A visit to Ganassi Racing and driver-coach Dario

Driver coach Dario Franchitti

Recently between the Milwaukee and Iowa IndyCar events, I had the pleasure of visiting Chip Ganassi Racing in Indianapolis. CGR of course also has facilities in North Carolina and Brownsburg, IN for its NASCAR, sports car and rallycross operations, with Indianapolis home to the organization's four-car Verizon IndyCar Series team.

Now, if you had any question as to why CGR has achieved the success it has over the past two decades plus, I can tell you that question is answered the moment you walk through the doors at the Indianapolis shop. Immediately, you are taken aback by the countless trophies, banners and race cars displayed celebrating the team's glorious history across many racing disciplines.

However, the Tuesday morning I visited, no one was sitting around shining trophies. There were amongst other tasks parts to build, a new paint job to put on the #10 Chevrolet of Tony Kanaan, and pit stops to practice. Drivers Scott Dixon and Sage Karam were both at the facility going over data with mechanics and engineers, and overall it just seemed like business as usual as the 10-time series champions were preparing to depart for Iowa that Wednesday.

I'll hopefully have more on my visit to CGR in a later piece. However, for today, I'm going to focus on one of the Ganassi organization's more famous employees and his transition to a very different role within the organization in recent years.

Dario

Dario Franchitti, of course, drove for Chip Ganassi Racing from 2008-2013, first as a member of Ganassi's NASCAR team in 2008, before returning full-time to IndyCar in 2009. From 2009-2011, Franchitti won three consecutive series championships to add to the title he won driving for Andretti Green Racing in 2007. The native of Broxburn, Scotland, who scored his first Indianapolis 500 victory in 2007 with AGR, also won two Indianapolis 500s in 2010 and 2012 for Ganassi.

Unfortunately, lingering concussion-like symptoms from a rather horrific accident at Houston in October of 2013, forced Franchitti to retire at the age of 40. However, as we will see, the wisdom gained from Franchitti's 31 career Indy car wins, three Indy 500 victories and 4 series championships are not going to waste, as Franchitti has transitioned nicely into television commentating on Formula E races and a role with Ganassi

Now, officially, Franchitti is a consultant for Chip Ganassi Racing. Unofficially, Franchitti's specific role is difficult to categorize, largely because it is "continually evolving" as driver of the 83 NovoLog FlexPen Chevrolet Charlie Kimball says.

Dario's Role

[adinserter name="GOOGLE AD"]"Biggest thing, firstly, is that since Dario's retirement he's been involved in the team," says Kimball. "He's been a mentor, an advisor. Having that recent first-hand experience he's been really good to liaise with the drivers, the engineers, the managements, because he's been in that position as a successful driver and can facilitate that communication.

Also, while Franchitti has been referred to as a driver-coach, Kimball says Franchitti's role is "much bigger and more diverse than just driver-coaching."

Dario Franchitti after his 3rd Indy 500 victory in 2012

For example, last year, when Tony Kanaan was selected as the Franchitti's replacement in the #10 Chevrolet, Franchitti who was teammates with Kanaan at AGR from 2003-2007, helped get the Brazilian integrated into the team. Of course, Franchitti had himself been required to do this just five seasons earlier. "Having him around just made my transition into the team that much smoother and easier for everyone involved," said Kanaan.

This past year a lot of focus has been placed on Franchitti's work with rookie Karam. To Franchitti, Karam "has all the attributes," of a star, and has learned this season "just how hard you need to work to be an IndyCar driver." The big thing with Karam is trying to get him to "avoid the pitfalls of being a rookie."

More recently, "I've been leaning on him more," says Kimball. And it is with the driver of the #83 Chevrolet that we will shift our focus.

Kimball

The Carlsbad, CA native turned 30 this past February, and last fall he married longtime girlfriend Kathleen Thompson.

