Lynn St. James at Indy 500 - At Her Age?

[Liz]

Lynn St. James is older than I am, and she has just received enough funding to allow her to take one more shot at qualifying for the Indy 500. The last time she tried she said that she DQ'd and it was humiliating. Has she improved since then? Are there other pilotes that age racing? How do they do?

I also think it is interesting that the oldest and the youngest pilotes trying out for the 500 are both female. That has got to be history making even if neither of them make the cut.

[Franklin]

I don't know about PILOTES, but DRIVERS such as Harry Gant won a Winston Cup event at the age of 52 while Chris Karamesines is still driving Top Fuel cars at the guesstimated age of 70. Sir Malcolm Campbell set the first over 300 mph land speed record at the age of 52. Dr. Nathan Ostich was over 50 when he went over 300 mph in "Flying Caduceus" (the first jet land speed car).

[This message has been edited by Franklin (edited 14 May 2000).]

[Liz]

I know that NASCAR drivers are all elderly fellows. Also I know that Mario (age 60) is going to be driving at Le Mans this June, and I saw an excellent gentleman of 75 drive in the Porsche Challenge Cup at Mosport not too long ago.

I meant Indianapolis 500 pilotes (drivers of open wheel cars).

[Crash Test]

Way to go Fraklin! A non-technical, non drag car post....oh well....

Would Dick Simon be entering her? Would be easier to get an average girl driver sponsorship than an average bloke driver? It opens up a whole new world of girlie sponsors...or in Lynn's case some elderly female sponsors...(sorry)
Wya to go Lynn, go out there and kick some pretty boy ass!

[enzo]

If her car is any good, Lyn could make the field. I've watched her for years, & while she really can't be called a great ( or even good sometimes!) driver, she has enough to be at Indy.

To a man ( and woman ?) the drivers will tell you that Indy is not a difficult track to drive - it is actually very non-technical as far as driver skills are concerned. If the car is set up properly for, say, a 220 lap, almost any driver of decent skill can run it that fast. It is even easier now with the current IRL cars, as they have a ton of downforce, even trimmed to the max, and are underpowered by about 250 hp for the downforce available. All that adds up to a very stable, easy to go fast car (as long as the setup is right!)

I just hope her stamina is up to the job of 500 miles, if she does indeed qualify.

[floid2000]

Why Not ? She's qualified to drive a race car and has sponser money. I,personally think, Lyn would have gone further in her career if it were not for that fiery IMSA crash in the eightys.4 expensive prototypes were destroyed and she shouldered the blame.
After that we didn't hear much from her except for her annual attempts to qualify for Indy . I hope she gets into the show and posts a good finish. She's a Florida Girl. Good Luck Lyn

[Liz]

I've seen her on Speedvision and she seems to be capable and knowledgeable; and I assume she is fast enough to give it a shot or they wouldn't let her out there. I don't know that her gender matters that much in this case - it's her age that I'm concerned about. I am a year younger than she is and can't imagine myself in that rugged a competition. Somehow I had always thought that modern cars needed younger people to pilot them.

Enzo, I'm not familiar with that story, could you tell me what happened please?

[enzo]

Liz -

She really can't be THAT old !!!

(No, don't hit me !)
----------------------------

I assume you are refering to the "easy" claim ?

Please bear in mind that I speak in a relative sense - entering ANY corner at 220+ is not EASY ! Even Piquet had to admit that Turn 1 took a lot of balls at first - he never seen anything remotely like it in F1 ! Cheever remarked that when he first want there he finally had to put his left foot over his right to keep the right foot from lifting off all by itself - it wouldn't obey his brain at all !

While Indy is danged fast, especially for as shallow as the banking is, it has never been know as a "technical" track in comparison to say Nazareth, Milwaukee, or Phoenix. It is VERY technical as far as maintaining a fast, consistant setup as the conditions change, but not from the driver skill viewpoint. A good engineer is almost more important than the driver ! (How else can you explain the likes of Jack Miller ? He couldn't get within 5 seconds of the next guy at Toronto in a Lights car!)

