2012 Indy Car

[CurtEgerer]

Ouch, those do hurt a little to look at! I'm going to give the series a chance and see what happens. I thought the prospect of 3 engine manufacturers was a big step forward. Ummm, maybe not. Apparently, all the engines go into the 'Indycar pool' and Indycar randomly assigns the engines to the teams. That way, no one team has an advantage

I've always thought the most interesting racing throughout history have been where one team DID have a big advantage, because the rules allowed it. One of the best examples (besides the 917/30) was Mercedes-Penske at the Indy 500 in 1994 when they developed the top-secret Indy 500-only pushrod motor and proceeded to blow everybody into the weeds. I was at qualifying weekend and there must have been 100,000+ people there. Everybody wanted to see that car run. Not sure there will be much excitement for a bunch of sealed pool motors in spec chassis

[Noah930]

IIRC, the "bodywork" aero modifications from different manufacturers is also something on hold for this initial season. All cars will run the same aero package. Sounds reasonable from a start-up perspective. But it does make it more of a spec-car series for this upcoming year.

I'm all for safety. Too many racing heros have died. Just wish safety didn't have to equate fugliness.

Like Curt (and others have) remarked, sometimes racing is entertaining because the playing field isn't totally flat.

[Flieger]

I wish they would go with the group C fuel limit or the Keith Duckworth fuel flowrate limit. Then you could do whatever the heck you want and they just throttle back the fuel if they get too fast. Then you end up with efficiency gains and all the cool technology like Flybrids and active suspension and active aero. Things that are relevant to street cars (at least sports cars).

[intakexhaust]

Safety aside, this is part older news but might explain why the wheelbase increase and a whole lot more. Seems the engineers indeed have their challenge - 'sizeable oversteer on corner entry and understeer on corner exit'.

AUTO RACING - INDYCAR: Dallara Commits To DW12 Updates

Also, to keep this 'qausi' spec series in check, teams are budgeted to $3 mil. and no, please don't compare that to F1 dizzy money.