You're listening to the Back Home Network presented by Home Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cast Galen Clavia, Scott Caulfield joining you midweek here in May as we hurtle towards Memorial Day weekend. We're almost there, Scott, and a lot going on in the city of Indianapolis over this weekend. Obviously, for those of us who have recovered from that gut punch Pacers loss in game one, wow. I I I felt all kinds of feelings that I didn't think I was capable of feeling anymore.
That was a gut punch. It's like the bill. I don't know where that fits in the Bill Simmons level of gut punches, but man, that was that. Yeah, that sucked. But but that going on, you know, we got the, you know, the the fever and Caitlin Clark around and then of course. Pacers, man. Like legitimate racers and Pacers. I know it's, it's, it's it's like we're in high school again, you know, it's it's it's pretty wild. But yeah, we're we're going to focus on the Indy 500 for this episode.
As Scott and I, for those of you who have followed Crannis and Cass for a long time, both big fans of the race. We've both been going for years and many of you in the audience are fans of the Indy 500. I'll warn you right now, there's no IU content at all in this. So numbers going down, just people. I mean, catch you next time. You know, it's funny, actually, I was thinking about this
yesterday. Like, you know, we've posted some podcasts recently and you know, anything with basketball content, it's like you've got thousands of people listening or watching. We've I posted that football podcast with Taylor the other day and it's got like 400 views. You know, it's like, I know we have so many, we love football.
We've got so many football centric fans, but it's kind of like when you read about how it's like the the Bronny James thing where it's like, no, we shouldn't be talking about Bronny James as a draft prospect. And yet the ratings during those segments are like sky high and you get. You know, 10s of thousands of views, you got to give the people what they want. And so this I'm going to do like an ESPN TS here.
We're going to do 40 minutes of Indy 500 talk with then Galen's going to have the hottest basketball take at the very end that you've ever heard. Right after this break. No. Yeah. So it's, but no, we're gonna, we're doing this one for us and one for our Indy, Indy 500 fans. So we're gonna jump into that.
But first, before we get to that, just a reminder that you need to check out Home Field apparel.com, proud sponsor of the back home network and increasingly the place to go for all of your your racing apparel needs. They have jumped fully into the racing world. They've got collections available on the website that I'm looking at right now. They have an entire Hendrick Motorsports collection. They have an entire Arrow McLaren collection. And of course. 500 they got.
And they've got the Indianapolis 500. They've got shirts, they've got hats, They've got just a little bit of everything across the board. Some really really. Making the race this year. The trucker hat is making the race, absolutely. So I'll. Give you a race for the trucker hat. Probably not the bomber jacket. I think even though, even though it looks like we might get a high under 80, I don't think I'm going to wear the bomber jacket to the Speedway on Sunday. That's a bold move.
Bold move. I I've seen people like normally those are the people you're like that guy's passing out like 10:00 AM yeah, he's done passing out on the ground. We've actually used the bomber jacket to cover the body up until until the coroner arrives. But yeah, so anyway, home field apparel, you're you're this is where you end up going to find your racing apparel to wear, obviously. So check them out, use the code home 23.
Get 15% off your first order. And you, you, you've got all kinds of events going on this week. The one that you want to check out is actually in Broad Ripple on Friday. Still some tickets available. Half Liter BBQ is the location. We've got shutdown forecast with special guest Atlanta King coming in to talk the race talk. You know, I mean, it's shutdown forecast. If you haven't checked it out, just check it out. You'll understand immediately and home field the proud sponsor
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We're going to have another video coming up here relatively soon, so check that out. It's crimsoncast.substack.com. We'd love to have you as a part of the community. All right, Scott, let's talk. Maybe, I guess let's start off by recapping Qualls weekend as that happened this past weekend. We got the field of 33 set we had. We sort of had bumping kind of it was a little anti climactic, which we'll talk about in a second.
