Handling Adversity at Indy 500 Qualifying

This weekend's Indy 500 qualifying showed a contrast in how drivers handle adversity. I would like to look at three drivers and how they handled the stress, misfortune, and in one case the heartbreak that Saturday's qualifying and Sunday's bump day handed them.

During Saturday's qualifying, Danica Patrick qualified with a scarily ill handling race car that was capable of only the 23rd starting position. Obviously frustrated at her first lack of success at Indy and probably compounded by her team's lack of performance throughout this season, this is what she said when interviewed over the track's PA system: "I don't know. I'm very, very disappointed. I've never been bad here before. I've never been outside the top 10 on a finish or qualifying, so... it's not my fault. This car is not good." She continued to recount a previous qualifying attempt in which she qualified well with an oversteering car as proof that she has the skills to do well. The crowd booed this and well they should have. She got out of the car, and whether she meant to or not, publicly placed the blame for her ill handling car squarely on the shoulders of her team. Motor Sport is a TEAM sport; she shoulders just as much blame for the car's lack of performance as the rest of the team does. Sure, they didn't provide her with a car that was fast enough but you can also argue that she didn't provide the feedback needed by the team to make her car fast enough. I hope that, in retrospect, she regrets what she said. I also hope that she doesn't believe what she said, that it was just the frustration of a disappointing season and month of May bubbling to the surface.

Paul Tracy, one of my open wheel heroes, experienced the worst case scenario: not making the big race. He and KV Racing pulled a time that eventually would have made the race expecting that another car would bump them out. Tracy's car did not handle well in the afternoon heat and he ended up aborting the try because the speed wasn't fast enough to get in. Time ran out on Tracy and the KV squad and he didn't get a chance to go out again. Sadly, PT is missing the 2010 Indianapolis 500. Paul's response afterwards: "Turns out we would still have been in. But it's a team decision. And we worked as a team all week, and we made decisions as a team. And you win and lose as a team." This is how the situation should be handled. PT realizes that it is a TEAM sport. You win and lose as a team, something that Danica Patrick apparently forgot.

Tony Kanaan almost experienced the same fate as Paul Tracy and during the weekend proved why he is a champion. Kanaan destroyed a car on Saturday, missing not only the Fast 9, but the top 24 as well, forcing him to qualify on Sunday's Bump Day. On Sunday, he crashed again, this time sustaining damage to the car. The Andretti Autosport team labored throughout the afternoon, using parts from three of the other Andretti Autosport cars to rebuild Kanaan's car. Kanaan didn't place blame in public. He maintained his composure throughout then went out and put the car in the field with a 224.072 MPH four lap average with only 30 minutes left in qualifying. This is the first time Kanaan has qualified outside of the first two rows for the Indianapolis 500, yet he handled himself like the champion he is and carried himself like the team leader that he is. Here is what Kanaan posted on Twitter after his trying weekend: "Today I am a happy person,not because I qualifed, because I realize how many friends and fans I have.Thanks to all of you for the support." This is why TK is another of my open wheel heroes.

Mac McCormick III

IndyCar 2010 Kansas Race Thoughts

I didn't get to watch the Kansas IndyCar race live, but I did record it and I watched it this morning. Here are a few of my thoughts from the race:

• Looks like Jay Howard has put SFR behind the 8 ball going into Indianapolis. I'm not sure how Sarah Fisher Racing is fixed for back up cars and spares, but that car looked heavily damaged. That team is really going to have work hard and hope for the best because Indy qualifying will be up coming up fast

• Hideki Mutoh and Takuma Sato were impressive until the restart with 14 to go. Sato did well for his first oval race. Hideki Mutoh did a good job prior to crashing with Takuma Sato, racing in the top 10 for part of the race. It looks like Newman Haas is getting their Oval house in order. I would have loved to have seen what Graham Rahal could have done with the car. Takuma Sato did quite well for his first ever oval race. No doubt racing for KV helped him out (I'm sure he got good advice from Vasser) but you have to be impressed with Sato being in the top 10 prior to the crash.
  

• Has the Kansas race been all that much better than the street course races? I'm sure some will disagree but I don't think so. While there was some good racing in the pack and there some battles for P2 and P3 at times, the race for P1 was never really in doubt. I just don't get how the Oval-Centric folks say that this is more exciting; road/street courses and ovals are equally exciting in different ways. On ovals you have wheel to wheel racing, on road and street courses you have the excitement of seeing who can brake the latest or who can control their car deeper into the corners.
  

