
Teething issues may be expected at Olsbergs, as 2015 runner-up Sebastian Eriksson and 2014 champion Joni Wiman bring in easily the biggest change of the season, becoming Honda’s factory squad with the Civic. Given the Indycar connections of other teams (Herta in particular) and the closeness with which Olsbergs had worked with Ford in the past, it’s a bit of a surprise, but certainly a welcome challenge for one of only two teams that has been with GRC from the outset of the series.
Another big change comes from SH Racing, as Nelson Piquet Jr. amicably parts from the rallycross scene for 2016, unable to fit it into a cramped schedule that this year includes not only a Formula E title defense but also a full-time World Endurance Championship ride. In his place is the absolutely deserving veteran Jeff Ward, who only ran two races last year and knocked it out filling in on Brian Deegan’s off days at Ganassi, only missing a podium at Daytona after contact with Steve Arpin resulted in a penalty.
Deegan will be running GRC full-time for the first time since 2013 at Ganassi, as he oversees his daughter Hailie’s season in Lites, and with Arpin back in the second Fiesta they should improve on 2015′s results. Deegan hasn’t won since X Games 2011 and Arpin hasn’t won period--I expect this will change before November rolls around.
Bryan Herta Rallysport brings the other M-Sport Fiesta--note I used that in singular, as they pare their operation down to a single car for championship contender Patrik Sandell, who was the only person less lucky than Ken Block over the course of the season. Where that leaves Austin Dyne is questionable, although he’s been continually posting as if he’s going to make an appearance in GRC later this season.
Also appearing later this season--and skipping most of the first three weekends!--is Subaru. Their dreadful 2015 campaign necessitated enough extra R&D work that they’re skipping the season-opener in Phoenix, only sending Sverre Isachsen to Dallas, and skipping Daytona entirely, with a full team return for the 4th of July weekend (well actually July 2-3) at The Base (which I presume is the same Base as last season, MCAS New River, North Carolina).
And about that schedule--notice I said Phoenix and Dallas? Yep, we have new events on there! But the new events are almost overshadowed by the loss of two series mainstays: X Games is dropping rallycross entirely, completing the separation of a series that used to basically be ESPN filler material before the Colin Dyne and Red Bull era; and the series will not be returning to SEMA Week in Las Vegas, opting instead to simply display their cars instead of race. Detroit and Barbados are off the calendar as well. In their place: well of course the aforementioned Phoenix (at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park, once upon a time known as Firebird Raceway) and Dallas (a street course at Fair Park), plus a new event at Atlantic City’s Bader Field, and a relocated Seattle event--not at Dirtfish Rally School, but northways to Evergreen Speedway, where there’s at least some infrastructure for a proper racing event. Daytona returns, as does The Base (unless of course it’s A Different Base), Washington (which will probably stay as long as Volkswagen’s in the series and it doesn’t piss off the neighbors), and the Port of Los Angeles doubleheader becomes the season finale in October.
So bring on the racing! As Indy 500 practices get going, a visiting dignitary in the form of Sebastian Saavedra gets a one-off ride for the Phoenix weekend, so we’ll see if that develops into anything beyond the first two rounds. For that matter, I’d be shocked if Pat Moro and Rhys Millen don’t make an appearance here or there.
Rallycross preview part 1: the Places That Aren’t America edition
The World Rallycross Championship is starting to feel--at least at a competitiveness level--like a proper world championship. Last season again went to Petter Solberg, although in not quite the dominating fashion that he took it in 2014. Solberg was equal on wins--three--with Timmy Hansen, previous champion Olsbergs MSE in the team points title. After running a sporadic second car in 2014 and a sporadically competitive Liam Doran in 2015 (off to drive for JRM-Mini this year), Solberg--somehow--only has the funding for a single-Citroen effort in 2016.
Perhaps it’s for the best to focus the resources on one car. Peugeot-Hansen are running a four-car effort this year, splitting Hansen and Davy Jeanney up into two official teams for the team championship: Jeanney will be on Hansen Academy with Timmy Hansen’s younger brother, Kevin, while Timmy Hansen will be matched up with none other than Sebastien Loeb, whose last rallycross run resulted in an X-Games gold medal in 2012 and, after a competitive couple seasons in touring cars in addition to his incomparable expertise on dirt, has the best shot at knocking off Solberg.
