Welcome to Long Beach! A few days late but never ever too short, it’s everyones favorite blogger hack indycar article!! I’ll tell you what, I’ve really enjoyed the 2018 season so far. The cars are racing great and the competition has been hot. I have literally 0 complaints thus far save for maybe not enough anger, but then again it’s still quite early in the season.
Anyway, Let’s get this thing going. Starting the DVR on a Dan Gurney retrospective. I need to go back and check that whole thing out.
Not surprising, but Newgarden is always so well spoken.
Historic Long Beach footage in the intro. Very well done.
Hi to my family at home. Excellent command!!
Here we goooooo
Cars are almost touching 180 MPH heading into T1. Giving the engines a few more horses to let them to crack 190 would be perfect. I’m excited to see the speeds on the Indy road course.
First Ryan Butterball-Reay commercial. Turketarians.
James Hinchcliffe Honda commercial. Ok. That one isn’t too bad.
The headshots are sometimes quite ridiculous. It may be previous prejudice but Rahal’s looks particularly ridiculous.
Veech in the poo car again.
It always makes me laugh when people would make fun of indycar for ‘racing in parking lots’ when the last few corners of the most storied street course in North America runs through parking lots. har.
—GREEN—
Terrible start. But it always is at Long Beach.
Pagenaud into the wall. It’s been a pretty clean year for starts. I won’t hold this against the guys.
—YELLOW—
Pagenaud looks very broken. Short day for him and the replay looks like Rahal just dumped him. too bad.
PT postulates that we will see cars hitting the mid 180s in the tow with push-to-pass. Nice.
RHR looks to have a broken front wing.
Also I have no idea what lap it is.
And he’s in for a new nose.
5
—GREEN—
Clean restart. Let’s get this race going.
The Truth is leading. I expect him to layethe the smack today.
Drive through penalty for Rahal. Definitely a punishment that does not fit the crime.
7
Wickens with a nice move on Kanaan. I’m so excited to see Wickens. He has a huge year ahead of him. There are absolutely no expectations on him and he is just crushing everyone.
9
Marco is the biggest mover of the race. Impressive. I want him to succeed so so bad but he is the definition of someone being their own worst enemy.
10
Good on Graham for not complaining about the penalty. Just very matter of fact about the systemic lack of rear grip.
Insert Sato crashing because of rear grip joke.
11
Back to Rossi KILLING THE FIELD
14
First of the 3 stoppers. I always respect the 3 stop strategy. No fuel savings, just solid strong and fast driving. The way racing should be.
15
RHR completes the pass. This aerokit seems to be doing its job. We’ve already seen a fair amount of action today.
17
Of course as I say that we see Rossi having trouble getting around a lapped car. I’m not making any judgments yet. Except that the cars look cooool.
18
Yes. I am impressed. Sato was able to complete a clean pass. Something is working today.
20
I’ll give it to Carlin. They’re doing a hell of a job with the modest at best talent they have wheeling the cars for them. Give them a few years and a new driver and they’ll be right up front.
24
Helicopter shots always remind me to remind you to donate to my buy-a-yacht-to-sail-to-races fund. Please and thank you. Share information will be provided later.
25
Of course the race I finally choose Wickens for fantasy he is having engine issues. Thanks. Wow that sounds quite bad on the replay. It may be a long day for young Wickens.
AAAHHHH
As I write this he comes back into the pits. His day is over. Body work coming off. Not a great sign.
28
Nose cam is amazing. Thank you Bourdais and Honda.
29
The pit rotation happening right now is very intriguing.
31
Savage move by Dixon to get ahead of Power in the pits.
32
Resetting the race sees Rossi in front. Again. The race is clearly for 2nd. As always I’ll pull for Bourdais thank you very much.
36
Through the field. Hmm. I thought they discontinued this. I’m honestly surprised it’s making a comeback today as this has been a very interesting race! I won’t rate this as a bad race solely because of the appearance of through the field. I wonder if the network is compelled to do it because of sponsors and whatnot.
37
The black Fuzzies car looks hot.
43
—YELLOW—
Kaiser stopped in the T1 runoff. Ok ok, the car is growing on me. I’m enjoying the clean and bold colors of the livery.
