2011 Indianapolis 500

It has been this way for a long time in many branches of motorsports.....

I don't blame AJ....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position.......Take the cash
I don't blame Michael....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position.......appease a sponsor
I don't blame Ryan.....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position........Drive in the Indy 500


I blame IndyCar for allowing a someone to buy their way into the race.

Remember that is is a series where one of the biggest issues among fans is the amount of ride-buyers and now a driver gets the opportunity to start their "greatest spectacle in racing" not based on talent or performance but on money.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chris R

It has been this way for a long time in many branches of motorsports.....

---

The Indianpolis 500, is/was supposed to be special, and I do not mean a K-Mart blue light special.

Decided yesterday to go the race ..

So my wife (who is also going) asked who was on pole, front row etc

I was giving her a grid rundown when I got go Bruno I explained what was going on with RHR etc

She said "'they can do that?!?!?"

I said yes etc


She said "'wouldn't that be like Kobe losing and then going to play for a team still in the playoffs!?!?!"

I didn't have answer besides .... Yes!

The reasons it was done may differ, but how is this any different from when Mario Andretti was in F1? Someone else would qualify the car and Mario would start the race from the back of the field. In this instance, you have a car qualified by Bruno and it's going to be raced by RHR.

Bruno handled this so well that it makes me wonder if there wasn't some sort of understanding with Foyt from the beginning. Possibly Foyt told him that if a driver and sponsor came to him at some point, that AJ would have to consider it as the car is not sponsored and, presumably, is funded by Foyt himself. Bruno didn't seem surprised by the turn of events.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by anthonyvop

I don't blame AJ....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position.......Take the cash
I don't blame Michael....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position.......appease a sponsor
I don't blame Ryan.....I would have done the same thing if i was in his position........Drive in the Indy 500


I blame IndyCar for allowing a someone to buy their way into the race.

Remember that is is a series where one of the biggest issues among fans is the amount of ride-buyers and now a driver gets the opportunity to start their "greatest spectacle in racing" not based on talent or performance but on money.

---

I agree except we need to blame USAC who put the rule in place 40 years ago. Now the ICS needs to dump the rule and fix it.

DBell...

Honest question because I don't know the answer...

Was there cars being bumped from the grid when Mario was starting from the back?

Because if their wasn't that would seem fundamentally different to me

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DBell

I don't think that the drivers setting up the car was a big factor in the Andretti's disappointing performance. Clearly they had a fundamental problem with the way they prepared the cars for Indy. Kanaan was singing the praises of RHR's setup abilities last year, so I doubt he's forgotten how to do that in a year. The "great setup meister" Kanaan with one of the best engineers managed to qualify in the bottom 3rd in terms of speed. I think this shows that the fast cars come to Indy fast and rarely does a car spend the month in the bottom of the field and find a magical setup or tweak that propels them to the front.

I feel for Bruno and hope he gets some good karma out of this, but I could see something like this coming after the end of qualifying. With one of the few real sponsors in IndyCar not being in the field, I felt that something would happen to get them in field. This race is probably the reason the signed up. It would be a disaster for the series to have them out of the race and maybe leave at the end of the year.

---

Mostly I would agree with you. But when TK praised RHR it was for his road course setups. Where I disagree is the input of the drivers if the basic initial setup was off. You would think at least one of the 4 regular drivers would have picked up the imbalance issues very early. The fact that a once a year driver like John not only found the problem, but his team fixed it (at least for qualifying) really makes you wonder how sharp the others are at setup or the ability just identify that something's wrong. Why did it take to Saturday night to learn that it was an imbalance problem? Weren't the teams working together?

A small team like Coyne or Conquest could be excused for showing up with a poor setup, but even they managed to isolate their handling issues and run quick enough - in Conquest's case with a driver in their first Indy Car race. Regardless of who is to blame, the whole AA team - drivers, engineers, and management - did a poor job, considering the resources they have.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DBell

The reasons it was done may differ, but how is this any different from when Mario Andretti was in F1? Someone else would qualify the car and Mario would start the race from the back of the field.

---

That was a long time ago and F1 banned it awhile ago. I could maybe accept a driver qualifying a car for another driver if it is announced ahead of the act. Like if Simona wasn't allowed to run because of her burns.

One has to wonder why do some teams even bother to risk qualifying. Just let someone else do it then buy the slot. I am sure there are some teams who would be open to it if was profitable.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by anthonyvop

That was a long time ago and F1 banned it awhile ago. I could maybe accept a driver qualifying a car for another driver if it is announced ahead of the act. Like if Simona wasn't allowed to run because of her burns.

One has to wonder why do some teams even bother to risk qualifying. Just let someone else do it then buy the slot. I am sure there are some teams who would be open to it if was profitable.

---

I wasn't talking about qualifying for an F1 race, but qualifying for Indy. I think there were at least 2 occasions when someone else qualified Mario's car at Indy. I know Wally Dallenbach substituted for Mario in 1981. I believe it happened a couple of years earlier when Mario drove for Penske, but I'm not sure on that one.