Curt and Kevin Talk Potential Schedule Conflicts, Silly Season, & Preview Milwaukee!

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
This is treck side with Kirk Cavin and Kevin Lee
on ninety three, five and one oh seven the fan
side by side, Ericson and new Guard come together and
both are in the wild. Championship may not be in
play for Poddle Award this year, but he's going to
join will Power as a three time winner in twenty

(00:24):
twenty four. War has won at the Milwaukee Mile. Oh
yeah man, and the championship leader has stopped on the
pace laps huge? What the development? Huge moment here?

Speaker 2 (00:38):
What is going on with the number ten of Alex plow.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
Stop gosh hard over on grooved, Joseph Newgart out from
pole position two days in a row are a start
that was wavedar unbelievable.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
And will Power is around are here grow He's made contact,
but he may not be out. He got some refired,
that's hun believable. He loves the history of motorsports. There's
not much more historical than the Milwaukee Mile. In the
IndyCar return stop with on it put his one again
on a book. Highlights courtesy of IndyCar and NBC Sports

(01:24):
from last year's twin two fifties at the Milwaukee Mile.
Bill Previews Sunday afternoon's solo edition on Fox, the one
hundred and sixteenth IndyCar race at the Milwaukee Mile. Next
year's NASCAR schedule is leaked. We'll discuss how it can
impact IndyCar and some other highlights, and offer some thoughts
on next year's IndyCar calendar and what it might look

(01:46):
like or could look like, and who might be driving
what car. We have one more answer confirm, plus your
questions and comments via Twitter and X. Hello and welcome,
Thanks for joining us trackside on ninety three to five
in Indianapolis. That's where Landon Coons is at downtown. Kevin Lee,
Kurt Cavin, and Kurt we start with this day in

(02:10):
history because I saw this come across the socials. It
is always worth noting what happened on this date in history,
A long, long, long time ago, one hundred.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
And sixteen years ago, a five mile race, two laps
and won by Louis Switzer. So as you think about
the Louis Switzer Award or you've heard of that, about
innovation and technology creations at the speedway during the month
of May, it's named for the first first race winner,

(02:42):
and you know it goes I say this a lot,
and I just still it mongles my mind to think
that that race, for example, was held and contested on
a circuit where at that time they ran fifty seven
miles per hour, and then the first Indy five hundred
you had to average seventy five miles over a quarter

(03:05):
mile distance, and that same layout, while the while the
surface has actually changed, that same layout still works for
cars that are going two hundred and forty miles per hour.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
It boggles my.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
Mind that, you know, this nine degree banking and twelve
minutes whatever that means, because I didn't take that class
in college. The nine degree banking that was created again
in nineteen oh nine, one hundred and sixteen years later,
still works for the Indianapolis five hundred and by the

(03:40):
way NASCAR and by the way, a large percentage of
the road course. It's just it's staggering to think that,
you know, with everything else in the world that has changed.
I mean, you know, doritos aren't the same as they
were when we were kids, but the racetrack one hundred
and sixteen years later still works.

Speaker 1 (03:59):
I compare that bit to baseball and the dimensions now
the dimensions have changed a bit since the game became
somewhat close to what the game is like now in
the eighteen forties and eighteen fifties, but since the eighteen
eighties eighteen nineties, it's been sixty feet six inches ninety feet.

(04:20):
And how a ground ball to the shortstop, you know,
if it's a routine ground ball, generally a solid throw
beats the runner by half a step of someone with
decent speed. And how that worked one hundred and twenty
years ago and still works today is quite amazing. But yeah,
I've always thought the same thing when it comes to
the Indianapolis five hundred as well, and it can apply

(04:42):
to the Milwaukee Mile this week. That track dates I
think I watched last year's broadcasts and I mentioned I
think eighteen seventy six as a horse racing track, and
it dates to nineteen oh three with cars, so longer
than the Indianapolis five hundred. Oh the other factoid from
this date in history, from August nineteenth, nineteen oh nine,

(05:06):
it was essentially a meat, right, a three day meat,
that's right. And Ray Harun was there and he won
one of the races, and Luis Chevrolet was among the
other winners. So that was on the crushed rock and
tar and cinder, and it was December of nineteen oh

(05:28):
nine when they went to the yard of bricks and
three point two million paving bricks. All right, this weekend,
we'll get into details race, though we'll note that first
of all, this is a Sunday afternoon race. We're on
the air at two o'clock on Fox about a two
to twenty ish green flag for two hundred fifty laps,
and we will get into all the particulars and we'll

(05:49):
talk more about what we expect to see this weekend
with the championship not at stake all wrapped up as
it really has been since about April, but I think
still plung to play for and that also impacts next year.
But let's go to what's new for today and what's
new the last couple of days, since it just came
out late this afternoon, and I think as I look

(06:11):
at this, it at least adds some to discussion for IndyCar.
NASCAR has not released the schedule, but Jordan Bianki of
The Athletic has released it himself. And you know, just
because someone in the media or our website releases something
doesn't mean it's accurate. There was one that came out

(06:31):
last week that looked all proper and official from IndyCar,
and it was not good. It was not accurate, and
it was just somebody going for clicks and it wasn't
an outlet that I'm familiar with. Well, there's history with
what Jordan Bianki in the Athletic do. I have noticed
the last several years that they are one hundred percent accurate,
and I'm sure that they got this as it was

(06:53):
released to someone in the industry, and you know Jordan
and the Athletic. We'll have to answer to NASCAR about
putting that out there, but that's the way it goes,
and Kiddy Car doesn't release these things to the teams
until about thirty minutes before it is released to the public.
I think we'll see it publicly from NASCAR in the
next few days. But I trust this to be one
hundred percent accurate and nothing will change on that. Here

(07:17):
are the highlights. Homestead. We knew this returns as the
championship venue. That had been a few years since that
had been the case. It had been Phoenix for the
last little while. A lot of this has been reported
and out there Chicago Land Speedway is back in joliets.
We knew that San Diego on the Naval Base was
going to have a temporary street course race, and NASCAR

(07:41):
will not return to Mexico City or the Chicago street
Course race. This article says they still hope to return
in twenty twenty seven. I'll kind of believe that when
I see it, but you never know. Other notable changes,
Watkins Glenn is shifting from its traditional August dates to
Mother's Day weekend in May, so that would be the

(08:03):
same weekend that the indiegp has been on the IndyCar calendar.
New Hampshire Motor Speedway has moved out of the playoffs
to make room for Homestead and now we'll host the
second to the last regular season race, so I think
that's late August. They've added an off week in early August,
which will be welcome. That means now they're two in

(08:23):
the season. There were some reports in the last few
weeks that Iowa could be on the chopping block, not
only for IndyCar but for NASCAR as well, but it
is on the schedule for a third consecutive year, slated
for August ninth. The Brickyard is Sunday, July twenty sixth.
That is a T and T race. So that's some

(08:44):
of the highlights that the athletic notes. Now, Kurt, I'm
going to look at some of the things that catch
my eye because now we'll shift to to IndyCar and
where things stand with the schedule. I think one of
the things, I've got several Twitter questions on this. Maybe
I'll just jump into Twitter questions and that will kind

(09:06):
of get us to where we want to go. Example,
Jerry Mills at JMSR nineteen eighty eight says, when is
the twenty twenty six schedule coming out? With Watkins Glenn
moving their NASCAR weekend to May, is there a distinct
possibility IndyCar races there in August? Question Mark. So, I
have no intel on that other than as I hear people,

(09:29):
and I'll just leave it loosely based at people. And
none of those people are Buddnker, Roger Penske, Mark Miles,
Doug Moles, Doug Bulls, Doug Bols. Yes, they're no one
that works for IndyCar. Michael Montri who also works in
this schedule. But I've heard Watkins Glenn out there. Now
some of that's because we are all just doing some

(09:53):
educated guessing, and we all have places that we would
like to see back. Now, what I've said is, I
don't know. While I would love it, it's one of
my favorite places and the racing was great. Needs to
work commercially, just like I say about why this particular
Ovali isn't on the track and commercially. Indy car has

(10:14):
tried this event three or four different weekends and it
hasn't done very well. Now the last time is not
totally fair because it was a replacement for Boston. What
would that have been twenty eleven? Yeah, maybe no, maybe No,
it's after that. No, it was like twenty sixteen because
Rossi has raced all sixteen seventeen somewhere in that range,

(10:34):
so that was kind of a hurry up kind of thing.
But I want to know why it would be different,
So I keep hearing it and I'd love to see it.
And what I've said is the way to guarantee that
you have some modicum of success is if it is
either paired with NASCAR, which I don't think they're going

(10:55):
to be interested in happening. Plus they use a different
track layout. They don't use the boots, so they don't
have fans down in the boot or with IMSA, And
I also don't think IMSA has a whole lot of motivation.
They need all the paddock space they can get for
their support series. That's part of their business model and
their crowd there is Actually I wasn't there this year,

(11:17):
but it looked okay on TV. I was there two
years ago and it was solid. It was really solid
there standalone, I'd still be surprised, but I cannot rule
it out. That schedule change does make it more plausible,
and I do think one of the challenges that IndyCar
would have had back in the day is that the
August race or the July race whenever the Cup race

(11:40):
was did great, and you're competing with that now that
it's in early May, and there's every chance that it
might snow for that race on May tenth, Right, Yeah,
by the way, that was so I've been there when
it snowed for a race.

