Seven of eight race weekends and eight of eighteen races of the 2014 Verizon IndyCar Series season have been completed. With two weekends off as a midseason break for the teams and drivers, we will take a look at what has happened up to this point in the season and then we will take a look at what is still to come in 2014 and a little further in the near future.
Today will recap 2014 to date. We will go through the points and take a look at each driver's season through Texas. We will see what has gone right, what has gone wrong and we will touch on some other points along the way.
1. Will Power
The Australian leads the championship with 370 points but he is setting up for a historic season. His worst finish to date is eighth (both at Indianapolis on the road course and oval). He has two victories and five podiums along with two poles and his average finish to date is 3.625. He has led a season high 279 laps and is the only driver to have completed all 929 laps in 2014. Tony Kanaan is the only driver to complete 100% of the laps run in a season. That occur in his 2004 championship season and his worst finish that year was eighth.
While having a dominant car all season, Power has dodged bullets. From avoiding penalties for causing accidents at Long Beach and Belle Isle 1 to overcoming penalties of his own doing at Indianapolis (twice), Belle Isle 2 and Texas. If he keeps making careless mistakes such as speeding on the pit lane, it will ruin what appears to be his best season to date. If he keeps finding a way to put his nose in the wrong place on a road or street circuit, he is bound to end one of his days prematurely and lose valuable points sitting on the sidelines.
The second half of 2014 have a few tracks that balance out for Power. Iowa and Toronto have snake-bitten Power on multiple occasions but Sonoma, Mid-Ohio and Milwauke are tracks he has found success at. At this point, it is Power's championship to lose.
2. Hélio Castroneves
It's been an Hélio Castroneves type of season for Hélio Castroneves. He hasn't been flashy. He hasn't been sitting the world on fire but he finds himself at the top. Before Texas, he had completed every lap in 2014 before finishing a lap back of Ed Carpenter. The Brazilian has a victory and four podiums and trails his teammate by 39 points.
I was critical at the end of 2013 that Castroneves played it too safe and pussyfooting cost him the title. He is behind in the championship and I don't know if he has enough to catch and pass Power in the championship standings. Castroneves has five top fives so far in 2014, he had six in all of 2013. An omen for what could be Castroneves' season to come is of the remaining eight tracks, Castroneves has won on two of them, Mid-Ohio and Sonoma but his last victories at those tracks were in 2001 and 2008 respectively.
3. Ryan Hunter-Reay
What looked to be a second championship waiting to happen after Indianapolis has become another second half of the season come back for Ryan Hunter-Reay and Andretti Autosport. This year's Indianapolis 500 winner trails Power by 60 points. He also has the victory a Barber and a total of four podiums but those are counterbalanced with four finishes outside the top fifteen.
Mechanical gremlins seem to be a theme at Andretti Autosport, having popped up in both 2012 and 2013 for Hunter-Reay. That is the one hurdle the team has to overcome to give Hunter-Reay and any other Andretti Autosport driver a shot at the title. Andretti Autosport has dominated the short ovals, having won the last six races on tracks a mile or shorter and seven of the eight short track races this decade. Hunter-Reay also has a victory at Toronto on his résumé and was running well last year before mechanical problems plagued the 2012 IndyCar champion.
The key thing for Hunter-Reay is having a car that can finish races. If the team can provide him that, he will surely be a contender come Fontana.
4. Simon Pagenaud
Five top fives in eight races have Simon Pagenaud 91 points back of his former Team Australia teammate Will Power. Pagenaud took the inaugural Grand Prix of Indianapolis and had he not had blistering tires during the Indianapolis 500 and if Will Power had not run him into the wall at Belle Isle 1, the Frenchman surely would have eight top ten finishes from eight races.
Pagenaud will have to put himself in better positions for victories as the Frenchman's lone race he has led in is his lone victory in 2014.
The second half looks promising for Pagenaud as he has a top five finish on five of the eight remaining tracks and has a top ten finish on six of the eigh, Milwaukee and Fontana are the exception where he has finished 12th in both his Milwaukee starts and his best Fontana finish was 13th in 2012.