Olsbergs return with a completely new driver lineup--a very young one at that, with Kevin Eriksson moving up from a 2nd place in Lites to his dad’s team, joined by another son-of-dirt: Niclas Gronholm. Timur Timerzyanov moves to Team Austria, Reinis Nitiss goes to Rene Munnich’s team as they switch from Audi to Seat, and Andreas Bakkerud--as well as Ford’s factory backing--goes to this guy:
Yep, Ford decided to take a big step with a properly factory-backed team, and hired out none other than Ken Block to head it up. The Hoonigan squad are in not Fiestas, but Focuses, a car that Block has been personally developing the high-performance variants on for much of last year. The big question, though, especially after last year’s GRC performance: can he string together a season’s worth of results to get up there with Solberg and Loeb?
Johan Kristofferson will mix it up with Volkswagen RX Sweden, a combined squad of Kristofferson and Anton Marklund. Topi Heikkinen moves over to Matthias Ekstrom and the Audis of EKS RX, and along with Robin Larsson’s Audi and the aforementioned Nitiss-Munnich Seat team, a more focused contingent from VAG should make an interesting title fight even more so.
Please meet my new best friend for 2016 season of @FIAWorldRX! @allinklracing has done a brilliant job! Love it! pic.twitter.com/Sp2a0VzcWq
Schedule-wise the series is actually backing up a bit, dropping Italy and Turkey in favor of... Latvia. Latvia! They still have their jaunts to the Americas, hitting Trois-Rivieres and returning to Rosario, Argentina for the season finale. No plans on encroaching any further on GRC turf, but if Block finally cracks that nut and takes a championship, who knows...
Returning to normalish
Signs of health for Indycar:
The series graces Phoenix International Raceway this weekend--not a gimpy street circuit, like Zombie-CART was going to run on, but the four-and-a-half turn, mile-and-literal-change beast of a bullring that was one of the highlights of the American open-wheel season, from USAC through Indycar’s pre-split glory days before becoming part of the IRL schedule from its first season in 1996 until 2005 (take a second or 5400 and watch the last running below!).
We won’t have any trouble getting 33 cars in the field at Indianapolis in May, with Townsend Bell pegged for a fifth Andretti car as the latest news item. Really, for a milestone like the 100th, anything less than bumping would have been an absolute travesty. (I probably shouldn’t hold my breath for Alex Zanardi, but pretty please can this happen? It’s a special occasion, after all.)
Another return: John Menard. Not as a team owner, certainly not as an engine builder, but sponsoring Simon Pagenaud’s car in that old familiar multi-colored paint scheme:
This is the prettiest car in rallycross. Honda is entering Red Bull Global Rallycross this season–not just with any team, but with perennial contenders (and until last season their only champions!) Olsbergs MSE, and not just with any car–I expected the Fit–but with the Civic coupe, an utterly gorgeous car that is going to be severly mangled over the course of this season. We couldn’t ask for a better fate.
Oh hey look who posted to the wrong page
Mostly happy with Melbourne
If we just ignore qualifying, the Australian Grand Prix was a fantastic harbinger of the rest of the season.
What better way to end hibernation than with the glorious sounds of Grand Prix cars
‘BOUT THAT TIIIIIIIIIIME
I know, I keep wavering on how back I wanna be with regard to Formula One, but ultimately there’s too much exciting me as we finally get a dry practice in Melbourne:
Mercedes are still on top–but the gap to Ferrari is nonexistent, with Vettel just .052 behind Rosberg. Mingling with the Ferraris are…
Toro Rosso–who have once again found themselves once again ahead of the theoretical A-team, and thus ahead of...
The pack--which includes Williams, Force India, the aforementioned Red Bull, and...
McLaren (finally!) back--or at least respectable, with Alonso and Button in 11th and 12th.
The rest, part 1--Sauber and Renault are basically right where they left off, which makes sense considering their money issues.
The rest, part 2--Haas and Manor are bringing up the rear but are at least within shouting distance of other cars, unlike previous years.