IndyCar Series: Show Us Your Twins
It wasn't a bad idea.
Here's what looks wrong:
The Twin 275 KM races at Texas Motor Speedway on June 11, 2011 will be broadcast on Versus, at the starting time of 8:00 PM CDT.
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The first race will run about one hour. That brings us to at least 9:00 CDT, 10:00 EDT.
Per current regulation, none of the spare cars may be fitted with engines until teams are granted approval to switch to a backup car.
Two hours between races would be enough time for a forced engine change. It might be enough time to prep a spare car. That would be your only shot, if you wad your car up in the first race.
Much less than two hours between races, and I don't see how crews will have enough time to turn the cars around if they have a significant problem in the first race.
That means the green flag flies for the second race at 11:00 CDT, midnight in the east. Does that strike you as a great idea?
The length of each race will be 275 kilometers = 171 miles = 114 laps. Maybe you already see this coming...
Remember Homestead 2009? Dario Franchitti backed off and started saving fuel after about 15 laps. That track is also a 1.5 mile oval, so if you can make your number at 3.5 MPG, you can run 50 laps.
That's how Dario won the race, and the championship. Briscoe and Dixon went at it tooth and nail, and were on a pit sequence of about 46 laps. They lost the race on fuel mileage.
So we start our 114 lap race and hope for a yellow. If we're making our number, and we catch some yellow flag laps during the first stint...do we race hard? Or do we conserve fuel until the first stop?
If some people have bad luck, maybe we can run 57 laps if we catch enough yellows. So we fuel the car, and race the second stint against the fuel number and not the competition. Maybe it would take 10 or 12 laps under caution each stint. Maybe if we save enough fuel the whole race, we make it on one stop.
Bye bye, tooth. Catch ya later, nail.
Hopefully somebody smarter than me crunched the numbers already. Can the cars run at Texas with a minor reduction in downforce as compared to Homestead? Maybe that drag reduction moves the number to 3.6 MPG. If enough caution laps get you to 3.9 MPG, you made your number. One stop. I hope somebody thought about this...
The Twins looked perky to me at 200 miles each, with a four hour gap to lift and separate them. For each race your fuel windows are wide open, and so is the throttle. You will have to make two stops, yellows or not.
And no matter what sort of luck you have in the first race, you can swap an engine or prep a spare car in time for the nightcap. The day/night double header creates performance variables, and a different look for the viewing audience, for each of the races.
Below is the schedule I wrote out in April, and intended the Twin 200's for a venue that was in greater need of a gimmick than TMS.
It wasn't a bad idea. Let's hope the Twin 275 KM races at TMS is even better.
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