Let's Play Two!

Hello Internet!

Coming up later today, the Indy 500 recap blog (complete with a comparison of the old and new formulae; a theory about Honda's performance in the 500; and an admission of how terrible my predictions were). But, for now a look back at last year's attempt to race at Belle Isle and/or the world's longest Bondo commercial. To the spreadsheet!

Belle Isle 2012

Race Finish	Driver	Qualifying	Grid	Laps Led	Completed	A.R.S. (Old)
1	Dixon	1	1	60	60	100.00
2	Franchitti	17	14	0	60	75.00
3	Pagenaud	4	4	0	60	48.00
4	Power	2	2	0	60	40.00
5	Servia	19	16	0	60	67.00
6	Kanaan	15	18	0	60	61.00
7	Hunter-Reay	6	6	0	60	36.00
8	Kimball	20	20	0	60	60.00
9	Conway	14	15	0	60	45.00
10	Tagliani	3	3	0	60	18.00
11	Andretti	23	22	0	60	53.00
12	Carpenter	25	21	0	60	50.00
13	de Silvestro	22	25	0	60	47.00
14	Hildebrand	21	19	0	59	35.80
15	Newgarden	16	12	0	59	20.03
16	Briscoe	8	7	0	59	3.28
17	Castroneves	9	8	0	59	1.28
18	Viso	5	5	0	59	-9.57
19	Rahal	7	17	0	58	0.47
20	Sato	12	11	0	38	1.23
21	Hinchcliffe	13	13	0	38	-0.13
22	Wilson	11	10	0	28	-2.73
23	Jakes	24	23	0	26	6.43
24	Bourdais	10	9	0	24	-7.60
25	Barrichello	18	24	0	11	0.53

- All in all, not a lot to say about last year's race. The track fell apart, and we're lucky no one got seriously injured.

- Notable, however is that Dixon scored a 100.00 for leading every lap and winning from the pole. So, that's something you don't see every day.

- Again, just not a lot to be said, except to remark on how on a track where "you couldn't pass" half of the top 10 finishers started outside the first five rows, and only two drivers from the top 10 grid spots finished more than one lap down. So, maybe you could actually gain positions on the old track...

- I still think that the new one will be MUCH better.

Driver Shuffle

With all that about last year's race out of the way, I want to take a look at the driver changes that are coming up for the Dual in Detroit.

- Briscoe in for Hildebrand - If you have a Twitter account, follow anyone IndyCar related, and were breathing yesterday, you know about this. Panther Racing and JR Hildebrand agreed to terminate JR early, and Ryan Briscoe was brought in to drive the Number 4. Hildebrand has had one good race (Long Beach) and four awful ones this year. Briscoe has been in one race (the 500) and was quite good (you'll see how good later, when I post the 500 review). I thought it was a shame that Ryan Briscoe didn't have a ride this year. I'm sad to see JR out of the saddle, but to be honest the results haven't been there for a while... (Objective data sometimes makes me sad...)

- Conway in "for" Beatriz - I have the quotes because I think everyone assumed that the second car at Coyne would be a ride-share situation. I think Conway is a good pick here. He has good pace on the twisty courses, and performed well at Belle Isle last year (see above). I hope this isn't the last we see of Bia this year, as she had a very nice run at Indy. Memo to Dale Coyne: run three cars for the Triple Crown events. Put Bia in one of them. Odds are, you won't be disappointed.

- No one in for Seriva - This is a shame. An utter shame. By the way I measure things (RSWC points, mostly) here is a list of drivers, who were having worse years than Oriol Servia going into the 500 (it doesn't change much after the 500, by the way): Will Power, Dario Franchitti, Charlie "Quietly Having a Great Year" Kimball, Tristian "Rookie of the Year" Vautier, Sebastien Bourdais. The list goes on, but I hope you see my point. Oriol is out-performing a LOT of talented people this year. I hope he gets some seat time somewhere during the rest of the year.

Conclusion

That's all for now, the Indy 500 recap should go out this evening. Twitter predictions after I stare at qualifying results from the first race this weekend for a while. Doing two should be interesting. I reserve judgement on what kind of interesting until after I see it...

-- Guido