But obviously we want to focus our attention at at first, I think on the the top of the field and talk about how qualifying went in general. Let's maybe focus first on the results and then we can talk about the quality they're in. Looking at this, it's Team Penske across the board on the front row, and you end up with Scott McLaughlin on the pole, Willpower in the middle of row one, Joseph Newgarden on the outside of row one. You get Alexander Rossi on the
inside of row two. You got Kyle Larson, who's been a pretty big name in the middle of row two. So you've got two teams for the first five spots and then the wild card of Santino Ferrucci, who finished 6th and qualify. He's on the outside of row two. And then just to round out the 1st 3 rows, Renus VK recovers from a crash, ends up finishing ninth in qualify, excuse me, 10th in qualifying, Potto award, and then Felix Rosenquist. And then we can kind of filter
through the field from there. So first of all, your overall impressions of how qualifying went and whatever take homes you've got from the top of the field. Yeah, I mean, so do do we know if Penske got extra push to pass for for qualifying? No, I I know they don't use it on the ovals. You know it. Well, the other thing that I find interesting with the way the field, you know, shook out, I would not have had this on my bingo card is Meyer Shank Racing having the highest placing Honda
in the field. So Fields Rosenquist is the highest placing Honda and then Rahal Letterman has Sato in the next spot and then Kirkwood Andretti to get to Ganassi. You've got to go down to Polo in row five. That that's kind of surprising. And you do see, you know, you know, of the first nine spots, eight of them, 128 are Chevys. So it does seem like Chevy does have the, the more horsepower, although maybe a little more reliability issues.
But this is something you've seen over years where, you know, normally going into one of the five hundreds, one of the two engines seems to have it over the other. Although it normally seems it's hard to parse here 'cause you don't know if it's Chevy or if it's Penske. Cause in the end, while Ganassi has been a, a very good team, it's been a team dominated by Dixon and Franchitti and then other driver Polo has done very well.
But it at the Indianapolis 500, it's really been those two drivers who kind of led Ganassi. I mean, Andretti's almost had a little more high level success than Ganassi at times. But you know, it's like, is it, is it Penske or is it Chevy every year? Cause Penske is always the class of the most always the class of the field in the 500. It is interesting though, because we do. It feels like every year you've either got Penske at the top of their game and Ganassi struggling off the radar.
Yeah, vice versa like 2022, Scott Dixon's on the pole, Alex Pelo is is is second on the grid. And I think the, the highest qualifying Penske that year was willpower and he was in the middle of row four. And I think I've got that down right. And so it is I, I've always found that fascinating, The like, one team has their crap together and the other team doesn't, at least not the way that they do in the rest of the
series. And then you've got whether it's Erin McLaren or whether it's Andretti or whether it's Meyer Shank kind of sprinkled in around them. But I do think, I mean, clearly Penske doesn't just seem to have the engine dialed in, but the way their cars looked throughout all of qualifying. They were just in a completely
different class. It felt like like even even Rossi, who was clearly the next fastest driver both on Saturday and then also on Sunday, did not look like he was really in the conversation for the first row, let alone the pole. And it wasn't just the engine. It was the way the cars drove. Like there seemed to be almost like very little effort. I mean, it was clearly effort, but it looked like there was very little effort being given by the Penske cars to do what
they did. Yep, no, I would all say, you know, I was thinking this. I I there's not a lot of great stat sites for IndyCar, but I know shocking eight former winners in the field. I think that's close to, if not, I don't want to say the record, but it's really close to a the most that I've seen in a long time. Along with I think there's like like a bunch of rookies too. So it it's an odd field that's basically you're either a winner, winner or a rookie or you're, you know, Marco Andretti
kind of in that in that mold. Yeah. I mean, it, it's funny. We talked about this last time. I still have a hard time getting I'm having a harder time getting excited for this field and I'm not sure why. You know, you, you and I talked about, you know, I think there's
a lack of personality. Then you're like, I I really watch the racing and the personalities, which is a very valid point I was thinking about and I'm like, not sure I have an answer to that, but you I think I graphed on the personality of the driver to the car and it's just, you know, when you look at the. This is this is basically Elon Musk's dream. Just install personalities into vehicles. It's it's like Elon really just wants the the like the plot of cars, but in real life.
