Round 10: Honda Indy Toronto. Exhibition Place, Toronto. July 14-16.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Round 10: Honda Indy Toronto. Exhibition Place, Toronto. July 14-16.

Originally the Molson Indy Toronto during the CART era, the Honda Indy Toronto is the second longest running street race on the calendar after Long Beach and is one of seven Canadian circuits to have held an IndyCar race, the others being: Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Mont-Tremblant, Sanair, Montreal, Vancouver and Edmonton.

History
In the spring of 1985, the in-house promotional division of Molson Breweries, Molstar Sports & Entertainment, proposed the running of a CART race at Exhibition Place in Toronto, as an alternative to the Candian F1 Grand Prix, which was sponsored by rival brewers Labatt's. The following year on July 20, 1986 the first Molson Indy Toronto was held and was won by Bobby Rahal, driving a March 86C-Ford Cosworth DFX for Truesports.

The race became a perennial on the CART calendar, however with the demise of CART, it morphed into a Champ Car World Series event, changing its name to the Molson Grand Prix of Toronto in 2006, after which Molson dropped its sponsorship of the event.

The Steelback Brewery signed a multi-year, multi-million-dollar deal to become the event’s title sponsor, renaming it the Steelback Grand Prix of Toronto, with the first race scheduled for 2007. This was to be the last race as a Champ Car World Series event at Toronto.

On February 22, 2008, the unification of the Champ Car World Series and the Indy Racing League was announced. However the race was cancelled for that year but returned in 2009, after Andretti-Green Racing, acting as the event organiser and promoter (later Green Savoree Racing Promotions), had purchased the assets of the former Steelback Grand Prix of Toronto, as well as signing a multi-year agreement with Honda Canada Inc.

Since then the event has remained on the IndyCar calendar, being traditionally held in mid-July, though in 2015 the race was moved to June, as it clashed with the Pan-American games also being held in mid-July. More recently it was cancelled in 2020 and 2021 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

After the cancellation of the 2020 race, a new three-year agreement was reached in September 2020, between Green Savoree Race Promotions, Exhibition Place and Penske Entertainment to host the event through 2023. Currently Green Savoree Race Promotions and Penske Entertainment are close to formalizing a new agreement that will keep the Honda Indy Toronto on the calendar for years to come.

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Some Trivia:
The driver with the most wins: 7, Michael Andretti: 1989, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1995, 2000, 2001.

The team with the most wins: 8, Newman/Haas Racing: 1989, 1991, 1992, 1995, 2000, 2002, 2004.

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Track Layout
The original 1986 track length was changed from 1.784 miles (2.871 km) to 1.755 mile (2.824 km) in 1996, due to construction of The National Trade Centre building, which led to the pit straight being lengthened and last turn being altered.


In 2016, major changes were made to the track. The Pit Lane was moved to the North side of the track, starting at Turn 9 and extending back onto Princes' Boulevard past Turn 11. The hospitality suites were also moved to the North side and the Turn 11 grandstands are now on the south side of Pit Lane. However, the paddock remains in its original location, linked by a pedestrian bridge.


1986 original layout:



1996-2015 layout:



2016 to present layout:



Length:
1.786 Miles - 2.874 Km
Turns: 11

Lap record:
Gil de Ferran. July 17th, 1999. 57.143 seconds, 110.565 mph (177.937 km/h).
Walker Racing, Reynard 99i-Honda HRS V8t,
CART FedEx Championship Series.

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Last year's race:
https://www.indycar.com/news/2022/07/07-17-toronto-race

Pole:
Colton Herta,
Andretti Autosport w/ Curb-Agajanian
Dallara IR18-Honda HI22TT Indy V6

Winner:
Scott Dixon,
Chip Ganassi Racing,
Dallara IR18-Honda HI22TT Indy V6

Laps: 85
Distance: 151.81 miles (244.314 km)
Race Time: 1:38:45.3087
Average Speed: 92.234 Mph (162.383 Km/h)
Fastest Lap
David Malukas - Dale Coyne Racing w/ HMD Motorsports, Lap 15. 60.8307 sec, 105.697 Mph (170.103 Km/h)

Cautions: 4
Laps: 2 - 3, 45 - 48, 55 - 57, 69 - 65

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Practice and Qualifications

Practice 1
Friday, Jul 14.
3:00 PM - 4:15 PM ET

Practice 2
Saturday, Jul 15.
10:35 AM - 11:35 AM ET

Qualifications - Round 1 Group 1
Saturday, Jul 15.
2:50 PM - 3:00 PM ET

Qualifications - Round 1 Group 2
Saturday, Jul 15.
3:15 PM - 3:25 PM ET

Qualifications - Round 2
Saturday, Jul 15.
3:40 PM - 3:50 PM ET

Qualifications - Firestone Fast 6
Saturday, Jul 15
4:05 PM - 4:20 PM ET

Race
Sunday, Jul 16
1:45 PM - 3:45 PM ET

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TV Coverage:
Peacock, July 16. 13:30 PM ET, 17:30 PM UTC
Sky Sports F1, 6:30 PM BST

[joeb]

Looking forward to this, if for no other reasons than to see if Palou can keep his streak going, and see what Tom can do for MSR.

[joeb]

First practice has started, Blomqvist isn't last with 40 minutes to go.

