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IndyCar
INDYCAR: Long Beach Rewind
Marshall Pruett breaks down a wild weekend at Long Beach, looks at trap speeds, the Andretti/Rahal crash, the Franchitti/Newgarden clash and much more.
Will Power and Simon Pagenaud, former Champ Car teammates, served up two incredible but very different drives on the way to finishing 1-2 at Long Beach. (Photo: LAT)
Versa-Will-ity
I think it finally happened, and if it did, it spells trouble for the 25 other drivers in the IZOD IndyCar Series.
Race winner Will Power has repeatedly proven that he’s capable of dominating at a number of tracks, but the question mark—the weakness, for lack of a better term—surrounding the Aussie was whether he had the goods to deliver on an off day. With a big mountain to climb, did Power have the right mental composition to keep pushing until he made it to the top?
Through 2011, he was hit and miss in that category. But through the first three rounds of 2012, Power has been lights out, overcoming starting ninth at Barber and 11th at Long Beach to score wins and grab the championship lead.
As I’ve written a half-dozen times, the path to Power’s first IZOD IndyCar Series title will involve using Dario Franchitti’s proven formula of winning whenever possible and getting the most out of the bad days, and over the last two rounds, DJ Willy P has taken seemingly insurmountable odds and turned them in his favor.
Power’s Team Penske pit crew, which had become a liability at times over the past two seasons, is also performing at its peak, which has helped to remove any visible weaknesses from the No 12 car’s game.
We’ve yet to see Power get knocked around on the racetrack like he did last year, so I’m not quite ready to start the coronation ceremony, but if he handles contact with Franchitti or a punt from Castroneves better than he did in 2011, his rivals could be the ones with more questions than answers on how to halt Power’s championship march.
The French Connection
In the battle of storming drives among the different nations represented in the IndyCar Series, France is looking pretty good right now.
Sebastien Bourdais owned the drive of the race at St. Pete and again at Barber, and Simon Pagenaud took over for his friend and countryman at Long Beach with a stirring performance that ended in a second-place finish.
I asked Bourdais, who crashed after bottoming out at Turn 9, what he thought of Pagenaud stepping up to shine for Le Tricolor, and he surprised me with his answer.
“Simon did an amazing job, but I think the drive of the race went to Will,” he said. “How did he go 31 laps on a tank of fuel? How did he go that fast that long on that tank? I think that deserves as much recognition—more recognition. Don’t underestimate how hard that was. That was the drive at Long Beach.”
Responding to his former Champ Car nemesis, Power told me Bourdais’ post-race praise meant a lot.
“He said the same thing to me after the race, and I said I learned from the best,” he said. “I had to learn to save fuel in Champ Car to beat him because he was the master of going one or two laps longer than everybody else. I think it was at Toronto one year where [Justin] Wilson was leading, figuring he was saving fuel and Bourdais just sat right behind him the whole time. Wilson pitted and Bourdais went two laps longer… If I’d been able to push and not save fuel, we could have gone quicker, but we knew saving fuel was the key on Sunday.”
Saving fuel usually comes with a marked increase in lap times, but to Bourdais’ point and to Power’s credit, the Penske driver’s best lap of 1:09.8, set on Lap 44 of 85, wasn’t that far off of Pagenaud’s 1:09.5, set on Lap 64 while he was taking huge chunks of time out of Takuma Sato in second place.
No disrespect to Pagenaud, but if Power wasn’t stuck in an economy run just past the halfway point, there’s every reason to believe the Penske car would have crossed the finish line with a healthy margin to the man in P2.
New-Schooled
Like an adolescent lion playing with the big cats for the first time, rookie Josef Newgarden got a healthy smack upside the head from reigning series champion Dario Franchitti on Sunday.
Along with many others, I was thrilled to see Newgarden try to lead the opening lap of the race but, and this is the only part that really matters, he forgot some of the off-season lessons he learned while reviewing last year’s IndyCar races.
Looking back at the contact, did the Nashville native do anything wrong or grossly negligent? Not really. Did he deserve to end his race against the wall? Not at all.