Speaker 2 (11:54):
That was the first week of August because it or
early August because it often followed the Brickyard four hundred.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
Okay, So I think that I'm at least gonna say
there's a chance. Now you still have to make sure
it works, but I feel like you have a better
chance IndyCar standalone, that you're still going to be competing
with IMSA, which actually that schedule is out and we
could look that's been out since February, not not February,

(12:26):
but March, you know, we could kind of see how
that would work and whether there are any possibilities there.
So that's part one. So I'll find that in a moment.
I'll find it for you. So I think that's maybe
I wouldn't put it super high on the list. Next
question is from Andrew at Drew Crew eighty four. With

(12:47):
NASCAR not returning to the streets of Chicago, the rumors
of Chicagoland Speedwab returning since this before this came out,
have ramped up in the past weeks. Do you think
if that happens, it would be a possibility of IndyCar
making their way back there again? The races in the
early to mid two thousands were greats. My first is
the chances are a lot better now than they were
a year ago. Track was not an operation, So maybe

(13:11):
NASCAR can do for IndyCar at Chicago Land what IndyCar
did for NASCAR at the track they own Iowa Speedway.
There is no chance they well, there is very very
little chance. I'm going to say no, there is not
as great of a chance they would have given Iowa
a try if they had not seen what Penske Hyve

(13:32):
and IndyCar did with that track. And it's oh, we
actually own a track. And that all came together because
I believe that year they were trying to run a
race at Montreal Cup Race and that was said to
be done and it fell through and they went scrambling
to what is a ready made event? Here you go.
IndyCar has made this viable again. So I'll be shocked

(13:54):
if Chicago Land is on the speedway next year. But
I cannot rule it out. And here's what I think
is going on now. And one of the reasons why.
Another question we'll get to is when do we expect
to schedule. I'd say best case scenario is next weekend
at Nashville, but I don't even know if that is likely.

(14:18):
I think there are a few things in play, and
Nathan Brown has detailed some of them in the Indianapolis
Star about Mexico City and some changes there in who
owns part of it? And also Toronto trying to deal
with the date and the potential new venue because the
location that they've raced at for the last many many
years is not going to be available in July. So

(14:40):
you're either going to have to wait and run Toronto
at Exhibition Place in mid to late August, or I
guess in the spring, which probably isn't likely, or you're
going to need to find somewhere else. And Nathan is
kind of tabbed in an Indie Star story from last
week the airport in the area where you could do
something like that. That's part one, Part one and two.

(15:01):
I guess those two dates, and then I think part
three is what are we doing about ovals? Are we
gonna give Iowa another try? My guess is they're inclined
to say no, and they're seeing is there anything else
we can do to keep the calendar at seventeen races
and still have the same amount of OVAL races, if

(15:24):
not at least oval weekends, they could still be down
because you remember Iowa was a doubleheader. You might drop
how many ovals is that this season? Is six? Or five?
I think I get five. I get confused because it's
a different amount of races from weekends.

Speaker 2 (15:42):
Indeed, down a race Indye Gateway, Nashville, Milwaukee, and Iowa five, so.

Speaker 1 (15:50):
Six races though, correct, Okay, so you may be down.
So potentially you're down to four next year unless you
want to make Milwaukee or Nashville a doubleheader, which no
one really wants. But I think people will be satisfied
with keeping five IndyCar weekends if you could at least
day to that, and then what are your options? So

(16:12):
then you're going back to looking at this schedule and
the easy NASCAR owns most of the ovals you could
race at, so you have to kind of say, all right,
when is NASCAR going to race there? Can we find
something that will work? Phoenix still has two races, makes
a little bit tough, and their first race is March eighth.

(16:35):
The only way I see that working is if IndyCar
and NASCAR can play together. I don't think it makes
sense to go there three weeks before. Maybe you can't.
Maybe it's already written down that Saint Pete is your
season opener, which I think there is a date for
that that's already out there, like same as this year.

(16:56):
February twenty eighth March first or whatever. So maybe and
that's the Fox NASCAR race, so you'd have a great
tie in. I think you could maybe sell NASCAR on
the fact that, hey, we're going to run the IndyCar
race first, and that's going to be a two and
a half hour commercial for NASCAR coming up next, and

(17:20):
we're going to try to help each other. We're going
to promote the NASCAR race on Fox and have one
big window all day, or maybe one's on Saturday and
you're promoting the next one for Sunday. So in my mind,
not knowing any particulars, I think that's a possibility. Homestead

(17:40):
I've heard mentioned kind of the same concerns I've had
about Watkins Glenn. Homestead was not well attended the last
time around, and part of that is because when they
have a couple of Cup races, there's only so much
the market is going to go. It's not really Miami,
it's a long way away. But they are clear in
the time their Cup race is now the championship. So

(18:04):
if you wanted to do something in March, at least
from a date standpoint, it could potentially work. You've got
to have a plan. Doesn't do anybody any good. If
you go there and your race in front of ten
thousand people, which looks like three thousand at a big
place like that, or maybe even fifteen thousand doesn't look
very good. So you want to have a plan to

(18:24):
see if that's viable. We've had some questions about Kansas.
Kansas is still on the Cup schedule two times. I
don't see a third race. The only way you could
do that again is if NASCAR will playball and you
could race with them Sunday April nineteenth when they have

(18:45):
their Cup race, and there may that may be much
plutch calendars up.

Speaker 2 (18:50):
Yeah, that may be for next year. Is that long
beach weekend? I think so, I'll have to dig that
one up real quick. By the way, filling in a
couple holes, the season. IndyCar season does begin March first
in Saint Petersburg, so the first day of March. That
IMSA Watkins Glenn date you're looking for is the last
weekend of June, so June twenty eighth. So to do

(19:15):
something the first week of August, second week of August
at Watkins Glenn seems seems feasible. And then you were
asking about one other IndyCar race Long Beach Old Long Beach.
I do think the Phoenix one has has more optimism

(19:38):
from my standpoint. By the way, that is the April nineteenth,
as we both suspected April nineteenth of twenty twenty six,
I don't see Homestead as feasible.

Speaker 1 (19:49):
I mean, I've been.

Speaker 2 (19:51):
To all of them there and I'm not sure any
of them were great in terms of attendance and footprint
in the market.

Speaker 1 (20:00):
What I don't remember is when the Cup race was
around that time, if they were also racing in the
springtime within a few weeks of the IndyCar race, that.

Speaker 2 (20:12):
I think they I think they only had I think
they only had one Cup race at the time. They
when they went to two Cup races, that's when it
became a real problem. I think they just had the
season ender because I can remember going to the season
ender for Cup many of those years Tony Stewart was
in the mixer or Gordon was kind of passed, kind

(20:34):
of the end of the Gordon time. But I don't
think they had a Spring Cup race at the time.

Speaker 1 (20:39):
So the other dates on the NASCAR schedule that would
interest us with IndyCar events would be Nashville for Cup
is going to be Sunday, May thirty first, so that's
the week after the Indianapolis five hundred, So that's good.
There's a long path between what we think would be
the IndyCar season finale. Again, although we don't know anything

(21:00):
at this point, the Chicago land Race is fourth of
July weekend, that is Sunday, July fifth. I'd be really
surprised if Indy Carr and NASCAR going to work together,
and I feel like if IndyCar and NASCAR we're going
to work together, it needs to come before the Indy
five hundred. It needs to come in the spring when
Fox is already going to be there and you can

(21:20):
help promote each other. So I don't see any kind
of summer scenario going on there. The Iowa data is
mentioned is August ninth. Richmond has come up a lot
for IndyCar fans, so their NASCAR race is Saturday August fifteenth,
So I think that potentially keeps that in play. If
you wanted to run in April or a first weekend

(21:42):
of May race at Richmond, then from that standpoint, spreading
them out, I think that works. It would just be
all right. Can we sell enough tickets to make that
a possibility. New Hampshire people have mentioned the Cup race
is Sunday, August twenty third. I've actually not heard anyone
mention New Hampshire. I've heard a bunch of these other

(22:04):
tracks mentioned. I've heard Richmond, I've heard Homestead, I've heard
Watkins Glenn, I've heard Phoenix, I've heard Denver. Don't know
if that's for next year for a street race, I've
heard and now I've read. I wish I could credit

(22:24):
at which outlet outlet wrote this, but I think someone
wrote Philadelphia as a possibility. If you're starting to look
at places where you could find a parking lot for
a football stadium, you know, maybe keep an eye on
that in the future. So that's what I see from
the Cup schedule as for potential tie ins with the IndyCar.

