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LEO PARENTE: Let's get right to it today.
Indy 500 preview.
Some things to watch for as you watch the 500.
And as a racing fan, you know you must.
Indy's still a US and global iconic event.
Plus, this year's new cars, like them or not, give you
many reasons to watch, good and bad.
Monaco F1, another most iconic race.
Not real F1.
This track perverts the capabilities of F1 tech.
But, like last year, it sets up for great strategy and
great driving.
Guys like Alonzo, Button, Hamilton, Vettel, Raikkonen,
and who knows, will put on a real wheel show.
And finally, Isle of Man TT.
Bikes and sidecars on the streets of the mountains and
towns of the Isle of Man, off the shores of Great Britain
and Ireland, for those of you who cut geography class for a
smoke behind the school gym.
It's one thing to circle the Brickyard or carve the Monaco
streets in your carbon tub safety cell race car.
Isle of Man racers on 200 mile-an-hour bikes take the
racing thing to a whole other level.
You know, I would have said they had big balls, but last
time Mike Spinelli mentioned Isle of Man on his Drive
Central show, you guys spit out a spate of "he
loves Man" gay jokes.
So during the Shakedown intro that's about to play, get it
all out of your system, so when we get back, we can go
back to work after the break.
The Indy 500.
For the casual fan, know this-- this year, Indy has new
cars designed to be safer, but controversial, not just for
their looks, but for not fully polished handling and slower
speed versus the old car they replaced.
And three engine manufacturers versus being all Honda for the
last many years.
Chevy and Lotus join Honda.
But Indy 2012 has been an all-Chevy show so far.
The winner usually comes from the front of the 33-car field.
In 1987, however, Al Unser won his fourth Indy starting 20th.
Since then, the average starting spot for the winner
has been 5.6.
So think the first two rows.
That doesn't mean there aren't dramatic runs from the back to
try and steal a win.
Tony Kanaan in 2010, and Scott Goodyear in 1992.
Tony starts P8 and is due for an Indy win.
All the major players of Indy are ready to go.
Penske, who brought Chevy back to Indy, is on
pole, plus P4 and 5.
Andretti Autosport, also Chevy, fills out the rest of
the front two rows.
And Ganassi, with Dario Franchitti, Scott Dixon,
Charlie Kimball, and Graham Rahal lead the Honda charge.
But they start P16, 15, 14, and 12, respectively.
Lotus, for your information, is in the last two last-row
row, so far off the pace, ha, I get to do this joke.
The TV broadcast will once again feature "Batcam," a
camera on a cable running alongside the main straight
capable of 80 mile-an-hour speeds.
Hey, that's faster than Jean Alesi's Lotus.
OK, not much of a joke.
The race favorites--
Will Power and Helio Castroneves from Penske, Marco
Andretti from dad's team, and his teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay.
The series ABC TV marketing media favorites?
Let's start with Ryan Briscoe and his
Izod-sponsored Penske on pole.
Izod is the IndyCar series sponsor, and word is Izod is
not happy with the series.
So pole and a win would be at nice sponsor-saving result.
Next, James Hinchcliffe is the 2012 media darling with his
hipster internet video comedy act.
He drives the GoDaddy car that Danica Patrick used to wheel.
You'll see one of his snarky videos on the race broadcast,
so you decide if he's cool or not.
A GoDaddy win would be good for IndyCar to keep a brand
who spent a ton of money happy, to exorcise Danica from
Indy once and for, and to reward all the Danica haters
with the opportunity to say, see?
JR Hildebrand, the other media story the Indy media beats
like a baby seal on a Sarah Palin family outing.
JR lost the 2011 500 on the last turn, and that allows the
media to torture him with actual questions like, JR, are
you ready to win now?
Yeah, no way.
Look at the publicity I got for crashing.
I'm more confident in the Greek economy than my driving.
So lap one, turn one, I'm just going to auger the damn thing
into the safer barrier, and let you focus on the real
racers, you ***.
No?
OK.
The emotional picks for a win?
How about Reubens Barrichello starting P10.
How about his teammate, Kanaan,
as I mentioned earlier?
And Sebastian Bourdais, free from the no-horsepower Lotus,
now in a Chevy, because he's fast, fearless, and needs to
remind all that he's still a great racer.
He won four consecutive Champ Car championships.
He's starting 25th, so he'll be the guy to watch making the
run from the back.
And a prayer for Dan Wheldon, and hopes that Indy and the TV
show do not overplay his passing.
And now some Indy 500 details for the techno
geeks in the audience.
Indy's success is a function of low drag, handling,
horsepower, and balancing setup against the many
variables of track condition, weather, temperature, air
density, wind, et cetera, et cetera.
The race will be exciting, because the teams and racers
are dealing with so many new things and have no experience
on how to make the new cars and engines work best or eke
out the versus others advantage.
Plus, the 2012 rules are trying to limit the
adjustability of the cars and the tweaks the teams can do to
make the cars special.
But the key is to cut drag and make a slippery race car.
Listen a bit to Dario Franchitti as he discusses a
bit of that about his Ganassi Dallara Honda.
Thanks to our sponsor, Simraceway,
for sharing the video.
DARIO FRANCHITTI: No matter what we tried, that was the
speed we had in the car.
And it's not good enough, quite honestly.
Everybody on this team works so hard, and we just--
both in the car and the engine side of the things, I think we
got left behind a little bit.
