Random Thoughts on Thermal Club
Note from George: I thought I would share my thoughts on yesterday’s race and give a quick update on my wife Susan. She did not go home from the hospital as I had hoped, the day after Doug Boles and Josef Newgarden unveiled the ticket for this year’s Indianapolis 500. That even took place on Thursday, March 6. She was finally discharged the evening of Monday March 10 – almost five weeks after she went in.
Her first couple of days home were kind of rough, as she had no strength or energy. But by Thursday of that week, she found her stride and began a major upswing. She has now gone back to work, although I wanted her to give it another week just to be safe. One of her greatest joys in life is proving me wrong, but if that’s what it takes to get her back on her feet, I’m all for it. I am now even more hopeful that she will be ready for May.
Her health issues in 2025, are not why I chose to semi-retire from this site. But the timing worked out. Even if she returns to 100%, I still made the right decision to step back a little bit. I will not do race re-caps of every race like I used to, but I was in the mood to write one up after yesterday’s race – so I did. I’ll still pop up here from time to time, and will still be here every day in May. But I kind of like having my evenings and weekends back after sixteen years. Please keep checking back.
Last week I appeared on a motorsports podcast, The Green Flag, to share my insights on the upcoming IndyCar race at Thermal Club. I began my segment by saying “I can’t remember when I have looked forward to an IndyCar race, as little as I do for the race at Thermal this weekend”. I was expecting the others on the podcast to argue with me, but to my surprise they were all in agreement.
Now that the race is behind us, I don’t think I was too far off the mark.
Was yesterday’s race the worst race I’ve ever seen? No, but I saw nothing to make me want to mark my calendar for the next race at Thermal. The last fifteen laps or so saved it, when Alex Palou charged from third to second and then passed Pato O’Ward for the lead. That was an impressive bit of driving, even if it may have set the stage for a very boring championship season.
At this rate, the series may want to book the championship dinner at the famous Siebkens Resort in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin – because may clinch the championship at Road America by the end of June. For those that are humorly challenged, that is an intentional exaggeration – but it may not be that far-fetched.
Other than that and some good drives from the back of the field, it was a very forgettable race on Sunday – except for the fiasco power-failure that knocked the FOX broadcast off the air for about ten laps at the halfway point. While it wasn’t the fault of FOX, it seemed like a bitter irony that they showed yesterday’s NASCAR race from over at FS1. I think I would’ve preferred more commercials from Farmer Wants a Wife.
After such a strong showing for the FOX debut at St. Petersburg, I was afraid those new viewers who liked what they saw three weeks ago, would be disheartened tuning in to the Thermal race. I saw it as a blessing that they were going up against NASCAR and Round Two of the NCAA Tournament. I really hope no new viewers turned in, so they won’t think what we saw yesterday is typical for an IndyCar race. [some of you stop chuckling out there]
If there was a race to sacrifice the TV ratings to basketball and NASCAR, Thermal would be it. I would much rather the new fans see the crowds at Long Beach in three weeks, even though they will be going up against The Masters.
TV Coverage: I’m not going to dwell on the lost broadcast due to the power failure on site. I’m sure it was someone’s fault, but I don’t think the fault was with IndyCar or FOX. It was simply bad luck.
What I will discuss are some of the improvements FOX made over their debut three weeks ago, and what tweaks still need to be made. I had heard that the frightening looking cartoon pictures of the drivers had gone away. Some had. Mercifully, the scary cartoon of a sinister-looking Scott McLaughlin was replaced by a smiling photograph of the Kiwi. But other cartoon-like photos remained. Maybe it takes a while to re-do their inventory of driver profiles, but getting rid of some is a step in the right direction.
The timing and scoring graphics were better, but not perfect. Apparently, this is not all the problems of FOX. IndyCar made some changes with timing and scoring over the winter, and supposedly a lot of the problems stem from that. Whatever the case, the two entities need to work together to get these problems resolved.
I didn’t realize just how much info NBC had been getting to us through their graphics. I especially miss how a driver is doing to the sixth-place bubble during qualifying. I hope that is on FOX’s to-do list.