• Andretti Autosport may not have fully sorted out the ovals, but it looks like @TonyKanaan and @RyanHunterReay certainly did for Kansas. Danica Patrick finished 1 lap down in P11 and Marco Andretti finished 2 laps down in P13 but Tony Kanaan finished P3 in front of Castroneves and Ryan Hunter Reay finished P5 in front of Ryan Briscoe. They didn't beat the Ganassi cars, but they did beat the Penske cars. Finishing in front of one of the giants isn't bad considering the Andretti team's last few seasons. Obviously there is improvement to be made by two of the Andretti cars, but this race shows that 2 of their cars are definitely getting with the program.
  

• P3 for @TonyKanaan! Good to see one of my favorites back on the podium. Congratulations TK!

Mac McCormick III

IndyCar Debuts at Barber Motor Sports Park

I enjoyed watching the first IndyCar race at Barber Motor Sports Park in Birmingham, Alabama yesterday afternoon. I saw a lot of tweets and comments online about how boring the race was or how much of a snoozer it was. Not all races can be pass fests and even though this one didn't feature a lot of passing, it was still an interesting race from a strategy standpoint. Even though there weren't a lot of passes, there was still a lot of pressure being applied. I imagine you could probably ask Marco Andretti about the pressure that Helio Castroneves was putting on him. That said, some change could probably be made to the track to make for more passing opportunities and I understand that the facility has made promises to do so.

Congratulations to Helio Castroneves on his win. Good to see him climbing the fences again!

Mac McCormick III

Newman Hass Lanigan Signs Mutoh

I read several sources over the last couple of days that indicate that Newman Haas Lanigan has signed Hideki Mutoh for the 2010 IRL season. This leaves Graham Rahal out in the cold as far as a ride for 2010 goes. It shows the sad state of affairs the IRL and Motor Sports in general is in when a mediocre driver gets a ride instead of a race winning driver just because the mediocre driver can bring money and a sponsor. I can make the list longer: Takuma Sato, a driver with no experience in Indy Cars (but with F1 experience) gets a ride with KV Racing yet drivers like Paul Tracy and Oriol Servia go rideless. Once again, Sato gets the drive because of money and his connections with Honda, not because he is the best driver available.

Mac McCormick

Danica Patrick's 2009 IndyCar Season

I was waiting for the IRL season to end before posting this in the interest of not placing a hex on the rest of her season.

The 2009 IRL season saw great improvement from Danica Patrick over her previous season. Granted, she did not win a race this season but her performance over the whole of the season was vastly improved over her past performances. She finished the season in fifth place in the championship behind only the two Ganassi and two Penske drivers, essentially putting her first in class. This was quite an accomplishment given that Andretti Green Racing (or whatever they are calling themselves now) had far from a stellar or even average season.

Danica Patrick was consistently the best performer on a subpar performing AGR and consistently the best performing non-Ganassi or Penske driver. It would have been expected that Tony Kanaan would have been that driver but instead it was Patrick. What led to her taking that position? In my opinion two things: an improved attitude and better teamwork.

1. In past seasons, Patrick's attitude and temper were stumbling blocks. She lost her temper quickly and it prevented her from performing at her best. She did not handle adversity well and it showed. This season, she seemed to be an almost different person. It would have been hard to blame her for losing her temper with her team's overall performance but she handled with grace in public (I have no idea what she said behind closed doors). She had several incidents in the pits and on the track that she handled more professionally and coolly than she did in previous seasons. I have no doubt that the way she handled the negatives this year led to her improved performance.
2. It was obvious this year that Patrick was better able to work with her team and engineer to keep the car's setup not only stable throughout the races but to improve it throughout the races. She started out races with good handling and was able to maintain and improve the handling throughout the course of the race. She kept her frustrations in check and took what the race offered rather than overdoing things and ruining the day's performance.

Personally, I would love to see what the improved Danica Patrick could do in a Ganassi or Penske car.

Anyway, congratulations to Danica Patrick on an improved season in 2009 and good luck towards continued improvement in 2010.

Mac McCormick III

IRL at Chicagoland - A Terriffic Race

What can I say about last night's IRL race at Chicagoland? One word can sum it up nicely: WOW! It was the best oval race I've seen in a long time, by far a better show than the IRL oval races prior to the rules changes at Kentucky and by far better than most NASCAR races this season.

At one point Graham Rahal, Mario Moraes, and Marco Andretti were racing 3 wide wheel to wheel to wheel over fourth place. That fight went on for several laps and unlike a NASCAR race, it didn't end in a crash!

The race ended with Ryan Briscoe taking the win over Scott Dixon in a side by side finish with Mario Moraes taking third from Dario Franchitti in a side by side fight that was nose to tail with the fight for the win!

Unfortunately because it was on Versus and most NASCAR fans won't watch the IRL, it is probably one of the best races only a few people ever saw.

