re: 2024 NTT Indycar Series Season Thread: Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix, 06/02, 11:00 AM

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He's mentoring Larson and getting him up to speed

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Cool!

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Kyle Larson seems to have an issue on his 4th qualifying lap... he doesn't get locked in but was third through 6 cars at 232.445 mph before something gave on 4th lap.

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his time got yanked in the tech shed. A wheel spacer was out of spec

ETA: Apologies it was iilot not larson

I think he’s still in 6th here’s his run (Larson)

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I feel like it’s not crazy to believe that Kyle Larson could win the Indy 500.

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also who thinks Nolan siegel is going to bump Rahal??

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Eh, the kid won’t be able to touch 230. Graham and Ericcson just need to focus on not putting it in the wall to make it. Legge isn’t that quick either, but she should be able to hit the 229s and beat the kid. I could see her crashing though

Saturday Notes

Saturday qualifying was filled with strategy, unexpected results, and dramatic moments.

Teams where all drivers qualified close to each other

Penske dominated with all three drivers finishing at the top of the chart P1, P2, P3.

McLaren had P4, P6, P10, and P15. It was not without drama however. I think Illot initially made the Fast 12 but his first attempt was disqualified for a minor technical violation. He ended up P15. O'Ward initially didn't make the Fast 12 but later in the day finally got to P10.

Ganassi had P14, P16, P18, P21, and P27. It's shocking that none of them made the Fast 12.

Teams where drivers had dramatically different results

Andretti had Kirkwood in the Fast 12 in P5, Herta just missed the Fast 12 at P13, Marco mid-field in P19, and new guy and recent Indy 500 winner Ericsson in P32 where he will have to qualify again on Sunday.

Rahal Letterman Lanigan had Sato in the Fast 12 at P9, but the other three drivers are all at the back just like last year, with Lundgaard and Fittipaldi on Row 10 at P28 and P30, and Graham Rahal at P33 and being sent to Sunday bump qualifying for the second year in the row.

Chevy plenum fires

Part of the drama stemmed from multiple Chevy drivers reporting a sudden, short loss of power, ruining several qualifying attempts, including Larson, Pato, Conor, Rasmussen, Carpenter and Canapino.

nbcsports.com/motor-sports/news/why-chevy-drivers-plenum-fires-events-indy-500-qualifying-how-problem-fixed-kyle-larson-pato-oward-agustin-canapino-christian-rasmussen

Takuma Sato

Last year Sato entered the Indy 500 with Chip Ganassi, replacing rookie Marcus Armstrong, who only did road/street courses his first year. All four Ganassi drivers made the Fast 12 and all four finished the race P7 or higher. Marcus Ericsson should have won the race except for a horrible decision by the officials to have a one-lap shootout to end the race after a late yellow flag that they turned into a red flag just so they could force a green flag finish. Last year was a complete disaster for Rahal Letterman Lanigan (RLL), with three of its four drivers stuck at the bottom and forced to do bump qualifying.

This year Sato joined RLL for the Indy 500. Sato made the Fast 12, but surprisingly the other three RLL drivers were still at the bottom. This is a strange result, as Graham pointed out in the press conference linked below. He kind of insinuated that Sato had a better engine than the other team members. This forced Honda to make a statement explaining that Honda doesn't choose who gets which engine. Each engine has a serial number, and IndyCar assigns the serial numbers to the cars. youtube.com/watch?v=Ax8tI-NbyXQ&t=1018s

Meanwhile, none of the Ganassi cars made it to the Fast 12 this year. Ganassi has three rookies (including Armstrong, who was held back last year), and Palou and Dixon, both of whom should have made the Fast 12. Maybe Ganassi should have hired Sato again this year for the Indy 500?

Not really a Larson fan on the cup side just strictly because I can't stand Team Hendrick but really pulling for him to do something special at Indy. That would be cool to see.

i think siegel pulls a kyle kaiser in 2019 and bumps graham out

nothing beats indy bump day

its crazy all the DTS fans in the f1 thread are oblivious to it

Legit CSB