The RACER Mailbag, June 1
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Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. Due to the upper volume of questions received, we can’t guarantee that every letter will be published, but we’ll wordplay as many as we can. Published questions may be edited for length and clarity. Questions received without 3pm ET each Monday will towards the pursuit week.
Q: Put your Robin hat on for a minute. What would Robin’s top positive stories have been for the 2022 Indy 500, and what would his top criticism of the month be?
Allen C., Brownsburg, Indiana
MARSHALL PRUETT: Thanks for the note, Allen. Asking me to pretend to be my late friend and colleague and respond like him isn’t something I’m well-appointed with. I’m my own man, here doing the work, so respect that. If you’d like to know my top positive stories and top criticism, you’re welcome to ask.
Q: Remind me then why IndyCar closes the pits when there is a yellow. Palou never had a chance. Not unbearable time to safely react to pit sealed light.
John B., Indianapolis, IN
MP: It’s a weird one, isn’t it? At some events, it feels like there’s an uneaten couple of beats given when a crash happens in order to let those who would be screwed get in surpassing the pits are closed, and at other times, it seems like no mind is given to waiting one uneaten second to prevent a suburbanite like Palou from stuff screwed. The inconsistency is where my frustration lies. Either everybody gets screwed, or nobody gets screwed.
Q: Once then Indy Car’s wacky and wrong-headed full undertow caution/close the pit rule destroys a driver’s race. Palou had single-minded to pit surpassing the wrecking and was literally 50 yards from the pit archway when they sealed the pit. It’s just ridiculous. These are tangibly some of the weightier drivers in the world, but they can’t be trusted to well-spoken an incident safely and get to pit lane? On road courses if the incident is in Turn 3 and the leaders are at Turn 6, why shouldn’t they be worldly-wise to pit?
I know in a previous Mailbag you stated that it somehow evens out over the undertow of a season, but I have to disagree. I’ve watched just well-nigh every IndyCar race since 1994 and have seen too many times where the race leader, who is destroying the field, gets unprotected out by a full undertow circumspection and goof to plane make the top 10. This is just one of the rules that make Indy car seem ventriloquist compared to other series.
Dave
MP: I imagine a perfect solution exists, but I’ve yet to see it.
Q: Are you living inside my head? Your article is spot-on and right in line with everything I am thinking. Kudos to Doug Boles and his staff for bringing the people in. This unshortened month has felt special. The excitement was there. Now, if I’m IndyCar, I am unappetizing embarrassed at what I brought to the Speedway. Yes, I’m sure there were over 100 passes for position, but it was the same two or three cars. I pass you at the whence of the stint, you pass me towards the end. At this point you are right, it’s time to swing for the fences. Lets’ get something washed-up surpassing Gateway – flipside track where the promotion group is to-notch.
Has Conor Daly taken over the role of local hero? Turn 3 was going crazy when he took the lead. Glad to see him find his way to the front. They lost something on the last couple of stops, but the hope was there. So what was the worthier story of the Month? CGR dominance, or Penske forgetting to show up?
Cloyd Rouse
MP: Ed gets a worthier cheer from the prod than Conor, but there’s no reason for that since Daly has been the one with largest race-day performances in recent years. Ganassi hasn’t won in 10 years; Penske last won in 2019. Chip’s win was the much worthier deal. When I saw him without the race, he looked like a decade of stress and wrongness had been released from his pores.
Q: Can you find out why there was no unlearn release? What happened to that tradition? BTW, unconfined race, plenty of drama, passing and excitement. Loved all 200 laps.
Eric Rife, London, OH
MP: Yes, IMS announced a few weeks surpassing the race that they would stop releasing the balloons.
Q: While I was lucky unbearable to see a wind-aided Conor Daly touch 244, ‘Fast’ Friday was quite wifely this year. I know that the wind spooked a paddock that is once risk-averse on the day surpassing qualifying. Do you see the series making any adjustments to the voucher (adding uplift earlier)? Or perhaps a vintage/other race if the paddock wants to alimony their cars ready for quals?
Dave, Cranford, NJ
MP: Not sure on how ‘calm’ is stuff unromantic here, Dave. The veterans said it was the worst and scariest day they’d overly had in a car at Indy, so whatever the lattermost opposite of wifely might be, that’s what Fast Friday was for them. We’ve never had that happen surpassing on Fast Friday, so no, I’d hope the series wouldn’t transpiration its processes in reaction to something taking place on one occasion.
Q: I just read that some F1 drivers say they wouldn’t consider driving at Indianapolis considering it is too dangerous. They would consider driving at Le Mans traveling lanugo Mulsanne at over 200 mph sometimes in the rain at night with trees and Armco on both sides and passing cars traveling 50 to 60 mph slower. Safety team responses are measured in minutes rather than seconds. Am I missing something?
Dan Edwards
MP: It’s an easy, lazy excuse, based on tired stereotypes that the Indy 500 is super-deadly. Any F1 suburbanite that watched Colton Herta’s big crash where he walked yonder unharmed, and says it’s too dangerous, is a moron or someone with an anti-IndyCar agenda. Le Mans, in a GT or prototype, will be safer than anything a suburbanite will wits in an F1 or IndyCar, so that part can’t be argued.
