Track Walk: Sonoma 2012

The final permanent road course race of the season and the thirteenth round of the Izod IndyCar Season takes place at Sonoma Raceway in California. The GroPro Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma is the first race in three weeks after the cancellation of the China race back in the spring.

Changes
A few changes to the race track configuration this year. A tighter turn seven, widen bus stop and a long run down to the turn eleven hairpin. The race will also be extended ten laps from previous season to eighty-five laps. Other changes have to do with push-2-pass, with a shorter delay of three and a half seconds instead of five that was used at Mid-Ohio.

Additions
Dragon Racing announced Katherine Legge would return at Sonoma in her TrueCar sponsored Chevrolet and Sebastian Saavedra will run the same car he ran at Indianapolis with AFS and Andretti Autosport.

CART Revival
News of the week came on Sunday when Robin Miller dropped a bomb on Wind Tunnel stating four to five team owners are trying to purchase the IndyCar Series from the Hulman-George family. No names were made public. Over the past few days things have died down. People have been speculating that while some may want to buy the series, the series may not be for sale. We will probably hear more during the weekend.

2013 Schedule
IndyCar will be heading back to Texas next year along with St. Pete, Long Beach, Sao Paulo, Indianapolis, Toronto, Edmonton, Iowa, Barber, Houston, Milwaukee and Belle Isle. Sonoma and Fontana both have three year deals with their sponsors but nothing has been confirmed with IndyCar. Mid-Ohio and Baltimore have not been confirmed for 2013. Reportedly other interested venues are Pocono, Michigan, NOLA Motorsports Park with other rumors of races in Austin, a third race in Canada and Brasilia, the capital city of Brazil. It has come out that doubleheaders at road and street courses are being considered for next year. The schedule is tentatively set to be announced on September 1st.

2014 Indy Lights Chassis
In the last week, two groups have come forward with ideas for the new Indy Lights car. DeltaWing has made it known they would like to become the new Lights car, while ALMS team Dyson Racing, in partnership with former Lola employees have a design similar to the car Lola presented to become the new IndyCar back in 2010. The Dyson group has decided to call their proposed car the "Hulman" in honor of Tony Hulman and his family.

Predictions
The point standings will remain close. Power will come out with the lead but Hunter-Reay will remain in second, while Dixon jumps ahead of Castroneves for third. Franchitti has a good weekend, as does Hildebrand in his home race. I know I have taken him before and more than one occasion but I will take Hinchcliffe this weekend and if he does not win I will not pick him for the remainder of 2012. If not Hinchcliffe, Power is a smart pick. He has won the last two Sonoma races from pole. Sleeper: Sebastien Bourdais.