WideOpenWheel

Love the Lines

I will link all of this hot mess together by the end of this article, I promise!
I tend to get a tad antsy this time of year as we all await the wheels turning at the Grand Prix of St. Pete.
I mean, it is one thing to endure a long, miserable winter with record snow depths that extend back to when they started keeping records.

Please End Winter [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fo4L-MEvcuM&feature=youtu.be ]

It is another to also endure the long off season, far away from my not so secret addiction: speed. Just mere weeks until things heat up and scheduled testing begins in earnest.
I thought I would take up some more blog space and opine on how one survives the off season. A good portion of my time is spent taking advantage of YouTube and the ability to review some highlights of the previous season. With lingering daylight and longer nights, I tend to get into the historical types of Indy Car videos. Recently, I came across both US and BBC produced copies of same year events and it is pretty interesting to see the different broadcast perspectives. If you have about 4 hours to kill and a good amount of tissue, I would suggest SKY Sports’ British broadcast of the 2012 Indy 500. A fabulous perspective awaits, but be warned; Dan Wheldon is highlighted in this broadcast and it will absolutely bring the [manly] tears.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Elt3GmA-P0

One of the early testing locations I look forward to is Sonoma because in the early spring the grounds are covered in green. I posted a similar video about this time last year and, again,the video for this year is presented by GoPro cameras. The cool thing about this yerar’s video is the placement of the camera. It never occurred to me to see the track from the perspective of Simon Pagenaud’s helmet. Now, I am usually familiar with ‘point of view’ shots and have grown accustomed to seeing racing portrayed from a camera hung off the car. The start of this video blows me away……and makes me chuckle as well. Look for a cameo appearance by none other than Davy Hamilton. Extra bonus points will be given.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmTOvnRfAJU

The bat mobile

All of this leads me back to 2009 and while on a drive to my daily cubicle death, I encountered a AM radio drive time talking head that was interviewing a lady about none other than the Indy Car series and motor sport. I forget her name, but I seem to recall that it was Race Girl or something like that. I was pretty impressed as she stated her case against Indy Car adopting the Delta wing as the next generation of race car platform. I kind of snickered when it was referred to as the penis mobile and yet that moniker remains to this day. Go figure! Especially since the Delta wing has evolved into a potential class within the sports car and endurance racing disciplines. All that and a qualified female piloting the current iteration of the Delta wing makes for pretty good humor when I look back to that radio show. The recent accomplishments of the concepts first envisioned by Ben Bolby are pretty impressive as is evidenced by this cool video summary of an ALMS race in 20123 from Road America. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FppLCAUbt74

All of which brings me back to where it all began. You see, from that radio show I was listening to in my car, stuck in traffic, bored and mad as hell, I ran across Monica Hilton. Interesting person, very gifted writer and tireless worker on behalf of the sport she loves. It was nice to see fresh attitudes and unfailing charm in action and she went on to toil for HVM racing in Public Relations. As things always do, they change in Indy Car on almost a weekly basis and people switch, change, move on…..

All of which brings me to this link about a new venture called Snake Pit Customs. Back when I had a hankering to start an Indy Car blog, I had a chance encounter with the rcae gIRL and used her writing style as a guideline. Not because I wanted to be just like her, but because of the tenor and tone of her sarcasm. In fact, I believe that the blogosphere of Indy Car is quite awash in the use of sarcasm. I tend to enjoy that quite a bit! But I digress…..

Fast forward to today, or at least January 21, 2014. The times have changed and Monica has moved on to a different slant on the world of PR.

http://monicahilton.wordpress.com/

So, now to tie all of this blog posting up into a nice and tidy little package. There are a few clues, but to the untrained eye it appears to be mere rambling. Well, look no further and consider these hidden points:

Winter will never end in Indianapolis
Somewhere the folks at IMS are planning a killer snake pit event for the 2014 Indy 500
Simon Pagenaud can drive a GoPro like nobody else
Monica Hilton has a great new adventure
Snake Pit Customs is born (http://snakepitcustoms.com/ )
The first client of record for Snake Pit Customs is…drum roll please:
Simon Pagenaud!