At St. Petersburg, Jack Harvey was a little stiff. By this weekend, he had loosened up tremendously. I saw a lot of negative comments about Harvey in the week that followed the season-opener, but I thought he was fine this past weekend. He seemed much more at-ease and he asked good questions in his interviews. I think he has a broadcasting career ahead of him, once he steps out of the cockpit for good.
I was glad Townsend Bell focused on the racing this past weekend. Last year, he was gushing over all of the multi-million dollar homes on the property and the people that owned them. It was almost a little creepy. This year, it was a relief to hear him talk racing instead of real estate.
Try as I might, I still have not warmed up to Will Buxton. His diction and emphasis on every word just Sounds. Like. He. Is. Trying. Too. Hard. He also needs to toughen up his vocabulary. When I was growing up, I was taught that there are two words a man should never use in conversation – delightful and lovely. Buxton used them both several times through the race weekend. I never heard AJ Foyt say that his driver made a lovely move.
Drive of the Day: Although Alex Palou was clinical in the final laps of the race to go from third to the lead and the win, It was Will Power that earned the coveted Drive of the Day. Power appeared to be in deep trouble by the end of Qualifying on Saturday. He lasted about three corners in the season-opener, and was in need of a bounce-back. He got caught up in the Team Penske qualifying disaster on Saturday, that saw Power qualify twenty-first. His teammates also qualified poorly, but Josef Newgarden was able to go from starting seventeenth to finishing thirteenth. Scott McLaughlin had a horrible weekend – starting twenty-fifth and finishing twenty-seventh.
It looked like Power would probably have a terrible day as well. But he found his stride and methodically moved through the field. He didn’t get lucky on a pit-stop and steal a few positions. He earned every position he got, moving from twenty-first to finishing sixth. Considering this is a contract year for the 44 year-old Australian, he will enter Long Beach on a roll, instead of being in desperation mode.
All in All: Yesterday’s race was actually better than I was expecting, which tells you how low my expectations were. Quite honestly, I hope this race doers not come back. I just don’t think it races well at all. It has served its purpose – being a date place-holder when Texas went away. But next season, the Grand Prix of Arlington (Texas) will be run on this date. That will be a good reason for Thermal to quietly go off of the schedule as it won’t be needed anymore.
George Phillips
Oilpressure 
March 24, 2025 at 6:16 am
Good to hear from you and your thoughts on Thermal. Also good to hear about Susan.Still not used to and missing your old pre semi retirement schedule. I had to work but watched the race when I could on my phone. I watched it again last night on a FS1 replay. Hopefully the race will disappear. I thought it would look better after a year. The novelty has disappeared. I tried as best I could to get excited for this race but I just kept loosing interest as the weekend went on. I don’t remember being this unenthused for a season and now we have to wait another 3 weeks for the next race. Will Power is my man this season mainly because he is old.
March 24, 2025 at 7:37 am
I watched the International Feed from St. Pete, and the graphics there had photos of all of the drivers rather than the illustrations. So it should be very simple to swap the entire field. Someone chose which drivers still have comic book drawings.
March 24, 2025 at 9:47 am
I must confess I found the hullabaloo over the cartoons of the drivers to be sillier than the cartoons themselves. Fox uses similar cartoons for other big sports properties like NASCAR and the NFL. Silly as they are, the fact that Fox took the time to produce the cartoons should tell Indycar fans that the network considers Indycar a “major league” property.
March 24, 2025 at 7:37 am
And, definitely glad to hear encouraging news about Susan!
March 24, 2025 at 8:21 am
Glad to hear that Susan is back home and things are getting back to normal.
As you mentioned, this was not the worst Indycar race, but they did seem to be trying to make it as “unmemorable” (if that’s even a word) as possible. Fox did seem to clean up a few things, but definitely are still missing the mark on others. What happened to Jamie Little? It was great seeing her at St. Pete…. or was that a dream…
Again, they forgot about the back half of the grid. Several of the series major players spent a lot of time back there, but if you didn’t watch for the few seconds the back half of the field was on the screen, they just didn’t exist.
I too miss the Green/Red part of the graphic during qualifications. It really adds to the viewing enjoyment. If this is not copyrighted by NBC, I would definitely add this in somehow….
On to Long Beach!