Speaker 2 (22:49):
And it does seem like the NASCAR race at the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway is right in that sweet spot when
you're trying to schedule an IndyCar Series race. You hate
that you would love for those to be a free
weekend on the IndyCar schedule, but I mean, that's a
really precious time on the IndyCar calendar. The last weekend

(23:11):
of July.

Speaker 3 (23:12):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (23:13):
Yeah, you're trying to make use as much as you can.
You know, here's another big hope. I'm glad the NASCAR
schedule is out, most of the IndyCar dates are probably
already finalized. But in a dream scenario, easier said than done.
When we have a weekend like what we just had

(23:33):
with Cup race on Saturday night, which was a really
entertaining race. Nothing on Sunday, no Cup race, no Formula
One race. I'd really like to see IndyCar racing that afternoon.

Speaker 2 (23:45):
Yeah, you know. The other thing just just going back
to Phoenix, and the only reason it seems to me
that's you know, more in play maybe than it might
have been otherwise. It's just this Fox involvement, with the
ownership it has in the IndyCar series. You know, does
it really push to say what a great weekend that

(24:08):
would be for our network? You know, we could promote
both races. You know, I'm with you. I think if
a joint race is going to happen, or a joint
weekend is going to happen, the only way it happens
is during a Fox part of the NASCAR schedule. That's
the only time that makes sense from a logistics standpoint,
from having you know, running the cables and the cameras

(24:29):
and all the things that go into the back end
of a production, and then to have just to have
Fox's interest in having a motorsports showcase. I think that's
that's the that's the motivation and the oomph, if you will.
But I think that idea has now that it didn't

(24:52):
have before. I mean Fox was a player last obviously
in twenty twenty five with IndyCar and could have leveraged.
But I think now it has an investment. I think
it can work well.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
They've also just had a little bit more time to
start thinking about things, and you know they're going to
try to get creative, and they know that head to
head with other motorsports is not going to help your ratings,
and they're going to try to do what they can
to make those better next year. And then the other thing,
you know, people always talk about ratings. There's something to

(25:26):
think about and we've discussed this last week to two perspectives.
Both are accurate. It just depends on which way you
want to look at it. Are they poor because they're
down head to head with NBC versus Fox, or are
they way better because they're way up from Fox versus
cable or streaming? And if you look at network to network,

(25:49):
are they down because the championship has been over since April?
You know? That might be something we have to I
think that's going to be the tasks for Indyecar marketing
and Fox marketing. Unless Alex Polo is going away, and
unless they are doing a playoff, you're very likely in
this position again next year. I'm not going to say

(26:10):
one hundred percent, but what do you think forty to
fifty chance he dominates the championship again next year? At
least a thirty three percent chance, So we're going to
need another hook. Then the championship always comes down to
the last lap. We're going to need to accentuate the

(26:31):
entertainment value of each individual events and something else because
the championship may not get it done well. I agree.
Might be why your ratings. For those that want to
say the ratings are down and look at it that way,
that might be the number one reason why they're down
because it's been a foregone conclusion since at least May.
Who was winning the championship. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (26:52):
I just don't think I appreciate that we'll we very
very likely are going to be in this position again
next year. I just don't think with a complicated point system,
I still have to explain it to people who are
who are following this sport on a regular basis. I know,
I know we've been saying, you know, he's the expected champion,

(27:14):
but I've also continue to read the way people write
it that that you know there are still Poto Award
is still in the hunt.

Speaker 1 (27:24):
So I get it. I just think that's smart people
know that's not true. Well, I think that for a
long time.

Speaker 2 (27:30):
I think the smart people are already watching because they
like IndyCar racing. That's all I'm saying. I think I
think the casual fan doesn't know the difference. They're just
watching the action. And I do think it's been a
positive that Alex Pelow's status has now brought him into
the mainstream conversation. If you're just a motorsports fan watching

(27:51):
an IndyCar race, now you've known Graham, Ray Hall, you
know Joseph Neugarten, and now you know Alex Polow.

Speaker 1 (28:00):
Scott Cooper Scott DC eight sixty one says Penske Entertainment
hasn't exactly hit it out of the park in event promotion.
There's already an entity in place, Koreen Savary, which has
done amazing jobs at Saint Pete mid Ohio in Toronto, Portland, TBD.
Why doesn't Penske contract with them for other events? Well,

(28:21):
you're assuming that Green Savary wants to partner. I mean
they have a limited staff as well, correct, I mean
they have their hands in four events. Middle Ohio is
massively important to them, not that Saint Pete track. They
own the track.

Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yeah, so you know Saint Pete obviously is big, and
they wouldn't do the other two if it wasn't important
to them. So they're all important. But midd Ohio they own,
and Saint Pete is a season opener, and they can
only be so many places. It's in so many you know,
time zones, and you know they have to use their
resources to get to Portland when they should be in

(29:00):
midd Ohio or they should be in Toronto or could
be I suppose anyway, So it's you can't assume that
Green Savary wants to do more. And you know they've
done They've done great by it and.

Speaker 1 (29:13):
Yeah, we'll see. I feel confident that every time there
is a new venue that doesn't have a built in promoter,
Penske reaches out and asks Green Savary, Hey, are you interested?
And then it may be if you are okay, are
you willing to pay the sanctioning fee, because that's what
a promoter does, That's what Green Savary is doing. They're

(29:34):
putting their neck out on the line for all these
events and they are guaranteeing IndyCar money. And essentially that's
why IndyCar is promoting some of these other events, because
they've decided to invest. We think these venues and markets
are worth it, so we're going to take the chance
and not collect any money. Some of them are a

(29:55):
little bit vague. I don't know exactly how the new
Arlington Race works. I'm guessing I'm hoping that the Rangers
and the Cowboys are putting in an actual sanctioning fee,
but I don't know that. They may just be helping
in regards with advertising, promotion and things along those lines.
And Lynn Drive for seven Lynn Underscore IndyCar says seems
like the twenty six schedule is on hold due to

(30:17):
the ongoing negotiations with Mexico City promoter, which is now
Live Nation after buying controlling interest of Okasa. Your question
not friends of IndyCar. Who owns Live Nation? Answer Liberty
Media owner of F one, Lynn Wrights. So yeah, that's
one of the things that Nathan Brown wrote about in

(30:37):
The Star last week that may or may not be
the reason for the hold up, but it is something
to be interested in. I think it's they own something
like forty nine percents now, so you already we're dealing
with a track that Formula one is their biggest event,
and now Formula one has a big stake in it.
I don't think they really want IndyCar to do well.
I don't think they really want fans in Mexico City

(31:00):
to find another option that might be a third or
a fourth of the price and might have a Mexican
driver that has a great chance of winning the race,
unlike Formula One. So yeah, I'm not I've said this
all along. I always believe these deals are done when

(31:21):
I see them announce, and sometimes I even need to
get on the plane to go there because Kurt, I
think there have been two events I've had tickets for
and have had those canceled about two months before the
event actually happen.

Speaker 2 (31:32):
Yeah, I can certainly vouch for that in my what
now approaching forty years of being involved with this sport,
that there have been numerous examples where we thought we
were headed one direction only to not end up there.

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Okay, we'll get to more of your tweets covering a
lot of ground there and some other stuff all coming up.
We'll get into silly season with some of the questions
we have next track side ninety three to five one
oh seven to five of the fan. Hi, this is
Poto Award and you're listening to truck Side. Thanks for
staying with us. More from the Xbox. From Twitter at
Kevin Lee twenty three and at Kurt Cabin. This is

(32:11):
from Storm and Soda. Just going to kind of bounce
around and cover some other topics here. Not a question,
but have really appreciated how Christian lung Guard has sparred
with Polo this year. I remember multiple occasions where he's
drove well, defensively or fought back against him. Really the
only one in the field I can think of doing that.
Props to him. I think that's an excellent note and
I actually had it in my notes thinking, and I

(32:32):
know Christian when we saw him interviewed after he finished
second a couple of weeks ago at Portland, looked pretty down.
What I would say to him is you actually beat
Alex Polou in a straight up fight, and that's not
happened to very many people this year. So I still
think it's been a really good season for Lounguard.

