Indianapolis Qualifying: Preview

This weekend kicks off the competitive festivities at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway as drivers and teams vie for their spot in the 100th anniversary running of the Indianapolis 500.  Before a driver can put his or her face on the Borg-Warner Trophy, that driver must first qualify.  This year, with no less than 40 cars and drivers looking to make the race, qualifying alone will be no small feat.

With the high number of competitive rides this year, coupled with the poor weather that has dramatically reduced track availability this week, many teams are finding themselves behind the 8-ball and will be scurrying to make up for lost time.  In the past, teams typically spent the entire first week on track looking for qualifying speed with the goal of safely securing a spot in the field on the first weekend.  If successful, the entire second week of practice would be used to find a good setup for the 500 miles on race day.  Now that the schedule has been slashed, track time is at a premium.  Fast Friday looks to be frantic from track open at noon until the closing gun goes off at 6 PM.  They must find speed.  They must find their setup.  Teams cannot afford downtime.  And they certainly can’t afford to put cars into the wall.

Unfortunately, that is just what happened to second-year driver Simona de Silvestro yesterday.  Simona’s HVM Racing car had a failure somewhere in the rear end that put her hard into the wall in turn 3.  Though she went for a terrifying ride through the north end of the track, Simona was largely unhurt, seeing only some relatively minor burns to her hands.  Though released from Methodist Hospital late yesterday afternoon, Simona has yet to be cleared to drive by IndyCar medical officials — she will be evaluated again this morning.  A bigger problem for HVM, however, is that their primary car (which the team had affectionately nicknamed Janet) was completely destroyed and will now be unavailable for qualifying.  The backup car (also sporting a nickname:  Pork Chop), which is believed to be the oldest chassis currently in use by any INDYCAR team, is substantially heavier and does not have all the latest “trick components” that have been developed since 2003.  If Simona was having difficulty finding enough speed with Janet, it will be even more difficult with Pork Chop.

Of course, HVM Racing is not the only team that will be searching for speed going into the weekend.  Several of the smaller teams and the rookies will be desperate to find the comfort that comes with a secure qualifying speed.  But it’s not only the small teams and rookies that are desperate.  Andretti Autosport driver Mike Conway is still searching, able only to attain a fast lap of 222.359 mph yesterday, good for 36th fastest on the day out of 40 cars turning laps.  Could Mike Conway be in for a weekend like Tony Kanaan experienced last year?

Given the little amount of practice time available, it seem likely that some of the Big 5, particularly those from Target Chip Ganassi Racing, have yet to really stretch their legs and trim their car for outright speed.  With Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti placing 8th and 16th on the speed chart yesterday respectively, odds are high that the Target Twins were looking to find stable race cars on a day that saw heavy traffic on track and was more conducive to simulating race conditions than qualifying.

On that note, understanding just how fast a particular driver is to this point in the week is difficult to do.  For instance, Danica Patrick, who wound up 10th fastest yesterday, posted her lap of 226.267 mph early in the day while she followed in the draft of Bruno Junqueira for nearly an entire lap.  While these practice lap times are impressive, they are often extremely difficult to duplicate in qualifying.  We won’t have a real understanding of who has what speed until this afternoon when teams really start to trim out their cars.  Even then, if the track is as busy as predicted, finding a clear spot on track to run a clean lap may be virtually impossible.  Look for big numbers to be posted early in practice that may not be duplicated when qualifying commences on Saturday afternoon.

The other big story for the weekend, of course, is the weather.  Current predictions have rain likely on Saturday with a lesser chance on Sunday.  The big dilemma will come if rain falls on Sunday without the field being filled.  If that is the case, all unqualified cars will draw for a spot in the qualifying line for Monday (or whenever the first available day should be), and each car will have one opportunity to post a speed.  There will be no wave-offs, and there will be no second chances.  The fastest cars on the day will complete the field.  Given that only 24 cars will be allowed to qualify on Saturday, there should be nine spots up for grabs on Sunday.  Keep this in mind, though:  if rain ends qualifying without a full field, those drivers who do qualify Saturday and Sunday will be locked into the field and cannot be bumped out on the make-up day.  If 27 cars are in the field as of Sunday night, the remaining unqualified cars will vie for the last six positions.  That makes the strategy even more interesting for teams that might be close to the bubble on Sunday if rain looks to be a threat.

Of course, this is all conjecture at this point, and if there is one thing that is certain about Indianapolis, it’s that things will not go according to plan.  Last year, nobody could have foreseen the difficulties that a former IZOD IndyCar Series champion like Tony Kanaan would experience in simply finding the speed to qualify after crashing his cars on both Saturday and Sunday or that rookie Sebastian Saavedra would be in the field, and then out, and then in, and back out, and finally in again (after crashing and being taken to the hospital for observation).  Without a doubt, something strange will happen this weekend.  It’s likely that at least one full-time IICS participant will not find a spot in the starting line-up.  It’s just as likely that a driver who struggles all day on Sunday will find enough speed in the final hour of qualifying to bump his way in, much in the way that John Andretti did in 2009.  Pole Day is about raw speed.  Race day is about tradition and pageantry.  Bump Day, though, is about twists and turns and gut-wrenching emotions.  There is one thing you can take to the bank:  at the end of qualifying, 33 drivers and teams will be happy.  The rest will be heartbroken and begin crossing off days until the Indianapolis Motor Speedway opens again for practice in 2012.

Be sure to stay tuned to More Front Wing all weekend long as I bring you up-to-the-minute news and information from Indianapolis, both here and on Twitter (@MoreFrontWing).