5. Marco Andretti
Marco Andretti rounds out the top five in points, 135 back of Power. I think we should note double points at Indianapolis being the primary reason for wider margins in the championship this early in the season. Pocono and Fontana (the other legs of the Triple Crown, also worth double points) should balance out the standings. Andretti has two podiums and four top tens in 2014. Had he not been caught up in a restart accident at St. Petersburg or had his engine not expired after three laps at Texas, Andretti could be look at six top tens.
It feels as if it is a matter of when, not if, Andretti gets his next victory. He has made 50 starts since his last victory at Iowa in 2011. Before that, Andretti went 77 races between his maiden victory at Sonoma in 2006 and Iowa. Ovals are still Andretti's best shot at a victory. He won pole position at Milwaukee and Pocono last year before an engine failure and poor fuel mileage cost him chances at victory.
6. Carlos Muñoz
Carlos Muñoz leads the rookie of the year standings by a healthy 64-point margin over Mikhail Aleshin but trails Power by 143 markers. The Colombian has picked up where he left off after three starts in 2013. A second at Indianapolis, 17th in a last-minute substitution for Ryan Briscoe at Toronto 2 and a 23rd place finish at Fontana after charging to the front running a line lower than anyone else would imagine. A rookie has not won an IndyCar race since 2007 when Robert Doornbos in ChampCar won two races (Mont-Trembland and San Jose). A rookie has not won an IndyCar oval race since 2003 when Sébastien Bourdais in CART won at Lausitzring.
Muñoz has four top tens in 2014. Muñoz has been to seven of the remaining eight tracks in Indy Lights. He will be racing for the first time at Sonoma later this year. Muñoz has Indy Lights victories at Pocono and two at Fontana.
7. Mike Conway/Ed Carpenter
The IndyCar match made in heaven each have a victory in 2014 and are seventh in the teams' championship. Mike Conway has 122 points while Ed Carpenter has amassed 102 points, aggregating to 226 points, 144 back of the #12 Team Penske Chevrolet. Had Mike Conway not had miscommunication over when to pit at St. Petersburg and Ed Carpenter not been caught on that lap 175 accident at Indianapolis, the #20 could be much higher in the championship and could have another win under it's belt.
Despite the Long Beach victory, Conway has a lot to improve on in 2014. That Long Beach victory is his lone top ten in 2014. He has made it out of the first round of road/street course qualifying on only two of five occasions. Amazingly, his average finish and average starting position is the same, at 13.6667.
Carpenter is slated to be one of the favorite at the remaining four ovals in 2014, having already won at Fontana as well as having top ten finishes at the other three ovals.
8. Juan Pablo Montoya
In his return to open-wheel racing, Montoya's championship position appears to be quite good, but dig away a little and wonder how long it will last. He has a podium and three top fives, leaving him seventh in the championship, 147 points back of Power but has an average finish of 13.5 on road and street courses in 2014 with six road/street events to go. Montoya clear has what it takes on ovals having the capability to stretch fuel longer than anyone else in 2014. He recovered from a pit lane speeding penalty at Indianapolis to finish fifth and was up front all day at Texas.
Montoya has shown that he hasn't lost a step since exiting open-wheel racing in July 2006. He has some room to improve but has not lost the fire that drove him to a championship as a rookie, an Indianapolis 500 winner as a rookie and to the top of the podium at Monaco, Monza, Interlagos and Silverstone.
9. Scott Dixon
The defending IndyCar champion finds himself in a familiar place: Winless. Scott Dixon enters the second half of a season with a bagel in the win column but that isn't the end of the world for the Kiwi. He didn't win until race 10 of 17 in 2007 and lost the championship by about a gallon of fuel. Last year, he didn't win until race 11 of 19 and won the championship with plenty of fuel in the tank.
