And crowning Alex Palou as this year’s IndyCar
champion…
Having been on Holiday (again) during the
Portland and Milwaukee Double Header weekend’s, I only got to listen to the
Portland race via IndyCar Radio. Which was reminiscent of past Portland
Snoozer’s after a Hard day’s outing trackside drinking multiple "Adult" beverages
in the blazing sunshine Wayback’ in the Good ‘Ol CART Dazes! When Portland’s
racetrack still featured the West End Grandstands between Turns 5-7, which now
is RV Parking instead…
As will Power’s dominant performance Sunday was
also sleep inducing, albeit this time with Hang 10’ Hilo laying alongside Mwah
on the couch. As the highlight of the Portland weekend was the Great Santini’s
improveable maiden Indycar Pole position Saturday, before finishing a distant
eighth.
Thus, I didn’t listen to any of the Milwaukee
action until returning home and “watching”, Err listening to the various
Highlight packages via Youtube, which left much of the drama out of these six
minutes vignettes. Except for Kevin Lee’s nauseating, annoying totally FAKE excitement, nee Yelling!
While Yuhs already know that Pato O’Ward won
Saturday’s race, and ScottyMac’, aka Scott McLaughlin won Sunday’s race.
Yet largely overlooked was Conor Daly scoring
Junco Hollinger Racing’s (JHR) first ever podium when finishing third on
Saturday. Before gearbox issues saw Daly soldier to a 17th place finish Sunday.
Meanwhile, Santino Ferrucci dazzled us again
with two fourth place finishes at the Milwaukee Mile enroute to setting a
record for most passes! With Santino saying it’s been a Helluva year for the
No. 14, currently sitting comfortably in tenth place in the championship.
Leading 11th place Christian Lundgaard by 38-points; 339-301. And trailing
ninth place Alexander Rossi by only 11 “markers”. (350-339)
Yet I suppose everyone’s waiting for me to
comment upon the title fight and the misfortunes of both Championship leader
Alex Palou (525 points) and second place Will Power, (492 points) who trails
Palou by 33 markers. And with a maximun of 54 points on offer; mathematically
third place Scott McLaughlin is the only other title challenger, albeit a
longshot 50 points adrift. (475 points) Meaning the championship is Palou’s to
lose. Although interestingly, currently both Penske drivers have the first
tiebreaker advantage with three wins apiece vs. Palou’s two.
Reportedly Palou suffered an Hybrid induced
electrical failure upon the grid Sunday which then fried His battery! Leaving
the Spaniard stuck in fourth gear and not even able to communicate on the radio
to His crew. As the No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing crew had to discharge the Energy
Recovery system (ERS) in order to learn the battery was toast! Replace the
battery after draining the ERS again and then recharging it in order to get
Palou back on track 29-laps behind, before ultimately finishing P19.
Yet it was Will Power who shot Himself in the
foot once again by mashing the loud pedal on a late race restart and
pirouetting into the wall! Lightly damaging His front wing. Before two pitstops
– to ultimately decide to replace the front win caused Him to go a lap down,
dropping from sixth to 13th place, before finishing tenth. As just the drop
from sixth to tenth was a loss of eight points!
Points Scoring System
1st = 50, 2nd: 40, 3rd: 35, 4th: 32, 5th: 30,
6th: 28, 7th: 26, 8th: 24, 9th: 22 and 10th: 20.
Positions 11 thru 25 decrease by one point from
19 to five.
Bonus
Points
One point for Pole position. Two points for
Most laps led, and One point for leading a lap.
According to Raymond Hando of For the Love of
Indy, Palou wins the Championship no matter what, with a ninth place finish. For
which initially, I hadn’t done the math for. But Yes, Palou’s 33-points plus 22
= 55-points; one more than the maximum of 54.
One other interesting wrinkle to Sunday’s
season finale on the 1.33 mile Tri-oval. With IndyCar making it’s return to
this concrete Oval for the first time since 2008. Is the return of Alternate
compound Oval tyres. Which Arse-sumedly at least two laps have to be run on
both tyre compounds…
Being a longtime Will Power Fan, you’d think
I’d be pulling for Him this weekend. But I’d actually like to see Alex Palou
score His maiden Oval track win and get the “Monkey” off His back! Whilst I
expect Palou to do enough to secure His third IndyCar Championship in four
years and then celebrate with His traditional Fried Chicken Fricassee!
As until Milwaukee, think I read Racer’s
Marshall Pruett saying Palou had an average finishing position of 4.63! As His
lone copybook blemish this season was His self-induced accident during Iowa’s
first race, before bouncing back to fourth the following day. With His
Milwaukee finish of P19 solely due to mechanical woes…
As interestingly, Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott
Dixon and Alex Palou have both been victims of Hybrid powertrain issues this
year. So perhaps it’ll be Penske’s turn at Nashville?
Meanwhile, Conor Daly and David Malukas both
can say Job Done! Having hauled their respective JHR and Meyer Shank Racing
(MSR) Nos. 78 & 66 mounts comfortably into the vaunted Leaders Circle Prize
fund standings. For which I believe that the race for the 22nd and final
position is between Ed Carpenter Racing’s Christian Rasmussen and A.J. Foyt’s
Sting Ray Robb? With RLLR’s Pietro Fittipaldi also potentially in the mix…
Leaders Circle Points
Standings
According to the Indianapolis Star’s Motorsports Beat Reporter Nathan
Browne.
19. No. 78 Juncos
Hollinger Racing: 189 point
20. No. 66 Meyer
Shank Racing: 187 points
21. No. 30 Rahal
Letterman Lanigan Racing: 177 points
22. No. 41 A.J. foyt
enterprises: 175 points
23. No. 20 Ed Carpenter Racing: 174 points
With Dale Coyne
Racing’s Nos. 18 & 51 being outside the “Cut” line.
As I really cannot say what the Charter System
will do for us other than clarify the 25 IndyCar Fulltime entries eligible for
the 22 positions. Since right now, Ganassi’s Nos. 11-4 entries make this clear
as Mud on a Rainy day!
Although I’d also enjoy seeing Alexander Rossi
score His first win in quite some time for McLaren, whom He’s departing from
following this race, with Christian Lundgaard taking His seat next year. As who
knows where Rossi’s new IndyCar home will be in 2025?
As it’s been a whopping 778-days since Rossi
last won the Gallagher Grand Prix on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s
permanent road course for Andretti Autosport on July 30, 2022, Yikes!
And Ditto for Davey’ Malukas scoring His maiden
IndyCar win at Nashville. As I still don’t understand why He’s chosen to depart
to A.J. Foyt Enterprises next year. Where hopefully He’ll be paired with
Ferrucci. Which wisely, it sounds like Larry Foyt’s keen on making happen…
As I suppose I could ramble on ‘n on, but
instead. We’ll just have to wait another 48Hrs for the dust to settle and see
who’s victorious. Since after all, that’s why they run the races…
