After noon at Barber Motorsports Park, I returned trackside to photograph the Star Mazda Series qualifying session for Open Paddock’s coverage of the Mazda Road to Indy. Five minutes after that qualifying, the IndyCars were due to practice again. I could’ve resumed photographing from the ‘outside’ of Turn 2 or Turn 3, where I’d been yesterday and today for quite long enough, or try a new vantage. So I went to the inside of Turns 2 and 3, onto a landscaped (pruned trees, flowering shrubs) hill around which the race…
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IndyCar – Afternoon in Dairyland
Greetings from Barber Motorsports Park in Leeds, Alabama. Lightning is striking and rain is falling on this “picturesque, gorgeous” racing facility in the hills east of Birmingham. So all the camera monkeys, like me, scurried for shelter. Some of the photographers are carrying equipment that costs as much as my car. Serious hardware, including 600mm autofocus lenses. That’s right, kids; the biggest lenses that I’ve seen that weren’t called telescopes. The cloudy, slightly breezy morning at B.M.P. saw two sports car series practice, then a lunch break. This afternoon I…
Read MoreIndyCar – Welcome to Barber Motorsports Park
Hello from beautiful Barber Motorsports Park in Leeds, Alabama, near Birmingham. I’ve been spectating here at sports car, IndyCar, and motorcycle races since 2007, and I’ll chime-in with my agreement that this is a “gorgeous facility.” Unlike Sebring International Raceway and other race tracks you can easily call to mind, this is repeatedly referred to, year after year, as a ‘beautiful, park-like setting.’ I rolled in mid-day Thursday, a day or two after race teams, and found Parking Lot C already nine-tenths full. I was surprised, but I shouldn’t have…
Read MoreIndyCar – Friday Comedic Relief
Happy Friday and welcome to the weekend! To make sure we get the best weekday started off right, we have this for you. Along with Kevin, we also have Brian McKay back at it behind the lens at Barber Motorsports Park. As we know, Alabama is true NASCAR country. The folks are some of the nicest people I have ever met but man do they love their NASCAR! Brian stopped off at a local retail store when he had this conversation with one of the clerks…enjoy! Clerk: “You here for…
Read MoreIndyCar – Thursday, March 29 Barber Report
Editor’s Note: Kevin Neely has been kind enough to write some articles for us while down at Barber Motorsports Park this week. I would like to personally thank Kevin for reaching out and offering his observations! There’s one thing for certain about late March/early April in Central Alabama; the weather is going to be anything but predictable. For the past two years, the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama presented by Legacy Credit Union has had the luxury of Chamber of Commerce weather conditions. This year, however, that streak looks…
Read MoreEpisode 131 – OpenPaddock.net Podcast
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadThis week we welcome Jenna Fryer to talk about the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. She talks not only about the weekend, but some of the things IndyCar should be thinking about going forward. Doug is here this week as well and we talk Mazda Road to indy, Formula 1, and this weekend’s round of the WRC in Portugal. Thank you for the download and we really hope you enjoy the show!
Read MoreIndyCar – Lotus Can Supply for 2012, Compete Though?
The off season was rich with speculation that Lotus may or may not make the 2012 season with its Judd engine. Think back to late December when there was little to no contact between Lotus or really any of the teams that were in the market for an engine. Autosport.com featured an article this morning that indicated Lotus was in fact capable of supplying the teams they had signed for the entire season. That includes bonus parts and support for HVM, Herta, DRR, and Dragon. The recent change in ownership…
Read MoreIndyCar – St. Pete Grand Prix Highlights
IndyCar – Stunning in St. Pete
This weekend’s opening round of the IZOD IndyCar Series had a lot of questions around it. Had Randy Bernard fixed some of the credibility issues, would the new cars and engines be competitive, would the field of talent be as good as what they were predicting? The answer to all of these questions (at least after the first round) was a resounding yes. St. Petersburg lived up to everything we had hoped for and then some. Great story lines, great drivers through the field, and the cars looked very competitive in…
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