New addition to the Indy 500 entrants list. Buddy Lazier has been announced with the Hemelgarn Johnson #91. Lazier ran the #91 last year and started 32nd and ended up 17th. Lazier’s entrance makes him the 5th previous winner of the 500 So here is the updated list of 41 entrants. Team # Driver AJ Foyt Enterprises 14 Vitor Meira AJ Foyt Enterprises 41 AJ Foyt IV AJ Foyt Enterprises 48 TBA Andretti Green Racing 7 Danica Patrick Andretti Green Racing 11 Tony Kanaan Andretti Green Racing 26 Marco Andretti…
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The latest news from the IndyCar Series, Indy Lights, Pro Mazda, and USF2000!
IndyCar – Milka is Back
Dreyer and Reinbold has announced that Milka Duno has been picked up again for a limited schedule. With their 2nd car for Kansas and their 4th car for Indy listed as TBA, it was clear that Dreyer and Reinbold had something in the works with somebody other than Darren Manning and Milka’s name was most heavily linked with said works. While Milka definitely improved over last season, she is still not nearly as talented as most of the Indy Lights field. And while the media has to grudgingly accept that…
Read MoreIndyCar – Attendance and Ratings
Attendance figures have been released for the Long Beach Grand Prix with a weekend total of 175,000. This is up from last years 170,000 for the Champ Car World Series finale. On the surface, a bump of 5,000 doesn’t seem to carry much significance, but with the stagnant economy, the numbers should be read as a win for the race promoters. But the numbers only tell part of the story. This event’s headline act is far more stable than CART or CCWS was in their last few visits here. The…
Read MoreIndyCar – Kansas City Preview
The IndyCar series makes it’s first visit to an oval this weekend on the hectic return trip from Long Beach. Kansas City is one of the five 1.5 mile ovals on the circuit this year, including Texas, Homestead, Chicago and Kentucky. And while the usual suspects (Ganassi, Penske & Andretti Green) are expected to continue their total domination of the ovals, there might be more hope for the other teams this year. An excellent article was posted today on IndyCar.com describing how the IndyCar series has fixed the wheelbase of…
Read MoreOpenpaddock.net Live From Kansas City
As the IndyCar series moves to Kansas City this weekend, so does openpaddock.net. We will be reporting everyday from the track with updates and editorial as events happen! The entire staff will be in attendance and we will be in the paddock getting the low down on all of the weekends activities. We will also be covering the Indy Lights series as well as the other happenings in the world of motorsports. Keep it tuned to Openpaddock.net and join the conversation all week long for your IndyCar content as well as reports all…
Read MoreIndyCars in Kansas City: A Little History
Believe it or not, the first Indy car race in Kansas City didn’t happen in 2001, but in 1922. For three years, 1922-1924, AAA sanctioned a total of four championship car races at the Kansas City Speedway, a one and a quarter mile board track. Sadly, the track has since been demolished, but the winner of that first race in 1922 was none other than Tommy Milton, two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 Mile Sweepstakes, once in 1921 and again in 1923. Milton won the 240-lap 300-mile event at the…
Read MoreIndyCar – Dario Wins Long Beach
Dario Franchitti showed everybody this weekend that a season in Nascar did not dull his abilities on the street courses. On the tight streets of Long Beach, he displayed his dominance by putting up more passes than anyone else. It certainly didn’t hurt matters that Dario’s two pitstops occurred just moments before full course yellows, allowing him to take the lead and comfortably stay there. But the stories coming out of Long Beach this weekend don’t stop with the top step of the podium. Take your pick. Helio returns to…
Read MoreIndyCar – 500 Update
Going into the day, we knew that KV racing had scheduled a press conference. We also pretty much knew exactly what they would talk about since Robin Miller told us he was sworn to secrecy about it on Wind Tunnel last Sunday, and then proceeded to act like he wasn’t leaking it. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that KV had put together enough hamburgers and hot dogs to lure Paul Tracy out of his Forsythe induced retirement. Jimmy Vasser (part owner of KV racing with Kevin…
Read MoreIndyCar – Helio in for Long Beach!
Robin Miller is reporting that Helio will be driving for Team Penske in his familiar #3 this weekend. Will Power will drive the #12 entry that as of yet, Team Penske hasn’t even unpacked. We incorrectly assumed that the #12 would be for Helio, not for Will Power. Trackside Online reports that Team Penske has called a press conference for later this afternoon to discuss the situation, but currently the media and even Brian Barnhart are swarming the Penske operation at Long Beach for quotes and information. It will good…
Read MoreIndyCar – Versus Telecast Thoughts
The IndyCar series kicked off their season two weeks ago at St. Petersburg on the Versus network, and while the on air product was vastly superior to anything ESPN/ABC have given IndyCar fans over the last decade, the TV ratings are initially telling a different story. The final Neilsen ratings scored just 235,000 households. Granted, this was Versus first race with the IndyCar series, but the ratings were down significantly from last year despite Versus’ noticeable efforts at advertising the series. The on air talent alone was a vast improvement…
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