Gateway Indycar 2017

[Johnsfolly]

Watching the pit stop competition. Race to.start in about an hour☺! May not be able to post pictures.

[Johnsfolly]

Jackie and I went to the Indycar race with a couple of friends. One from Columbia and the other from Indianapolis. We had purchased paddock passes and wanted to try to get some interactions with some of the drivers. Wandering around the paddock is a juxtaposition of the high rollers out to be seen to the true motorheads drooling over engines/transmissions that can put out 800+ horsepower and propel these cars to speeds over 180 MPH. We were a little bit of both. Impressed with these vehicles as well as some serious people watching and autograph hounding.

Cars going in for pre-race inspections.

Our friend Owen who is from Scotland. He is a big F1 fan that has been to several F1 races. He was absolutely gobsmacked by how close you can get to the cars, the track, and the drivers including his new man crush Josef Newgarden.

Jackie on the pit wall.

Jackie was excited about meeting Tony Kanaan and we spent most of the day to get his autograph. If you know Indycar racing you will know that TK has a prominent proboscis. My daughter wanted to meet him and ask if she could boop his nose. Well after several attempts at putting ourselves in a position to get near TK we never really did. So she asked one of his crew members if she could boop the nosecone of his car.

It was a beautiful night for racing. There were a couple of crashes within the first four laps. One of the drivers bumping the wall was Tony Kanaan. He ended ups three laps down and never really recovered.

James Hinchliffe (got his autograph) in the pits. They were quick stops all night long. The cars just looked great under the lights!

After leading the majority of the race, Josef Newgarden found himself in second position with less than 30 laps remaining. He made a extremely risky pass where he actually bumped his teammate out of the way to take the lead. Could have taken himself and Simon Pagenaud out of the race. The pass stuck and he won easily. Pagenaud lost the lead and also got passed by Scott Dixon and ended up third.

Top four from right to left:

Josef Newgarden, Scott Dixon, Simon Pagenaud, and Helio Castroneves.

We had a great time!

[BilletHead]

     Good pictures and racing report John,

 Jackie almost got to check one off her bucket life list. She had the right lure out but missed a potential strike but getting to touch the nose cone instead of his actual nose is an almost catch . Well done Father and daughter!

  BilletHead