Harvest Grand Prix

[swift]

Doubleheader at the IMS road course. Piggybacking on Sunday's 8-hour sportscar race.


Hinchcliffe is back in an Andretti car
Helio is driving for McLaren :saywhat:
Bourdais is now driving for Foyt.



(it's 2020, nothing makes sense or matters anymore)

Race #1 live broadcast at Friday 3:30EST on the "usa network". :rolleyes:


Race #2 Saturday 2:30 on NBC. Will be tuning in for this one.

[TedN]

For my fellow Canucks, both races will be on the SN360 channel. Here is a great reference for all televised racing in Canada.

Link (http://www.prnmag.com/tv-listings)

[nissan gtp]

the first race was excellent, the second was so-so

[TedN]

I would like to see at least some rain at the season finale to see how the aero screen performs in the wet.

[datachicane]

I watched the rebroadcast of the last half of race #1 last night, which was a very, very big step for me. I haven't watched even a single lap of AOW since the 'merger'. I'm sure I'm not alone in having been left with a very bad taste in my mouth after that, but I figured that now that it's RP's show I should at least give him a chance.

Observations:


Is that PT and Bell in the booth? Geeze, they're really making it tough not to bury the hatchet with that fan service, regardless of what kind of job they actually do.
Man, those cars are extraordinarily ugly. Wow.
Bourdais in a Foyt car? Castroneves in a backmarker McLaren? Cats sleeping with dogs? I'm surprised at the number of familiar names after 13+ years.
25 cars on the grid? Not bad.
Man, those cars are ugly. Are they still spec cars?
That's a crappy leader board graphic- rather than a nifty graphic of a stylized car number, why not show the team name? Maybe that's just an old guy problem having been away for so long.
That's an ugly car, but it's nice to see that proper roll hoop poking through. Maybe it'll grow on me, maybe it's somehow salvageable, I dunno. Nah, don't think it's going to grow on me until that windscreen is tweaked.
A couple of OK passes, some nice sliding around, not bad racing. It's a shocker seeing the 45mph pit speed limit, especially just coming off rewatching a bunch of '80s CART seasons when there was no speed limit at all. It's incredibly slow, and the right thing to do.
What the heck was that with Ferrucci and Herta? Why the heck wasn't Ferrucci penalized for blocking after like the third move? Does that not happen anymore? That's some insanely stupid and dangerous stuff.
Not much discernible engine note, but that might be the broadcast.
Man, that's a lot of folks in the stands crowded closely together without a mask to be seen. Guess it's Indiana.
I really wish they weren't quite so ugly.


Conclusion- not nearly as bad as I might have thought. I'm on the fence as to whether I'll try to catch the next one or make it a regular thing. If it's possible to turn this thing around, and that's a big if, I have no doubt that RP is the one guy on the planet who could do it, but he's got his work cut out for him. As a potential fan, the car is probably my biggest barrier to embracing this, which is a long way from where I was a few years ago.

[nrc]

You forgot to mention how ugly the cars are. I mean, really ugly.

I still have a hard time seeing some of the people involved who screwed the whole thing up. Penske among them but I can almost tolerate that because I know the gomers hate him ten times more than I do.

Maybe when they bury the last crapwagon...

[nissan gtp]

I’m ok with the cars. Are they beauties? No, but for a hack job they are pretty good. I like the way they take some contact and not have too much damage. Some of our favorite cars from the past were as fragile as glass, and those front wings cut down tires a lot.

Halos and aeroscreens are here forever, like the hans device and seatbelts. Whenever a new chassis comes along, it should be better integrated. And hopefully, prettier, with a good bit more power.

[opinionated ow]

Observations:


Is that PT and Bell in the booth? Geeze, they're really making it tough not to bury the hatchet with that fan service, regardless of what kind of job they actually do.
Man, those cars are extraordinarily ugly. Wow.
Bourdais in a Foyt car? Castroneves in a backmarker McLaren? Cats sleeping with dogs? I'm surprised at the number of familiar names after 13+ years.
25 cars on the grid? Not bad.
Man, those cars are ugly. Are they still spec cars?
That's a crappy leader board graphic- rather than a nifty graphic of a stylized car number, why not show the team name? Maybe that's just an old guy problem having been away for so long.
That's an ugly car, but it's nice to see that proper roll hoop poking through. Maybe it'll grow on me, maybe it's somehow salvageable, I dunno. Nah, don't think it's going to grow on me until that windscreen is tweaked.
A couple of OK passes, some nice sliding around, not bad racing. It's a shocker seeing the 45mph pit speed limit, especially just coming off rewatching a bunch of '80s CART seasons when there was no speed limit at all. It's incredibly slow, and the right thing to do.
What the heck was that with Ferrucci and Herta? Why the heck wasn't Ferrucci penalized for blocking after like the third move? Does that not happen anymore? That's some insanely stupid and dangerous stuff.
Not much discernible engine note, but that might be the broadcast.
Man, that's a lot of folks in the stands crowded closely together without a mask to be seen. Guess it's Indiana.
I really wish they weren't quite so ugly.



