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The operative phrase for this weekend’s $1 Million Challenge at The Thermal Club near Palm Springs probably should be The Great Unknown. No one really knows what to expect, in what is essentially a made-for-TV event.

When this event was first announced several months ago, IndyCar officials were criticized. This was perceived as an exclusive event that only the very rich could afford to attend. Some claimed it was cronyism at its finest, as Roger Penske’s buddies would be the only ones in attendance.

While the original $2,000 ticket price sounded astronomical, I didn’t fault IndyCar for scheduling this event. Granted, having a non-points race after the season has already started seemed a little strange – but I understood the reasons behind it.

The NTT IndyCar Series needed a race for this weekend. It’s tough to follow complete date equity in the springtime. The Easter weekend jumps around, and the series wisely avoids scheduling anything over Easter. In the late 90s, CART scheduled a race in Rio over Easter weekend. They caught a barrage of flack for it. If memory serves me correctly, NASCAR ran the spring race at Bristol over an Easter weekend and they ran into similar pushback. It’s odd that the NCAA can host March Madness over Easter, and they never receive any pushback. We will likely not hear a word about the Elite Eight being played over Easter, next weekend either. I guess that’s one of life’s little mysteries.

If I think IndyCar is at fault, I tend to point it out. But I truly feel like losing the spring Texas date was not IndyCar’s fault. The rest of the schedule had already been set, when Texas evaporated at the last minute. It would not have been a good look to begin the season at St. Petersburg, then have a six-week gap to the next race at Long Beach. The series got creative and created an exhibition race at Thermal, where Spring Training had been held prior to the 2023 season, with mostly positive results.

With no permanent seating inside the gated community at The Thermal Club, and even less parking, a traditional event didn’t seem feasible. The idea was to create an event that paid a big purse, rather than points. I’ve been doing this site for almost fifteen years. This is the first non-points race that has occurred in that time.

Quick Trivia: What was the last IndyCar event that was planned as a pure exhibition? The Nikon Indy 300, held after the conclusion of the 2008 season at Surfers Paradise in Queensland Australia. It was won by Team Penske’s Ryan Briscoe.

While the last non-points race at Surfers was a traditional race, this weekend’s event will be far from traditional. The ins and outs are too detailed to go into it here, but what I like is the weekend schedule. Altogether, there will be about nine-hours of on-track practice time for the weekend. Friday will serve as two long test-sessions with all teams participating. Friday’s Session One gets underway at Noon EDT. It will run from Noon until 2:00 pm EDT and can be viewed live on Peacock. Session Two will start at 5:00 pm EDT and will run for three solid hours until 8:00 pm EDT, also on Peacock.

Saturday will offer two additional extended test sessions and a qualifying session. Session Three of the weekend starts Saturday at Noon EDT, and will run until 2:00 pm, just like the day before. Session Four on Saturday will begin at 4:00 pm EDT and will run to 6:00 pm EDT. Qualifying begins at 8:00 pm EDT Saturday evening. This is where things get different. There will be two groups, but they were determined by a draw that took place Thursday night. Qualifying will also feature Push-to-Pass, which I don’t believe has ever been done before.

Qualifying will determine the order for two heat races that will run on Sunday, beginning at 12:30 EDT on NBC. That will be a 9:30 am local start. The two heat races will determine the twelve-car field for the $1 Million Challenge, which will consist of two 10-lap sprints with a “halftime” in-between. Cars will be allowed to take on fuel during the break, but they cannot take tires. Fuel saving will not be a concern.

The winning driver will receive $500,000, the second-place driver pockets $350,000, third get $250,000, fourth earns $100,000 and fifth is awarded $50,000. All other cars will be paid $23,000 each for showing up.

Is it convoluted and hard to keep up with? It might be, or we may be able to know what’s going on all the time. With cash on the line, will drivers be willing to go all-out for the win, or is that amount enough to justify risking wadding up a car? That’s one of the great unknowns.

You might ask why it’s called the $1 Million Challenge if winning only pays half of that. Well, there were plans to pair residents of The Thermal Club (who would pay a fee to enter) with different drivers in the field. Those paired with the driver would receive the same amount of prize money as the driver. That never gained any traction and was scrapped. The $2,000 tickets? They were reduced to $500 a few weeks ago. The event justified sticking with the $1 Million branding, since the $1.756 Million purse far exceeds $1 Million. They claimed that it was the second largest IndyCar purse ever offered outside of the Indianapolis 500, until Racer.com’s Marshall Pruett pointed out that CART’s 1996 US 500 had a purse worth $3.5 Million. Oops!

Some have compared this event to the ill-fated 2011 season finale at Las Vegas. I don’t see how they compare at all. One was a more traditional race on a high-speed oval, while this will be on a 17-turn, 3.067-mile road course. The naysayers are calling this a gimmick. No, a gimmick is having three red-flags in the last ten laps of the Indianapolis 500 to try and guarantee a green-flag finish. This is a non-points race and serves as the perfect opportunity to try something new and do something completely different from how you would stage a traditional points-paying race.

Not only do I have no problem at all with this event and this format, I’m glad they are doing it. Granted, I’ll have to juggle some time to watch my Tennessee Vols in the NCAA Tournament – just as many people will trying to watch their favorite tea,. But not everyone is a basketball fan, and we also get to spend a lot of time watching race cars on track, with a completely new format.

Who do I predict will win? That’s a crap shoot. I don’t know if teams will simply treat this as a test session and try to preserve their equipment, or if anyone will truly stand on it and risk their cars for a cash payday for the whole team. That’s part of the great unknown. Just for kicks, I’m going to say Arrow McLaren’s Alexander Rossi will get his first win as a McLaren driver, but he will get no points from his win.

This event could be outstanding or it could be a total snoozer. That’s another one of the great unknowns. IndyCar gets criticized for never trying anything new. Well, they are trying something totally new and different this weekend, and guess what – they are getting criticized for it. This event came about out of necessity. Now that it’s here, let’s have some fun with it!

George Phillips

This entry was posted on March 22, 2024 at 4:04 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.