We can maybe get a cyber truck to be in the field, see what that looks like just. Fired to the whole Speedway, yeah. My, my biggest fear with the way things shook out and I've heard from a couple people kind of in the Speedway area is just that, you know, the way that the Penske cars were so dialed in and the fact they're 123 across the field. Does this just become a race that Penske kind of just dominates the race and dominates
the front of the field? All there was a year a couple years ago like Dixon and Frank Kitty just we're just swapping first and 2nd for like the 1st 180 lap. And that that may be, but you know, I'll, so I'll go back.
I'll use 2022 as an example. You know, Ganassi kind of dominates the the start and I, you know, Kanaan was in a Ganassi car that year as well, But the, the order of finish there ended up being Ericsson award, who was Erin McLaren Kanaan and then Rosenquist, who was also Erin McLaren. And he's had a crazy crash out of that one, right.
Well, that's kind of the point. It's like, you know, that that you end up with this situation where, yes, it's very possible that you're going to have a situation where Penske could
dominate. But as we've seen, mechanical issues will knock out one of the cars early on because that just seems to be how it is. And the idea with the current configuration of the cars in the way that they are engineered for this Speedway, I mean, when was the last time we really saw a driver pull away from the field or even a a pack of drivers pull away from the field and really get that much distance? I mean, it's been a while. Yeah.
So that's that I'm, I'm not as concerned, but I certainly understand the concerns. You know, I mean, last year the, I think what was it the, the top 15 cars finished the race within 5.7 seconds of each other, which is nuts. And you had to get down to 18th, sorry, the top 16 cars were within 5.8 seconds of each other. You had to get down to 18th to find your first lap vehicle.
So, you know, I think certainly you'll have a situation where there'll be some separation early, but that's liable to get
bunched up down the line. It's just for me, it's more like it's hard to envision a scenario towards the end of the race where either a Honda is going to have the horsepower to compete with a Penske Chevy, or another team's Chevy is going to be able to compete with Penske and the way that they've got their cars set up. And I say that knowing that you could have everything go sideways. Like, that's entirely possible, but that just kind of feels like
the vibe right now. No, I completely agree. And you also have it, you know, from the the high level teams, you assume that Penske can ask you the two high level teams. You know, with with Penske, you just have more kind of drivers in their prime with McLaughlin and Newgarten.
You know, if, if you assume that power is kind of on the tail end of his career, that it it's weird that looking at this field through the lens of, you know, watching some of the old races again, you watch some of those races in the 80s and 90s, you'll see like, you know, that there's a one year, like I think in 94 when like AJ Foy was in the front row, but it's like, all right, but he really wasn't a front row caliber car and then he didn't finish there. I wonder if that's kind of the
willpower spot. But then you also look to the back of the field, you know, Dixon's finishing and, you know, starting in the 7th row, just a not a great position. I always look to like the mid 8, mid to late 80s was always like, you know, Lone Star Jr. Johnny Rutherford always was kind of in the field in the back and as a young kids, like, oh, man, like there's a winner back there. And it's like, yeah, no, he's not going to do anything. I wonder if this is the the new Dixon.
But you look at, you know, Dixon and Polo are really the the two bullets that Ganassi has. And it just feels like maybe Penske has an extra kind of younger in his prime driver. Possibly, I mean, one of the, you know, look, the and this is something I think you got to bring Elio Castroneves into the conversation when you start talking about this as well.
One of the things that sometimes throws people off who are just starting to follow IndyCar for the first time is the qualifying speed doesn't really mean that much. It's, it's kind of just show ponying, you know, to see how fast the cars can go, but race configuration and the ability to drive in traffic, the ability to avoid incidents.