Professionally, the recent race at Iowa was Charlie's 81^st career start. In that span, Kimball has 1 win, 5 podium finishes and a championship best finish of 9^th in 2013. He notes that he is proud to be part of the "winner's club" in IndyCar. Also, as a type 1 diabetic, Kimball mentions that he takes very seriously his role as an ambassador for the diabetes community. And if you've been to an IndyCar race in recent years, you've surely noticed the presence of children and adults alike sporting the orange and blue Novo Nordisk shirts and hats in support of Kimball.

But like a lot of drivers, Kimball is looking for a little more on track. He notes that at given times, he has run well on all the different types of circuits, although short ovals have been perhaps their toughest discipline. He also says at given times the team has done all the things necessary to be a regular front-runner in the series.

Kimball believes he is "knocking on the door of being consistently inside the top-10. This year we've had kind of some rough results from things outside my control – getting run into at St. Pete, a mechanical issue at Long Beach, the rain race at NOLA was a roll of the dice for a lot of people, and getting knocked off the track at Barber – I mean the first clean race we had was the Indy GP and then we had a third at the 500.

"The Detroit race was a real mess for me, an area which we grew from. But then at Texas we had a really good race. So, how do we as a unit, that 83 unit, from spotter to strategist, to engineers, mechanics, pit stop guys, Charlie, Dario, how do we pull from all of these resources?"

"Optimization"

Charlie Kimball

"With Charlie, I think that's a good way putting it to optimize," says Franchitti in response to a word I've put to him. "To make sure he's getting the most out of himself, make sure the communication with the engineers or the engine guys is clear, if there's a situation find out why that happened and try to improve things so it doesn't happen the next week; sometimes its race craft, pre-race preparation using that experience I've gained not just from driving but from working with great drivers and great engineers, and to look for that advantage."

One example Kimball noted was his work with current engineer Brad Goldberg, once an assistant engineer for Franchitti. "I can go to Dario and say ‘why am I not getting this from Brad,' and he can go to Brad who may say ‘I didn't know Charlie would want that.'" Likewise, Goldberg who has a relationship with Franchitti can get a driver's perspective, in assisting with an engineering endeavor. In other words, because Franchitti has a prior relationship with both Kimball and Goldberg, he is able to bring a "global perspective" beneficial to all parties.

Kimball describes characterizes some of the conversations between the three as "brutally honest," but say they are in helping "extract all the resources of Chip Ganassi Racing," and that Franchitti is helping both engineer and driver do that. Kimball, who is seemingly an endless encyclopedia of analogies, referred to Franchitti as "Switzerland," in his exchanges with various members on the team, and specifically in regard to he and Goldberg.

No bull shit!

[adinserter name="GOOGLE AD"]One of the things Franchitti believes made him successful was that he was able to get a lot out of the quality teammates he had throughout his career. There were numerous examples he went through mentioning Dan Wheldon, Michael Andretti, Bryan Herta, Kanaan, Dixon and others. Franchitti noted that Paul Tracy, with whom he formed one-half of a powerful pairing from 1998-2002 taught him the value of "no bull shit, no games, be completely open."

Franchitti notes this lesson served him well throughout his career.

Nowadays, "it's so hard to find an advantage in IndyCar. Drivers are so talented, drivers and great teams are so experienced," says Franchitti. Noting that when he drove for Ganassi, he knew he wasn't going to be able to beat Dixon all the time, Franchitti says, "When you get to a certain level with certain drivers, you're not going to be better every week."

"I'm trying to get Charlie to learn from teammates."

Franchitti would still be driving if IndyCars had canopies

Overall

As Franchitti, says "Each driver requires something a bit different. " Whereas Kanaan and Dixon are given occasional and "minimal" advice, Karam is enduring the ups-and-downs of being a rookie in a top-level series, and Kimball is looking to breakthrough and become a regular front-runner.

Also, as I discussed in my conversation with Kimball, some other contemporaries of his, Josef Newgarden and Graham Rahal are enjoying breakthrough seasons in 2015. While Kimball did not mention them specifically, he does believe he has been been knocking on the door.

With Franchitti's help can he bust the thing wide open?

Time will tell.