Reading the IndyCar tea leaves as testing begins
After the longest racing offseason in memory, the Indy Racing League ended its winter hibernation this week with a two-day test on the Daytona International Speedway Road course. It's one of only two open tests before the IRL IndyCar season kicks off under the lights at Homestead-Miami Speedway on March 24, so the eight teams expected to participate needed to make the most of the track time.
More than four months have passed since the IndyCars turned a wheel, so the drivers are expected to be a little rusty. Then again, 10 of the 17 pilots who were set to take part in the IndyCar test just spent the past weekend polishing up their road-racing skills at DIS in the Rolex 24 Grand American sports car series race, so at least they knew which way the track goes.
The Dallara-made cars are mostly unchanged from a year ago -- in appearance at least. But the Daytona test will mark the first time that the full field uses 100 percent ethanol fuel, so drivers had to adjust to a slightly different power curve from their Honda engines.
It promised to be a busy (and noisy) couple of days. Here's what to watch for coming out of Daytona as the clock ticks toward the 2007 IndyCar season:
1. Can anyone get closer to the Penske and Ganassi teams this year?
Probably not, though IRL management certainly hopes so. In the final race of the 2006 season, the four Penske and Ganassi cars were so dominant they lapped the rest of the field. Those teams will not have been sitting still during the offseason, but they have far less progress to make with their chassis development programs than the rivals who are chasing them.
Still, with the best engineers and the best driver lineups in the series -- Helio Castroneves and defending IndyCar Series champion Sam Hornish Jr. at Penske, former IRL titlists Scott Dixon and Dan Wheldon at Ganassi -- there is no reason to think that one of those teams won't walk away with the hardware again.
Some observers believe that of the two super-teams, Ganassi has more room for improvement because it just switched to the Dallara chassis last year after many years using a Panoz/G-Force. The 2006 season was also Wheldon's first with the Ganassi team after three campaigns with Andretti Green Racing.
"I think we could have won the championship last year without the mistakes both sides of our team made," said 2003 IRL champ Dixon. "This coming year I'd be very disappointed at not winning a lot more races. The team has more of a focus on what we need to work on.
"That's just time to evolve the car, and so far it looks like we're picking up a ton of speed. "
2. What impact will Danica Patrick's move to AGR have?
Danica Patrick definitely can't make a bigger PR splash than she did over the last two years when she was with Rahal Letterman Racing, and she is the first to say that her move to Andretti Green Racing was intended to make her more competitive on the racetrack. After 32 IndyCar Series races, Patrick is still looking for her first podium finish, and she believes joining the team that dominated the series in 2004 and '05 is the best way to get to Victory Lane.
AGR's cars will probably be quicker than the ones engineered by RLR over the last couple of years, but that might not be enough to make a winner out of America's favorite female racer. She'll have to qualify better than she did in 2006, and she'll definitely need to raise her game on the opening lap of races, a time when she traditionally loses places.
Outsiders won't be able to assess the area where Danica will probably have the biggest impact: on AGR's legendary camaraderie and chemistry. That already looked to take a negative hit last year when team owner Michael Andretti's son Marco took over the departed Wheldon's seat, and AGR detractors gleefully predict an all-out meltdown before the 2007 season ends.
"All the babies are in one crib now," quipped one rival IndyCar Series driver who wisely asked to remain unnamed.
3. What's different about the cars?
The Dallara chassis looks the same and the Honda engine is still ear-piercingly loud. But there are some significant changes under the hood.
For starters, the Honda engine will now be powered by 100 percent ethanol, after the traditional methanol fuel was phased out over the last year. An ethanol-fueled engine produces less power, so the Honda engine has been stroked out to 3.5 liters to recoup the lost horsepower. However, ethanol also contributes to an increase in fuel mileage; as such, fuel cell capacity has been reduced from 30 to 22 gallons so races feature a similar number of pit stops.
The smaller fuel cell also means cars will suffer less of a balance shift as the fuel load goes down over the course of a long run. That could produce even closer racing than the IndyCar Series is already famous for.
"This is the first time in 40 years that a new fuel grade has been incorporated into open-wheel racing," IndyCar Series senior technical director Les Mactaggart said. "The results to date have been impressive. Backed by an experienced group of engineers and technicians, the transition has been flawless."
4. What is the significance of IndyCars testing at Daytona?
When Indianapolis Motor Speedway CEO Tony George invited NASCAR to test at his track in 1993, he had no idea that he released the first snowflake in what became an avalanche that transformed Indianapolis from the open-wheel racing capital of the world into a stock-car town. It's safe to say that this week's IndyCar test won't have the same effect on Daytona Beach.
IRL and Daytona officials stress that this isn't even a compatability test and there are no plans for a race in the future. The IRL says it was simply searching for a new warm-weather road course for testing.
That said, the lure of racing at Daytona certainly appeals to the drivers and teams.
"The bottom line is it's Daytona, so it's real exciting," said Panther Racing's Vitor Meira. "It's really, really cool to be at that track just knowing all the history that that place has."
Meira believes that testing at a track like Daytona has benefits, even if the series doesn't ever return there for a race.
"I think with a road course, no matter where you're at, you can always take advantage of it," he said. "I would say that Daytona is a little bit on the simple side of road courses. But it has two very hard-braking areas with real fast chicanes, and you can really get a lot of information from that."
5. What else is new in the IRL?
The IRL expected 17 cars to run at Daytona; Dreyer & Reinbold Racing named two drivers, 2004 Indy 500 champion Buddy Rice and Sarah Fisher. George's Vision Racing team is considering running a third car in 2007, and at Daytona, family friend A.J. Foyt IV will get a tryout.
The delayed announcement of Cahill Racing could come at Daytona; Larry Cahill plans to run two cars for Jeff Mitrisin, a sprint car veteran from Iowa, and female sports car racer Milka Duno, who co-drove the second-place Daytona Prototype at the Rolex 24.
John Oreovicz covers open-wheel racing for National Speed Sport News and ESPN.com.