You know, it's ironic that we bring Scott Dixon up with this because Dixon's actually been involved in a bunch of of incidents over the course of of his time in India. That's why he doesn't have more wins. But which is? Wild because in all other races he seemed to get he's able to get out of incidents. And yeah, it's, it is, it is kind of nuts to think about just from a, from a historical perspective, how he has had more
than his share of bad luck. I would say in terms of, of, of what he's done in the race, going all the way back to like his first few years. He, you know, he was what, 717th and then eighth and then 24th, you know, in his first three races in India. And that's kind of how his pattern has gone to some degree over time. I mean, you know, in, in what it was a 20/21, he was 17th. In 20/22, he was 21st. Last year he was 6th. Anyway, I say all that because race setup is very different.
And this is where a guy like Santino Ferrucci has shined. It's where Helio Castroneves is has shined, Tony Kanan sticking around that long and not getting down a lap and and avoiding any major mistakes will put you in a better spot. And then it really to some degree comes down to fuel strategy and luck. And so that's where it's hard to count anybody out that has history in the race and at least a decent car. And it's hard to say exactly where the line for decent cars is.
Like, you know, even in the lower ranges of of the qualified groups, you're still talking about a bunch of of drivers who we're very, very close to each other in terms of their qualifying speeds. You're talking 3-4 miles an hour difference from the top of the field to the bottom is essentially that. That may matter if you're in a dead Sprint, but maybe not even that because race trim is going to be so different from qualifying trim.
I, I would say, you know, you're 100% right about the, the qualifying trim versus the race trim and the speeds. I would kind of put the line of demarcation at row seven. Row seven is Marco Elio and Scott Dixon.
After that, I'm not going to read through the, the, the, the list, but you have, you know, Cantopino, you have Stingray Rob, you know, Romain Grosjean, you have a lot of rookies and a lot of guys who I would be shocked if you know, Christian Lungard ones wins this race or Pietro Frittipaldi. You know, Erickson has won the race before, but starting from that far back is tough. So I, I, it does feel like row eight and beyond. I would be pretty shocked if any
of those people won the race. I think that's fair. It's, and even some of the folks who are in front of that, like I, you know, it's, it's hard to envision like Kiff and Simpson be being able to put something together throughout the course of the race or Marcus Armstrong like that. They just like rookies in the middle of the field like that. But I, I do think that a lot of these cars are, are close together in terms of their abilities and.
This is where Indy just kind of becomes a character in the play that in itself is putting on and that that will be and, and this is where the teams matter where, you know, I, I really like Santino Ferrucci. I think he has, he had a really good car last year. And what happened is what I expected probably happened this year. What happened last year is that he's on an AJ Foy team and the team is just over five to six or seven pit stops, which you're
going to have in this race. You got to be flawless in all of them because that's the thing with Penske is like they one of those guys between McLaughlin Power and New Garden, one of them might have a pit mess up. But like of those three teams, one of those teams is going perfect for all those pit stops. So if you're the one bullet that AJ Foyt has, you got to be perfect. And I just don't trust AJ Foyt to have a perfect pit stop every single time.
And I think that's going to kill guys like Ferrucci and even some of the team like Aaron McLaren. I'm just not sure they have the team set up that Penske does because Penske is, there's only so many good, you know, engineers and pit guys and crew guys at for IndyCar and Penske hires all of them. Yeah, Well, even, I mean, we saw, we've we've seen that issue with with Ram Rahal. You know, I mean, there was
that, what was it? What was it two years ago or last year where he's in contention to win and then he loses a tire because of a of a pit stop there? I mean, he's, it really does matter. And even, I mean, even if you want to draw some of the distinctions, I mean, obviously Andretti's had other problems, but I mean, they've been just that much slightly slower than than Penske and Ganassi in the pits. And that's, that's created an issue.
It it, it makes, it'll be interesting because you know that you've got more teams that are kind of in that contending range. And we've seen them have some success. We obviously Meyer Shank won a race with Elio. We've I mean, Aaron McLaren seems like they've got their stuff together mostly.