Yep, it is Towsend Bell and Paul Tracy. They do a pretty good job although even they know what their tendencies are and they take the piss out of themselves regularly
They looked alright before they stuck the windscreen on them. Still not a pretty as an early 00s Lola
Bourdais' first race of the year and first time with Foyt. Vasser/Sullivan/Coyne didn't keep him for some reason at the end of the year. Castroneves was an injury fill in for Indy Lights champ Oliver Askew. No experience with the team and it showed as he was very uncompetitive.
Grid numbers have been surprisingly good-even with the Rona Recession. New entrants looking in too, and not the CCWS "new entrants" either
Still spec cars.
Graphics are neither here nor there for me. At least you know who is running where
New car will have the windscreen integrated so it should look a heap better
More than a couple of OK passes. That race was wild, and in a good way. Lots of action throughout the race. PT described it as the best indycar road race he'd ever seen. I'm not sure it beats Cleveland 1995 though
They do still give penalties. Kyle Novak has been pretty fair and consistent, I don't remember it particularly so maybe it wasn't that egregious. Ferucci is a bit of a hot head-like a young PT really.
Engines sound ok but they don't have anything on the 2.65L Turbo V8s. It's definitely a flatter note but the V6s sound a hell of a lot better than the F1 attempts at V6s do.


I've gotten back into it the last 3 or 4 years. I came back to it with no expectations and I've been pleasantly surprised. That car is a bugger of a thing to drive and when you get it right, you look amazing. If you don't get it right, you look pretty average. It's definitely racy in road course/short track mode. In speedway mode I like the racing because it's not Handford device nor is it IRL Pack Racing. Others apparently think differently

[Gopeddle]

The ugly cars look a whole lot better than the previous crap wagons, so that's a plus. Still, they ain't CART or Champ Car amazing.

I like PT and Townsend but I wish Leigh Diffey would shut the hell up. They all have a tendency to talk, talk, talk. Please, just let the racing happen. And I get very annoyed by the constant promoting like, "Rossi's in for a new set of Firestones and a fill-up of Speedway fuel", etc. The announcers sound too much like shills. I understand the need to keep the sponsors happy, but they're supposed to be covering the race, not advertising the for the sponsors.

The new young drivers like Newgarden, Rossi, Herta, O'Ward etc. are very good and Dixon seems to be just as fast as ever.

I wish the teams would settle on a consistent paint scheme for their cars. It's very hard to figure out who is driving what from race to race because they're spec cars so you can't distinguish the cars like you could when they ran Penskes, Lolas, Marchs etc. and the teams often change the sponsor colors. It may be a little thing, but when I tune in and find Rossi driving a pink car for instance it's just frustrating.

It's also annoying to see the winning driver pull into pit lane and be forced to sit in his car until he's struggled with removing all the hoses and communication equipment and taken off his helmet, put on a sponsor ball cap and only then is he allowed to jump out in a mock spontaneous show of excitement.

However, I do watch most races and find them mostly enjoyable. The new drivers are what really keep me coming back. They're very exciting. But the cars are ugly. (Did anyone mention that?)

[TravelGal]

The ugly cars look a whole lot better than the previous crap wagons, so that's a plus. Still, they ain't CART or Champ Car amazing.

I like PT and Townsend but I wish Leigh Diffey would shut the hell up. They all have a tendency to talk, talk, talk. Please, just let the racing happen. And I get very annoyed by the constant promoting like, "Rossi's in for a new set of Firestones and a fill-up of Speedway fuel", etc. The announcers sound too much like shills. I understand the need to keep the sponsors happy, but they're supposed to be covering the race, not advertising the for the sponsors.

The new young drivers like Newgarden, Rossi, Herta, O'Ward etc. are very good and Dixon seems to be just as fast as ever.

I wish the teams would settle on a consistent paint scheme for their cars. It's very hard to figure out who is driving what from race to race because they're spec cars so you can't distinguish the cars like you could when they ran Penskes, Lolas, Marchs etc. and the teams often change the sponsor colors. It may be a little thing, but when I tune in and find Rossi driving a pink car for instance it's just frustrating.

It's also annoying to see the winning driver pull into pit lane and be forced to sit in his car until he's struggled with removing all the hoses and communication equipment and taken off his helmet, put on a sponsor ball cap and only then is he allowed to jump out in a mock spontaneous show of excitement.

However, I do watch most races and find them mostly enjoyable. The new drivers are what really keep me coming back. They're very exciting. But the cars are ugly. (Did anyone mention that?)

:laugh::laugh: Pretty much all my sentiments, particularly about the paint schemes. I realize it all about the Benjamins (product mention, sponsor colors, etc) but it sure does get annoying. Like Gopeddle, I find most recent races enjoyable=I don't sleep through nearly as many as I used to.

[Rus'L]

It's also annoying to see the winning driver pull into pit lane and be forced to sit in his car until he's struggled with removing all the hoses and communication equipment and taken off his helmet, put on a sponsor ball cap and only then is he allowed to jump out in a mock spontaneous show of excitement.

They do this in IMSA also. Drives me crazy.

[opinionated ow]

They do this in IMSA also. Drives me crazy.

Seems to be in all American racing. It's genuinely the worst thing.