TPF indi

After four straight busy weekends, including the Indianapolis 500 and a double-header at Detroit, the Verizon IndyCar Series returns to the high-speed, high-banks of Texas Motor Speedway. We also saw the series return to the pack-style racing that drew so much criticism in 2011. We parse through the Rainguard Water Sealers 600 and it’s nine finishers, and ponder what this means for the future of oval racing and the future Dale Coyne Racing who lost two more cars on Saturday night. It’s a right mess, but we will try to sort through the carnage.

The rain gods love IndyCar racing! In spite of forecasts of rain for both the Indianapolis 500 and Race to at Detroit’s Belle Isle, the fans and racers enjoyed ideal race conditions. Belle Isle is the only double-header on the IndyCar schedule and comes with it’s own special qualifying format. We review the qualifying drama and the brilliant career-best performance put in by Graham Rahal. Next up is the high-banks of the Texas Motor Speedway. It’s always an exciting race and a tense challenge for the drivers. Too much of a challenge for a rookie driver, in the eyes of IndyCar. No racing for you, Gutierrez!

Today, I have the great pleasure and honor to speak with ascendant Mazda Road to Indy driver, savvy businessman, and host of the “I Hate Racing Radio” podcast TJ Fischer. TJ last spoke with Formula1Blog.com in an interview with Todd “aka Negative Camber” McCandless as part of the FBC Downshift interview series while he was racing in Formula Renault in Europe back in 2015. Now he’s back stateside and driving for Team Pelfrey in the Mazda Road to Indy’s Pro Mazda series and has finished on the podium in every race so far in 2017.

TJ is doing more than just driving a car, though. He’s also putting his business acumen to work with his new not-for-profit organization Project O2, a project aimed at raising awareness of the struggles those with asthma face, and providing ways that people can best minimize the impact of asthma through fitness, nutrition, and proper health care.

The rain held off and we turned a full 200 laps for the 101st Running of the Indianapolis 500 Mile Race on the Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend. McLaren F1 driver Fernando Alonso stole the limelight most of the Month of May and Race Day was no exception, but other former Formula 1 drivers also had their moments including Alexander Rossi, Juan Pablo Montoya, Max Chilton, and of course Takuma Sato. Three of these drivers with Formula 1 experience were on a team owned and operated by former Formula 1 driver, Michael Andretti. Let that sink in for a moment.

We’ll dissect the race, discuss the potential fall-out of the Dixon-Howard incident and the Rookie of the Year controversy, and assess the championship points implications. We also take a look at this weekend’s Detroit Grand Prix. No rest for the weary.

After dodging the raindrops on Saturday, the Fast Nine for Pole Day was set. We look at who succeeded and who underperformed, and what the Honda engine failures during Sunday’s and Monday’s practice sessions mean for Race Day. Monday’s practice session was all about race setup, and although we hesitate to read too much into the times, Honda still seems to lead the charge. In spite of the strength of the Ed Carpenter Racing team’s qualifying performance, are we looking at a Honda-dominated race this Sunday? Lastly, we have Carburetion Day coming up and while that means final practice for the big cars, it also means the Indy Lights drivers will contest the Freedom 100. We make our picks and prognostications for both races coming up this weekend.

The Month of May has begun, and we review the INDYCAR Grand Prix without resorting to using the term “lockstep”. As of Monday of this week, practice has begun for the 101st running of the Indianapolis 500 Mile Race and while the first two days saw Chamber-of-Commerce weather, Wednesday brought fierce winds that eventually brought a halt to the day’s activities. We take a look at the quick and the struggling, and believe it or not, there’s more drivers out there than just Alonso!

Doug and John look at IndyCar's desire to capture the live streaming magic that surrounded Alonso's test, we look at how seriously we should be taking the rumors of fly-away races to Mexico and China, and we preview this weekend's Indianapolis GP that marks the official start of the Month of May.

The collective yawns at the start of this podcast are due to an early morning podcast here in the USA, and not because even thinking about Phoenix makes us yawn. Well not too much anyway…

Also this week, a certain wacky Spaniard completed his rookie orientation at IMS and Indycar conducted a test at Gateway.

Tom and John recap the IndyCar race from the lush green confines of the Barber Motorsports Park and preview the next race at the polar opposite of climate and track type, the 1-mile oval of the Phoenix International Raceway in the middle of the Arizona desert.

Tonight, we have one thing on our minds: Barber Motorsports Park! There’s a little bit of news, and a bit of a twitter storm, but mostly, we look forward to the first natural terrain road course of the 2017 Verizon IndyCar Series season.