Mac McCormick III

Indy 500 Qualifying

Watching Sunday's "Bump Day" qualifying at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, one could easily assume that that the drama and excitement is back in the Indianapolis 500 qualifying process. As Lee Corso might say, "Not So Fast, My Friend..."

While at first glance, there were 36 cars competing for 33 starting spots, it was obvious all day long that of those 36 cars, only 34 were truly capable of making the necessary speed. Thus the drama was to an extent a creation of the coverage. Stanton Barrett and Buddy Lazier never really had the speed needed to make the field. The competition to not be bumped out was between John Andretti, Ryan Hunter-Reay, and Alex Tagliani. That was where the drama was. It was odd that the veteran Andretti was finding it hard to make the car handle when his teammates, even Milka Duno, were. That Ryan Hunter-Reay had trouble both weeks finding the speed when teammate Ed Carpenter did was also surprising. These two teams really provided the drama during qualifying. I'm surprised that Tagliani wasn't faster given that Bruno Junqeira put his car in the field fairly easily with little practice. Unfortunately, Junqueira's effort comes to naught as his seat has now been given to Tagliani. I can't help but feel sorry for Bruno; obviously the commercial aspect of racing has trumped the performance aspect of racing. With the performance he turned in, Bruno deserves the ride in the Indy 500.

Mac McCormick III
kf4lmt@comcast.net

Milka Duno to Newman Haas Lanigan?

http://auto-racing.speedtv.com/article/indycar-milka-duno-and-robert-doornbos-to-newman-hass-lanigan/

Surely this is a joke. Doornbos I can understand. If it is true, I can only describe Duno's signing as a bought ride. I can't decide whether to be mad at NHL or feel sorry for them. Has it gotten that bad?

Mac McCormick III
kf4lmt@comcast.net

Faulty Transponder?

I just got finished reading an article on USA Today's website about the finish of Sunday's Chicagoland IRL race that attributed the confusion over who won the race to a "faulty transponder." The article goes on the state that the transponder was improperly fitted to the car, causing the signal to be transmitted in the wrong direction (I didn't realize the transponders were directional, I always thought they were omnidirectional). If that is the case, the transponder wasn't faulty! It performed as it was supposed to. Hopefully the improper installation was simply an error on the team's part and not an attempt to gain an edge.

Mac
kf4lmt@comcast.net

IRL Season Ends, Dixon Champ

Yesterday's IRL season-ender at Chicagoland Speedway was a good race. It was a contest of strategy and a contest of racing ability at various points during the contest.

I won't comment on Castroneves' penalty that resulted in his start from the tail end of the field, because I didn't see what caused it (the side effect of not having coverage of practice and qualifying that NASCAR is given) but it was a blast to watch him streak the through field to put himself back in the hunt at the beginning of the race.

At this point, strategy took over as Dixon played a fuel game, balancing mileage with staying in the position he needed to clinch the championship and Castroneves' teammate Briscoe played wingman, covering Castroneves on the outside while he ticked off laps in the lead to take points for most laps led.

Caution flags turned the end of the race into a sprint without the need for fuel conservation, ending in a Castroneves v. Dixon contest that led to victory by a nose and .001 of a second! Victory was initially given to Dixon because the timing and scoring system showed him first. The photo finish imagery, however, clearly showed Castroneves' car ahead by a nose at the stripe.

Victory aside, Dixon's second place was plenty enough to give him the championship; a championship that was well deserved even if you think that Castroneves' Detroit penalty was wrong (which I do not).

On a final note, I would like to comment on something that seems to have become a staple of NASCAR and IRL coverage in recent years: video of driver's wives during tense times: While cars were wheel to wheel, nose to tail at the front of the race, they kept on showing Scott Dixon's wife Emma in the pits. Emma Dixon is clearly easy on the eyes, and I understand the human interest in seeing how she is reacting to the situation on the track, but I tuned in to watch the action on the track. Show us the human interest when there is no track action or after the race. When there is close racing on the track, that should be shown full screen.

Mac
kf4lmt@comcast.net

Dario Franchitti Returns to the IRL

While reading the newspaper this morning, I came across a blurb in the sports section reporting that Dario Franchitti was returning to the IRL to take Dan Wheldon's seat in the #10 Target Chip Ganassi car. According to Autosport, Wheldon is moving over to take Vitor Meira's seat at Panther (no word on where Meira is going, I guess).

This is good news. I would much rather see Franchitti in an Indy Car than a stock car. NASCAR's current crop of tin tops is really not the place for his talents. Franchitti belongs in a mixed road/street/oval series.

Mac
kf4lmt@comcast.net