Even without the rain, rookie E.J. Viso's running time at Indy has been limited by availability of parts. (LAT photo)
Despite having one series, fresh storylines and deeper competition, there remains a serious shortage of sponsors in Gasoline Alley. But there’s something even more rare than money this month at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway: Backup cars and spare parts.
Because unification literally came out of the blue last February, chassis-maker Dallara and gearbox manufacturer Xtrac were basically bushwacked.
"To be honest, it caught us a bit off guard and we certainly didn’t anticipate selling any new cars this year," said Sam Garrett of Dallara. "As a matter of fact, we’d taken on other projects because we didn’t have much going on in the IRL.
"With GP2, Formula 3, Renault world series and a new prototype in Grand-Am, we had a full plate. So, it’s been a challenge to say the least."
As it stands going into the first weekend of qualifying, most of the transition teams from Champ Car are running a little scared, for lack of a better word.
A backup car for Graham Rahal and/or Justin Wilson is being assembled in the Newman/Haas/Lanigan shop in Chicago.
KV Racing received a couple of big shipments this week and there’s a chance it could have one backup car ready for either Will Power or Oriol Servia by mid-May.
Dale Coyne’s two-car effort for veteran Bruno Junqueira and rookie Mario Moraes has a third car almost built up.
HVM Racing is cobbling together a spare car for E.J. Viso, while Pacific Coast Motorsports just hopes Mario Dominguez stays out of trouble.
Eric Bachelart’s Conquest Racing was in the best shape of all the IRL newbies since he had four cars ready and it’s a good thing because rookie Jaime Camara badly damaged his primary wheels on Monday.
"If we’d have had a crash like Camara’s, we’d be in serious trouble," said Vince Kremer, team manager for Keith Wiggins’ HVM stable. "That’s why this rain the past two days has been a bit of a godsend because it’s given us a chance to work on our spare car.
"It hurts that E.J. isn’t getting to run, but I don’t think anybody wants to be at Indianapolis with only one car."
All the two-car transition teams have four tubs and the one-car efforts are supposed to have a pair of Dallaras. The catch is having enough parts to assemble all your cars.
"I think a lot of us have been waiting on aero stuff, mechanical parts, suspension pieces, small carbon stuff and that’s what has been keeping us from being able to assemble our third and fourth cars," said Mark Johnson, general manager at KV Racing.
"We were also waiting on wiring looms from Pi Research but we got a bunch of stuff this week so we’re looking better. Having a backup just increases your level of security. I’ve never been to a race track without a backup car so it’s kind of unnerving."