Dixon has a history of slow starts to a season. This was his third consecutive season with four finishes outside the top ten in the first eight races. The good news for Dixon is the second half of 2014 appears to be his bread and butter. He has won on six of the remaining eight tracks, Iowa and Fontana being the exceptions.
At the halfway point last year, Dixon was 7th in the championship, 92 points back of Castroneves. This year he is 156 points back, 8th in the championship. Can he repeat his 2013 efforts? Only time will tell.
10. Tony Kanaan
Six top tens but only one top five has Tony Kanaan 9th in the championship. He sits 181 points back of Power. Kanaan's 2014 season has been consistent but noting to jump for joy about. As he has aged, the results fade. He is coming off finishing 11th in the 2013 championship, the first time he has failed to finish in the top ten of the championship since 2002 in CART.
He's led one lap in 2014. Since reunification he has only three victories. He can bring the car home in one piece but just like his fellow Brazilian Castroneves, does he have enough to scratch and claw his way to finishes higher up the pylon?
11. Justin Wilson
Rounding out the top ten of the drivers' championship is the ever reliable Justin Wilson. One hundred and eighty-eight points back of Power, Wilson has a top five and three top tens in eight races. Considering Wilson and Dale Coyne Racing lost their two wizards in engineers Bill Pappas and John Dick, top ten at the halfway point is a pretty promising result.
Wilson has a top ten finish on seven of the remaining tracks and Toronto was the sight of his first career victory in 2005. He ended 2013 with four top fives in the final five races and a surprise 6th in the championship.
12. James Hinchcliffe
The Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde of IndyCar in 2014, just like in 2013, has been James Hinchcliffe. Of the full-time drivers, he has the best average starting position at 6.125 but his average finish is 15.125. He loses on average nine positions from his spot on the starting grid to taking the checkered flag. He finds himself eleventh in the championship, 189 back of Power. One top five and three top tens in 2014 aren't that different from his first eight races of 2013, when he had three top tens, two of which were victories but were cancelled out by three finishes outside the top twenty.
Hinchcliffe's second half in 2013 started with a turn one, lap one accident at Pocono and his season never lived up to winning two of the first four races. He excels on the short ovals but has struggled in his homeland. If Hinchcliffe can turn his starts up front to finish there, he should shoot up the standings but if his finish remain bipolar, it will be another off season of scratching his head wondering what he has to do differently.
13. Sébastien Bourdais
A point behind Hinchcliffe, twelfth in the championship is Sébastien Bourdais. The Frenchman finished twelfth in the championship in 2013 but 2014 has started off better than last year. He didn't score a top ten until Toronto last year and already has two tens, both coming at Indianapolis. Bourdais has advanced from round one of road/street course qualifying four of five times but has only made the Fast Six on one occasion.
Most of the tracks on the second half of the schedule are new to Bourdais as 2013 was his first full-season in IndyCar since the final ChampCar season in 2007. Toronto should be the four-time champions best shot at victory having finish second and third there last year, boosting his stat line at Exhibition Place to one win, four podiums, six top five and eight top tens in nine starts.
14. Ryan Briscoe
I am going to give you two stat lines:
Stat line A: Finishes of 6th, 18th, 9th, 8th, 17th, 16th, 24th and 16th.
Stat line B: Finishes of 10th, 17th, 11th, 6th, 18th, 15th, 10th and 9th.
Now think about which one you were preferred to have.
Briscoe's 2014 season is B, Simona de Silvestro's 2013 season is A. My question is, couldn't de Silvestro have been 14th, 191 points back of Power, the exact same position Briscoe is at so far in 2014? Briscoe has been average. Other than leading a few laps at Belle Isle, Briscoe has been a non factor in 2014. I don't mean to take shots at Briscoe, he is a talented driver who doesn't get enough credit. However, something deep down in me sees the results and thinks this is what a Ganassi-quality driver is made of and de Silvestro wasn't considered Ganassi-quality? I hate the ideas of drivers fitting molds. Whether is be a Penske mold, Ganassi mold and so throughout motorsports. Hire the best driver, whether they are male or female, have a Grizzly Adams beard or are baby face, extroverted or introverted. Three of the final eight tracks Briscoe has won at but he has never won at a track multiple times.