Speaker 2 (32:50):
I think he's established himself as as one of the
top guys. I'm not willing to say he's a championship
contender yet because he hasn't shown it consistently on the
Ovals and certainly not the short Ovals, but I think,
you know, if he can take that step over the
next calendar year that Polo has taken on the on

(33:10):
the Ovals, then he'll be right with Alex because he
You're right he and then you know, pot A Award
is the other one that has taken the fight to Alex, uh,
you know, on on multiple occasions. You know, those are
the two guys right now that that in my mind
can beat can beat Alex Poulo. Obviously any of the

(33:32):
Penskes could and if they get there, you know, ship
righted but Christian has taken a big step this year.

Speaker 1 (33:40):
Next question is from Chris, and he's on it, says,
let's discuss Andretti stealing Jackson's sponsor. Hey, now, did you
so Marcus Erickson and Andretti have a new sponsor for
I don't know how it was announced, so i'll but
I know it's on the car this weekend. Browning chat Bean,

(34:01):
which is based in Westfield, specialty contractors a lot of
flooring work. They have been Jackson's, I think now, longest
term partner. They've been with him since he got into
car racing his first year in USF two thousand and
Maybe coincidence or not, but that's kind of how motorsports works.
You see a logo on a type of a race car,
you approach them and say, hey, would you like to

(34:22):
be on our race car? So this is also a
big company in the Indianapolis area, so all is fair
in that regard. And I have been aware that they've
been talking to Andretti throughout the year. They continue to
be a partner of Jackson's and I am happy that
they are on the Andretti car this week and as well,
so that's cool. It's a good looking race car. And
I've advised Allen and the Browning Chappin people that they

(34:45):
would not have a better representative than Marcus, so good
time for them, and luckily they are still a part
of the Jackson Lee Racing Empire as well at this point.
So that's one of the new looks. I don't have
interr list is on out yet, right, I've not seen
what different looks what Penske sponsored as Malucas have on

(35:05):
his car this week. Yeah, I don't know yet.

Speaker 2 (35:08):
If we were a Wednesday show, that typically is when
Arnie Shreven would distribute it. But yeah, I've not seen
the entry list yet.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
Let's see next question if he has Verizon. If he
has Verizon, that's where we'll well here this question will
kind of lead into this from Mohammad, most boring off
season ever smiley face laughing emoji. I think, so we

(35:38):
know this. Here's his prediction. Malucas to Penske, Armstrong to
m Y. I guess that's Meyer Shank, which that's been confirmed.
That's one of the things that we have this week
is that Marcus Armstrong is staying put. It was a
little bit vague. Kurt, what's the wording. I'm going to
read the wording in the press release. So my understanding,

(36:00):
and I think others, has been that Marcus Armstrong was
fulfilling a contract with Chip Ganassi Racing and was essentially
loaned out or this was a part of the technical
partnership with chip Ganassi supplying engineers and data to Meyer
Shank Racing, and that was up. And what Mike Shank

(36:23):
has always told me is that they don't have to
take the Ganassi driver. But it makes perfect sense. I
think he had an interest in Melucas last year, but
it makes sense that, well, this works well with the
partnership and Marcus is also really good. Is Marcus now
a Meyer Shank driver or is he still a Ganassi driver?

(36:46):
My guess is, if I'm Marcus Armstrong, I would like
to still be a Ganassi driver because I want to
be in line whenever Scott Dixon retires, which might be
nine years from now, but you know, when you're in
your mid forties, it's kind of a year to year
type of thing that I at least want to still
have a chance to be there in case he decides

(37:09):
all of a sudden, I've had enough and I want
to move on or something changes and you can go
back to four cars or whatever the case may be.
And I believe the wording, which I knew, I did
a cut and paste. This basically said that he will
drive for the team next year. I don't think it
says anything about we have re signed him or signed him.
It's just he is going to be with team for

(37:31):
next year, which which is all good. And it's just semantics.
In a small portion of this back to Muhammad's predictions,
Howger Hunkos, VK coin Power, Ray Hall, Letterman, Lanigan, Di Francesco,
coin Abel, aj Foyd Daily, Imsa. So a lot to

(37:54):
unpack there, and I don't know if any of those
are totally out of left field. So I'll starting backwards
version with Connor Daily. I know Connor Day is not
ready to give up an IndyCar and wants to be
an IndyCar, and I think he has a really good
chance to be an IndyCar next year. But just happened

(38:16):
to notice that yesterday a team that he has been
involved with in the past, and the team owner, Paul Sparta,
owns the Random Vandals sports car team that's raced an SRO.
That's where Connor was going to be racing last year
before he got the call up to Honkos, and he's

(38:38):
still going to be doing an event for them. I
think he's going to run maybe the NDY eight Hour
Weekend with them. So Paul Sparta and his company, I think,
have supported Connor in the past. If he were to
look for something in sports car racing where he can
get paid and not just have to bring all of
the budget, that's where I'm going to guess he would start.

(39:01):
And Paul Sparta just said a couple of days ago
that my hope is to have an Imselweather Tech GTD
team next year with BMW, so that's a little higher
platform than SRO. So I think that's a long shot
that Connor is the driver because they have other drivers
that are there full time. But it just kind of
struck me, is that maybe if I'm Connor, I want

(39:23):
to kind of keep that in my back pocket and
at least explore that. But I know he wants to
get it done in IndyCar and he's got two week
races with a great chance it results, and I'm optimistic
he can retain a seat somewhere. It starts with Bill
Power still and I know nothing more that I do
last week, and I'll go to the next question to
lead us to this. Jason at Don Jason zero zero says,

(39:46):
have you listened to the most recent Speed Treat podcast
where Connor interviews will Power? He does not sound like
a driver that currently has a job. I don't know
who if Jason is referring to will Power or Connor.
That's kind of the reality these They're on yearly contracts,
so neither of them are guaranteed to have a job

(40:06):
next season. Connor has been pretty plain about that throughout
the year, and even if there is a contract, I'm
sure it is a team option, so he is going
to have to get rehired. And we've been telling you
all along that Will Power does not have a job
with Team Penske. Now he might, and I'm still not
ruling out. So, as I said last week, I believe

(40:28):
will Power believes he has done and most of a
paddock believes he is leaving Team Penske. But I think
most of us also think, hey, you never know, because
it still doesn't make a great deal of sense why
you want to move on from the only driver that's
won a race that is by far the best in

(40:50):
the championship, that was the best on your team last year,
so on and so forth. So I am still holding out,
not just hope, but a thought that Roger Penske has
something up his sleeve and will power may still return
to the team next season. That doesn't make a lot
of sense, because we have you said, you don't hide

(41:12):
good news. But when I keep hearing I won't know
anything until August thirty first, I keep going back to
there's some sort of a clause that we don't know
whether it's going to be enacted now or not, or
we are trying to come up with another solution, and
we're going to take as long as we can before
we have to decide on something.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Yeah, I keep that just doesn't make any sense that
they wouldn't have told him, they wouldn't have announced it,
he wouldn't have said something. I agree. I think the
sense that he's projecting is that he will not be
a Team Penske next year. But that may just be
he's resigned himself that that's the ultimate outcome here. But

(41:55):
I think there's still a chance. It may be a
ten to twenty percent, but I still see a pathway
to making this happen where he stays, because either Malucas
hasn't achieved the level that is in the contract that
says he will move to Team Penske, maybe he has
to finish in the top ten points, you know, something

(42:16):
to that effect.

Speaker 1 (42:19):
Or we're going to try to talk him into staying
put and try to explain if they do indeed believe
that's best for all parties. And I also get the
Malucas side of things, and I hope this does happen,
that David Malucas doesn't bear the brunt of this. It
would not be his fault if this happens. It's if

(42:40):
someone offers you a seat at Team Penske. You are
not going to ask a lot of questions. You're going
to simply say where do I sign up? This would
not be his fault. And I also get that putting
him in that seat, you're going to see a different driver.
He is very likely to take a huge step up.
It would just be different to what Team Penske has

(43:01):
always done. They've always taken drivers that already made and competing.
McLaughlin's the only one, but he had won three championships
for the team. In another high level series, but he
was the one that didn't have IndyCar experience. You got
to go way back to find someone that did not

(43:22):
have pedigree in IndyCar racing for Team Penske to give
them a chance. Well, Lucas has some he has doesn't
want to race, and he hasn't wont a poll yet.

Speaker 2 (43:32):
No, but he did finish essentially third in the Indy
five hundred, technically second, which is pretty pretty impressive, and
he has finished second in you know, to Team Penske
at Worldwide Technology Raceway. He has shown flashes on ovals
he had just does not won a race, and it

(43:54):
still seemed like there was one more point to be
made here. But I think it's still possible that Will
Will's going to be there next year.