[joeb]

Tom beat one driver there at the end, but looked like he enjoyed it in the post practice interview.

[broadrun96]

Not a great start for the Foyt folks down there in new guy territory. Have to figure Tom can get to around 20 by quali but we'll see how he did learning the track

[Adam43]

Need
https://twitter.com/alexanderdyck1/s...j6eBMuiRu0YfKw

[joeb]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Need
https://twitter.com/alexanderdyck1/s...j6eBMuiRu0YfKw

That is clutch! Makes sense it would keep your drink cold since Stingy has ice water in his veins

[mstets]

Practice 2 results. Rosenqvist the first to contact the wall hard enough to cause damage.

[broadrun96]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Need
https://twitter.com/alexanderdyck1/s...j6eBMuiRu0YfKw

Yeah, I need one of those

First video I've gotten if the weekend, Palou looks like Chase Elliott joined Indy from the quick shots.

And rain with 1:15 left in Group 1. And no rain on the radar image but rain in the camera. And it's pouring on a couple shots

And Palou out in Group 1, 8th at 1.6340. After group 1 and 2 run the rest of field by best time? Could help Group 1 guys be in front of the slowest

[broadrun96]

Looks like tools coming out to tweak setup of the Group 2 cars, guess they let em adjust all the way through.

And track hold for the rain, it's coming down pretty good

[broadrun96]

Fastest with 5 min to go is 1:15.591

Blomqvist was P6 for a while, dropped back with Grosjean and Armstrong knocking him back

[broadrun96]

Sadly he was at P5 and then dropped back to P10, last lap he blew through the tires at Alt-SF, drove them down the track and went right through them


Herta knocked out, drifting over the line and kissed the wall under the flagger, who didn't even flinch.

Also, only the fanciest rigs to carry the front wing back to pit lane

[mstets]

Surprising that Rosenqvist had to switch to a backup chassis. It didn't look like a very hard hit but the tub was evidently punctured. Group 2 results still under review.

[broadrun96]

Bonus pay to the SF flagger this week, barely flinched at all

[mstets]

None of the Andretti cars advance to the Fast Six after being among the quickest in practice.

[broadrun96]

McLaren throwing it down, Pato out on greens. Rest of field having to respond and come in so they'll lose at least 2 laps of heat to Pato

[broadrun96]

Pato took 3 seconds out of fastest, Scotty Mac spun her and only Will is close.

And now Scott should park it, double penalty coming

[broadrun96]

Lundgaard to the top, Power looked good but was first to cross and fell all the way to 6th.

Has to be penalty coming for Scotty, he spun in front of Lundgaard and then returned in the front of Ericsson as well. His times have to be dropped.

Track was drying but still 3ish seconds from dry G1 times


And he was penalized, yellow in front of Felix for the spin

Ok, radio says penalty but obviously not so rules mean nothing and the regs are all made up

[mstets]

Results under review. Seems Scotty Mac may be penalized but it looks like Lundgaard has his second pole.

[joeb]

Originally Posted by broadrun96

Lundgaard to the top, Power looked good but was first to cross and fell all the way to 6th.

Has to be penalty coming for Scotty, he spun in front of Lundgaard and then returned in the front of Ericsson as well. His times have to be dropped.

Track was drying but still 3ish seconds from dry G1 times


And he was penalized, yellow in front of Felix for the spin

Not a penalty on Scotty is crazy. I bet Erickson is going to have something to say about it.

I watched qualifying from airport trying to get a kid on a flight unaccompanied. Already more than an hour delayed...

[broadrun96]

Originally Posted by joeb

Not a penalty on Scotty is crazy. I bet Erickson is going to have something to say about it.

I watched qualifying from airport trying to get a kid on a flight unaccompanied. Already more than an hour delayed...

Nice, you have fun there. And I'm gonna guess the likely storms in the afternoon coming your way won't make delays any better

We're having fun here and throwing a few pop-up storms at JHammy this afternoon

[broadrun96]

So the claim from Indy is the penalty is your fastest 2 laps to that point, given he had only recorded one slow lap on rains no penalty for the spin. They made no mention of the cutting off of Ericsson and it appears those with credentials don't want to mention it either. Sounds like they missed that part and don't want to be shown up but that was a clear you're done park it blocking call, easy to make. And from what I can tell that's a lose your fastest lap at least but ok Indy

[bjohnsonsmith]

Qualifying Result

Christian Lungaard gets his second pole, in what were tricky conditions during a wet 2nd round, with drivers starting the Fast 6 on wet tyres and then switching to slicks on the fast drying track.

Alex Palou, looking for that 4peat will start 15th, his worst qualifying position this year.

That was a good showing from Chevrolet, with 4 cars in the Fast 6, but not good enough for pole.

[joeb]

Originally Posted by broadrun96

So the claim from Indy is the penalty is your fastest 2 laps to that point, given he had only recorded one slow lap on rains no penalty for the spin. They made no mention of the cutting off of Ericsson and it appears those with credentials don't want to mention it either. Sounds like they missed that part and don't want to be shown up but that was a clear you're done park it blocking call, easy to make. And from what I can tell that's a lose your fastest lap at least but ok Indy

This is exactly why drivers complain on the radio, so everyone can hear what they just saw. It sounds whiny at times, but it is playing the game.

[mstets]

Warmup results.