INDIANAPOLIS — For the first time since 2014, the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship is back at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Here are 5 things I’m watching for Sunday’s TireRace.com Battle of the Bricks.
Can Penske Capitalize
This has been a Penske perfect weekend thus far for his Porsche program. Literally. On Friday, Matt Campbell and Felipe Nasr were quickest on the speed charts. That was the start of something special. They were quickest on Saturday morning and turned that into a pole on Saturday afternoon.
Campbell and Nasr are seventh in points with results of 7th, 5th, 3rd, 9th, 7th, 6th, 1st. Can they win two straight races? No one has this season but so far, this looks like their race to lose.
If anyone tops them, it may very well be their teammates of Nick Tandy and Mathieu Jaminet. They were P2 in both practice and qualifying on Saturday and look primed to make a run at it on Sunday.
Tandy and Jaminet sit fourth in points after finishes of 8th, 3rd, 1st, 2nd, 9th, 5th, 7th.
Josef Newgarden won this past May’s Indianapolis 500. Can 1 of his 2 Porsche’s win Sunday’s Battle on the Bricks?
Penske has won the Brickyard 400 (2018 with Brad Keselowski), the Xfinity Series race on both the oval (2012 with Brad Keselowski) and road course (2021 with Austin Cindric), the GMR Grand Prix (5 times), the Harvest Grand Prix (swept 2020) and the Gallagher Grand Prix (2021 – Will Power).
He’s won 19 Indy 500’s, 18 poles and 18 Pit Stop Competition victories.
The only thing missing – IMSA road course win.
Meyer Shank Racing’s Battle Back
When Meyer Shank Racing announced that Tom Blomqvist would be one of their INDYCAR driver’s in 2024 and that Helio Castroneves would stay with the team but as a part-time driver and full-time owner, one under the radar tidbit from that press conference was the future of their IMSA program.
“We’re still working on that. They’re up in the air right now,” Mike Shank said that morning of the shared INDYCAR-NASCAR race weekend.
The reason being in flux is due to the Daytona incident this past January.
HPD well after the race finished discovered some tire pressure data manipulation and reported it directly to IMSA officials. As a result, a bevy of penalties was unleashed on MSR and at that moment, some friction between HPD and MSR came about.
There’s been some awkwardness ever since. Then you get to WTR Andretti announcing that they’ll field a second car for 2024 with the Acura badge. Is that in addition to MSR’s team or is WTR Andretti getting MSR’s program?
Then you read statements like we saw in the press release with WTRAndretti and you get a sense that this relationship between MSR and Acura is more than likely done.
“We’re looking forward to working with both (cars),” said HPD President and Technical Director, David Salters. “I’m stoked to see we have a super strong driver line-up across both our electrified Acura hypercars.”
“Both” of our electrified Acura hypercars. Not three. I feel like that’s some strong wording there. Which is why I’m not shocked that after Shank made his comments last month, he then went off the cuff and spoke of almost as if it his words were an audition or job interview for other manufacturers paying attention.
“Those guys, through our tough January, have battled back and they’re in the championship again, which is unbelievable,” he continued. “You put those points back on the board and they’ve checked out on the championship.
“We don’t know yet, is the answer. We’ll know probably in four to five weeks. This is my 20th year as a team in the Rolex. We’ve won it three times. We’ve had much success. It was kind of the start of all this. We’re doing everything we can to stay on.”
In saying that, you’d think a team of that much success, one that is the two-time defending Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona champions, more on that in a second and the defending IMSA champion would be attractive to remain inside the HPD camp.
They’ve ran under the HPD badge since 2015. Why stop now?
Well, that Daytona tire fiasco could be why.
However, as Shank said, they went from a hole of 200 points back up to fifth (-118) with two races remaining. It was a remarkable comeback for which they feel like they have a lot to offer.
But, if HPD doesn’t support them, where do they go?
“I don’t know what the odds are. They float. It goes from 50/50 to 80% right now,” Shank said on if he’ll be on the IMSA grid in 2024. “It’s coming down to the last minute, which I don’t like a lot. That’s the way it is right now.”
How much of this is manufacturer dependent?
“That’s a good question. In my life, Jim (Meyer) and I yelled at each other over this for a while now, the team that Jim and I have created on that side has won everything, is extremely competitive, fought back from a 200-point deficit, has a chance at the championship again. In my mind, they’re at the pinnacle level of sports car racing,” Shank said. “That’s where they deserve to be. You can imagine where I think we need to be.”
Meyer chimed in and said don’t count them out just yet. They’re in the thick of it and we’re about to see the aggression get ramped up even more.
“If we’re in contention when we leave this place in a month, might as well come (to Road Atlanta, season finale) because it’s going to be a Martinsville short track race,” Shank agreed.
We’re reached that place. Blomqvist and Braun have put together a hell of a run with three straight podiums including a win in Mosport and a runner-up in Road America. Can they continue this string through Sunday?
They’ll start third.
There’s a lot riding on the final two races for MSR and one of which could be their sports car future. Ironically enough, MSR shares an alliance in INDYCAR with Andretti and it appears at least for today, Andretti is taking their IMSA car.
