ForumsThe TavernIndycar Season 2012

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waluigi
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waluigi
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I'm gonna try this seeing as racing is at least somewhat popular here, as evidenced by the F1 2012 thread.
So anyway, the 2012 Indycar season is upon us, with the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, Florida tomorrow. This season sees new cars, new rules, and more competent race directors (they've already changed most rules that had "official's discretion" in them). Multiple engine packages return with Chevrolet and Lotus joining Honda in the series. With not much testing to them yet, anything could happen.
New drivers are coming in this year as well. 19 year Formula 1 vet. Rubens Barrichello has come over to drive for KV racing alongside Tony Kannan and E.J. Viso. He has struggled so far this weekend, but picked up in qualifying to get 14th. Former champ car driver Katherine Legge returns to open wheel racing driving for Dragon Racing. And former sports car driver for Peugeot, Simon Pagenaud, had a ride with Schmidt racing.
As for qualifying, Chevrolet engines dominated the day. The field will be lead by an all Penske front row with Will Power and Ryan Briscoe on top. Behind them are Andretti Racing teammates James Hinchcliffe and Ryan Hunter-Raey. 5th went to third Penske driver Helio Castroneves, and 6th to Pagenaud. The However, he recieves a 10 place penalty due to an engine change.
Ginassi racing was off the pace, with Scott Dixon in 7th, Dario Franchitti 10th, and Graham Rahal 11th. Lotus was completely off, with there best spot in 17th with Alex Tagliani.
The new car has proven itself to be fast through qualifying. The track record fell with Will Power surpassing his previous record by .3 seconds. How will it handle race trim. Tune in to find out!

http://images.thecarconnection.com/med/will-power--anne-proffit-photo_100386207_m.jpg

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waluigi
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waluigi
1,948 posts
Shepherd

I'll update this and see how it does.

Congratulations to Helio Castroneves for being the first winner in the new car. Today's race proved that Chevy is the class of the field, but Honda can compete, as proved by Dixon leading the most laps. Power was no where in site amazingly. 3rd and 4th went to Andretti Teammates Hunter-Raey and Hinchcliffe. Rounding out the top five; Ryan Briscoe
Back to Helio, his celebration was emotional. He stopped to climb the fence between turns 10 and 11, which had been renamed "Dan Wheldon Way" after Wheldon's passing.

This race was full of strategy due to three cautions. Only one crash, and that was from James Jakes. The final order:

1. (5) Helio Castroneves, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
2. (6) Scott Dixon, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
3. (3) Ryan Hunter-Reay, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
4. (4) James Hinchcliffe, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
5. (2) Ryan Briscoe, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
6. (16) Simon Pagenaud, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
7. (1) Will Power, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
8. (12) EJ Viso, Dallara-Chevrolet, 100, Running
9. (22) Charlie Kimball, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
10. (15) Justin Wilson, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
11. (19) Josef Newgarden, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
12. (10) Graham Rahal, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
13. (9) Dario Franchitti, Dallara-Honda, 100, Running
14. (7) Marco Andretti, Dallara-Chevrolet, 99, Running
15. (17) Alex Tagliani, Dallara Lotus, 99, Running
16. (23) Oriol Servia, Dallara Lotus, 99, Running
17. (13) Rubens Barrichello, Dallara-Chevrolet, 98, Running
18. (24) Ed Carpenter, Dallara-Chevrolet, 98, Running
19. (18) JR Hildebrand, Dallara-Chevrolet, 96, Mechanical
20. (11) Mike Conway, Dallara-Honda, 75, Mechanical
21. (26) Sebastien Bourdais, Dallara Lotus, 73, Mechanical
22. (14) Takuma Sato, Dallara-Honda, 73, Mechanical
23. (25) Katherine Legge, Dallara Lotus, 59, Mechanical
24. (21) Simona de Silvestro, Dallara Lotus, 22, Mechanical
25. (8) Tony Kanaan, Dallara-Chevrolet, 21, Mechanical
26. (20) James Jakes, Dallara-Honda, 19, Contact

( )= start position

MrDayCee
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MrDayCee
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I'll bump this back into action again as I'm having the possibility thrown at me to watch some re-runs of the races in Indycar! So I'll be participating in the thread, but I'll be a behind on the races for now I guess... I just saw Alabama and today (Sunday) is a re-run of Long Beach. Keep us updated waluigi! =)

MrDayCee
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MrDayCee
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I saw the recap of the Alabama Indy, but that was not that much fun for me... =/

And I just saw the recap of the legendary Long Beach Indy race and that they used to race F-1 here as well! Completely forgot about that! =)
A really nice race on a challenging track, with a killer hairpin-straight combination that can make or break you in the race! A lot of action and excitement this time around, yuz! =D

I have to state that Bourdais seems to have lost his superiority from a few years ago, where he was the man to beat in the Indy! He even made a stupid rookie mistake shovelling his car into the tyre wall this time!! LOL

Marco Andretti had a nice flyer there on the back of Rahal! But not as nice as Webber's in Spain though...

A nice finish with Will Power for the win and Pagenaud on his tail at the start-finish! Sato was pushed around by Hunter-Raey in the end, shattering a chance for a 3rd place finish, shame... And a pile-up with Barichello at the final lap, blocking the complete rest of the field! =0

Oh my... I hope the next race in Sao Paulo will be just as exciting!! Yeah! =)

And I hope you will pick it up again on keeping us up to date there waluigi! *hinthintnudgenudge*

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