We've had two weeks to digest how lame big track racing has gotten (Brian Barnhart is working on the problem, apparently), so let's try and forget about it by tackling a couple of killer short tracks.
The site of this week's circus will be Iowa Speedway, a 7/8-mile, D-shaped ring of craziness. Unlike just about all of the 1.5-milers on the schedule, Iowa is delightfully different from everything else. It has variable banking in the turns, which opens up multiple grooves for the drivers. It is also spectacularly wide, which allows the drivers to go three wide on the straights with ease. Most importantly, a race here is won by the driver, not the aerodynamics.
There is but one problem with the track this year: weepers. It rained cats and dogs before the USAC midgets took to the track last night, and the storm left a ton of water in the ground. The midget race was run after the track was dried, but water began popping back up through the track and causing all sorts of issues. USAC cars can deal with losses in grip -- they make their living running on dirt after all. Indy Cars and their little brothers in Indy Lights run too fine of tolerances to be hitting random patches of water on an oval.
Qualifying was "washed out" in a sense by the weepers and at last look, the safety crew was still desperately trying to clean them up (there's an army of trucks and safety workers on the backstretch). It's hard to know how things will look when it comes time for the Indy Lights cars to take to the track, but we're about to find out.
As for the big cars, it's hard to know if they'll even race tomorrow. The weather forecast, at least for the early part of the day, is pretty unfavorable. Word butcher/meteorologist Will from Is It May Yet? says the race will go off, but it will likely start later than scheduled. The problem will be what happens to the water once the rain stops and the surface dries. If the weepers show up tomorrow the way they did today, there will be a massive issue.
As it is, I'll keep up the optimism that we'll race and give my oh-so-awful predictions:
Winner: Dario Franchitti. Dario was second in the first practice, first in the second practice, and will be starting the race near the top of the grid. He's a good driver, he's in one of the fastest cars, and he hasn't won a thing since Chicagoland '07. He'll have to watch out for those Penske cars, though...they'll be fast too.
Dark Horse: Tony Kanaan. It's hard to ever consider Kanaan a "dark horse", but this year has not been kind to his team and they have been relegated to the second tier of IndyCar. However, Tony has it in him to win and he's been consistent in practice. Plus, Kanaan is generally strong on tracks like this one.
Ninja Dark Horse: Tomas Scheckter. What a story it would be if Tomas can bring one home for Dreyer & Reinbold. He has the ability to drive the wheels off his car, as evidenced by his 9th-fastest times in both practice sessions. As long as he doesn't drive his car into the wall and gets a few breaks, he could be near the front at the end.
Danica Watch: Top ten, probably. I don't see her doing all that well in this race, especially since she's had awful luck in this track's brief history. She might be able to challenge her way into the top five, but I don't think she'll get much farther that.
There you have it. Everyone do your anti-rain dance and let's hope the race goes off as planned. Should be a good race, assuming it happens.
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