Speaker 1 (44:03):
Lucas is worthy, it's just comparing against the other three
options that you know, I think if this was four
years ago, they just create a fourth car for a
year like they've done in the past, but that's not
really an option at this point in this new charter environment.
So we'll talk more on this, and we'll go through

(44:23):
the list and what we have and who we think
is available and kind of get into that coming up
from preview hour number two. More coming up Trackside ninety
three five one oh seven five The Fan. Hi, this
is Scott McLachlin and you're listening to trackside on ninety
three five and one I seven five the Fan, Our
number two coming up. In just a moment, we will
continue our conversation about silly season and what we think

(44:44):
might happen next year. We'll go back to some more
of your tweets. We need to start talking about Milwaukee,
what we think will happen this coming Sunday, and what
else is in store for the weekend, and plenty more
all on the way on trackside, Hi, this is what
Power and you're listening to trackside our number two track
site on ninety three five one oh seven to five
the Fan in Indianapolis. After first off weekend in quite

(45:08):
a while, we're back at it. Final two both ont
ovals the Milwaukee Mile coming Sunday A week from Sunday,
the Nashville super Speedway two o'clock on Fox this Sunday afternoon,
about a two to twenty green flag. Also coverage here
on the radio ninety three five one oh seven five
The Fan. No conflict with the NASCAR Cup race they

(45:31):
are at Daytona on Saturday night seven point thirty on NBC,
the Infinity Race as it's now known for a little
bit longer on the CW on Friday nights at seven thirty,
there is MS so we are head to head with IMSA.
That's on USA and Peacock Sunday afternoon from v i

(45:51):
R Virginia International Raceway. We always like to talk about,
you know, primetime advantages Saturday night races. I just saw
that the Nastar car ratings from this past Saturday night
which I was home and watched, and it was a
really good race. They had a lot of tirewaar not
tire deg I know you don't like tire deg so

(46:13):
tireware and just different strategies going on. But Saturday nights
sometimes are difficult. The rating this year was down significantly
from last year. A point seventy five one point four
million viewers for Saturday Night's Cup race at Richmond compared
to last year one point two rating and two point

(46:35):
two million on a Sunday evening. So let's talk about
Milwaukee and before cast that I also saw come by
low seventies and sunshine on Sunday. How does that sound
and high seventies and mostly sunny on Saturday. I think
there's a little bit of a chance of some rain
at some point, but not a lot. Still too early

(46:57):
to get into that, but we can start with temperatures,
which they're really good with and I like it.

Speaker 2 (47:02):
Yeah, Wisconsin always seems to do well by us, whether
it be you know, up a little further north or
on the ovals. It's usually pretty nice road. America I
think was hotter this year, but you know it's going
to be good. I'll tell you if you want to
root for drama, root for will Power this weekend. He

(47:23):
finished second in Race one last year. If he strings
two wins together here late in the season, the team
Penske drama is going to be really interesting to watch
play out. I don't if he wins one of these
last two races. By the way, two o'clock is your
memory bank. You need to put that in the memory
bank because the next two races, these two remaining, are
both at two o'clock broadcast times Eastern. But if will

(47:48):
Power wins, which he very well could win this weekend
in Milwaukee, this has been a place where he's won before.
He has in his I think he's had seven starts
on the Milwaukee Mile. He's had a first, a second,
a third, a fourth, and a tenth, so he has
been Last year it was second and tenth. So he's

(48:10):
been very good at Milwaukee, and you would expect that
he'll be in the hunt again. I don't know if
he wins the race, but if you want some drama
in your life, in your silly season, throw Willpower on
Victory Lane come Sunday afternoon.

Speaker 1 (48:26):
I'll be interested. I don't think they would say anything,
going back to the will Power thing. That is kind
of how Team Pensi has always done things when they
are ready to move on. We were asking, well, why
wouldn't they just say if they're moving on. That's not
how they operate. They finished the season and they make announcements,

(48:46):
which is why everyone thinks that he's gone. I'm still saying,
maybe they just change their mind, and maybe that's one
of the reasons why they don't announce things until after
it's done, just to leave them some room in case
we need to do something different. You know, if indeed
they are moving on, was this decision made last year?

(49:10):
And if that's the case, you're making it when this
time last year he was in the championship. If his
seat belt doesn't come loose, he might have a chance
to win the championship. In the last race of the season.
He won more races than anyone else last year.

Speaker 2 (49:29):
Well, he was tied him to this, he was tied.
He won three. There were potter pot potter one three
did so did McLachlin. McLaughlin also went there were three
or four guys won three.

Speaker 1 (49:43):
Here's an I like theories. Why would Team Penske, if
that's the case, have written it down that Will Power
was basically going to have to leave at the end
of twenty twenty five when he was coming off of
a season like that. One thing is I've heard this before.

(50:08):
When you don't know the answer, start thinking about money.
Money is often the answer to questions if you don't know,
is that it I don't know, I don't know. Team
Penske doesn't require fund the drivers. Maybe there is a
business to business relationship with HMD Trucking, But a more
likely theory is what if Chip Ganassi had taken an

(50:33):
interest in David Malucas and was going to place him
and keep him in the car that he was driving
the number sixty six for Meyer Shank Racing for this
past season. I know this. Michael Shanks said, I might
have entertained keeping Melucas, but he was off the market
before we got to it. Does this happen? I looked

(50:54):
it up today. It was announced. I think it was
announced August thirteenth last year. That means it was done
before that. That's when it was announced. I could be
off on a few days, but it was sometime a
little over a year ago. If Team Penske needed to
have a reason, if indeed this is happening the way
we think it is that it's written in stone that

(51:17):
Melucas is moving to a Penske car and there's no
room at the end for willpower. What other reason would
there have been is that we think this guy is
it and we don't want to risk losing him because
normally it's Joseph Neugarten whoever else, hang tight, we're gonna
get you when we're ready. And there wasn't really an

(51:41):
option at Ganassi or no one was close to signing him.
But now Ganassi you can argue, you can easily argue
is the better place to be, not only looking at
the championship this year. But you wrote the story in
IndyCar dot Com this week they've won seventeen champions and
how many years now? Yeah? Thirty, thirty, Yeah, seventeen and thirty.

(52:06):
That's the same number Team Penske has won since nineteen
sixty nine, and in recent years the numbers say you
have a better chance of winning a championship at Chip
Kanassi Racing than you do at Team Penske.

Speaker 2 (52:21):
It's almost incomprehensible, but the facts are the facts, and I.

Speaker 1 (52:28):
Have no intel on that. I have no idea if
that's right. It's just throwing stuff up against the wall.
But I'm just still trying to come to grips is
how is there not a seat for Willpower? And it
might be because we felt like we had we were
in competition and we had to offer something to David

(52:49):
Malucas right now or we ran the risk of not
having him when it is time to replace one of
our drivers.

Speaker 2 (52:56):
I just and I think the world of Dave, and
obviously Aaron McLaren did too. I just don't know how
you you put every egg in the basket right there
to make sure that doesn't he doesn't get away from you.
I just I just don't know what's so convincing about
his about his background that, I mean, why didn't if

(53:23):
he's that good and he might be, If he's that good,
why did Aaron McLaren cut ties, Why didn't they just
wait on him?

Speaker 1 (53:32):
Because I don't know that they thought he was ever
going to be able to drive effectively. Again, David has
said his wrist is not ever going to be one
hundred percent. He is overcoming that, yeah, to be able
to and maybe he won't be as good as he
ever could be, but he's still pretty good. And he
showed a lot of good results last year, especially in

(53:53):
the Meyer Shank camp, and has been really strong at
times this year, not as consistent I think is they
would like, and hasn't had as many big days as
everyone is hoping for. But they're always extenuating circumstances in that.
But that's kind of the only thing I can come

(54:14):
to is that someone else was after him and there
was competition, and let's face it, you get better deals
if there is someone else interested in your services. Absolutely,
If you're competing against no one, then then they could
have simply said it's our option, We're going to bring
you over when we're ready to bring you over.

Speaker 2 (54:36):
So the only thing that I guess I would challenge
you on this. I know Will. I know Will can
tow the party line, and he can. But why hasn't
he slipped and told somebody who could write it that
they've told him he's done.

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Because I don't think they've told him he's done. I
think he's telling the truth.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
I do too, I think he's telling the truth as well.
Why didn't they tell him when he could when he
could have shopped his own services?

Speaker 1 (55:07):
Because they probably I think he he knows he can
shop his services. I don't think team Penske is going
to stand in his way to have Oriele Servia look
around and have a place for him to be. This
can get done and there's not collusion like you see

(55:28):
in the NFL that that is not a deturing factor.
I believe that he knows enough to be able to
move forward. And I think if he did have an offer,
that'd be interesting how he would work that he'd have
to go in like hypothetical. So say, boss, what if
I did have a firm offer right now, should I

(55:51):
take it? Roger or not?

Speaker 2 (55:53):
Not?

Speaker 1 (55:53):
Saying I do because I'm not talked to anybody, but
if I did, what do you think I should do?

