And in times of chaos, there is only one constant.... Scott Dixon.
No seriously, dude has a reputation for winning when there are big tech/rule changes - he won the second championship with the DW12, the first championship with the manufacturer aerokits, first championship with the UAK, and the first championship with the areoscreen. Winning the first championship with hybrid engines would be par for the course for him lol
A full-field test of INDYCAR’s power unit is scheduled for Tuesday, June 11 at the Milwaukee Mile to allow teams to finalize implementation ahead of the July debut.
I’m excited for it! People are judging it hard before they’ve even seen it operate, and obviously the run up to the introduction hasn’t been smooth, but let’s just chillax and give it a chance first….
No, no, no. This will be the death of the series. So will Penske. So will Fox. So will the aeroscreen. So will fewer ovals. So will the UAK. So will not getting a new chassis by "x" year. So will...
Good for IndyCar if they actually get this done mid-season. When they announced it, it definitely seemed like a cope to pretend they weren’t pushing it to 2025. I’m in favor of IndyCar showing that they can successfully do things.
Damn, they're claiming they're running it at 120hp? So we're going to be around ~870 in full boost settings with full hybrid assist and it can only get better through the years?
I really think this will be not a big deal. They’ve done enough running and testing to ensure reliability. The issue I thought for the delay was the parts availability. I am interested to see how this changes strategy or maybe levels the playing field slightly with everyone figuring it out at first
If there's one thing this sub is good at, its shutting down the people sounding the alarm about parts shortages months before they cause public issues. The delay was always due to the need to have enough of a parts pool to address any issues or potential failures before rolling out.
I'm excited they are gonna get it implemented before iowa. Lots of series have switched to hybrids for road courses. This will make them the first hybrid car to run ovals though afaik. I'm really looking forward to see how it works
Yep and the Mid Ohio introduction is clearly aimed at Honda. Central Ohio is the de facto US HQ for Honda. They'll probably have lots of brass on site for the race.
In other news, the NFL will ban the forward pass for the playoffs only for next season.
Why, why, WHY are we doing this halfway through a season? There is way too much risk involved here if a championship contender loses a race because their unit fails.
This is just loads of bad press waiting to happen. I can’t imagine that the hybrid is that important to Honda and Chevy that they’d jeopardize competitive integrity halfway through the season just to push it through.
Should’ve just waited until next year. Yet another unforced error by the series.
It’s more that I’m just confident that Honda is already gone and rushing this through is just INDYCAR playing appeasement like what it did with Porsche. They balked when we said no hybrids, and then 2 months later we’re going “omg look sexy new hybrids!!!!” and Porsche told us to kick rocks.
Between when that piece about Honda potentially leaving came out (Dec 2023) and the fact that they’d likely announce their departure sometime early next year, there’s just not a lot of time to get a solution together.
But this isn’t a solution. This has a much higher chance of causing bad press and issues with teams than it does of making Honda decide to stay IMO.
The issue I see with your point of view is the bulletproof reliability that's been seen in testing with the unit up until this point. That's why they do the extensive testing, to ensure they won't be randomly failing and embarrassing the series like you think they will. You seem a tad overly negative in the face of the available data which is positive.
But the key word there is testing. Everything is different in a race setting. It’s quite possible that they’ve tuned it down to an extreme degree in testing to avoid issues that might rise in a race. Granted, it’s still possible that they keep them tuned down, but we don’t really know for certain until it’s race time.
And in any case, this is still a fundamental change to the car even without the reliability factor. Adding this significant of a weight change halfway through the season doesn’t sit well with me. I just don’t think this is the best option available to INDYCAR with the hybrid question.
I truly believe waiting until 2025 was the best decision. I know Honda and Chevy wanted it pushed through, but I guarantee that someone is going to be pissed off if they go into Mid-O leading the championship and then see a drop off in form after the hybrid is introduced. It’s all just a last-ditch effort to keep Honda appeased while risking the ever-dropping trust from teams.
The hybrids alone are not enough, I agree. But if they can reduce cost, honda leaving is far from a forgone conclusion. According to reports, they are still an active participant in discussions regarding new technical regs
It’s a pretty big if on if they can reduce the cost. Don’t know how they do that without tuning down the engines an insane degree, or INDYCAR suddenly becomes dramatically more popular than what it currently is.
And the whole P2P debacle probably isn’t making HRC too thrilled with the series owner either. Just gotta hope that somehow INDYCAR can reverse the trend here.
The issue is that making an ROI suddenly increase enough for them to stay isn’t something that happens quickly. It’ll take several years to actually reach that point and I don’t know if Honda will stick around that much longer.
The Series likely sees it as a way of keeping the base tuned in. Lets be honest: viewership has already sucked this year. Adding this now isn’t messing up some amazing momentum the Series has going.
I for one am more likely to watch the events live. Last year you could have called the road courses for Palou and ovals for Newgarden and not been far off. That isn’t really engaging.
As to bad press? P2P issue already has done that for this season. And it drove zero increase in viewership or interest.
Competitive integrity, it took a huge hit in St Pete. This announcement is more damage control and directing attention away from scandal on the eve of the biggest event of the season.
Only 3 years late, thanks for nuthin.
Word on the street is Indycar is working with Firestone on a radical new tire design called a radial, stay tuned. Oh wait never mind it’s been done already.
The introduction of potential reliability issues midway through the season could really throw the championship for a loop