Was I outraged when contact took place between Franchitti’s right front and Newgarden’s left rear? Not in the least.
For me, outrage is associated with surprise. For the very same reason most people don’t reach down to pet a stranger’s pit bull or walk down a dark and unfamiliar alley at night, trying to go around the outside of Franchitti on a street course should trigger the same kind of “I’d better think twice” response.
Call it the champion’s prerogative or just a hard-nosed approach to wheel-to-wheel competition, but Franchitti isn’t known for moving over and letting a pass happen easily. You won’t find an ounce of “After you, Jeeves,” in his driving. That point was proven at St. Pete and again at Toronto last year, which led to some heated exchanges between the Scot and Will Power.
If Newgarden thought politeness and accommodation existed at the front of the grid before Long Beach, he not only learned about the reality of the situation at Turn 1, but also how to conduct himself the next time he’s faced with a similar situation.
The only thing Newgarden appears to be lacking right now is experience, and earning it will continue to come from the mistakes and revelations he encounters each weekend.
He was nearly inconsolable after missing the Firestone Fast 6 at Long Beach, which is just the kind of reaction you’d want to see from a kid with so much potential. He wasn’t impressed with himself for qualifying seventh, or by overachieving at such an early stage of his rookie campaign.
His burning, self-critical reaction was the same I’ve seen in most rookies who’ve gone on to become series champions, and that, unlike knowing how to read what was always going to happen by going the long way around Turn 1, can’t be taught.
Powered By Chevy, Fueled By Insecurity
After being asked about his improbable 12th-to-first drive, Will Power gave the assembled media sitting in the post-race press conference a quick, 30-second glimpse into his psyche, and when he was done, the Aussie made it clear that his motivation comes from the belief that he’s constantly playing from behind.
Compared to those drivers who strap into their cars feeling flush with bravado and self-confidence, Power’s glass-half-empty approach, for whatever reason, seems to unlock his best performances.
“I go into every season thinking that there's no way I can win another race,” Power explained. “I don't know why I feel like that, but I do, and that's always my I guess I have an insecurity or something or I don't believe in myself enough. Yeah, that's always my feeling.”
Fascinating stuff.
I think it finally happened, and if it did, it spells trouble for the 25 other drivers in the IZOD IndyCar Series.
Race winner Will Power has repeatedly proven that he’s capable of dominating at a number of tracks, but the question mark—the weakness, for lack of a better term—surrounding the Aussie was whether he had the goods to deliver on an off day. With a big mountain to climb, did Power have the right mental composition to keep pushing until he made it to the top?
Through 2011, he was hit and miss in that category. But through the first three rounds of 2012, Power has been lights out, overcoming starting ninth at Barber and 11th at Long Beach to score wins and grab the championship lead.
As I’ve written a half-dozen times, the path to Power’s first IZOD IndyCar Series title will involve using Dario Franchitti’s proven formula of winning whenever possible and getting the most out of the bad days, and over the last two rounds, DJ Willy P has taken seemingly insurmountable odds and turned them in his favor.
Power’s Team Penske pit crew, which had become a liability at times over the past two seasons, is also performing at its peak, which has helped to remove any visible weaknesses from the No 12 car’s game.
We’ve yet to see Power get knocked around on the racetrack like he did last year, so I’m not quite ready to start the coronation ceremony, but if he handles contact with Franchitti or a punt from Castroneves better than he did in 2011, his rivals could be the ones with more questions than answers on how to halt Power’s championship march.
The French Connection
In the battle of storming drives among the different nations represented in the IndyCar Series, France is looking pretty good right now.
Sebastien Bourdais owned the drive of the race at St. Pete and again at Barber, and Simon Pagenaud took over for his friend and countryman at Long Beach with a stirring performance that ended in a second-place finish.
I asked Bourdais, who crashed after bottoming out at Turn 9, what he thought of Pagenaud stepping up to shine for Le Tricolor, and he surprised me with his answer.