Speaker 2 (55:59):
Here's the beauty of it all. Will's gonna tell us
Come September first, Will is gonna He's gonna explain how
this happened. He's eventually going, yeah, maybe not September first.

Speaker 1 (56:14):
Who with some point. But Will's smart enough to not
burn bridges.

Speaker 2 (56:19):
He's not gonna burn bridge, but he's gonna explain what happened.
You know, there are other drivers who wouldn't do that.
They would just it would Justy's.

Speaker 1 (56:28):
So you're saying he's gonna say, yeah, they just simply
they had to put Malucas in the seat because they
hain't got tract. I think he probably will tell.

Speaker 2 (56:35):
Us that at some point checkered flag come next weekend.

Speaker 1 (56:42):
I'm telling you a reality show, Drive to Survive one
hundred days to Indy. If you could just get that
team Team Penske to open up, which they're not, or
make it a thirty for thirty. I'm not sure that
our unfortunately our sport is big enough to draw a
large enough audience. But let's think about the stories that

(57:02):
we still do not know. The answers for starting at
Saint Pete twenty twenty four. I'm not just hiding what
I think is the truth. I don't know what happened.
I have theories, I have thoughts, I have things people
have told me, but I don't think they know either

(57:22):
what happened with Push to Pass and then what happened
because of what happened with Push to Pass. It ultimately
led to three very distinguished people in the sport losing
their job on the eve of the Indy five hundred.
Because what happened in May this year is a nothing

(57:45):
burger if we didn't have Saint Pete in twenty twenty four.
So you got that, and you got the will Power story,
and you've got the bus Bros. Coming to an end.
There are stories of plenty, just within the team. Penske

(58:05):
walls that people would be in our sport. Now maybe
there's not enough of us. But if you wanted to
try to sell your own docuseries but nobody wants their
dirty laundry aired, Formula one has sort of allowed that,
but they don't allow everything. But you're getting enough of it.

(58:26):
It's still amazing, how because they know that's not going
to air for two more months. But you go back
and watch those shows, and I think some of it's
kind of scripted, but they're saying what they're thinking in
the time. Toto Wolfe is saying, yeah, I don't know
if George Russell's good enough for us. And that's aired
and we see that that's from last year, you know,

(58:46):
around this time last year or June July, whatever it was. Yeah,
we got to still see some more things from George
and that's in his mind this year when they're flirting
with Max verstapping again, it's.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
You know, and we and no, you're a little thirty
for thirty or countdown to Indy here would include just
various clips of Will standing on Pitt Road, venting, throwing
water bottles, just have a little segment throwing things at you.

Speaker 1 (59:17):
Usually to me, I'm still fascinated of what actually happened.
Is it exactly as they stated? But we can't even
because they had different stories. What Joseph said was different
than what the team said. So eh, which is why
maybe we're where we're at and they're eighteenth, eleventh, and
sixth in the championship. And those weren't eighty seven d

(59:40):
nfs this year you said those were distinguished members of
the Paddock. I would argue that at least two of
them are in the top five or six people in
terms of influence and respect, and they may all three
be in the top twelve in this sport. They are
the elite of the elite, Tim Sindrick and Robert Zinski

(01:00:02):
and Kyle Moyer. And it took ten minutes for when
Kyle decided he wanted to work in and again and
felt like he could work again before he was hired
by a top team. And it's probably going to be
the same for the other two if they want to
work now. Ron is not as well known a name
because he was an engineer for many years until became

(01:00:23):
a strategist and one of the people that we talked
to on TV in the last five years. But I'm
telling you so, I don't know if Tim Sindrick wants
to work. You know, Tim is doing pretty well, but
if he wants to, he will, and if Ron wants to.
And I don't pretend to know Ron well enough to
know whether he is going to want to or not,

(01:00:44):
but I put him pretty close to P one on
the free agent list head of all the drivers this winter.
If I'm looking to reshape my organization. How can I
make us better? That's a silly season that as we
look at people that are out there, and what I
joked last week about, I'd go after everyone on the

(01:01:05):
tent stand. Now I'm sure everyone does. I'm also quite
certain none of them are leaving. All of those people
are lifers at Chipkannassi Racing. They ain't going nowhere. But
that as you're trying to figure out some way to
break up this juggernaut that is the number ten Chip
Gannassi Racing team and you can't get the driver. You're

(01:01:28):
going after anybody that you can at this point, but
they're not going anywhere. They're all quite content and happy
with where they're at. Where did I start with this?
We were talking about the talking about the weekend. So I
watched the last two races from Milwaukee last night and today.
They were really really good. Yeah, they were really good
last year, and I don't know why it should be

(01:01:50):
any different. It should be the same tire we had,
the hybrid. You had daytime races last year, so this
should be really similar. And boy did we have a
lot of different developments. Race two alone. Let's take you
back to Race two. I feel like the championship was
something like low forties, and there were still there was

(01:02:12):
still one race to go, so it was going to
take power finishing ahead of Polo to stay ahead in
the championship, and then Polo as a mechanical first thought
it was a hybrid issue. It turned out to be
some sort of a battery. But he starts the race
eight laps down and will Power all of a sudden
is minus six points as they run in a position.
If he were to win the race and he's running

(01:02:34):
second and third, he could have had the championship lead,
and then he spends on his own on a restart,
as you mentioned, only finishes tenth in that race, or
it could have been winner take all. At Nashville last year,
you had Scott McLaughlin win a race. Last year you
had Potto Award win a race. You had Connor Daily
win a million dollars for Hunkos and essentially his seat

(01:02:57):
for this season. You had a wheel fall off. Colton
Herd and the Andretties were good last year. The McLaren's
were good, the Penskes were good. Who else.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
That's pretty much It obviously seems good enough with Connor
Marcus Armstrong finished finished third in the other race.

Speaker 1 (01:03:18):
Linas Lundquist was good in the eight car, but he
started a crash at the beginning. Oh and really, Joseph
Neugarten is going to feel like when he watches this
race back these races, that it was twenty twenty five,
not twenty twenty four, because that was very twenty twenty five.
Like for Newgarden. He crashes with Marcus Erickson in race one,

(01:03:39):
kind of a disagreement. I still don't know, you know,
did Marcus come up, did Joseph come down? Did Marcus
not leave enough room? One of them racing deals. And
then in race two from Pohl, he's hit from behind
when they waved off the start. One of the reasons
why they don't often wave off starts because things like
that happened. But that was a micro cossam of this
year for Joseph Newgarden. Surely at some point something has

(01:04:05):
to go right for him.

Speaker 2 (01:04:06):
Yeah, I don't know what. I don't know what it'll be.
I think, you know, you'd have to think he'd be
in the conversation this weekend, but they've not been. They've
not been outstanding like you would expect. The other thing
that I thought was interesting.

Speaker 1 (01:04:19):
Well, in the short ovals they have, they're still they're
still fast, they're still outstanding. Yeah, I'm not as dominant
as they were, still really really good. Yeah, No, I
would agree with that.

Speaker 2 (01:04:32):
Last year in that second race, I was going back
the question we had on IndyCar dot Com that comes
out tomorrow is, you know, we've seen Polo and a
few others win their first oval race here this year
and or in the last two years. So who's on
tap to finally win an oval race? And you had

(01:04:53):
a slew of those top contenders last year at Milwaukee
nearly win their first oval race, Marcus Armstrong, Connor Daily,
and the rest of the top ten. I think there
were like seven drivers in the second race that has
never that have never won an oval race, so they were.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
Tino finished fourth in both of those races.

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):
He's another one, so you know there was there was
a bunch of a bunch of guys that you know
you mentioned Lindquist, Uh, there were Rena's VK had a
strong car at that point, you know, you had you
just had a Rose. Well, let's see who else was
in that that other race. Luinguard was was one of

(01:05:33):
his better Oval races.

Speaker 1 (01:05:35):
So yeah, I watched that back. They were nowhere. He
just happened to cycle out and hold his position. They
were lost last year.

Speaker 2 (01:05:43):
Well, I think that speaks to where he was with
OVAL's the last three years. I mean he was He's
not had any results to speak up on oval races.

Speaker 1 (01:05:52):
So true. So anyway, they still got some work to
do that. That's one of the things I want to
see this weekend. Where is ray Hall, edtermand Lanigan. They
have been better this year. Can they take a step
forward to be a little more competitive or is this
going to be one of those days where you know,
Graham ray Hall looks like, yeah, I want to be
anywhere other than here right now. Yeah, that's a good one.

(01:06:14):
You know Connor and Ferrucci and Malucas and Melucas, Yeah,
all could potentially win their first race. And don't don't
count out Rasmussen and no ease, yep, don't count Kevin
Simpson either. I mean that Ganassi car. Those Ganassi cars
were pretty good last year. And then we'll keep an

(01:06:34):
eye on Rasmusen watching the races back. He didn't make
friends in this race last year. This was his first
Oval race outside of the Indianapolis five hundred, and he
drew the wrath of Graham ray Hall in that particular
race should be a four stopper. We saw five stops
in race two. They will need tires before they need fuel.

