Saturday a.m. report from NOLA (update)
It's much cooler this morning today, 70 degrees, under cloudy skies with a pretty good chance of rain before qualifying. Although, it should be noted the weather forecast for both today and tomorrow has improved. If/when the rain does come, we expect it to be thunderstorms that move out relatively quickly.
Despite the track being flat and built on swampland, they seem to be able to dry it quite quickly. They have an Air Titan truck on site which you see at many NASCAR races.
Many team members arrived at the track at 9:30 am, which is really late for us who have followed this series for a long time. But given the relatively late practice time (12:30 pm start) it makes sense.
Lucille Dust reporting for AutoRacing1.com
04/11/15
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| Winglets could be in high demand. |
Good morning from a cloudy NOLA Motorsports Park. Weather is still the story here and it seems to change so often we're having a little trouble keeping track.
One thing we are sure of is there remains a shortage of replacement parts for the new front wings for
both Chevrolet and Honda. With rain being the four letter word of the weekend, these parts could become hot items. We'll track the tenor of the paddock on this situation as the next two days unfold.
As for the winglets, which were strengthened after the situation in St. Pete, we've been told the Chevy winglets can still be bumped off by passing cars. I asked a Chevrolet engineer why the winglet has to be on the edge of the wing and he explained that the air has to flow over the tires so that is where the winglet must be placed.
We also looked into the addition of the gravel traps here at NOLA outside turns 6 and 7. Knowing that F1 went away from the concept of gravel traps years ago in favor of wider curbs, artificial grass runoff paths, and then asphalt, we found it odd that NOLA put in a gravel trap. We also learned that the FIA license issued a few months ago did not require the installation of traps, which were only added about 3-4 weeks ago at the request of the drivers.
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| AR1 sees the turn 6-7 area as being potentially troublesome during this weekend's race |
Given the time frame it is perhaps logical that IndyCar added the traps. And safety is obviously paramount. However, given that the old-fashioned traps are very large and very close to the track, we expect cars will easily become stuck resulting in long caution periods to dig the cars out.
Further, our inquiries led us to the conclusion that the gravel trap installation probably cost the track about a half million dollars. Contrarily, a proper up-to-date system of asphalt run-off would have taken more time to install but also would have from our estimates cost about half the price.
This is unfortunate when you consider the track sunk a half million dollars to erect a safety system that is two decades out-of-date and could greatly compromise the quality of the race. NOLA has already sunk major capital into changes for the IndyCar event, and will likely have to redo this area soon. Seems as though a little better communication and oversight might have made for a better, less costly situation for all involved.
Brian Carroccio and Lucille Dust contributed to this report