Like we haven't seen any that I can recall at least hideous pit errors or, or problems, they're timing wise, but you're just trying to overcome a monster with Penske and, and what a well oiled machine that is. And that's not a new thing. That's been the case for a long time. It is just interesting how Penske's luck has not always transitioned into actual success in the 500.
And that I, you know, that's probably, it's just random statistical noise rather than being something that even necessarily point to as a trend 'cause when you got strong cars and strong drivers, that tends to trump quite a few things. Yeah. When they do have the defending champion, a new garden. And the other thing that I was curious about just taking a step back from drivers is just weather. This is the first year in a while that I can remember there being concern on my part.
Looking at the weather forecast for Sunday, right now it looks like it's going to be warm, but there's like almost a 70% chance of thunderstorms throughout the day. See my this one of the things I've found fascinating about this year 'cause I, I follow the weather religiously. You know, this is the I, I read that on the IndyCar subreddit or I see it on Twitter. And then other people are like, what are you talking about? Like for instance, you just said
70% chance of thunderstorms. I went to my weather app, which is AccuWeather and it has a, there's a 35% chance of precipitation, but no, no real like chance of thunderstorms. What is forecast is a heavy wind like a 13 mile an hour S southeasterly breeze gusting to 22 and cloud cover which to me. That sounds like a like really fast racing conditions cause like a, a high of 76 with 88% cloud cover means a relatively
cool track. It also means like some weird stuff going on in terms of that cross wind, because if that's coming in from the South SE, like that's a very, that's, that's what hitting the drivers is they're, they're going on to the front stretch and it's at their back as they're coming down the back stretch. I don't know the, the, the weather is fascinating and it's Indiana. So we won't know until probably 12 hours before the race what we
should expect. But there is such a widespread of things as far as what might happen there. But I understand your concerns. Yeah, well, I mean, and, and we'll, we'll still go and we'll see. And it's, but it's, it's been a hot minute since it's the race has been rained out or rain delayed. I think 2005 or so it's been, it's been a while. So hopefully knock on wood, that doesn't happen. Absolutely, yeah. I mean, what, what are you, you
know, it's, it's funny. I was going to ask, you know what, you know, I always kind of think I, I don't do this as much anymore, but you know, who would, who would be the best storyline to come out of this? But it never seems to matter because we've had, you know, Marcus, Marcus Erickson win, who's kind of a boring dude with a chocolate company that you can't buy in the US as a sponsor. It's like, all right, that that sucks. But then you have like, you know, new Garden wins and he
jumps in the crowd. He's an American guy. And it's like no bump. It's like that. You've had stories where it seems like it makes, I mean, outside of like Marco Andretti winning, I'm not sure if there's any real storyline. And honestly, I think where the series is at, I'm not sure anybody winning is unless like Marco Andretti somehow like jumps over Graham Rahal's car and wins. Like he drags. Car like the, the turbo movie into the, the finish line.
Like I just don't think this makes any kind of national news at all, no matter who wins. Well, and, and I, I agree with you, I think, but I, but I don't know that, that it should be something that IndyCar is concerned about 'cause you can't do anything, you know? So you, you just from my perspective, I look at it and I say, well, what would be the
best stories? So to me there's a cluster of like 4 drivers who I think if they won the race would open up a brand new front in the idea of who are the pre eminent drivers. I want to guess. Go ahead. I want to guess you're 4th. You have 4, right? I, I have let me, let me double check my my count here. Yes, I've got, I've got four. OK. Alex Pelow is one of them. Absolutely. Scott McLaughlin, No. So here's the thing. I think Mclaughlin's already positioned OK because he's with.
