2024 Hy-Vee IndyCar Race Weekend @ Iowa

Good for Scottie. Always fun to see that dude win.

Championship race got more interesting tonight. The restarts in the final stint were exciting, but overall that was really disappointing. Newgarden would usually dominate here in the past but there would always be good multi-groove racing and lots of tire wear. Not sure how to get back to that in the interim until the track ages a bit. As much as I hate to say it, they might want to look at adding some downforce back and taking some power out along with it.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Good for Scottie. Always fun to see that dude win.

Championship race got more interesting tonight. The restarts in the final stint were exciting, but overall that was really disappointing. Newgarden would usually dominate here in the past but there would always be good multi-groove racing and lots of tire wear. Not sure how to get back to that in the interim until the track ages a bit. As much as I hate to say it, they might want to look at adding some downforce back and taking some power out along with it.
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I don’t know man, Ferucci was wheeling and dealing on the field
 
I'm going to be odd man out and say I enjoyed it. We've seen a lot worse, but at least Santino provided enough excitement.
 
That was a hard race to watch. Too many commercials, too many wrecks, no flow. Happy with the outcome. Sure hope today is better. Has to be....I think.
 
Mispeedway15 said:
I don’t know man, Ferucci was wheeling and dealing on the field
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He is IndyCar's Mr. Excitement. This series was lacking something when he wasn't in the field. At least there's one driver who isn't afraid to make some moves and go for even the smallest of gaps.
Love him or hate him, he gives us something to talk about every weekend.
 
donthaveanickname said:
Just watched Race 1 and it was... not very good.
No passing possible except for restarts. And once again absolutely nothing going on for the first 80% of the race because fuel saving is king.
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Went from what’s historically been a 4- or even 5-stop tire-limited race to another 2-stop fuel race.

Maybe today will be different with much higher track temps but I’m not holding my breath.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Worst IndyCar race weekend I can remember. It was generationally bad.
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Race 1 kinda saves it for me. Far from good but better than Gateway 4 years ago.
They need to do something to these cars. It's not acceptable when a every track that has been repaved puts on ****** racing for at least three years.
They need some brutally soft tires that drop off five seconds after ten laps, anything to keep these races from being pure parades.

It's been 5 years since Roger took over the series and yet there hasn't been significant improvement, just lots and lots of standstill. No growth at all.
I'm with Michael Andretti. Roger should consider selling.
 
Race 2 was mostly boring but I was glad it was a clean race compared to the carnage in race 1 and then........ Sheesh! Glad they all seemed ok.
 
donthaveanickname said:
It's been 5 years since Roger took over the series and yet there hasn't been significant improvement, just lots and lots of standstill. No growth at all.
I'm with Michael Andretti. Roger should consider selling.
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I think it’s been more than enough time to start offering real judgments on the Penske ownership so far, and I agree that it’s been pretty lackluster especially compared to what the initial hopes were. I don’t think Michael is the only owner who feels that way either. It’s rumored that Greg Penske has some ideas that team owners have been in favor of, but Roger hasn’t been fond of himself. So they’re essentially in a holding pattern until Roger steps down and transfers executive decision-making responsibility.

I think it would be one thing if the rest of the motorsports world were still floundering, but you can look around the rest of the industry and see that a lot of major championships have bounced back from and even found significant growth since COVID. I think his stewardship of IMS has been great, and the facility improvements and ticket sales there have been great, but the series side is a whole different project.
 
FLRacingFan said:
I think it’s been more than enough time to start offering real judgments on the Penske ownership so far, and I agree that it’s been pretty lackluster especially compared to what the initial hopes were. I don’t think Michael is the only owner who feels that way either. It’s rumored that Greg Penske has some ideas that team owners have been in favor of, but Roger hasn’t been fond of himself. So they’re essentially in a holding pattern until Roger steps down and transfers executive decision-making responsibility.

I think it would be one thing if the rest of the motorsports world were still floundering, but you can look around the rest of the industry and see that a lot of major championships have bounced back from and even found significant growth since COVID. I think his stewardship of IMS has been great, and the facility improvements and ticket sales there have been great, but the series side is a whole different project.
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Really well said. It doesn't feel like there is much of a vision currently beyond the basics. The Fox TV deal presents a real growth opportunity due to the consistent network exposure and compacted schedule. They have to find ways to put on more compelling races. Hy-Vee and Iowa have worked wonders promoting and building regional interest. Maybe this stuff presents better in person than on TV, but I doubt they can sustain the event for another decade with the quality of racing seen this weekend.

None of this is me stating that I have any desire to see IndyCar cheapen the integrity of competition or God forbid the championship format to juice entertainment value. Please don't do it. I think they were on the right track when they were talking about 1000 HP and (relatively) lower grip and downforce. To me that would lead to more passing on even narrow ovals due to how important handling, setup, and skill become. It seems like that has faded due to a couple of well-received 500's with a higher downforce formula and the vast uncertainty about future powerplants and where they're going to come from.
 
My general thoughts on Indycar:

-The long term IRL fans aren't happy but they haven't been happy for a very, very long time. The IRL's business model failed.

-The long term CART fans aren't happy but they haven't been happy for an even longer period of time. CART's business model failed when separated from the Indy 500.

-1996 was 28 years ago. The split ended 16 years ago. There are a lot of fans who are newer to it who have no memories or opinions about the split.

-F1's popularity has led people I know who aren't racing fans or people I've seen online who are newer fans to think of Indycar as being "off brand F1". Knowing the history of each I understand why that's wrong, but crossing that bridge to tell the story of Indycar and how it influenced racing as a whole is something that isn't coming anytime soon. Even on YouTube there aren't really content creators mining that much.

-Indycar has a cash flow problem and has since the split occurred. NASCAR has managed to find itself stability and in fact record revenue thanks to the burgeoning nature of media rights, and Indycar lost it's popularity and became predominantly watched by old men (the worst demographic for advertisers) because of the split. That put Indycar way behind the 8 ball and led to the split series giving away races to TV networks. Trying to get paid lots of money today for them is just next to impossible.

-New cars won't fix anything. It never did before. It never will in the future.

-The racing has, in reality, been pretty decent week in and week out. There's some lousy races here and there, but the majority of the races are entertaining and competitive IMO. They're very affordable to go to as well, which encourages turnout for fans like me.

So, having said all that: Roger and I'm sure much of his team has realized all the same things I just typed. They have, by all accounts, increased the media rights value of Indycar. That's good and necessary to find growth for the series because they were getting about as much for the entire season as NASCAR was getting for a single weekend of racing. They now need to distribute that money to teams and encourage teams to reinvest in newer equipment and do whatever it takes to keep Honda engaged so you have two OEMs. Yes, a new car at some point will be necessary, but this car doesn't really resemble the DW12 and in fact it was entirely renamed after so many substantial changes were made. Heck, what we even talk about as a car is really just a tub the driver sits in. That's it. All the rest of it is bolted on.

I do think that Indycar needs to make a better case for itself with the public about what Indycar even is. Where did it come from, who are the legends, why does it matter, what influence has it had throughout history, why did guys like Unser and Foyt never go to F1, etc.? Right now that narrative is being written predominantly by neophytes who know f' all and Brits (let's just call them for what they are) who think that the BTCC is an equivalent level series to NASCAR. That's something Indycar should be able to do with a fair amount of ease. They shouldn't be relying on FloSports to be doing it for them with the documentaries that Flo's produced on the Bettenhausens and Foyt.
 
virtualbalboa said:
My general thoughts on Indycar:

-The long term IRL fans aren't happy but they haven't been happy for a very, very long time. The IRL's business model failed.

-The long term CART fans aren't happy but they haven't been happy for an even longer period of time. CART's business model failed when separated from the Indy 500.

-1996 was 28 years ago. The split ended 16 years ago. There are a lot of fans who are newer to it who have no memories or opinions about the split.

-F1's popularity has led people I know who aren't racing fans or people I've seen online who are newer fans to think of Indycar as being "off brand F1". Knowing the history of each I understand why that's wrong, but crossing that bridge to tell the story of Indycar and how it influenced racing as a whole is something that isn't coming anytime soon. Even on YouTube there aren't really content creators mining that much.

-Indycar has a cash flow problem and has since the split occurred. NASCAR has managed to find itself stability and in fact record revenue thanks to the burgeoning nature of media rights, and Indycar lost it's popularity and became predominantly watched by old men (the worst demographic for advertisers) because of the split. That put Indycar way behind the 8 ball and led to the split series giving away races to TV networks. Trying to get paid lots of money today for them is just next to impossible.

-New cars won't fix anything. It never did before. It never will in the future.

-The racing has, in reality, been pretty decent week in and week out. There's some lousy races here and there, but the majority of the races are entertaining and competitive IMO. They're very affordable to go to as well, which encourages turnout for fans like me.

So, having said all that: Roger and I'm sure much of his team has realized all the same things I just typed. They have, by all accounts, increased the media rights value of Indycar. That's good and necessary to find growth for the series because they were getting about as much for the entire season as NASCAR was getting for a single weekend of racing. They now need to distribute that money to teams and encourage teams to reinvest in newer equipment and do whatever it takes to keep Honda engaged so you have two OEMs. Yes, a new car at some point will be necessary, but this car doesn't really resemble the DW12 and in fact it was entirely renamed after so many substantial changes were made. Heck, what we even talk about as a car is really just a tub the driver sits in. That's it. All the rest of it is bolted on.

I do think that Indycar needs to make a better case for itself with the public about what Indycar even is. Where did it come from, who are the legends, why does it matter, what influence has it had throughout history, why did guys like Unser and Foyt never go to F1, etc.? Right now that narrative is being written predominantly by neophytes who know f' all and Brits (let's just call them for what they are) who think that the BTCC is an equivalent level series to NASCAR. That's something Indycar should be able to do with a fair amount of ease. They shouldn't be relying on FloSports to be doing it for them with the documentaries that Flo's produced on the Bettenhausens and Foyt.
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Well said.

If I may add a couple of my thoughts...

- there's been some pretty steady growth the past 5ish years in Indycar\. The mid/late 2010s had smaller fields and the 500 was not selling out save for the 100th running. These turn-arounds have been fantastic, IMO, especially getting back to full field of 26-28 cars and that there's been no threat of a short field for the 500.

- Indy NXT is one of the best turnaround stories in racing right now. From being on life support life support, to dead, to alive, to great, to thriving and now there's going to be a NXT TV deal. And all in the last 10 years, mind you.

-Indycar's biggest problem is that the racing you see at the 500 may as well be a different sport compared to what you see each week. Detroit being the week after the 500 is probably the worst place they could go to. The next race should be an oval to capitalize on any morsel of new fans that tune in after the 500.

-And of course relating to that, some intermediate ovals in the schedule would solve this problem. Indycar has shown they want nothing to do with that.

Indycar reminds me a lot of NASCAR in the mid 2010s. Lots of changes no one asked for, and the most pressing issues are completely ignored by the sanctioning body. No one (save for the team owners) wants guaranteed starting spots for the 500. No one wants more gimmicky street circuits so narrow a school bus couldn't navigate through. No one wants a closed-to-the-public race at a private club in the middle of the desert. No one wants a hybrid that is millions of $$$ and years behind that is just for show.
 
Speedbowl14 said:
Well said.

If I may add a couple of my thoughts...

- there's been some pretty steady growth the past 5ish years in Indycar\. The mid/late 2010s had smaller fields and the 500 was not selling out save for the 100th running. These turn-arounds have been fantastic, IMO, especially getting back to full field of 26-28 cars and that there's been no threat of a short field for the 500.

- Indy NXT is one of the best turnaround stories in racing right now. From being on life support life support, to dead, to alive, to great, to thriving and now there's going to be a NXT TV deal. And all in the last 10 years, mind you.

-Indycar's biggest problem is that the racing you see at the 500 may as well be a different sport compared to what you see each week. Detroit being the week after the 500 is probably the worst place they could go to. The next race should be an oval to capitalize on any morsel of new fans that tune in after the 500.

-And of course relating to that, some intermediate ovals in the schedule would solve this problem. Indycar has shown they want nothing to do with that.

Indycar reminds me a lot of NASCAR in the mid 2010s. Lots of changes no one asked for, and the most pressing issues are completely ignored by the sanctioning body. No one (save for the team owners) wants guaranteed starting spots for the 500. No one wants more gimmicky street circuits so narrow a school bus couldn't navigate through. No one wants a closed-to-the-public race at a private club in the middle of the desert. No one wants a hybrid that is millions of $$$ and years behind that is just for show.
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Yeah, I think people look at F1 and say "Wow, look at the growth!" and look at IMSA and say, "Wow, look at the growth!" and point at the fields and I get both. But Indycar is not either of those things and their business model is completely and totally different. Also, IMSA has improved the field sizes for sure - but the viewership isn't great. WEC is still trapped on Max and MotorTrendTV where maybe 5000 people in America watch the races that take place once every 7 weeks. Indycar meanwhile - Iowa and Milwaukee come back, 27 cars is your standard grid each week, NXT is getting upwards of 20 cars again, and TV ratings have actually been generally trending upwards for the last couple of years.

Indycar has had intermediate ovals after the 500 before and it changed nothing. No reason to believe that the issue is them not racing ovals so much as it is connecting Indycar's racing to wider audiences. You can argue that was the point of the IRL, but, well, how did it work? A bunch of years with test pattern ratings and full houses thanks to something akin to regulatory capture that the tracks were able to pull when Cup was red hot. When I see YouTube videos about American motorsports from foreigners, they talk about bootleggers and prohibition, but nothing about open wheel racing in this country in spite of us having by far the largest and arguably oldest open wheel circuit racing fandom in the world.

I'm not saying I don't want Indycar on ovals. I definitely do now. The cars are a lot safer (AEROSCREEN~!) and I have thoroughly enjoyed Indycar races at Texas Motor Speedway and Iowa in person in the Penske era. But I also understand that they are dealing with NASCAR, and NASCAR does not care at all about Indycar's health or growth. NASCAR won't even work with their own teams right now, leading Denny Hamlin to suggest that teams won't be running full seasons in 2025 without charters. That tells me a lot.
 
Mispeedway15 said:
What is it with American racing series and their hard oval tires?
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To start, the series ran the first half of the year with harder tires than designed for, because Firestone went into production last year with the hybrid debut targeted for the start of the season. When that got delayed, the tires were mismatched with a much lighter car than they were built for. They tested at Iowa again with a hard compound but had blistering issues, so what they brought last weekend was actually softer than first anticipated. Obviously it wasn’t nearly enough, but I think that was always going to be a challenge with only one test day at a new surface.

So over the past month or so the series has been to four different tracks which were repaved within the past two years, and two of which didn’t even have the right tires on. You can only hope that with more data and track aging that things will get better. But it’s a difficult task given all the variables thrown Firestone’s way. What they bring to Milwaukee and Nashville are going to be critically important for those events as well.
 
virtualbalboa said:
-New cars won't fix anything. It never did before. It never will in the future.
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I think they’re going to have to do this at some fairly soon, just because even the team owners notorious for balling on a budget have spoken about how they’re due for a new chassis. If Dale Coyne says he’s ready for a new car, that should be your green light.

They’ve Frankensteined so much off of and onto this car over the years that there has to be a better way to integrate everything with a complete ground-up redesign. It’s been a mightily successful base chassis for sure, but they’re due. Even the current hybrid solution was dictated by the constraints of the current chassis. And it has only gotten heavier and heavier with the aeroscreen and hybrid, so if you can find a way to safely put the next car on a diet it would be beneficial. A number of drivers have mentioned that they’re really approaching the limits of what they can handle without power steering.
 
IndyCar is legit my favorite American racing series. I just find every race so damn exciting that’s an easy product to watch on the eyes. You can see the speed and precision it takes to drive one of these cars. Saying that, I don’t think all is bad with the product and the sport, some enhancements sure. But if all was doom and gloom, they did just sign a network deal with Fox that will put all their races on network tv, which is more than we can say the last deal did for them. I think the biggest hurdle to growth is some of their fan base that still cling to 1986 like it was just yesterday. Every week I read Marshall Pruet’s mailbag on Racer.com and its old boomers moaning about reclaiming the glory of yesteryear while not even paying attention to the product of now. I mean we’re so close to having a Palou vs Ward title fight and they’re worried about bathrooms at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it’s zany I tell you.
 
FLRacingFan said:
I think they’re going to have to do this at some fairly soon, just because even the team owners notorious for balling on a budget have spoken about how they’re due for a new chassis. If Dale Coyne says he’s ready for a new car, that should be your green light.

They’ve Frankensteined so much off of and onto this car over the years that there has to be a better way to integrate everything with a complete ground-up redesign. It’s been a mightily successful base chassis for sure, but they’re due. Even the current hybrid solution was dictated by the constraints of the current chassis. And it has only gotten heavier and heavier with the aeroscreen and hybrid, so if you can find a way to safely put the next car on a diet it would be beneficial. A number of drivers have mentioned that they’re really approaching the limits of what they can handle without power steering.
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I don't want to suggest that new cars shouldn't happen. I'd love a new car. But at the same time, I gotta be honest: what series was "saved" or "elevated" by a new car spec? I can't think of a single one. There's a world of difference between very open rule books leading to Don Garlits or Colin Chapman putting engines in the back and performance shooting up and Indycar announcing the IR-27 as a deus ex machina that solves everyone's problems. Interestingly, that also then poses the reverse issue, which is that refusing to innovate has never led to growth. USAC is not better off today than it was in, say, 1998. I picked that year specifically because it was after they were no longer the sanctioning body for the IRL or the Indy 500 and yet still were (are are) strongly in a "Just Say No To Wings" stance. Has the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series ever really updated the chassis rule package since the 90s? Freak only got put out to pasture because it got crashed too hard and it was 13-14 years old at the time of it's retirement.
 
Jorge De Guzman said:
Every week I read Marshall Pruet’s mailbag on Racer.com and its old boomers moaning about reclaiming the glory of yesteryear while not even paying attention to the product of now. I mean we’re so close to having a Palou vs Ward title fight and they’re worried about bathrooms at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it’s zany I tell you.
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David Land made the point that in terms of hardcore Indycar fans, there just aren't that many. There's a million or so people who will tune in on network TV but people who are invested in modern Indycar are hard to find. The argument about that always becomes "Need 'muricans" except that's been tried and failed too because just putting American drivers in cars doesn't necessitate fan expansion and objectively did not expand the fanbase in the olden days of the split. If putting Americans in cars led to definite fan expansion, NASCAR wouldn't have adopted stage racing or a playoff or had to remove half the seats at their tracks. Also no one seems to know who these Americans would be or even if they want to race in Indycar. It's just more "We gotta go back to 1962!" stuff as though any series where cars cost millions of dollars and go 240mph can sustain themselves selling 9,000 tickets at the Springfield Mile.

You ever see or hear of that Star Trek episode where they see the evil/alternate versions of themselves with the mustaches? That whole discussion point is like a bizarro world version of trust fund marxists who want to eliminate the police, military, and cars but also get unfettered free access to the Steam games store.
 
Jorge De Guzman said:
IndyCar is legit my favorite American racing series. I just find every race so damn exciting that’s an easy product to watch on the eyes.
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Considering all the garbage we have to wade through on other forums, I find this to be a healthy attitude.

The entire internet is still feeling the effect of the split because a lot of people just can't let it go, and they pollute the entire discussion with negativity. Indycar fans trained either other to be negative and hateful, so I am very careful who I send a link to.

Having said that, this is a really good place full of good guys who would rather share the sport than fight about it.
 
FLRacingFan said:
He sure was special on restarts. I think beyond a few laps it was just nearly impossible to pass at speed.
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Since the hybrid isn't even overcoming it's own weight right now, all they really did in effect was just bolt 100lbs on a car that was already too heavy. If they are going to keep piling weight on it they probably need to just start over.
 
Doc Austin said:
Since the hybrid isn't even overcoming it's own weight right now, all they really did in effect was just bolt 100lbs on a car that was already too heavy. If they are going to keep piling weight on it they probably need to just start over.
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They need off-throttle/braking time and long straights for the hybrid to be of any use. The repave killed the off-throttle time at Iowa and they’re pretty much always turning there anyways, so it was essentially just ballast last weekend. My hope is that it’ll be of some impact at Gateway and Milwaukee, where those track characteristics are stronger.
 
virtualbalboa said:
I don't want to suggest that new cars shouldn't happen. I'd love a new car. But at the same time, I gotta be honest: what series was "saved" or "elevated" by a new car spec? I can't think of a single one. There's a world of difference between very open rule books leading to Don Garlits or Colin Chapman putting engines in the back and performance shooting up and Indycar announcing the IR-27 as a deus ex machina that solves everyone's problems. Interestingly, that also then poses the reverse issue, which is that refusing to innovate has never led to growth. USAC is not better off today than it was in, say, 1998. I picked that year specifically because it was after they were no longer the sanctioning body for the IRL or the Indy 500 and yet still were (are are) strongly in a "Just Say No To Wings" stance. Has the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series ever really updated the chassis rule package since the 90s? Freak only got put out to pasture because it got crashed too hard and it was 13-14 years old at the time of it's retirement.
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I think there are examples just now from sports car racing (LMH/LMDh) to F1 to NASCAR Cup, whether it be to (re)gain manufacturer interest in the sport, make participation more financially viable, or just to tighten the field and improve the racing.

There are certainly some series who are just fine running the same chassis for years and years, but the base DW12 is so long in the tooth that it’ll be well past time for a new car by the point in which it’s actually introduced. Whether it be for weight reduction, balance, freedom for different engine architectures, there should be ample opportunity to reimagine what an Indy car can be right now. And it’s very possible that, given what we know of the 2026 F1 regs so far, that IndyCar could be in a position to create the fastest formula cars on the planet.


Jorge De Guzman said:
IndyCar is legit my favorite American racing series. I just find every race so damn exciting that’s an easy product to watch on the eyes. You can see the speed and precision it takes to drive one of these cars. Saying that, I don’t think all is bad with the product and the sport, some enhancements sure. But if all was doom and gloom, they did just sign a network deal with Fox that will put all their races on network tv, which is more than we can say the last deal did for them. I think the biggest hurdle to growth is some of their fan base that still cling to 1986 like it was just yesterday. Every week I read Marshall Pruet’s mailbag on Racer.com and its old boomers moaning about reclaiming the glory of yesteryear while not even paying attention to the product of now. I mean we’re so close to having a Palou vs Ward title fight and they’re worried about bathrooms at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it’s zany I tell you.
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There are some repeat offenders in the Mailbag for sure - heck, even just the RACER comments seem to get a bit more absurd each week. I don’t think anything is ever really as bad or as good as the loudest voices want to say, but I think more people are simply acknowledging that there’s still a good bit of room for growth when the vibes in a lot of other forms of motorsport are trending upwards, and that it feels like Penske Entertainment has left something to be desired so far.
 
FLRacingFan said:
There are certainly some series who are just fine running the same chassis for years and years, but the base DW12 is so long in the tooth that it’ll be well past time for a new car by the point in which it’s actually introduced. Whether it be for weight reduction, balance, freedom for different engine architectures, there should be ample opportunity to reimagine what an Indy car can be right now. And it’s very possible that, given what we know of the 2026 F1 regs so far, that IndyCar could be in a position to create the fastest formula cars on the planet.
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This is, I think, fundamentally one of the major causes for why we don't have a new chassis yet. Indycar hasn't been able to determine with certainty what the powerplant should be moving forwards for their cars and their existing partners and to encourage other partners to join. Are we going to see a spec motor with open ECU and/or hybrid system? Are we going to see multiple potential formats with a BoP of some kind? Are we going to see them try to go junkyard formula with a car that can have LS crates thrown in? I have no idea and my sense is that Indycar may not entirely know either.
 
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