I’m at Road America… for NASCAR?!?

I’ve never seen an episode of The Surreal Life, but I feel like I’m living it in just one day at the track.

NASCAR, yes, NASCAR (!) is at Road America. And suddenly, this soon-to-be 21-year-old walks around the media center here a veteran of the circuit but a rookie to covering the Nationwide Series, while all the NASCAR crew are making their first appearances at this great track.

There have been plenty of odd couples throughout history but NASCAR and Road America is about as bizarre as it gets in racing terms. The only thing on par would be Formula One at Bristol.

This is strange. Four years here seeing Champ Car, ALMS, and the SCCA Runoffs, and now these lumbering beasts are pounding the surface. Beaching it in gravel. Braking early (waaay early).

You have greats like Jacques Villeneuve, Ron Fellows, Patrick Long and others in the field – a ton of young hotshoes (yes, as this is a non-joint weekend with Sprint Cup there are a BEVY of young stock car standouts), and those that fill out the field. At least one-third of the 43 cars are pure black or white blank canvasses that are likely to compete but a handful of laps because they “start-and-park.”

In other words, the teams don’t have the money for tires and crews, so they have skeleton efforts and retire due to “handling” or “rear end” issues. (Oddly, these are some of the issues people note about Milka Duno in IndyCar. Small world.)

The NASCAR mantra is also in full effect. ALMS embraces the open paddock, Champ Car certainly showcased its assets to fans here (cool cars, cool people), but at NASCAR? No way. This is OUR house and OUR rules.

The transporters are fenced off along the wall, preventing access to anyone without a pass even in a cold garage, and not only do you need credentials but a separate photo ID to get in. I hate to say I’ve become a “hard card snob,” but the unlimited access and small portability of the hard card versus a bigger, clunky, flipping and choking lanyard is night and day.

As for the race? There will be MANY cautions. When these cars go into the gravel, it takes at least 10 minutes between a crew arriving to dig them out and send them on their way.

The cars are slow. Sorry, but they are. Ten seconds slower than Trans-Am. Twelve than an ALMS GT2 BMW, Porsche, Corvette or Ferrari. Thirty-five (35!) slower than the overall lap record set by Dario Franchitti in a CART race. Yes, there’s more straight line speed, but getting these things slowed down is a Leviathan task. Michael McDowell, who’s won here in Star Mazda, said he needs a Sharpie to “draw in 6, 7, 8, 9 signs” for the earliest braking points.

Now that said, I think this will be a great EVENT. Certainly the Road America staff – despite their “Yellow shirt” tendencies on allowing access to certain points on the track (anybody who’s been to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway should get that reference) – know what makes a great show. The NASCAR media people I met today seem quite nice and hospitable from their overall PR person (I think), to Justin Allgaier’s at Penske (granted, that’s a Penske PR person), to the ESPN crew of Dr. Jerry Punch, Mike Massaro, and the lovely Jamie Little.

Paraded as heroes, the drivers here will take a lap before the green. The ratings will probably be higher on ESPN2 for this race than any IndyCar event non-Indy 500. And I’m almost certain there will be a green-white-checkered finish, which at this track is another 8 MILES. Try stretching the fuel that long.

There’s no threat of rain – though severe storms and natural family concerns prompted me to instead book a hotel for the night rather than make trips to and from Milwaukee at the last minute (better to be lucky than good I guess as there was quite a nice room, close to the track, still available).

The initial reaction on day one is that I’m glad to have seen the way NASCAR operates from a media member perspective, but I can’t imagine covering this series full-time, with 36 races plus non-points events and a far less enjoyable atmosphere. As much as I love traveling (I’m almost as bad as George Clooney’s character in Up in the Air, but not quite), I can’t fathom doing this much.

Maybe that’s just me. That’s the uncensored version.

On the bright side, here’s my thoughts on Friday at the track. Out for now, cheers.

Le Mans reflections

Last week was all Le Mans, all the time – even if I wasn’t actually there. It's a lot different covering from home as opposed to at the circuit.

The week was all about our blog coverage to the MAX. Writing/editing blog posts, photo teasers and galleries, tweets, and other odds and ends. And then after a whole week of preparation, came the race.

Oh the race.

I stayed up all 24 hours, but had max technical issues, first my laptop crashing (the battery was the culprit, I found out a couple days later), the video stream cutting in and out since Time Warner Cable basic in Wisconsin doesn't include SPEED, Twitter crashing, and then my backup desktop computer locking up every hour on the hour with too many processes running. As it was, nobody saw the tech. issues I had because the blog looked great.

I don’t think anybody saw the Pugs having their issues either. Well-deserved win for Audi, Pug kinda shot themselves in the foot with their right bank engine issues. Davidson did likewise with the whole aggressive Corvette pass. Major props to Radio Le Mans and John Hindhaugh for their coverage.

