Oilpressure

The NTT IndyCar Series makes its way to WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca this weekend. Since Laguna Seca made its way back on the IndyCar schedule in 2019 for the first time since 2004, it has served as the season finale. That was also the case throughout the 80s and early 90s, before Fontana replaced it as the season finale in 1997, when Laguna Seca became the penultimate race of the season. After that, Laguna started bouncing around the schedule, until it was moved to June for the 2002 season. After 2004, it was gone.

Is history is repeating itself? After serving as the season finale in September since 2019 (minus the 2020 season, when it was cancelled for COVID); Laguna Seca has been moved to June 23. Next year, it moves to July 27. I’m not sure what the reasoning is, but date equity was not a factor in the decision-making process.

Even though we have known since August that his year’s season finale has been moved to Nashville, it’s hard for me to get it out of my head that Laguna Seca will not be where we crown our next champion.

Most everyone will cite Alex Zanardi’s pass of Bryan Herta in The Corkscrew in 1996, as their most memorable moment from Laguna Seca. I would tend to agree, but I have others. I remember a young Paul Tracy in 1991, spinning his Mobil 1 sponsored Penske-Chevy to where his left-rear was off of the track, but could not touch the ground and his wheel was spinning helplessly. That was one day after Michael Andretti passed Rick Mears in the final turn in the old Marlboro Challenge, after a Mears hiccup.

It’s a challenging track without a lot of passing zones. Of course, The Corkscrew is one of the more famous turns, or set of turns, in all of motorsports.

This year’s race holds a lot more intrigue than last year’s race did. If you recall, the championship had already been clinched by Alex Palou the week before at Portland. Scott Dixon won the race at Laguna Seca, which was mostly for bragging rights.

This year, there is a lot more on the line. Alex Palou is not running away with the championship like he did last year. In fact, he is not even leading the championship. Palou trails Will Power by five points, while leading teammate Scott Dixon by six points. This championship battle is really shaping up to be a good one, between those three for now. Pato O’Ward trails Dixon by forty-one points, and Power by fifty-two. He has some catching up to do before he’s truly in the conversation.

But there is a lot of racing to go, and it starts this weekend at the eleven-turn, 2.238-mile track near Monterey, CA, about two hours south of San Francisco. The track is made more challenging due to the fact there is a three-hundred foot change in elevation from the highest to lowest points on the track.

I was never a fan of the IndyCar races that ran at Sonoma from 2005 to 2018. We actually attended the final race at Sonoma in 2018. As usual, we liked the track better once we got there and saw it in person, but I still think it was a boring track to watch a race on television.

Conversely, I’ve always liked the races at Laguna Seca, even though they offer about the same amount of passing as Sonoma. Maybe it’s The Corkscrew, maybe it’s the elevation changes, but I’ve always liked it better than Sonoma. I’ve never been to Laguna Seca in person, but I’ve heard Sonoma has a lot more amenities than Laguna Seca. That’s why you should always visit as many tracks in person as possible, in order to get a true feel for the track.

Please note – this week’s race is on USA Network, and not Big NBC. I’m not wild about the fact that this is going to be a late Sunday afternoon race – even in the Central Time Zone, where I live. Race coverage begins Sunday afternoon (evening?) at 6:00 pm EDT, and the green flag will be somewhere around 6:30 pm EDT. Be aware that the broadcast could start earlier (or later) depending on NASCAR programming beforehand. Of course, I’m being completely selfish about the start time. When writing up a recap to drop in early Monday morning, it makes for a late night for those of us that are unpaid media.

Practice follows a more traditional schedule (for a west coast race). Friday’s practice gets underway at 5:00 pm EDT, and will be shown live on Peacock. Practice Two will begin at 1:00 pm EDT on Saturday, with Qualifying set to start at 5:15 pm EDT – both on Peacock. The (morning?) warm-up will take place at 3:00 pm EDT, before the race broadcast begins at 6:00 pm EDT.

Once again, when I predict a winner – it usually means that driver will find the wall. I picked Will Power to win the Indianapolis 500, and he had a hard crash in that race. At Road America, I picked Alexander Rossi to win. He finished eighteenth, after starting ninth. Over the better part of sixteen seasons doing this, I would guess that I have picked the race winner less than ten times – probably closer to seven or eight. That’s an average of less than once every two years. I think I could spread drivers names across the floor and Maley (my yellow lab) would have a higher pick percentage than me.

So whose race will I curse this weekend? Well, the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree. Bryan Herta won this race twice, in 1998 and 1999. His son, Colton, won it twice in 2019 and 2021. This is the year that Colton breaks the tie with his father and gets his third win at Laguna Seca, also earning his first race win in over two years. We’ll see.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on June 21, 2024 at 4:02 am and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.