Oilpressure

After being away for almost a decade, the NTT IndyCar Series returns to The Milwaukee Mile this weekend – for a double-header no less. The Hy-Vee Milwaukee 250s will consist of a (sort of) night race on Saturday, and a Sunday afternoon race to scratch your Labor Day weekend racing itch. The big question is; will this weekend resemble the twin processional races at Iowa last month, or will it be more like the very fascinating race at Gateway a couple of weeks ago? We will probably have an idea which way things will go, by the end of this afternoon’s Practice One.

Susan and I will be attending and covering the race weekend at The Mile. We actually drove up yesterday after an uneventful drive, and we plan to be at the track by mid-to-late morning. Our hotel is only three miles from the track.

When the series announced a return to Milwaukee, I circled it on our calendar. We have never been to a race at the historic one-mile oval, although we did stop by it back in 2017 – while on our way back home from a weekend at Road America. We found an open gate at the south end of the track and wandered in for a quick look.

2015 was the last year that IndyCar raced at Milwaukee. Sébastien Bourdais won that race in front of roughly 12,000 fans. Michael Andretti was the promoter and it was decided that the series would not return the next year. I had no idea then, that it would be nine years before Indy cars would race at The Mile again. After the announcement that Christian Rasmussen would drive instead of Ed Carpenter, and Katherine Legge will be racing the No. 51 for Dale Coyne; there are five drivers entered for this weekend’s races that have experience racing at Milwaukee – Josef Newgarden, Will Power, Graham Rahal, Katherine Legge and Scott Dixon. Power and Dixon have both won at The Mile. The other 22 drivers entered for this weekend, have never raced at Milwaukee.

The Milwaukee Mile has a storied past. It is even older than the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The track opened in 1903, six years before IMS held it’s first race and eight years before the Inaugural Indianapolis 500. From 1947 until 1982, Milwaukee normally hosted two IndyCar races – the Rex Mays Classic in June, and the Tony Bettenhausen 200 in August. For decades, the June race was normally the race immediately following the Indianapolis 500.

With football season upon us, there is even an NFL tie to the Milwaukee Mile. The Green Bay Packers played several "home" games on the infield at The Mile. In fact, the 1939 NFL Championship Game between the Packers and the New York Giants was played at The Milwaukee Mile.

Jim Clark made history at Milwaukee in August 1963, when he put his Lotus in Victory Lane – becoming the first rear-engine car to win an IndyCar race. History was made there again in 1991, when three members of the Andretti family swept the Milwaukee podium. Michael Andretti won the race, cousin John Andretti finished second, and Mario Andretti came in third. Mario’s other son, Jeff, finished eleventh.

Perhaps the most historic event came in the August race of 1965. AJ Foyt’s Lotus had suffered a mechanical mishap and was not even at the track for qualifying. Foyt had come from running his dirt car at Springfield and still had the dirt car on the trailer. With his Lotus unavailable, Foyt unloaded his Meskowski/Offy upright dirt car and put it on the pole, besting the speeds of several low-slung rear-engine cars. (Photo: Russ Lake)

Foyt said “I felt like I was driving a Greyhound bus against a bunch of sports cars”. But Foyt was at a disadvantage with the fuel tank. The dirt car could go no more than 100 miles on a tank of fuel. Instead of a fuel hose, the car had to be filled using NASCAR style “dump cans”. Plus, he had to change his right rear tire. Still, even with the long delay of a pit stop – Foyt finished second in the race to Gordon Johncock. Almost sixty years later, fans still speak of that day with reverence.

After being in existence for over 120 years, you would expect there to be some tragedy at The Mile, and there has been. Jim Hurtubise suffered severe burns in a crash with Foyt and Rodger Ward at Milwaukee in 1964. The car of Hurtubise went airborne, hit the outside wall and burst into flames. Hurtubise sustained three broken ribs, a punctured lung and suffered third degree burns over 40% of his body. He was taken to a burn treatment center in San Antonio, where he underwent months of treatment and rehab. Muscles and tendons in his hands were burned away and his right pincky was amputated. He famously asked doctors to set his hands in a position, so that he could grasp a steering wheel. By the following March, Hurtubise drove in and won the USAC stock car race in Atlanta.

Unfortunately, there have been several fatalities at The Mile. Some of the better known drivers were Doc Mackenzie (19336), Ronnie Duman (1968) and Jim Hickman (1982).