As a for instance - a couple of years ago a friend was helping the Ongias effort there & got to ask Danny what the IRL car felt like compared to a CART car. He said that the IRL car was "over gripped, underpowered" & very easy to drive at whatever speed the setup will allow. Their original setup would only give them an easy-to-drive 215 - but forget anything more. They got a 220 setup from Menard (Menard wouldn't cough up a 222, even with pressure from Goodyear & Tony G. !). and Danny immeadiately went 220, and declared that the car was even more comfortable at 220 than it had been at 215 !

As well hyped & as big a name as the 500 race is (was?), it in reality is not a tough test or good comparison of driver skills.

[floid2000]

I beg to differ Enzo (great name by the way)
No computer or race engineer can know what a car "feels like". Most of the great drivers know exactly what to tell thier crew in order to make a car run at it's best. Also
at speeds up to 135 (in the past) there are aerodynamics at work unlike any other track in the world,since they screwed up the "Moulson Straight". Don't make Indianapolis out to be some "walk in the park"for a driver. Ask any F-1 driver if he'd like to have an Indy win on his reume'.
Indianapolis is a tough race to win for a mechanic and a driver.......500 miles is a long tine to run "balls to the wall" so...
Don't disrespect those that have EARNED that trophy.
Don't get me started !
just kidding

[enzo]

floid:

Whoa! Down boy! I'm only the parrot here!

These are not opinions made up by me - these are the opinions of the top drivers we all respect ! Guys such as Mario, Rick, Al, Danny, etc. Many times over the years they've all said the same in interviews.

Don't confuse Indy's being a great race - lots of hype, great worldwide exposure, lots of tradition, etc, etc - with being technically difficult from the driver skill standpoint.

Does a driver need endurance? YES.
Does a driver need large gonads ? YES.
Does the driver have to be super skilled ? NO.

Again, we are talking in reletive terms here. Would you put guys such as Dick Simon, Barbazza, Vitolo, Miller, etc., on the same plane skill-wise as Mario, AJ, Big Al, Emerson, etc ? Gads, I hope not ! One only has to look at the reletive performances of these guys at the more technical tracks such as Milwaukee, Phoenix, and Mid Ohio to sort the chaff form the wheat !

As far as the engineering goes, a driver can only tell what the car feels like, how it has responded to a change. He cannot tell the engineer how far the car has moved, or what the absolute change in dynamic ride height was, how much grip was developed by the right front vs. the left front, etc. It's the enginer who has to calculate these numbers, verify via the data aquisition that it did indeed respond as calculated, etc. A .010 inch ride height change cam make a heck of a diffrence there, or a 1/10 degree wing angle change. Or even a 5 degree air temp change. If the engineer plugs in the wrong tire deflection numbers, forget it ( shades of Penske ) , no driver, no matter how skilled, can make up for those engineering deficiencies !

[slicktoast]

In deference to Sarah and Lyn, the qualification of big(or otherwise)gonads should be waived.

[KC]

You are both right to sopme degree about it. The driver is required to inform the engineers what he thinks the car is dong and they will back up his info with the data. There are some things that can only be measured with the seat of the pants and some that cona only be measured in hundredths of an inch from potentiometers. The seat of the pants is one of the things that separate the men from the boys on ovals. It is why so many road racers do well on ovals because they have honed their senses to detect very small inputs from the car.

Case in point, Alex Zanardi struggled with ovals in the first part of his first season until he began to trust Mo Nunn. The things Nunn were telling him just didn't make any sense. Zanardi said the car felt perfect, good traction and good turn in. Nunn said, but you are too slow. We must take out some of the wing so you can go faster. But, won't this make the car more loose and more likely to lose control. No, because you are going faster you can generate more downforce with less wing. The trick to oval racing is to find that limit, where the available downforce does not grow enough to compensate for the loss of wing loading. That is the point where the car will go as fast as possible befire sliding off. It takes an equal balance of both driver and engineer to do this.