The Ace of Aces' Indy car is on display in Arlington
- Mar 13
- 3 min read
Open wheel racing is a sport that demands precision. An IndyCar circuit is unforgiving; even a slight deviation of your machine's wing or the fuel mixture can cost the hundredths of a second that can knock a driver from the top of the podium.
Loyal Scaiaholics will recall I learned those details at a workshop where I drove an IndyCar years ago.
So when drivers arrive at a venue the week of a race, they need to focus on the race. For instance, here's Tony Kanaan doing some research at Hurricane Harbor before the race at Texas Motor Speedway back in 2014.
But that race moved away from TMS years ago, leaving Texas wanting. But during a hypothetical conversation among Arlington's leadership, they devised a plan to bring IndyCar back during the, roughly, two weeks when the Entertainment District slows down each year.
This weekend is the first Java House Grand Prix of Arlington.
A new course--and a road course, no less--demands a lot of planning and focus. I discussed this need for intense concentration with several drivers as they prepared for a calf-roping contest and were being fitted for cowboy boots.
The team from Arrow McLaren explained they wanted to get kids involved to get the next generation excited to watch the sport, so each the drivers picked a munchkin out of the crowd to hold the calf.
I'm not going to spoil it for you, but you can hear in the podcast who won. It was a real nailbiter.
Andretti Global, meantime, sent its drivers to pick out some new cowboy boots. Will Power says western sports have a big following in Australia and New Zealand, so he was ready to put those boots on for the race.
His teammate, Marcus Ericsson, was ready to go all-out. He picked out some boots but then also a hat and leather jacket.
"But the bad guy wears black," I said to him.
"I am the bad guy," he explained.
In fact, he was hoping to get boots with a skull on them, but Lucchese said those were limited edition, so they didn't have any he could buy off the rack.
Down the street at the Medal of Honor Museum has an exhibit open for a recipient who also drove in the first Indy 500.
Rickenbacker got the nickname, "Fast Eddie," and he was actually turned down when he tried to enlist during World War I because of a lack of education.
Many of us, myself in particular, would have said, "Aw, shucks," kicked at the ground and then gone about our day happy we wouldn't have been shot at. Rickenbacker couldn't abide that. The exhibit explains he stayed persistent and was accepted into the Army Air Corps, ultimately earning the medal for actions in 1918.
In fact, he showed pilots and auto racers share some similarities like needing to solve problems quickly.
That topic also came up during a round-table at the museum this week.
You might not think a Medal of Honor recipient shares much in common with a pit crew, but that's why #ScaiPod is here. Sal Giunta says the two jobs are similar because both are under constant pressure.
Chip Ganassi Racing's director of human performance says they have to deliver precision under that pressure. He explains cars might seem like they're driving slow in pit lane, but imagine changing a tire on the freeway. All of a sudden traffic going 60 miles an hour doesn't seem so slow.
Indy cars also have to stop in the pits within two or three inches of their marks, then the crew as to "execute at the same time within one heartbeat," explaining they have to change four tires and load 14 gallons of fuel. If that takes seven seconds, it's a complete failure.
My greatest pit stop failure, meanwhile, was this morning when I filled up at QuikTrip but only realized later I couldn't get a brisket and egg burrito because it's Friday. I have also wrecked so many station cars, one of them just fired all its reporters and the other did away with news cars entirely.
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