So, now that you are all informed and are armed with KILLER INSIDE PERSPECTIVE, start getting excited about the upcoming series kickoff event in my favorite part of the world, St. Pete! And we all look forward to what the speedway has planned for this year’s Snake Pit!

As always, thanks for stopping by and we will talk to you next time!
GFGorcePaul

KuBu at Indy 2013

I unashamedly follow Tony Dizinno, a writer for NBC Sports “Motor Sports Talk” as well as other outlets. This gent is a PROLIFIC producer of word count and not just for the sake of volume. He produces well written content across multiple racing platforms!

Something he recently had written caught my eye and actually left me with that tilted head, confused dog look. Imagine an Indy 500 that followed the “path” laid out by BCG or whatever moniker du jour is used today to describe the plan to move THE Hallowed Grounds forward. A page out of that playbook called for adding a star from another series to the entry list. The most recent tome on the topic from Tony can be found here:

http://motorsportstalk.nbcsports.com/2014/02/14/more-possible-suitors-for-a-kurt-busch-indy-500-run/

Now, to most commonly educated folks, that would mean add a NASCAR star to the entry list. Actually, the Indycar Series DOES try to cross pollinate from other so called open wheel series to complete the field of 33. I believe what the Consultant du Jour meant was a NASCAR star.

Enter Kurt Busch.

Such a fanfare of tweets were proffered by the plethora of pandering bloggers! Oh my…… Did you see that Kurt was in Indy last summer and actually passed his ROPE in ONE DAY they screamed in unison. While, in unison I mean they screamed this talking point in many different flavors but you get my drift.

In all fairness, Kurt handled himself quite well in a borrowed car that I am sure came with the caveat, bring her home….please. Bring her home…..UNBROKEN! He enjoyed the experience so much that he delayed his IND departure to complete all phases of ROPE. I am not the best judge of talent behind an Indy Car steering wheel, but I have seen enough of the lines these cars take entering turn one  to know who is puckering and who is seeing it all IN-S L O W-M O T I O N.

Enter ‘Dinger.

The Dinger Knows Indy

From a man totally disgraced by NASCAR for an indiscretion of their vaunted “actions detrimental to NASCAR” and violations of their substance abuse policy to a man on a holy terror mission of redemption, at one point in the race, AJ kicked everyone’s ass in the 2013 Indy 500. Who in the class recalls where Dinger finished in that race? Anybody?…Class….class…Buheler….

He finished 7th in a race with too many lead changes to count let alone keep up. I used to be able to score Indy 500 races in my head without a pylon and then came the lead changeapalooza of last year. Emotional win for T.K. to be sure but; who came in second, let alone seventh?

Enter Chevrolet (or as Uncle Bobby calls them, cheverlayzzz).

What is the common theme here? Well, if you followed Tony Dizinno, you would be well informed but if you just follow me, well then, you would not be so informed. The common thread and talking points are these:

-Chevy had 13 teams last year. They have 11 now and are looking to share the love some more
-KuBu is a Chevy man
-‘Dinger is a Chevy man

So, my premonition is not one, but possibly TWO tin top drivers doing the daily double. My supposition is that ‘Dinger is pretty capable, his team uses Chevrolet power and therefore my conclusion is:
(Fill in your best cross pollination wish here).

The link to thought provoking wordsmithy by Jerry Bobkowski can be found here:

http://motorsportstalk.nbcsports.com/2014/02/14/could-chevrolet-be-part-of-kurt-buschs-and-aj-allmendingers-indy-500-plans/

So now, while you chew on that thought a little while and pray for Spring to finally arrive in Indianapolis, contemplate what it would mean for a double double to take place. Does this put more butts in seats? I am gravitating towards a yes vote!

As always, thanks for stopping by to read and rest your feet a few. We will talk to you next time!

GForcePaul