15. Charlie Kimball
Kimball has had an awful season qualifying. He has an average starting position of 20th but has picked up on average 6.375 positions a race. He has five top tens but his thirty-first finish at Indianapolis has been a much worse blow to his season with the event being worth double points.
Kimball was able to score two podiums in the second half of 2013, one of which was his first career victory at Mid-Ohio. Should he continue to string together top tens, he will find himself gaining ground in the standings. The Californian finds himself fourteenth after eight races, 201 back of Power.
16. Mikhail Aleshin
He may be a distance second in the Rookie of the Year standings and an even more fifteenth in the championship but Mikhail Aleshin has been a hidden gem. Trailing Power by 207 points, Aleshin has three top tens and has led in three races of 2014, including the Indianapolis 500. He had the major shunt with Sebastián Saavedra at the start of the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and a rough weekend at Belle Isle are the lowlights of his rookie season.
The Russian has plenty of room to improve but he has the right teammate in Simon Pagenaud to help him find speed at places that are unfamiliar to him. He has looked really good on the higher speed ovals. Let's see how he looks at the short ovals.
17. Jack Hawksworth
Jack Hawksworth started 2014 with great races that ended with him being in the wrong place at the wrong time. His lone top ten was at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis but Hawksworth has advanced from the first round of road/street course qualifying on four of five occasions with three Fast Six appearances.
Sixteenth, 214 back Hawksworth still needs some work on ovals after finishing twentieth and fifteenth at Indianapolis and Texas.
18. Takuma Sato
Hear that? It's the clock ticking on Takuma Sato's career at A.J. Foyt Racing. Two poles but only two top tens with three consecutive finishes of eighteenth heading into this two week break. Sato average finish is just outside the top fifteen. Inconsistency has been the word forever etched next to Sato's name in the history books. If his second half in 2014 is anything like his second half in 2013, where the Japanese driver's best finish was fourteenth with five finishes outside the top twenty, expect changes come 2015.
19. Josef Newgarden
The Tennessean might be the most snake bitten driver in 2014. Average starting position has been 9.875 for Josef Newgarden but his average finish has been 16.375. He could of had a podium at Long Beach had he and Hunter-Reay not collided. Running out of fuel and then being punted by Martin Plowman ended a good day at Indianapolis. Then there was Will Power hip checking him in turn three, lap one at Belle Isle 2.
Just like Hinchcliffe, if Newgarden turns those top ten starts into top ten finishes, he will climb many positions in the championship standings. He had a top five at Pocono last year while five of his nine career top ten finishes have come on street courses. There are four street courses remaining in 2014.
20. Graham Rahal
This was not the season Grahal Rahal could have been hoping for. A $12 million sponsorship pick up and Rahal has only one top ten to show for it. He has the worst average finish of all full-time driver at 16.625. He was beaten by his teammate Oriol Servià in the four races they shared the grid together. And he doesn't even have the luxury of saying the speed has been there because Rahal has the second worst average starting position of full-time drivers at 17.25, ahead of only Kimball.
I start this next point by saying I love Pippa Mann. She has been great in the radio booth with Paul Page. She has been the change that deserves more recognition than it has gotten so far in 2014. She is a fan favorite for engaging with fans on social media, signing autographs at the track and so on. She hasn't had many opportunities in IndyCar and has had a few good runs but nothing that has left you with your jaw on the floor.
The last two seasons Graham Rahal has been the male equivalent of Pippa Mann. You can do all the Twitter giveaways you want, sign every autograph request but ultimately you have to get it done on the race track. At this point of his career, he gets more attention for who he is dating than how he does behind the wheel of the car. He is only 25. Most drivers don't win championships until their 30s. Ryan Hunter-Reay was 31 when he finally won a title and 33 when he won his first Indianapolis 500. Dario Franchitti and Bobby Unser were both 34 when they won their first Indianapolis 500s and titles. Johnny Rutherford went 97 starts, over 8 years between his first and second victories, didn't win the Indianapolis 500 until he was 36 and first title until he was 42.
