Texas Saturday afternoon report

Nothing like getting thrown to the wolves. I caught up with Katherine Legge, who is running the Texas Motor Speedway for the first time.

And I do mean, "The first time." Because of the Lotus follies of the early season, the team didn't do any testing. "I've been thrown in the deep end!" she explained to me. Katherine easily passed her rookie test, and is set to start 22nd tonight.

Testing would've no doubt made her comfortable. On the other hand, a drivers meeting in Detroit yielded a request by the drivers to take down force away, to make the cars more difficult to drive, in an effort to avoid "pack racing." Most of the drivers will be feeling a bit uncomfortable today. Adding more to the excitement is that IndyCar officials — again, due to feedback from the drivers — has change the aero rules for this weekend 3 times.

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Add Firestone to the list of those interested in how this race is gonna go. As I mentioned, the IndyCar people have been playing with the aero package — wickerbills and stuff like that. The hope is that the tires wear out during a run, perhaps dropping lap speed by 5 mph or more between pit stops. Obviously, firestone can cope with this, but
they simply wish they would've been a bit more, uh, informed before they left their shops.

They know that tire wear will be a story here, but they hope everyone realizes that this is the way IndyCar wants it.

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— Tim Wohlford, reporting from TEXAS!!