Perhaps the most famous, or infamous, driver to be fatally injured at Milwaukee was Ed Elisian in 1959. Elisian was a controversial driver, who may be best known for causing the Turn Three crash on the opening lap of the 1958 Indianapolis 500 that took the life of popular driver Pat O’Connor. Elisian is a fascinating figure in racing, and I would like to know more about him. Unfortunately, there is not that much information out there on him. Rumor has it that he was so unpopular among his fellow drivers, that they all stood and watched without helping, as Elisian’s car sat burning near Turn One. I find that hard to believe, but I have heard that from more than one source.

For the most part, the racing has always been good at Milwaukee. Unfortunately, that no longer guarantees good crowds. Since the late 90s, the crowds have had trouble showing up. One problem is that the date and start time has been juggled since the 90s. As mentioned earlier, Milwaukee was the traditional next race after the Indianapolis 500 for decades. That changed in 1992, when Belle Isle took that spot and Milwaukee was pushed back to late June.

From 2004 through 2006, The Milwaukee Mile hosted Champ Car and IRL races generally less than two months apart. Neither race drew well in that time frame, and Champ Car dropped Milwaukee from their 2007 schedule, which ended up being their last year of existence. For 2007, Milwaukee moved back to the traditional next race after the 500 date, but that changed in 2011 when it moved to late June after not running at all in 2010.

From 2013 to 2015, the IndyCar dates for Milwaukee went from June to August to July. That was after not being held at all in 2010, and a late afternoon start time that had fans leaving the track near dark. By then fans didn’t know when or if to expect the next race and they showed their frustration by not showing up. Those that think that date equity is a non-issue should take a look at how Milwaukee was jerked around, and how fans reacted.

In my perfect world, The Milwaukee Mile would move back to being the race immediately following the Indianapolis 500. That was a date that worked for decades, but someone decided it needed to be changed. Change is Bad!

Since Detroit now seems to be entrenched in that slot, I guess the next best thing is to hold it on the same weekend every year. We already know that won’t happen next year, with Milwaukee moving back a week to Aug 24 and the season-finale at Nashville running on Labor Day weekend. At least Milwaukee will remain the next to the last race next season.

But what about this season? Will Power is now within striking distance (54 points) of Alex Palou, who has yet to win on an oval. You can say he’s still very good on them, but until he has that breakthrough win on an oval – that stat will still haunt him. I consider Colton Herta as being the only other driver still in realistic contention for the championship, and he is still 67 back. Many others are still technically alive, but too many things have to happen for them to even have a shot.

High-line Practice gets underway at 2:45 pm local time (CDT), with all cars running at 3:30 pm CDT. Since we are on-site this weekend, all times quoted here this weekend will be local times. Friday’s practice will be the only practice of the weekend. Qualifying will begin Saturday at 1:15 pm CDT, and the Race One broadcast will begin at 4:40 pm CDT, with the green flag flying at 5:05 pm CDT. Remember, Race One will be shown exclusively on Peacock. Sunday’s Race Two broadcast on USA will begin at 1:30 pm CDT, with the green flag flying at 2:00 pm CDT.

Who will win? Last week, I put the curse on Scott Dixon by picking him to win. He last half a lap. Some have suggested I pick Alex Palou, so that he will suffer some misfortune and tighten up the championship. Milwaukee is one of those tracks where experience matters. I think at least one winner will come from the group that has raced at Milwaukee before. I think this will be a weekend for Team Penske. I pick Will Power to win one of the races, while Josef Newgarden will win the other. I also predict that Alex Palou will encounter some problem, and the championship will tighten up significantly heading into Nashville.

It’s a shame that Susan and I had planned to post here throughout the weekend, similar to what we did in Iowa. Unfortunately, after we picked up our credentials yesterday, we went to go set up in the media center; only to find that there were no seats for us. For the first time ever after more than fifteen years, we have been shut out of an IndyCar media center. When asked where could I type out my posts, I was told I could post from my car. That was not the answer I was looking for, so most likely – there will be no posts from the track this weekend. It looks like my only posting from Milwaukee will be my Random Thoughts wrap-up for Monday. Had I known this was the case, we would not have burned vacation time and spent the money this is costing. To say I am not happy about this would be a gross understatement, especially when all of my contemporaries have media center seats. To be continued…

Update:  Thanks to all of you readers for commenting here and on social media. I just received a phone call from IndyCar telling us that they will make special arrangements to create a couple of seats for us. However this happened, I am very grateful to them for making these accommodations. I am also very grateful to the loyal readers expressing their frustration. We will now be posting throughout the weekend as we normally do. Thanks to everyone for making this happen.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on August 30, 2024 at 4:03 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.