And it's unfortunate.
Actually, not much else to say on it.
These cars, right now, there's only so much you
can take off drag-wise.
It's an unfortunate part.
If we had another couple hundred horsepower, we
wouldn't have that issue.
But there's only so much we can take off.
And so we took off all the efficient things, with the
leftover drag numbers--
or downforce over drag numbers, it's supposed to be.
And then we got really creative.
We maxed the rear wing out to minus 10, which in my book
becomes an airplane wing at that point, because it's
actually working the opposite.
But then the underflow, there's the sides of the
underflow that we're allowed to take off.
And you're pretty much dropping 250 pounds of
downforce a side for--
I don't know--
5 pounds of drag benefit or something ridiculous.
And Dixon and I qualified with one of those off each.
Dixon actually tried to practice with two off, and
that didn't work so well.
But nobody ever said we were smart, but we
really give it our all.
Hopefully, the engine that Honda brings for the race is
going to better.
And we've all done a better job with setting the car up
for the race.
And we'll see how it goes.
LEO PARENTE: Indy the series is trying to limit car
adjustability.
But with new tech and new rules comes officiating
challenges for compliance.
After pole date, 13 teams were handed $275,000 in cash
penalties for trying things, but avoiding the rules for
various infractions, most of it positioned as using the
wrong parts, or not following procedures.
All the cars in the first three rows--
save for the Josef Newgarden/Sarah
Fisher Hartman entry--
all the Penske, Andretti, KB racing entries
got a wallet nix.
In there, there was something about violating the spec
prohibiting the use of computer logic to control any
function of the braking system.
Was there a bit of stability control being tried?
Remember McLaren F1 and their brake
control to manage handling?
Watch the race become a drafting party.
Qualifying may not matter this year.
Using the draft to jump to the front and/or riding the draft
to save fuel may make 2012, more than any other year, a
race to just get yourself in position for the last 50
miles, 25 laps and for Ganassi Hondas to draft with a faster
Chevy to save fuel and maybe a pit stop.
But getting to a Chevy and passing are
two different issues.
And everything new may mean inexperience for all, but the
teams with the most experience still carry an advantage.
So Penske versus Ganassi verses Andretti for the win
will only not happen if we have crashes, if they make
mistakes, or the new engines fail the first
500-mile live fire test.
Let's all watch.
So there's middle America glamour at the Indy 500.
Corn dogs with Grey Poupon, anyone?
But for global glamour, there's the Monaco F1.
Thursday practice gave us Button at the front with Lotus
and Ferrari next.
But with rain-- and it is practice, so really, did we
learn anything?
The chatter is setting Lotus up for the win, or the
fall if they fail.
Kimi and Romain will be tough.
Monaco is not tough on engines, only 43% percent full
throttle, and not a horsepower track.
It's also not tough on brakes either.
It's medium stress versus other tracks.
High downforce and a lot of mechanical grip,
which gets us to tires.
Pirelli is introducing their P0 Red super softs to
complement their yellow soft tires.
So--
and I do not know the right strategy--
do you use reds to qualify and get track position, or save
red sets for the race and lower lap times as the race
burns on, or is there one-stop strategy lurking
to steal the race?
Now, Kimi said he wants to go rallying again.
The team said no.
They said Robert Kubica.
Monaco is the perfect car control venue to get the
sideways scanty flip [BLEEP]
out of his system.
I say Kimi versus Alonzo, Lewis, and
Nico will be awesome.
But what do you think?
Comments, please.
And after the race, let's see who gets it right.
What else do I think?
I get to tease you with the news I got today that may have
Shakedown going to an F1 race and not Montreal or Austin.
But look at the Austin pavement.
It's going down already.
So stay freakin' tuned for our F1
Shakedown travel show plans.
Anthony Bourdain, I'm coming for you.
Now, as cool as Indy and Monaco may be, the legend and
myth of the Isle of Man TT--
Tourist Trophy-- bike races transcends all, including my
ignorance of the events and our ability to show you
awesome video of bikes bangin' through the 37-mile,
60.7-kilometer circuit.
So I've loaded you up with links to the TT in our
description to set you on your way, like a rider leaving the
starting line, heading toward Bray Hill.
May 26 through June 8, practice and racing--
superbikes, superstocks, the side cars, which everyone
loves, the TTX GP green bikes, historic.
Enjoy the links.
Give me your thoughts and your smarts about the TT to fill in
the things I don't know.
And somewhere in all this, I'll try to Skype call one of
the TT stars to get some real insights.
And give me some names on that, too.
So to end, let me reflect back on last Monday's show.
Thank you for all the great ugly race car suggestions.
You guys know ugly.
I was going to make a montage, but you gave me so many.
And for the record, no, I don't think Tajima's Pikes
Peak EV is ugly.
And yes, I agree with commenter whaddayasay1--
I am ugly.
But I've been with girls.
What've you got?
Some Purell in your imagination?
***.
Also, a programming reminder.
This week's Shakedown will be on Tuesday May 29th.
That way, I can enjoy the holiday a bit, but get ready
to report back to you on all the weekend's racing results.
Well, all of it except the NASCAR race.
We'll leave that to speed.com to tell you how Billy Bob
Dickslapper won the Cracker Barrel cheese stores and gas
pumpathon 600 from some track in armpit, North Carolina.
Have a great weekend.
And in the US for Memorial Day, see you on Tuesday.
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