My laptop now has its battery being sent back for repairs. I’ll be on the go the next six weekends in succession – Elkhart Lake this one for the Nationwide race, then seeing family in Phoenix and San Diego through July 6, back to Milwaukee for a day, leave for Salt Lake City (next ALMS round) on the 8th, there for a weekend, Milwaukee again, then Lime Rock for the following ALMS weekend.

Holy cow. This summer is intense. Out for now, cheers.

What a freaking joke.

Rare is the time that merits a Saturday night near-midnight blog post, but this has to be said. I have no other words to describe the complete ineptitude of the "Holmatro Safety Team" in response to Simona de Silvestro during the night's IZOD IndyCar Series race at Texas Motor Speedway other than the title of this post.

De Silvestro crashed from turn 2 and was in a fireball from where she hit the wall and came to rest on the inside of turn 4 on the oval.

The first truck rolled up and the guys looked like the three stooges, trying to roll out a fire hose (fire extinguishers, anybody?) and then just standing around asking themselves what to do.

All this while Simona is trying to get out and is in the middle of a burning crapwagon. Yes, I said it (full disclosure, since I don't cover the series full-time, I'm just saying it. PT might agree.) It was more than 30 seconds from when the car rested to get her out and nearly a minute from the time of the accident. In racing terms, that's an ETERNITY.

Thank goodness for the one guy who went in to help extract her from the car, but even that was more chaotic than it needed to be since he didn't get the fire out but instead pulled her out sideways.

Her grace and class in the face of a horribly bungled rescue attempt by a patchwork crew who have given themselves the same name as the completely different and actually legitimate crew that existed in Champ Car is a testament to her character and her resolve. If it's me, or likely anyone else in that situation, we're holding back f-bombs, and rightfully so because we're wondering why you screwed up so bad.

Not only that, but the usually on-the-ball Versus telecast neglected to show replays of the accident or talk to crewmembers in the immediate aftermath of the accident. Her excellent engineer Michael Cannon was visibly frustrated.

I realize I'm less than three weeks from turning 21 so can be considered "young," but I've watched IndyCar racing for 15 years and covered it for five. And that has to be the weakest exhibition I've EVER seen by a safety team. If that batch of characters was the crew on site for Alex Zanardi's near death accident in Germany in 2001, he would not have survived. Alex Tagliani might not have either.

This is not the same group that made their mark as the most renowned crew on the CART/Champ Car side with Drs. Steve Olvey and Terry Trammell. Randy Bernard's been open to many suggestions so far and one this renegade young scribe will suggest is pink slips to all bar the one member of this team who epically failed in this situation.

Thank God for Simona's sake (or anyone else who might have been in such an unfortunate position) it wasn't worse.

***

The race itself had more passing and genuine interest with Danica and Marco threatening the leaders and for another week running, the best car and driver won with Ryan Briscoe keeping the "Big Two" firmly entrenched in P1. The only addendum I'll add is that Danica should have received a black flag for an egregious blocking maneuver on her teammate Tony Kanaan. TK was rightly frustrated and if "what goes around, comes around," then by all means do so.

Another sad story for Andretti Autosport is that this is probably Ryan Hunter-Reay's last race for that team, and that's the epitome of unjust. He's currently sixth in points (first in the non-Penske/Ganassi class) with a win and several top fives - not to mention IZOD's poster boy. It's criminal he, Graham Rahal and so many others are on the sidelines. Hopefully there's something that sees his season continue but it would be an 11th-hour deal at this point, I think.

Out for now, and off to bed. Cheers.

Indy 500 post-mortem

Oops. Guess I was off the ball on every aspect of picking. But, hey, as a responsible member of the media, that's probably karma for picking anyway.

Congrats to Dario. Only him or TK should have been standing in Victory Lane after the race. And when TK said the best car and driver won today, that confirmed it. One front wing change proved the turn of mastery that launched Franchitti into another stratosphere on Sunday, leading 155 of 200 laps.

After that it was a bit of an odd finishing order. Thanks to the unsurprisingly abysmal ABC coverage, we didn't see much of Dan Wheldon, Alex Lloyd, and others who eventually wound up in the top 15.

So how far off were my picks? Briscoe - my pick to win - crashed out. Dixon - my backup choice - lost a wheel on the pit stops. Rookie-of-the-year pick Ana Beatriz lost a few laps early and the same befell "3B" (thanks, Marshall Pruett) Bertrand Baguette when he lost a mirror. And naturally, Mario Romancini not only wasn't first out, but he was first rookie to the finish in 13th.

As much as I like Simona de Silvestro and feel her winning the month's ROY award is deserved, Mario should have got a share of it for being the fastest qualifier and top finisher driving for Conquest Racing. Either way, good show by both of those two.

For now it's time for Le Mans prep, and although I won't be there this year, there will still be plenty of work involved. And should be at Road America in a couple weeks to see NASCAR's Nationwide Series. Goodness me, do those words hurt to type.

Out for now, cheers.