“Simon did an amazing job, but I think the drive of the race went to Will,” he said. “How did he go 31 laps on a tank of fuel? How did he go that fast that long on that tank? I think that deserves as much recognition—more recognition. Don’t underestimate how hard that was. That was the drive at Long Beach.”
Responding to his former Champ Car nemesis, Power told me Bourdais’ post-race praise meant a lot.
“He said the same thing to me after the race, and I said I learned from the best,” he said. “I had to learn to save fuel in Champ Car to beat him because he was the master of going one or two laps longer than everybody else. I think it was at Toronto one year where [Justin] Wilson was leading, figuring he was saving fuel and Bourdais just sat right behind him the whole time. Wilson pitted and Bourdais went two laps longer… If I’d been able to push and not save fuel, we could have gone quicker, but we knew saving fuel was the key on Sunday.”
Saving fuel usually comes with a marked increase in lap times, but to Bourdais’ point and to Power’s credit, the Penske driver’s best lap of 1:09.8, set on Lap 44 of 85, wasn’t that far off of Pagenaud’s 1:09.5, set on Lap 64 while he was taking huge chunks of time out of Takuma Sato in second place.
No disrespect to Pagenaud, but if Power wasn’t stuck in an economy run just past the halfway point, there’s every reason to believe the Penske car would have crossed the finish line with a healthy margin to the man in P2.
New-Schooled
Like an adolescent lion playing with the big cats for the first time, rookie Josef Newgarden got a healthy smack upside the head from reigning series champion Dario Franchitti on Sunday.
Along with many others, I was thrilled to see Newgarden try to lead the opening lap of the race but, and this is the only part that really matters, he forgot some of the off-season lessons he learned while reviewing last year’s IndyCar races.
Looking back at the contact, did the Nashville native do anything wrong or grossly negligent? Not really. Did he deserve to end his race against the wall? Not at all.
Was I outraged when contact took place between Franchitti’s right front and Newgarden’s left rear? Not in the least.
For me, outrage is associated with surprise. For the very same reason most people don’t reach down to pet a stranger’s pit bull or walk down a dark and unfamiliar alley at night, trying to go around the outside of Franchitti on a street course should trigger the same kind of “I’d better think twice” response.
Call it the champion’s prerogative or just a hard-nosed approach to wheel-to-wheel competition, but Franchitti isn’t known for moving over and letting a pass happen easily. You won’t find an ounce of “After you, Jeeves,” in his driving. That point was proven at St. Pete and again at Toronto last year, which led to some heated exchanges between the Scot and Will Power.
If Newgarden thought politeness and accommodation existed at the front of the grid before Long Beach, he not only learned about the reality of the situation at Turn 1, but also how to conduct himself the next time he’s faced with a similar situation.
The only thing Newgarden appears to be lacking right now is experience, and earning it will continue to come from the mistakes and revelations he encounters each weekend.
He was nearly inconsolable after missing the Firestone Fast 6 at Long Beach, which is just the kind of reaction you’d want to see from a kid with so much potential. He wasn’t impressed with himself for qualifying seventh, or by overachieving at such an early stage of his rookie campaign.
His burning, self-critical reaction was the same I’ve seen in most rookies who’ve gone on to become series champions, and that, unlike knowing how to read what was always going to happen by going the long way around Turn 1, can’t be taught.
Powered By Chevy, Fueled By Insecurity
After being asked about his improbable 12th-to-first drive, Will Power gave the assembled media sitting in the post-race press conference a quick, 30-second glimpse into his psyche, and when he was done, the Aussie made it clear that his motivation comes from the belief that he’s constantly playing from behind.
Compared to those drivers who strap into their cars feeling flush with bravado and self-confidence, Power’s glass-half-empty approach, for whatever reason, seems to unlock his best performances.
“I go into every season thinking that there's no way I can win another race,” Power explained. “I don't know why I feel like that, but I do, and that's always my I guess I have an insecurity or something or I don't believe in myself enough. Yeah, that's always my feeling.”
Fascinating stuff.
INDYCAR BRAZIL
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