March 24, 2025 at 8:49 am
Yes, to a casual viewer it appeared that there were only two cars racing for the majority of the event. Way too, too many laps (seemingly like 70% or more) focused exclusively and entirely on the two front runners .
Were there other teams racers involved in the race?
March 24, 2025 at 9:07 am
“I especially miss how a driver is doing to the sixth-place bubble during qualifying. I hope that is on FOX’s to-do list.”
I’m glad you mentioned this. I brought it up after St. Pete, but didn’t really see anyone else talking about it so I thought maybe it was just me. I was hoping it would have been addressed by race 2. It wasn’t, and that really takes away from the qualifying viewing experience. I noticed another commenter mention it here today as well. We can’t be the only one’s noticing this. I really hope Fox fixes this.
Let’s hope IndyCar doesn’t return to Thermal. I know venues are limited in the early months, but this place is an ugly desert. Who cares about the mansions? I’d rather see them race in front of 100 people in Phoenix or Homestead than this. They will probably return though. Rich folks like being at rich places, and this place has the type of country club feel that I’m sure most IndyCar owners appeal to.
Good to hear Susan is improving!!!!!
March 24, 2025 at 9:40 am
Very glad to hear that Susan is doing much better. Continuing to pray for you all. Also glad to see a new post
La Jamais Contente – Belgian land speed record car or description of the Indycar fanbase? This race was pretty typical of an Indycar road race (certainly a caution-free one), and I would argue would likely have been plenty well-received had it taken place at Road America… or even Portland or the IMS Road Course. Certainly there was far more passing and wheel-to-wheel action than we saw at St. Petersburg (I saw a fair amount on TV even with Fox’s focus on the front-runners, the box score indicates even more), and frankly much more than I expected for a caution free road race at a rather long track.
I have my pet tracks that I would like to see Indycar race at rather than Thermal, but having races leave the schedule is pretty much never good in my opinion. I will not wish such on Thermal.
March 24, 2025 at 10:47 am
First of all, I’m glad to hear your update on Susan. I spoke to her on the phone for an hour last week and she made no mention of returning to work! She is a fighter, and it seems now that she is quietly making moves in order to prove everyone wrong. That’s wonderful.
I too, had low expectations for this race. My expectations lowered after Palou took the pole. I had the race planned out in my head…Palou would lead every lap, in a race with no yellows and no passing. Palou would win, leaving the rest of the field finishing fairly close to where they started. I was glad to be wrong about my predictions, but I wouldn’t call it a “good race.” It was a boring race, on a day where there was a lot of competition for tv viewership.
I have been very impressed with the amount of time, effort and money that Fox has put into marketing IndyCar. That’s right, I said “marketing.” It’s a foreign word for the IndyCar organization. I was fairly irritated by the sudden appearance of a NASCAR race on my tv, and I spent way too much time thinking it was caused by my dog sitting on the remote. We will probably never know who or what is to blame for the “signal loss.” However, it’s hard to justify being irritated by the signal loss of a race that I was barely paying attention to.
The cartoon images of the drivers. Hate them. Are they going away? No, I highly doubt it, because they are consistent with their graphics package for other sports they cover. I can’t speak to NASCAR, but “NFL on Fox” has been using the same cartoon images for two years. While I personally hate them, I do admire the consistency. (Consistency! Now there is another foreign word in the IndyCar organization).
Fox has some issues to figure out, but all in all, I think their coverage, and PROMOTION has been the best IndyCar has had in 15 years. IndyCar is finally getting some brand recognition here in the Midwest. (Promotion! Another foreign word)
-Practice and Qualifying on tv that I don’t have to stream? Can’t complain!
-MULTIPLE Super Bowl commercials promoting the drivers and the series? Wow!
Finally, I’m sorry to see you semi-retire, George. You are a great ambassador to the sport, and one of the first people I started following when I dove into the IndyCar social media scene in 2011. However, I’m happy for you that you have some more free time and less frustration with the organization.
March 25, 2025 at 9:08 pm
Unlike some other very vocal supporters, I agree with you George. The scenery is beautiful but everything else just doesn’t work for some reason. The track has fast parts, some slower sections, pit lane looks well laid out, I really want to like this race but I don’t. As much as I appreciate them getting a race on the schedule, Thermal just doesn’t excite me.