There is plenty of time for Rahal to reach the mountain top but it is disappointing seeing the struggles for him and Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
21. Carlos Huertas
Two top tens. Who would have thought Carlos Huertas would have two top tens and have made two oval starts this time six months ago? The Colombian hasn't been as impressive as Mikhail Aleshin but has been competent. He completed every lap entering Texas. Will Power and Hélio Castroneves were the only two other drivers who could have said that.
Huertas isn't the next IndyCar superstar but he has been good. If he just keeps doing what he has been doing so far in 2014, Huertas could capture another top ten or two.
22. Sebastián Saavedra
The Colombian has had a rough first 46 starts of his IndyCar career and a just as rough 2014. An 11th and 9th to begin the season at St. Petersburg and Long Beach and pole for the Grand Prix of Indianapolis appeared to be a turn in the Sebastián Saavedra's career. That all changed when he stalled from pole and was run over by Carlos Muñoz and Mikhail Aleshin.
Like Rahal, Saavedra is still young (24) but unlike Rahal, Saavedra has yet to have that flash in the pan moment. Granted, driving for teams such as Conquest and Dragon haven't helped him but the Colombian continues to languish at the back of the championship table. He averages a starting position of 15th and his average finish is 15.875. All he can hope for a is few breaks. He has shown speed on a few occasions but not frequently enough to be a factor.
23. Drivers Yet to Be Named
Look at all the drivers I have named above and realize I have yet to mention the exploits of Townsend Bell, JR Hildebrand, Sage Karam, Oriol Servià and so on. I brought this up on Twitter prior to the Texas race. The amount of talent drivers out of rides is disappointing but there are only so many seats. Someone is going to be on the sidelines. I'd love to see the four listed above along with the likes of Luca Filippi (who will drive from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing at Houston and Toronto), Bryan Clauson, James Davison, Buddy Lazier, Buddy Rice, Alex Tagliani, even Jacques Villeneuve out there each and every week but that's unrealistic. It's a great problem for IndyCar to have but a terrible one at the same time. It's just the nature of motorsports.
24. Kurt Busch
Sixth place at Indianapolis earned Kurt Busch Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year honors. I'd love to see him in an IndyCar some more but not just every May. For NASCAR's mid-July off weekend IndyCar is on the streets of Toronto. I'd love to see what he could do on a street circuit. It would be a whole nother challenge for him. Why not try it? You can't be afraid of failing. As Wayne Gretzky said, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take." Why not take a shot? If he is in the "Ed Carpenter-zone," it's ok. It's not for everyone. If he's respectable, then why be upset with that?
25. Doubleheaders
Still a fan of doubleheaders but after the V8 Supercars announced their changes to how a race weekend would be held and watching Belle Isle, I think IndyCar should alter the format a little. Instead of two races at the same distance, maybe the first should be 100 miles with the second race being 150 miles. It would be less wear and tear on equipment and it would change up race strategy so we don't see two similar races like we did this year at Belle Isle. I personally don't mind two qualifying sessions to set the field for each race but another idea I had was to have one qualifying session on Friday. That sets the grid for race one. Then, the results from race one and the qualifying position is added together and the field is set by lowest aggregate score.
For example: Hélio Castroneves won pole for race one and finished fifth. That is six points. James Hinchcliffe qualified second and finished sixth, that's eight points. All it all the front row would stay the same with Castroneves and Hinchcliffe but Graham Rahal and Tony Kanaan would be on row two, each with 11 points, tiebreaker is better finish in race one. Will Power came from 16th to win, that's 17 points and Carlos Muñoz would've rounded out row three. Juan Pablo Montoya and Carlos Huertas would've be row four with Sébastien Bourdais and Ryan Briscoe rounding out the top ten. Scott Dixon and Jack Hawksworth would have been row six, Justin Wilson and Mike Conway on row seven, Sebastián Saavedra and Marco Andretti on row eight, Charlie Kimball and Takuma Sato on row nine, Josef Newgarden and Ryan Hunter-Reay on row ten with teammates Simon Pagenaud and Mikhail Aleshin rounding out the field.