Not that the race was bad, it wasn’t at all, but the yellow at Long Beach is always nice.
47
—GREEN—
Rossi is gone.
3 lapped cars ahead of P2 Dixon. Frustrating but I understand why they have the right to be there.
48
BOURDAIS WITH THE MOVE OF THE RACE!!
Who says you can’t pass at long beach?!
Let’s see if he can hunt down Rossi.
50
No. It looks like Bourdais has actually lost time to Rossi. It almost seems like Rossi can control the gap at will today.
Sato with the worst luck in the paddock having more issues in the pits.
51
NBCSN is really on the ball with showing the passes. Say what you will about commentary but they do a hell of a good job showing what happens during the race.
53
Action all day long. Echoing what I said earlier I could be tempted to say this has been a better race than St. Pete, but we know ABC does not do a good job and St. Pete was a much better race than we saw.
54
Bourdais must give the position back. Lame.
55
And he gets the position right back. Bourdais is the man. Booth notes that Bourdais has lost time. I see it at about 2 seconds. Heartbreaking. We need another yellow. It’s not that I think that anyone can outrace Rossi, it’s that a win at Long Beach must be a stressful undertaking and he has had a quiet race today.
58
Bourdais car looks like an angry bumble bee.
Watching Bourdais and Dixon battle is always a treat. It’s easy to forget these two guys are numbers 4 and 6 on the all time wins list. much respect.
59
King gets a well deserved shout out for an excellent day. Pigot hasn’t been great.
60
—YELLOW—
Clamen Demelo into the wall.
Bourdais, Dixon and a few others get caught out and still take a pit stop at probable penalty. what a race changer.
I’m noticing the ticker gives a lap count as well as a laps left count. I’ll take full credit for continual complaining about being forced to do math. Thank you. And you’re welcome.
63
Mike Hull is a smooth cat. We’ll see if he is vindicated.
65
King had to come in for a brake bleed. That is weird as hell man. I wonder what the whole story behind that is.
Kimball +15 on the day. Yea, That’ll shut me up.
66
—GREEN—
Drive through for Dixon. All is right in the world. Bad call from Mr. Hull.
Seems as though he is going to take as much time as he can until he takes his penalty.
67
Dixon take the drive through.
Picked Jones this week. Cha Ching. I’m shocked at how hard of a time Chilton had in Ganassi equipment.
70
Rahal inside of Andretti. Andretti isn’t having an awful day at all.
71
—YELLOW—
Bourdais around in the hairpin complete with ensuing pileup. Looks like King was the aggressor. Yikes man, weren’t we just throwing platitude on you? still a rookie…
I think I just heard Bell call Power ‘slick willy p-ball’ I’m not sure what to think of that.
I’m liking these late race shootouts. Power doesn’t have anything to lose, I’d love to see him go for it. Also, if P2 took out P1 we may see some of that good ol indycar passion from the drivers.
How is Zach Veach in P4?
75
—GREEN—
Rossi is untouchable.
Veach is like 47 pounds how has he been able to wrestle the car for as long as he has?!
77
RHR has quite a broken car. replay?
I see the debris flag.
78
Power is very very close. This needs to happen! I definitely used to root against Power, but his fall from grace has been humbling. Watching him rebuild has been exciting. It’s time for another win.
81
I don’t think Power can do this.
All the SPM cars look super hot. especially the Harvey car.
82
Theres so much action that the director can’t decide which camera to focus on.
83
Rossi has been clinical. There wasn’t a single person that could touch him today. He is definitely F1s loss.
85
—CHECKERS—
ROSSI!! THE TRUTH!!
Good to see that Andretti Autosport still has it. Ugh, say what you will but Rossi has the personality of a wet noodle.
Leave it to Power to always find a way to complain about something. Today it was push to pass. And for the record he is wrong. The current system is the only true and fair way to dole out p2p.
Babe is looking older this year. Maybe that will translate into better and better results. P3 in the point.
alright alright. This has been fun. Happy Sunday. Lets do this again in Barber!
Eric Hall
anotherindycarblog 