Round 3: Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama, 25 - 27 April, 2014

[bjohnsonsmith]

This Sunday will see the 5th running of the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama, at Barber Motorsports Park, Birmingham, Alabama. The event was first held on April 11, 2010 and was won by Hélio Castroneves driving for Team Penske, in a Dallara-Honda. Prior to that Barber Motorsports Park hosted a testing session in October 2007, the success of which led to a full-field, three-day testing session in March 2009. In 2010 an open date became available on that season's race calendar and Barber Motorsports Park made a successful bid over Cleveland (Burke Lakefront Airport), Houston, Baltimore, Nashville, Charlotte and Portland, to hold the race.

Track layout:



Length: 2.38 mi / 3.83 km
Turns: 15
Lap record: 1:06.7750, Scott Dixon, Target Chip Ganassi Racing, Dallara DW12-Honda, 6 April 2013, Izod IndyCar Series.

Last year's winner:
Ryan Hunter-Reay
Andretti Autosport
Dallara Chevrolet
Laps 90
Distance 214.2 mi / 344.7 km
Race Time 1:52:05
Average Speed 110.818

TV Coverage:
NBCSN are televising the race with the Green flag at 3:00pm ET.

[mythoughtsareracing]

Not to split hairs... But I'm going to split hairs...

Barber Motorsports Park is in Leeds, Alabama, which is just outside of Birmingham. I guess you can call it a Suburb.


Also, according to the official event schedule, Green Flag is scheduled to drop at 3:15p EST (2:15p local time).

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by mythoughtsareracing

Not to split hairs... But I'm going to split hairs...

Barber Motorsports Park is in Leeds, Alabama, which is just outside of Birmingham. I guess you can call it a Suburb.


Also, according to the official event schedule, Green Flag is scheduled to drop at 3:15p EST (2:15p local time).

I looked on Google Earth and Barber Motorsports Park is between Leeds and Irondale but for all intents and purposes and for those fans not too familiar with US geography, I think Birmingham will do.

There does seem to be a discrepency as to when the Green Flag drops. According to the event schedule, http://www.indycar.com/Schedule/2014...-Series/Barber on the IndyCar website, which is where I got my info, it's 3:00 ET. If it's 3:15 ET, so much the better as this gives everyone an extra 15mins to find a decent feed so they can watch the race.

[NaBUru38]

I like this 2-week rhythm. I'm starving for aother race, but it's not like I've forgotten Long Beach either.

[rwintle]

I'm just looking forward to actually being able to watch Alabama on TV for a change. Thank you Rogers Sportsnet (even though I hate Rogers in general).

[Yannick]

Is Oriol Servia going to be in the #16 Rahal Letterman Lanigan car for this race, too? I sure do hope so.

[NaBUru38]

Serviá is in.

[bjohnsonsmith]

RH-R tops first practice.

http://www.indycar.com/News/2014/04/...tice-at-Barber

[JacobP]

Finally a road course. One of my favorite races last year.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Final practice Hinchcliffe fastest.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/113653

[gomick]

33rd career pole for Power, that's getting upthere...

[NaBUru38]

Will Power's pole lap was 1'08.31.
Ryan Briscoe's lap for 20th was 1'09.27
That's ridiculously tight!

[bjohnsonsmith]

Barber IndyCar: Will Power beats James Hinchcliffe to pole

By Mark Glendenning Saturday, April 26th 2014, 20:14 GMT



Will Power edged out James Hinchcliffe to secure pole position for Sunday's IndyCar race at Barber. The Penske driver's 1m08.3120s came with his first flying lap, although Hinchcliffe's reply was only 0.02 seconds slower but rather than taking another swing, the Canadian returned to the pits, and Power's time proved to be beyond the reach of any of his other rivals.
Ryan Hunter-Reay, who led both of Friday's practice sessions, will start from third after falling 0.08s short of his team-mate's time, with Josef Newgarden - who was punted out of the Long Beach race by Hunter-Reay two weeks ago - completing the second row. Scott Dixon will start from fifth alongside Helio Castroneves, who squandered his flying lap with a wobble onto the grass. Among the upsets was Mike Conway stranding himself towards the back of the field after flat-spotting a tyre on his flying lap during the first segment. It was also a tough afternoon for the non-Dixon Ganassis, as all three were eliminated before the final round, while KV Racing's Sebastien Bourdais was docked his two fastest laps for interference during phase two.
Another architect of his own demise was Marco Andretti, who was eliminated during the second segment.
"That one was on me," he admitted. "The team gave me the car, and I almost crashed it in Turn 12. That cost us the time we needed [to progress]."

Pos Driver Team/Engine Time Gap
1. Will Power Penske/Chevy 1m08.3120s
2. James Hinchcliffe Andretti/Honda 1m08.3409s +0.0289s
3. Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti/Honda 1m08.4264s +0.1144s
4. Josef Newgarden Fisher/Honda 1m08.4702s +0.1582s
5. Scott Dixon Ganassi/Chevy 1m08.5151s +0.2031s
6. Helio Castroneves Penske/Chevy 1m08.6258s +0.3138s
7. Carlos Munoz Andretti/Honda 1m08.6388s Round 2
8. Juan Pablo Montoya Penske/Chevy 1m08.6453s Round 2
9. Marco Andretti Andretti/Honda 1m08.6634s Round 2
10. Simon Pagenaud Schmidt/Honda 1m08.8682s Round 2
11. Mikhail Aleshin Schmidt/Honda 1m09.1708s Round 2
12. Sebastien Bourdais KV/Chevy --- Round 2*
13. Sebastian Saavedra KV/Chevy 1m08.9674s Group 1
14. Takuma Sato Foyt/Honda 1m09.1451s Group 2
15. Carlos Huertas Coyne/Honda 1m09.0267s Group 1
16. Justin Wilson Coyne/Honda 1m09.2018s Group 2
17. Charlie Kimball Ganassi/Chevy 1m09.1941s Group 1
18. Graham Rahal Rahal/Honda 1m09.2228s Group 2
19. Oriol Servia Rahal/Honda 1m09.2935s Group 1
20. Ryan Briscoe Ganassi/Chevy 1m09.2722s Group 2
21. Mike Conway Carpenter/Chevy 1m09.8580s Group 1
22. Jack Hawksworth Herta/Honda 1m09.4201s Group 2
23. Tony Kanaan Ganassi/Chevy 1m09.5829s Group 2

* Fastest laps removed for qualifying interference

TK last..

[BudLightJaguar]

Looks like a 'nice' weather.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Looks a tad wet, resulting in the race being delayed.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Nothing on the IndyCar website or from NBCSN to suggest when the race will start.

[PointDSM]

Looks like all the rain will be done in ~30 minutes.

Official start @ 4:15pm CST.

[bjohnsonsmith]

A rather tentative start. Sato's gone off and we have the 1st caution of the race.

[Louie Loper]

This shall be an interesting event

[bjohnsonsmith]

Fortunately a short 1st caution period.

[aki13]

Will Power is looking mighty.

He will hope it stays wet for a while.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Power off, then rejoins the race but loses the lead to RH-R.

[bjohnsonsmith]

2nd caution and they all pit. With Munoz losing it on his outlap, that's going keep the yellow out.

[Gingers4Justice]

Watching IndyCar live for the first time since...well...not sure I've ever been able to other than the Indy 500.

Looks really good in HD here in the UK. Going to stay up to the finish.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Castroneves penalised for going into the wrong pit and Montoya off, with what looks lika bit of help from Bourdais and the 3rd caution; Montoya back in the pits.