The order was altered a slightly. I think with the first race being a sprint though it would encourage some teams gambling and see a shake up in the running order. Just throwing something at the wall and seeing if it will stick.
26. Winners
Through eight races, we have seen six different winners. At halfway last year, there were seven different winners. Like last year, Ganassi Racing has still yet to win as Dixon, Kimball and Kanaan look to extend their streaks of consecutive seasons with a victory. The other winners from 2013 yet to cruise into victory lane are James Hinchcliffe and Takuma Sato. Ten different drivers won in 2013, one behind tying the record for most winners in a season which was accomplished in 2000 and 2001. There were four first time winners in 2013. So far, we have yet to see a new face on the top step of the podium in 2014.
27. Road to Indy
Gabby Chaves and Zach Veach are engaged in dogfight in Indy Lights. One point separate the two after Chaves won the Freedom 100. Chaves has three wins to Veach's two. Luiz Razia is eight points back in third with one victory. Jack Harvey is 28 points back in fourth while Matthew Brabham rounds out the top five, trailing Chaves by 31 points.
Spencer Pigot won the first four races of the Pro Mazda season but Canadian Scott Hargrove has won two of the last three and trails Pigot by three points. Kyle Kaiser and Neil Alberico are tied for third, fifty-three back of Pigot as Shelby Blackstock rounds out the top five, 68 markers back. Garret Grist won the most recent race at the Night Before the 500 and is 79 points back of Pigot.
R.C. Enerson won three of the first four races in U.S. F2000 but has struggled the last three races. Frenchman Florian Latorre has closed Enerson's point lead down to 9. Jake Eidson has yet to win in 2014 but is third in the championship, 21 points behind his fellow American Enerson. Brazilian Victor Franzoni won the season opener and is fourth, 36 back with Aaron Telitz, the most recent winner at the Night Before the 500 fifth in the championship, 38 points back.
28. Recap
I think we have to realize IndyCar and American open-wheel racing would see one major influx of fans save the day. It isn't realistic. Each race won't see attendance balloon with 100,000 more people streaming through the gates race day. Television ratings for the seventeen races outside of the Indianapolis 500 won't all of a sudden go from 0.4s to 4.4s.
Put the numbers aside and realize the on-track action is more than desirable, whether it be a road course, street course or oval. The field oozes talent like a freshly over filled jelly doughnut from all over the globe. Most road/street courses have seen a little over a second cover nearly two dozen cars. If that isn't good enough, then I don't know what will be.
Motorsports is evolving. Evolving isn't suppose to feel good or be easy. It challenges our core beliefs and scares us of what tomorrow will bring. It forces us to reevaluate who we are, who we want to be, whether we are happy where we are at or whether we are happy where we are going. The world around motorsports is evolving as well. How corporations view their expenditure on motorsports sponsorship is changing. How said corporations view television ratings is changing. How tracks sell tickets is changing and it is all happening at a pace faster than ever imagined. The old ways of drawing people through the gate and to the television screen aren't guaranteed success. Everyone, from motorsports to concert halls, amusement parks to television channels, are competing for survival. It has become cut throat.
IndyCar will survive. It found it's way through the Great Depression, two World Wars, an era where death was nearly a weekly occurrence at tracks, an oil embargo, it's own civil unrest twice and reunification during another time economic hardship. It has pulled it's way through not by sulking on what it isn't but by keeping it's wheels churning forward through those difficult times, realizing continuing on and not waving the white flag is worth it.
Happiness is a destination that is hard to find. Whether it be for you in your personal life or for IndyCar trying to survive in the 21st century. Patience is the best advice I can give to those demanding an upswing. Maybe being a little secret on the world landscape is the perfect place to be. Only time will tell.
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