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Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2005 9:16 am Post subject: Champ Car?

Any of you familiar with the Champ Car circuit?

I've never really heard about it at all until this year. There is a race in Edmonton this weekend. My brother and I are going, so hopefully its a good show (ie. no tire fiasco's etc.).

We bought a ticket package for the whole weekend, so starting Friday I've got three days of Atlantic, Trans-Am and Champ Car racing to look forward to.

Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2005 4:05 pm Post subject:

Champ car broke away from USAC years ago, that caused Tony George to create the IRL and basically kill open wheel racing in the US.

Main thing is they are turbo charged and running to a different spec than IRL. They use popoff valves to control the pressure genreated (reducing over all speed) by the engines turbo and limit top end.

They can have a fun race, but they arent any where near F1 as for skill and tech.

Have fun though. Take plenty of sun screen and ear protection

Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2005 5:29 pm Post subject:

Quote:
They can have a fun race, but they arent any where near F1 as for skill and tech.

as long as they have tires they are ahead of F1 in both.

Stray Dog Joined: 03 Jan 2005 Posts: 6

Actually, if I am not mistaken, the champ cars are more technologically advanced than the F1 cars. At least thats to say they allow more technology to be used. I used to follow the champ cars fairly closely and then they made the announcement that they would remove the turbos and run naturally aspirated. That in my eyes was a big mistake and it appears that they figured that out as well since the cars now are turbocharged again. I have just recently began following it again. Dont get me wrong, F1 does utilize its fair share of tech devices, but I feel that the champ cars are some of the most technologically advanced cars out there. I have been to several champ car races and its much more fun to watch in person. You should have a great time. Wish I was there!

/x

Posted: Tue Jul 12, 2005 4:44 am Post subject:

LOL god I was glad I was drinking my coffee. when I read the last one. Saved my monitor that way.

sorry

F1 isnt all marketing, your talking about a car that users cabron fiber transmission cases (ferrari), engines that rev to 19k and still last 2 races without a refit. Most teams have their own wind tunnels and I think Toyota has something like 900 people working on their cars.

Ford couldn't or wouldnt spend the $ that was required to stay in F1.

At one point the teams could change software as the car ran by the pits.

Yeah the tire rule blows I agree and I want slicks back.

As for Champ car, the one thing they did have is the turbo but no way as close. The one race track the both use is Montreal and last year pole for champ cars was 79.465 where as in F1 it was 72.275. In F1 that puts the pole holder in last place behind the Menardi and the Jordan. IE no points no money, and someone going to get fired.

The areo package on an F! car is so sensitive to air change look at the British GP when Kimi couldnt pass Kimi due to air being taken off the front wing. He had to wait and time it just right.

I like most racing and champ cars can be fun to watch but irl and champ need to merge and get their collect heads out of their asses

Posted: Tue Jul 12, 2005 4:50 am Post subject:

I also used to follow CART back in the 80's, attending the INDY 500 for a number of years. Something about the high RPM engine whine I loved.
Then, the CART, IRL fiasco sucked the life out for me. We called the IRL the Indy Rookie League as the first few years were (IMO) were awful.
I prefer NASCAR now, the open wheel cars are still a blast.
Have a good time, wish I was there to watch!!!

Moderator Joined: 05 Dec 2000 Posts: 5941 Location: USA

edh wrote:
Champ car broke away from USAC years ago, that caused Tony George to create the IRL

There were years between these two events - George gets most of the blame in my book.

The split away from USAC in 1979 was spurred by a group of activist car owners who had grown disenchanted with what they saw as an inept sanctioning body.

CART's move to include more road racing on the schedule, led to a split of the series after the 1995 season due to a dispute between egos at CART and Tony George.

The Champ Car World Series

Posted: Thu Jul 28, 2005 6:53 pm Post subject:

Well, its been two weeks since the race, but I was on holidays for the first week, so my late reply is half excusable Laughing

The races were pretty good. There were three separate events going on: A Trans Am race, an Atlantic series race, and then the main event Champ Car race. The Trans Am was the most exciting, with drivers trading paint everywhere, and the top three was in contention right up to the final lap. Jaguar had a good day there, taking 1-4, with Corvettes in 5-7.

The Atlantic race was boring. No wrecks, no passing, no nothing. The guys/gals (a woman won the race) that started the race 1,2,3,4 finished 2,1,3,4. That was the only pass in the top 4. Boring. Little, little Al (Al Unser III) basically raced the entire race by himself. He finished 6, 10 seconds behind 5 and 15 seconds ahead of 7. Boring.

The Champ Car race was entertaining, not exciting like the Trans Am, but entertaining. Canadian Paul Tracy took the lead early in the race (started 2), but basically had a slower car. He burned up the tires too much trying to hold the lead, and fell to fourth at one point. He managed to finish third. At one point the guy in the lead (not sure who it was) brushed the wall. He didn't seem to do any damage, but suddenly was much slower than the other cars, and fell way back. The new leader (again not sure who it was) led for a bit, and then while under a yellow flag, spun out in a corner. Not often you get to see a guy blow the lead under a yellow! That left it open for Sebastian Bourdai(sp?) to win the race.

All in all it was fun. They raped us good on the food and beer prices ($6 a beer, $6 a hot dog, $9 cheeseburger). We chose not to eat so as to have extra money for beer. On Monday, my body seemed to think that this was a bad idea.

Anyways, I took a bunch of pictures, mostly worthless, but some weren't too bad:

http://playoffs.servebeer.com:10880/Pictures/Champ_Car/display.php

A few samples: