Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama Preview

Josef Newgarden leads Scott Dixon during the 2015 Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park. [Photo by: Chris Owens]

Alabama isn’t exactly home territory for open wheel Indy-style racing, but the Verizon Indy Car Series will race Sunday for the seventh time at Barber Motorsports Park in this NASCAR-crazy state.

The 17-turn 2.30-mile natural road course first appeared on the schedule in 2010 after testing there the year before showed that the facility would be suitable for Indy car racing and has since developed a reputation for aggressive, competitive racing.

Six caution periods were recorded (20 laps) in 2011 while 21 drivers finished on the lead lap in 2013. Competitive, aggressive? Yes, the track has been good on both accounts.

The series comes to Alabama after a successful run last week at Long Beach where winner Simon Pagenaud was given a controversial “warning” by race stewards after crossing a blend line with three tires while re-entering the track after his final pit stop. Many felt that call (or non-call some said) should have resulted in a stronger penalty that likely would have given the win to Chip Ganassi’s Scott Dixon.

Team Penske’s Pagenaud leads the points chase by 14 over Dixon, while Penske teammates Juan Pablo Montoya (-28) and Helio Castroneves (-42) and Ganassi’s Tony Kanaan (-52) trail; all powered by Chevrolet. Takuma Sato (-61) is sixth in the standings for Honda’s AJ Foyt Racing.

At Long Beach Chevy took ten of the top 14 finishing spots while Honda stumbled to a “sweep” of the final seven positions.

Chevy has obviously found something (or “somethings”) aero or engine-related, that have made a shambles of the engine manufacturer’s competition. Chevy (3 wins) now leads Honda (0 wins) by 109-points coming to Barber.

Honda had one bright light in the caution-free LB race as Sato finished fifth and was pressing the leading-group at the finish. “Coming from eighth to finish fifth and fighting with Tony (Kanaan) and Juan (Pablo Montoya) in the final laps made the race very enjoyable.”

The recent past at Barber doesn’t give Honda much hope for a turn-around for Sunday’s 90-lap, 207-mile chase as Chevy swept the first three starting spots last year, with Castroneves on the pole, while Josef Newgarden’s Chevy won the race.

So it’s a “you-pick-um” among Chevy’s drivers: Castroneves? Power? Dixon? Montoya? Sato and Graham Rahal would like to pull off an unlikely Honda upset, but that would be like the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series…oh, wait!

QUOTES
• Honda’s Graham Rahal (after Long Beach): “As a series we need to look at the way that we generate the downforce on these cars. We need to get rid of so much top-side downforce; put the under-wings back on. We all have the parts, so it’s a no-expense addition that will allow everybody to follow closer and make the racing better.”
• Scott Dixon: “Barber is demanding. It’s like a little bullring almost. It’s very fast and very high grip. There are both fast and blind corners and it can get narrow in some places as well. The track has done a great job with the park over the years and it attracts a lot of people, which is great for our sport.”
• Juan Pablo Montoya: “It (Barber) has been one of our more challenging tracks since I came back to the series but we’re looking to change that this time around. I don’t have quite as much experience as pretty much everyone else so track time is important to our team.”

NOTES
• Team Penske has scored three wins at Barber (2010-2012), the most of any IndyCar team.
• Dixon has stood on the podium in each of his six starts here (four were runner-up), but he is still looking for his first win.
• Will Power (3), Castroneves (2) and Hunter-Reay have been the only pole-winners here in six events.
• Twenty-one drivers are again entered for Sunday’s race with Max Chilton, Alex Rossi and Conor Daly driving here for the first time in an Indy car. Daly and Rossi have competed in Indy Lights races here in past years.
• Should he qualify, Tony Kanaan will start his record 253rd consecutive series’ race.
• TV- NBC-SN, Practice: Friday, April 22, Noon ET, Live/ Qualifying: Saturday, 4:00 p.m. ET, Live/ Race: Sunday, 3:00 p.m. ET, Live.

Paul Gohde

Paul Gohde heard the sound of race cars early in his life.

Growing up in suburban Milwaukee, just north of Wisconsin State Fair Park in the 1950’s, Paul had no idea what “that noise” was all about that he heard several times a year. Finally, through prodding by friends of his parents, he was taken to several Thursday night modified stock car races on the old quarter-mile dirt track that was in the infield of the one-mile oval -and he was hooked.

The first Milwaukee Mile event that he attended was the 1959 Rex Mays Classic won by Johnny Thomson in the pink Racing Associates lay-down Offy built by the legendary Lujie Lesovsky. After the 100-miler Gohde got the winner’s autograph in the pits, something he couldn’t do when he saw Hank Aaron hit a home run at County Stadium, and, again, he was hooked.

Paul began attending the Indianapolis 500 in 1961, and saw A. J. Foyt’s first Indy win. He began covering races in 1965 for Racing Wheels newspaper in Vancouver, WA as a reporter/photographer and his first credentialed race was Jim Clark’s historic Indy win.Paul has also done reporting, columns and photography for Midwest Racing News since the mid-sixties, with the 1967 Hoosier 100 being his first big race to report for them.

He is a retired middle-grade teacher, an avid collector of vintage racing memorabilia, and a tour guide at Miller Park. Paul loves to explore abandoned race tracks both here and in Europe, with the Brooklands track in Weybridge England being his favorite. Married to Paula, they have three adult children and two cats.

Paul loves the diversity of all types of racing, “a factor that got me hooked in the first place.”

racingnation.com

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