Rounds 10 & 11: Hy-Vee Homefront 250 and Hy-Vee Step 250, Iowa Speedway. July 12-14.

[broadrun96]

Uh, that's not right for the 60. Pushing down on the wing and the car rocks side to side

[joeb]

Originally Posted by broadrun96

Uh, that's not right for the 60. Pushing down on the wing and the car rocks side to side

Great job not to end up in the wall though.


And now final stops complete - Power got ahead of Palou!

[bjohnsonsmith]

Congrats to Will Power but a big accident on the back straight.

[broadrun96]

Good Lord that's a mess at the end

Sting Ray on his roof and others all screwed up

AMR guy trying to put out fire on Robb's car with his hand, it didn't work

Podium on front stretch works too but they better get the teams out there. Power's car smoking fierce

[joeb]

WTF happened at the end? Robb upside down and Carpenter on top of Kirkwood.

Rossi involved too?

[broadrun96]

Originally Posted by joeb

WTF happened at the end? Robb upside down and Carpenter on top of Kirkwood.

Rossi involved too?

At least 5 cars I saw, no replay at all though

Replay and WOW, Stingie way up in the air and rolling hitting Rossi. Ed launched after getting loose and then in to the cluster at the wall

[joeb]

Robb ran up the back of Rossi then the rest of the cars were reacting to the carnage.

Stingy on a stretcher right now. but gave a thumbs up as entered the ambulance.

[peebee2]

Originally Posted by joeb

WTF happened at the end? Robb upside down and Carpenter on top of Kirkwood.

Rossi involved too?

Rossi slowed massively (no fuel?) and Robb had nowhere to go.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by joeb

Robb ran up the back of Rossi then the rest of the cars were reacting to the carnage.

Stingy on a stretcher right now. but gave a thumbs up as entered the ambulance.

Watching a difference race, but was notified of this.

Seems he is fine, especially if he is the one who retweeted it (probably his support team).

Thoughts and prayers.

[E.B]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Seems he is fine, especially if he is the one who retweeted it (probably his support team).

Thoughts and prayers.

God was with him. Looked a bit nasty for a moment.
Glad the chosen people's favourite and all others are undamaged.
Carpenter was being an angry man afterwards casting blame without having seen replays.

[bjohnsonsmith]

The Aeroscreen did its job, for both Stingy and Kyle Kirkwood, the left rear wheel of Ed Carpenter's car was just above his head.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Race2 Result

That was Will Powers 43rd IndyCar win. I thought he timed that pitstop well and was able to hold of Alex Palou, who had a much better race second time round, finishing second.

I thought Scotty Mac might do it again but the caution on lap 101 put an end to that. However, he finished on the podium again. Team Penske had a 1, 3 on the podium in both races.

Again no 2nd groove which is a shame.

[Yannick]

Thank God for the aeroscreen. It's been proven once again to be the best safety improvement of recent years.

[NaBUru38]

Race 1 was quite boring. I couldn't watch race 2.


Cars would spread out too quickly. I can't be just the new pavement. I think that there's some dirty air going on with the new wing package.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by NaBUru38

Race 1 was quite boring. I couldn't watch race 2.


Cars would spread out too quickly. I can't be just the new pavement. I think that there's some dirty air going on with the new wing package.

Reading this article from Racer.com, it looks like a lack of tyre degradation was the issue.

https://racer.com/2024/07/12/lack-of...-hard-at-iowa/

[joeb]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

Reading this article from Racer.com, it looks like a lack of tyre degradation was the issue.

https://racer.com/2024/07/12/lack-of...-hard-at-iowa/

With the heavier cars, they obviously wanted to make sure the tires could hold up under the new loads. Perhaps next year there can be a compromise and a different solution can be found that makes the tires a bigger Factor. Of course, the other extreme of that is the NXT race and they do not want one of those situations.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by joeb

With the heavier cars, they obviously wanted to make sure the tires could hold up under the new loads. Perhaps next year there can be a compromise and a different solution can be found that makes the tires a bigger Factor. Of course, the other extreme of that is the NXT race and they do not want one of those situations.

The hybrid system adds 105 pounds to the car and will undoubtedly affect the cars balance.


Originally the hybrid system was going to be used with the 2.4 L engine but that was dropped.

[fieldodreams79]

While I enjoyed the races, I think they should come up with a package to have less grip in the corners, slow the cars down a little or something to allow for more passing. Speedways have become too processional. It's so hard because you either get pack racing and loads of passing or a conga line where you have to win in the pits or with strategy alone.

At least the monotony was broken up with a zillion ad breaks, with my favorite being from yesterday:
Leigh Diffey -"There's a pass on the outside! Things are really heating up in Iowa!!" Cut to ad I've seen 100x about vacationing.

[broadrun96]

Yeah, they cut downforce after the test in preparation for the new grip but maybe not enough. But they cut it the usual amount of change so sticking with usual procedure. But think the over correction of the tire with the hybrid may have done the race in. For the most part last year with even tires was not too pass heavy but fresh tires and you'd rocket around the outside. Not so much this year

[v8supes]

Fair to say Ed Carpenter is not a fan of the hybrid.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KOHiKJcLZQ

[broadrun96]

Ed proving once again he should drive and not engineer a car at all, sooner he retires the better the series competition will be.

[NaBUru38]

I had high hopes for hybrids on ovals, but was underwhelmed.

I think that Iowa is so short that a 2-second boost per lap doesn't allow to pass. I you change it so the boost recharges every 5 laps, so drivers can use it for 10 seconds.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by NaBUru38

I had high hopes for hybrids on ovals, but was underwhelmed.

I think that Iowa is so short that a 2-second boost per lap doesn't allow to pass. I you change it so the boost recharges every 5 laps, so drivers can use it for 10 seconds.

It's early days yet and that was only the second time they ran hybrid system in a race. It would make sense for IndyCar to go back for another testing session at Iowa.

[Teretonga]

Originally Posted by v8supes

Fair to say Ed Carpenter is not a fan of the hybrid.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KOHiKJcLZQ

Ed Carpenter being diplomatic. Trying not to bag anyone but some serious questions raised about oval racing for the future.

ideally you would want everyone just to run flat out and the best combo win, but in this highly technical (computerized, not specification) days there's very little difference on either short or long ovals.

If we want entertaining racing, then the series needs to come up with a downforce/tire/power package that makes sense and find a way to deal with the NASCAR treatment, so the speedways are multi-lane once again.

If we looked at the Handford rear wing of the 90's, do we need to revamp the DW12 again to create a package that gives better drafting/speed stability
or is there a much simpler and less expensive way to get to the ultimate combination.

If every entry has spent over 1.5 million on the hybrid that's an investment of 67.5 million dollars in the hybrid technology by the teams, and yet Honda want to withdraw....
How much better for the car owners would things be if the teams had simply raced for another $30 million per year over the next two years....?

[mstets]

I'm with Ed. Can't see that the hybrid has improved the racing at all. I watched one driver's onboard for about 10 laps at Iowa and the display read 97-98% the whole time I watched. Evidently wasn't being used at all. I thought it would be great if only to restart the cars on road courses but it didn't seem to be very effective at that at Mid Ohio.