Traffic
All five classes will compete simultaneously during the TireRack.com Battle on the Bricks, with a nearly 10-second gap in lap times during the test between the GTP and GTD cars. That should ensure plenty of action and drama as quicker prototypes will have to navigate lapped traffic of the production-appearing GTD classes.
Bourdais says that’s going to make this weekend’s race a tricky, yet thrilling one. With so many cars around here (48), there’s going to be traffic and going to be plenty of times with that gap in a speed differential to have the GTP cars catching the others.
However, you can’t just pass as easily as you’d like and if you catch a slower car in the wrong place, it could be a massive loss of time which could make for a race to where no one is going to get too far ahead.
Plus, the braking zones here will make for a lot of moves too.
With how tight these individual classes are and how close the margins should be, catching traffic at the wrong time could make or break your chances of kissing the bricks at the end.
With 48 cars and 14 turns on a 2.439-mile track, it’s going to be busy and chaotic on Sunday.
Points
LMP3 and GTD could see run away winners this weekend. For LMP3, a main storyline is can Gar Robinson stay undefeated? While he didn’t win the season opener at Daytona, that also wasn’t a points paying event either. Every other race since (Sebring, Watkins Glen, Mosport, Road America) he’s reached victory lane. Can he win on Sunday? He crashed in qualify and will start last.
Then you have the GTD Championship for which the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 entry can clinch the title already.
This ride has been en fuego this season. Both Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow have a record setting 5 trips to victory lane including two straight. With a 375 point lead in points, if they leave Indy 385 points up or more on the field, then they’d clinch the title a race early. They start on the pole.
The other three are closely contested races.
In LMP2, Paul-Loup Chatin and Ben Keating hold the points lead and will come from the pole too. But, we’ve also seen five different winners in all five races run this season including the top three in points winning the last three. They just won in Elkhart Lake. Can they extend their lead on Sunday?
What about GTD Pro?
Jimmy Vasser knows a thing or two about racing here. Now, can he take his sports car team to victory lane on Sunday? KVSH won the 2013 Indy 500. A decade later, they’re eyeing an IMSA win in GTD Pro.
Ben Barnicoat and Jack Hawksworth in the No. 14 entry give them the best shot. They hold a 144 point lead in the standings on the heels of two wins in 9 races. While they’ve not won since June (Watkins Glen), they do have three straight runner-up finishes and 7 top 2 results in the last 8 races.
Among the pro class, this car was quickest in all four test sessions in July too. They were quickest on Friday but third in Saturday’s practice and qualifying.
Then you have the main class, the GTP cars.
The GTP points leader is WTR Andretti’s Filipe Albuquerque and Ricky Taylor. While they currently sit P1, they’re also winless in 7 races this season. Can they pick up an Indy win on Sunday? They start 5th.
Just 139 points separates first from seventh in points.
Also, each of the four GTP manufacturers, Acura, BMW, Cadillac and Porsche, have all won at least one race this season. They also sit 1-2-3-4 in points with Acura (WTR Andretti), Whelen Engineering (Cadillac), BMW (RLL) and Porsche (Penske) taking those four spots. 98 points separates them.
Penske looks the best, most notably the 7 car, but no one has won two straight races this season among this class either.
Meyer Shank Racing’s No. 60 Acura won Daytona. The Whelen Engineering Cadillac Racing (No. 31) team won Sebring. Porsche Penske Motorsports (No. 6) won Long Beach. Ganassi’s Cadillac Racing (No. 01) car won Monterey. BMW M Team RLL (No. 25) won Watkins Glen. MSR won again in Mosport. Then, the No. 7 Penske Porsche won Watkins Glen.
Does Campbell or Nasr win on Sunday or do we see another winner?
The only full-time cars yet to win is ironically enough the points leader in the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Acura and the No. 24 BMW M Team RLL entry. That’s it.
How The INDYCAR/IMSA Teams Fare
This one is obvious for me. I’m an INDYCAR guy so it’s only natural for me to watch how their IMSA teams do. Since 2014, five different INDYCAR teams have won the Indianapolis 500. All five will be represented in Sunday’s race.
Reigning series champions, Chip Ganassi Racing, has the No. 01 Cadillac V-Series R that’s driven by Sebastien Bourdais and Renger van der Zande. Team Penske has a pair of Porsche Penske Motorsports entries. Nick Tandy and Mathieu Jaminet is in the No. 6 Porsche 963 and Matt Campbell and Felipe Nasr in the No. 7 Porsche 963.
Andretti Autosport doesn’t have their own entry but they’re joined with Wayne Taylor Racing on the No. 10 Acura ARX-06 with Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque driving. Meyer Shank Racing has the other Acura in the No. 60 driven by Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun.
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing has a pair of BMW M Hybrid V8’s driven by Philipp Eng and Augusto Farfus in the No. 24 and Connor De Phillippi and Nick Yelloly in the No. 25.
That’s 7 of the 10 Grand Touring Prototype cars with INDYCAR ties. Can they pull off a win?
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