(01:06:58):
I don't even know how long they can go on fuel.
I wasn't in the pits last year, but I don't
think we ever got there. They always needed tires before
they needed fuel. Last year, the most anybody went was
about sixty seven laps plus the pace laps, and then
a race two they were going in the low fifties
because they were just losing so much time on the track.

(01:07:19):
How about this one, Chad two hundred. Chad Smith had
this one on Twitter today along with his notes. When
Scott Dixon made his first career start at the mile,
he finished third with pac West Racing, So that was
probably two thousand and one. One or two these drivers
were not yet born Lunenguard, Malucas Kiff and Simpson, Nolan Siegel,

(01:07:42):
Louie Foster, Sting, Ray Rob We got about a fourth
of the field were not born when Scott Dixon started
settling in on the podium in Milwaukee.

Speaker 2 (01:07:52):
And this always comes up and I feel bad bringing
it up, but you want to talk about how things
change or why things are sometimes different. The four season
for Chip Ganassi Racing with the Toyota, Dixon crashed effectively
on back to back laps in practice and qualifying and

(01:08:13):
didn't and sat out the race because they were like,
we're done. Scott Dixon is crashing twice. I think they
were both in turn four as I recall, basically back
to back laps, crashed at the end of practice or
in practice, and then in qualifying.

Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
As I recall, the whole team went home. Yeah, the
whole team went home. I can't remember if it was
Brisco and Manning, if it was all three of them
or just two of them. I think it was Manning
and Dixon, Manning.

Speaker 2 (01:08:44):
And Dixon as I recall. But it was an ugly weekend.
It's as ugly for one team, especially a title team.
Remember they had won the championship the year before with Dixon,
so that wasn't like he was on his way up
in the sport. He was an established at that point
and it was a It was a disaster.

Speaker 1 (01:09:04):
And what would his consecutive appearance streak be if not
for that I know this this will be his three
hundred and fifty fifth start in a row, so it
would be three or four more years beyond that. Yeah,
you know, I think that that's the only race he's
ever missed in his life, and he's done more races
than anyone ever has, so it would be in the

(01:09:26):
four hundreds for him at this point. So that was
one that kind of stuck out for this particular weekend.
I think the crowd can be good. I've heard good
things about ticket sales. I think it probably helps that
it's just one race instead of two. They had the
flooding there, that's all sorted and taken care of, so

(01:09:47):
should be a good weekend on that front. Coming up next,
want to get into some Alex Plow notes, I know
I have those. I'll sneak back at the Twitter box
and see what else we need to go to. And
I don't know that I ever really finished the silly
season things, so I'll kind of look down at the list.
I'm going to be doing a little more diligence this
weekend and getting on the record answers as much as
I can from team owners about what seats are open,

(01:10:10):
So we'll kind of talk that through together. Next here
on track Side how this is Scott Dixon and you're
listening to track Side on ninety three to five and one.
I seven five the fan. Okay before we get back
to silly season, on to sneak back to the xbox.
Twitter questions at Kevin Lee twenty three at Kurk Cavin
Michael Allison asks this, would Alex Pollo be a four
time champion if he had gone with Aerol McLaren instead

(01:10:33):
of saying it CGR.

Speaker 2 (01:10:35):
I think the answers no, just just because I think
the ten Car and the Ganassi operation is pretty deep.
But it's an interesting thought, as I do think that
the question really could be does he have another championship
if he hadn't been in the middle of that Errol
McLaren Ganassi battle, Because once he got that sort of resolved,

(01:10:59):
he had it pretty get into that season, So it's possible. Hey,
one thing, when I have some time going into a race,
as I did this particular week, I think my Thursday
package of notes has usually come up with some pretty
interesting things. Here's one that I think flew under the radar.

(01:11:19):
But this year Alex Polo has become the second winning
as driver and Chip Ganassi raising history in the IndyCar Series.

Speaker 1 (01:11:27):
Passing.

Speaker 2 (01:11:28):
He passed One Montoya, Dario Franketi, and alex Sonarti on
the Ganassi list of IndyCar winners. Pretty impressive little list.
In his eight wins, he now has nineteen. Of course,
he's not probably going to catch Scott Dixon, who's now
up to fifty eight with Ganassi. He had the one

(01:11:48):
prior to getting to the Ganassi team. But I thought
that was pretty interesting, and we've actually got a couple
guys who are the team leaders. Will Power is the
all time Penske race winner in Indy Car and Graham
ray Hall is the all time winner in ray Hall
Letterman Lanigan. Of course those are different kind of numbers,

(01:12:09):
but it is interesting how many those big heavyweights Alex
Polo has passed it at Chip Ganassi Racing.

Speaker 1 (01:12:17):
I like this stat that Brian Frederick had on Twitter.
Alex Polo has averaged forty one point seven to three
points per race this season. That's more than the points
awarded for second place, which is forty. He's averaging better
than second place. Yeah, he's so you're saying he's pretty good.

(01:12:41):
What else Kyle Gregory says, listening to your podcast, Santino
was penalized in mid Ohio for running Connor and himself
off course. No penalty for turn seven raz into Connor
question mark, they call that and Connor doesn't go for it,
and turn two and turn ten never happens. I think
he's responding because I said they don't seem to penalize
people from running around the outside, and that's from Connor

(01:13:02):
mentioned that on his podcast. So I'm sure there has
been a time where they have penalized someone for running
someone off the road, but that's all circumstances, but generally
they don't. Listening to Hinch and Rossi, whose opinion I
respect a little more than mine, they offered the same
thing that I was talking about last week, or least
I think Hinch did. I can't remember if Rossi is

(01:13:24):
for that or not. I think Rossi is one of
those that use that to his advantage over the years.
He knows that you just run people wide, you open
up your hands, as they say, and you just take
your path and you go out there at your own peril. Now,
I think I even responded to Kyle on this. He says,
if they call that penalty. Turn ten never happens. That's

(01:13:47):
not true. They don't. It's not like a whistle like
in basketball. They call that penalty three minutes later. So
might have been a good idea to just let that
play out. And I think so maybe that position. Now,
that's easy for me to say that sitting here at

(01:14:08):
my desk. When you have been aggrieved and feel like
you've been aggrieved in this type of circumstance, you're going
to get angry. You're going to look for an opportunity.
And that opportunity came when Hey, there it is. Let's
go ahead, just take care of it. Now. I think
this will be dissected a little bit more on the broadcast.

(01:14:28):
So I want to hear what the racing people have
to say. I want to hear what if we hear
from Race Control that may have a better explanation to
educate us as to why something was not called in
this perspective. Want to hear what Christian Rasmussen and Connor
Daily have to say after their coffee at job House,
which actually that last Wednesday. Yeah, so we'll look for

(01:14:52):
that at a certain point this week.

Speaker 2 (01:14:54):
The thing I would add is that typically if something
happens like that in turn seven. The combatants aren't back
together three corners later. Normally it takes a little time
for that to kind of for the for the mist
to boil, and maybe it's the next lap. But the
way those two cars came off track and then returned

(01:15:17):
to the track, Connor was in a position to make retribution.
I mean, maybe that's too strong, but he was in
position to create another situation. Normally you don't have that
chance that quickly. It takes a little wait.

Speaker 1 (01:15:34):
Yison Branch says the same thing, and regarding Rasmussen driving
Connor up the track, Connor mitched on his podcast that
Santino got a penalty for driving Connor up the track
at midd Ohio inconsistency at best. So I wonder had
Connor not come back in and hit Rasmussen in what
turned two the next lap, and had they not crashed

(01:15:54):
in turn ten, if that had been the only thing,
maybe raise control does come back. And this is pretty simple,
got a lot more complicated when there were three contacts
within the same incident in a lap and a half. Yeah,
I agree. From Paul J. Ingram fifty six story in
the Carmel California Pine Cone on page eleven. Can't believe

(01:16:17):
I missed that a speedway native, Mel Harder is now
the GM of weather Tech Raceway. Future interview. Yeah, Mel,
Mel's I'm happy for Mel, and I did not see him.
Mel has worked in the IndyCar world. He works with
Tony George for a long time. He's worked with Chip
Ganassi Racing, He's worked for other teams, has been in
the sport. I am excited to hear, so maybe that's

(01:16:39):
a winner conversation. What plans weather Tech Raceway Laguna Seca
has did not I saw him from Afar, but did
not get a chance to talk to Mel. But he's
been a friend for a long time. So I'm happy
for him and I'm happy for us that someone like
Mel is in charge of weather Tech Raceway Laguna Seca.
Couldn't agree import it. That's nothing but a positive.

Speaker 2 (01:16:59):
And he's a he's a good friend, and we'll have
the chance. Let's keep that on our top of mind.
He'd be a good interview because he can speak to
a lot of different subjects, including this Alex Pollo run.
He has has worked with Alex as well, so that
would be that would be relevant, But getting back to

(01:17:21):
race control just for a second. You know, you mentioned
that they don't have a whistle where you just can
call something bang bang, like a basketball play, and the
reason is because they want to look at the replays
and they want to look at the onboards, and it
sometimes takes maybe it's sixty seconds to a couple of minutes,
but they want they want the stewards to look at
it because.

Speaker 1 (01:17:42):
And by the way, the game is still going on,
exactly going on.

Speaker 2 (01:17:45):
There's no dead ball, so you know, it's not quite
as simple as just saying, oh, it looks like driver
a ran driver b off the racetrack, because there are
always extenuating circumstances and you want to look at that
from for an angles shoot, even the NBA will go
to the monitor and look at the four or five
angles that they have, you know, and that they can

(01:18:08):
stop the play. So it just does take time. And
as you mentioned, there were three contact points in literally
a lap and a little bit, so you know, it's
just happens so fast.

Speaker 1 (01:18:22):
Sarah Morris twenty twenty seven asked this a few days ago,
but it's still relevant. Any rumors as to where will
power is going or is he leaving? So that is
the number one question that we will be talking about
until we have some answer. The first thing we need
to know is is he going to be invited back
to Team Penske. You know, he made a mention that

(01:18:45):
when someone said asked him in the press conference, do
you feel like you're putting things in your own hands again?
And who's to say they're not? You know, I think
that's just kind of talking. Will would probably admit, yeah,
I don't really have fully control over this. I think
he understands that if there is still a place for
him a Team Penskey, that's going to be his best path.

(01:19:07):
And then I think he's going to decide what are
my options and will I be comfortable with them? And
one thing I did hear from Connor Daly's podcast with Will,
which should have thought of a little bit, And one
thing that his management company can help him with, which
Fernando Alonso owns. Will mentioned sportscar racing, more specifically World

(01:19:32):
Endurance Championship. It has become very difficult to get hired
as a top level driver in IMSA. You can, but
unless you've gone up that factory path and been a
Porsche BMW whatever. It's hard to just say I'm an
IndyCar driver, I'm here. Used to be easy transition, not

(01:19:55):
so much anymore. I feel like I see more of
that in the World Endurance Championship the Path to Lama,
that we see more big name drivers get opportunities there
because there are oftentimes three drivers per event rather than
just a two. So I think that would make some

(01:20:16):
sense a lot of those that that's one of the
options that Calumilot had. Calumilt was weighing a factory paid
deal with was with Cadillac. I think it was where
Sebastian Boordat is now or coming over and going through
the growing process that is Premo racing, and he still

(01:20:36):
wanted to do IndyCar racing. He took this, but I
feel like that probably was something that he had to
do a little think about. So that is a legitimate
option for Power. Maybe that's the scenario. Maybe he is
going to be offered a fourth seat for Team Penske.
It's a little bit hard. It's not an automatic to
say how we are getting to thirty three cars for

(01:20:59):
the Indie five hundred. It is going to happen, but
sometimes it takes some work for that to happen. I
think it's in Team Penske's It's in Penske Entertainment's best
interests for Team Penske to field a fourth car, especially
when it's someone like Willpower. So I would not rule

(01:21:22):
that out being sort of a nice going away gift. Hey,
you're going to do this in World Endurance Championship. Maybe
they can lead him to Porscha Penske. I don't know
those are Porsche guys. Maybe maybe not, but I thought
that made a lot of sense on that front. Well.

Speaker 2 (01:21:39):
I think seeing him in an inighty five hundred ride
with Team Penske is high on the list of the
possible outcomes here.

Speaker 1 (01:21:48):
Now.

Speaker 2 (01:21:48):
The only thing I would say, and I know he's
an Australian born driver, and the only thing I would
say is does he want you different than Calamilott? A European?
He's been an American driver here for many years. He's
got a wife from basically Central Indiana. Does he want

(01:22:09):
to go have a European schedule?

Speaker 1 (01:22:11):
I don't know that short season though I get it,
sixteen races. I think you're just flying away for those
weekends and it would still be less work, less time
away from home by a lot than an Indy Car schedule.
It's not ideal, it's not option one. And while some
drivers are all about it's only the Indy five hundred,
real Power can show his strength and skill by running

(01:22:35):
on Rodent street races. He's really good at Indy, but
he's really good at Rodent street races, and I think
he would like to find a full season option to
do that, just like Simon Pagano. I don't know if
Pagano was offered that Indy only type of deal, but
he still wanted to be a full time IndyCar driver
and that's what he chose. Where could Power go? A

(01:22:58):
lot of people talk about Ray Hall, Grim and Lanigan.
How does that work with the financials? Would they look
at what's deviln di Francesco situation, what's Louis Foster's situation?
Multi year contract? Did they take one of these drivers
and say, we're going to continue to have them in

(01:23:19):
our family, but we're going to do like Anassi did
and farm them out to another team that needs a
little bit of budget and a driver. But you somebody's
got to pay for it, and they might decide, yeah,
if we can get Power. We're just going to create
space and we'll figure it out. Honkos, and all of

(01:23:40):
these teams that I'm mentioning, Power has to look at
them and where they're at in the standings and say,
all right, do I want to do this? Honkos. I
don't think anybody's locked up there Dale Coin Racing don't
think they have two seats locked up there is How
are they going to pay him? I don't see that
being much of an option. I think they're probably going

(01:24:03):
to try to work to keep rinas VK. That should
be a lesser salary than what will Power would command.
I think Prema is going to be what they are
for next year. The best seat out there was the
sixty six for Meyer Shank, and that's now off the market.
Marcus Armstrong is driving that car next season unless we

(01:24:24):
get some sort of shock thing, which I don't expect
to be. I expect Marcus Erickson in the third Andretti
car next year. He's got a contract. I think they're
going to fulfill that. He, by the way, was second
in the Indy five hundred on the road this year
and is a good team player. Not all three year
drivers can win races all the time. Maybe there's something

(01:24:47):
to be said that you want to have two running
for the championship and you want to have a third
that contributes in certain ways, is good with all your
partners like Marcus is and oh, by the way, has
won four races and could have been a three time
Indy five hundred winner with a couple of breaks going
some different ways. So I don't see anything happening on

(01:25:10):
that front. The other one is the simple trade to Foight,
and that's probably going to take Penske paying for that,
because I don't see how Foight would have the resources
to be able to hire Willpower. Yeah, I think we
got I don't.

Speaker 2 (01:25:27):
I don't know where I put my money, but I
think he'll The most logical thing to me is he
runs a Team Penske fourth card Indy next year and
and he quietly steps aside because none of the others,
you know, he's he's just had the he's had the
perfect sort of walk off. If you can't win the
Indy five hundred and the championship in your last year,

(01:25:49):
he's gone out on top, and I think he'd be
okay with that.

Speaker 1 (01:25:53):
Fascinating questions once we do not have answers for at
this point, we'll see what we missed and more next
on track Side, Hi, this cold heard it and you're
listening to Trackside on ninety three to five and one
oh seven the final segment. What we missed We miss
seeing Chip Ganassi Racing testing at the Nashville super Speedway today.
I think it was just their three cars. So we'll

(01:26:14):
see if that can apply at all to Milwaukee this weekend,
and certainly we think it should help. Although remember the
only team that tested the head of Portland was Andretti
and it did not go well for them entirely. So
testing is simply that it is testing schedule for the weekend.
It's two day weekend and it's been flips. So you

(01:26:35):
may see have seen some schedules that had the first
IndyCar practice at eight am local nine o'clock Eastern on
Saturday morning. That's been switched. I think they realized, wait
a minute, why is the top level series cleaning off
the track on Saturday morning? That's what the lowest level
series has to do. And alas it will be Indy
next so Jack Harvey and I and Georgia Henneberry will

(01:26:57):
be there bright and early eight am on fs T
two on Saturday morning. That's Central time, nine o'clock Eastern time.
Then the first IndyCar practice is at eleven Eastern on
FS one. That's where qualifying will be at two o'clock.
Then Indie next qualifying is back to FS two, and
then the final practice which includes either high line or
low line however you want to look at it, at

(01:27:18):
four thirty Eastern time. Couple of other nuggets. Florida's Logan Sargent,
who did parts of a couple of seasons in F one,
is going to be racing LMP two here at IMS
and also Rhode Atlanta with the team that Benjamin Peterson
is racing four. And the new NASCAR Xfinity Series name
starting next year is the NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series.

(01:27:41):
We're on Tuesday down again next week. We'll see it
then

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