Penske I don't I don't think Scott McLaughlin winning opens up any new fronts. I guess I think it'd be a great story, but Colton Herta Yep. Paddle award Yep, and this is this is where it gets interesting. Stingray No, I'm just kidding. Not Stingray. Rob probably like I mean, I think Santino Ferrucci. I think Santino Ferrucci is like two years away from getting a good ride, but I think that would be a wow. This guy won a 500 with AJ Foyt but I'm also a fan of his so
maybe I'm I'm biased. I would I, I, I actually was going to go with Renus VK. Oh. That's that's a good, that's a really good one. Yeah, I mean, and Ferrucci was a wild card in as much as the, you know, the problem with Ferrucci is the baggage. And, you know, some people don't care about it all. Some people, that's all they care about.
Like he is the, he is by far among the fan groups that I observe, the most polarizing figure, but it's actually he's not really polarizing because everybody just seems to dislike the guy except for Scott. And so it would be interesting if he won, But I, I think that the benefits for IndyCar would be much greater if one of those four drivers that I mentioned
won. And, you know, because I, I just don't think I, I think of the, the problem that this, the first part of this season opened up for the series is that there is now a perception that Penske owns the series and that his team is getting all of the breaks. And that that that there's a there's a tainted element to whatever success they have, fair or unfair.
So for a a driver from Ed Carpenter racing like Renus VK is driving for this year, you know, Polo or a ward who are both like young exciting drivers. I think award in particular being of Mexican heritage, that would be that would get a bunch of of people interested that might not otherwise be. And certainly Hurda with both the fact that he's an American driver and also is a legacy driver and has been kind of sniffing around higher level
success. I think any of those drivers, there's a lot of knock on opportunities down the road there that make that suddenly put them back in the conversation at a much. Higher level totally agree that the in in using that same logic, the worst case scenario is one of those guys leading with like 6 laps to go and a controversial red flag, which then allows McLaughlin or Newgarden to win. Even though it even though if it was totally legitimate.
Like, and this is and it's something that I did in one of our VIP videos about IndyCar, which again, keeping in the VIP section, 'cause I'm assuming nobody really cares about the stuff. But you know, this is, you know, IndyCar is not the NBA, it's not the NFL, it's not, you know, it's a collective of people who are also kind of their own owners and have their own points of view. And in the end, Penske buying the series was probably the best
thing for the series. And the steward that understood the series, but he's also an owner of the series. It's just it's a conflict of interest. It's always going to be tough to kind of square that circle and so. You can you can get a way. Where if it happens, even if there's no but no connection, it's going to look just funky after the season you've had. And, and I think it's important for people to remember like this, this this is auto sports, like this is, this is how it
works. Like, I mean, you know, the, the the previous owner of the Speedway, Tony George owned A-Team and his I don't know what what is Ed Carpenter to him. I forget the the relation like second nephew or something like that owns A-Team and has been a driver. But you know, Tony George's teams were never that good. So it wasn't that big of a deal. You know, I mean, the France family owned a team in NASCAR, but they were never like the pre eminent team, at least not in recent history.
So. You it would be like the NFL is like given the Jaguars. OK, you guys own the NFL now. Yeah, I know. Yeah, No, it's like. The Rooney family like runs the league and oh, by the way, the Steelers keep winning Super Bowls. How does that happen? You know, it's but so this is a unique thing where, yes, I think Penske's ownership and stewardship certainly took the series to a better place than it was. But then you have this big cheating scandal involving the push to pass stuff.
And and so there's this perception that it's if, as you said, if for a second year in a row you have a situation where we do this rules thing that we've never really done before, it just happens to benefit a Penske driver. That's that's a real issue. That said, I also think just in general, Indy being such a high profile event, being able to spread the wealth out a little bit is helpful. I know there's other good stories, you know, you mentioned
like the Marco Andretti story. I don't think Marco's actually going to win. There's there's a reason why he doesn't win these things. And it's so hard to do as a one off driver unless you're Elio Castroneves where you're just kind of a supernatural guy on this particular track, you know, Ed Carpenter. I still don't understand why every media member that talks about Ed Carpenter's like he's beloved by the fans and people really want to see him win.
And it's like, I, I got to be honest, I've never talked with a single fan who's like, God, I love Ed Carpenter. Like I really want to see Ed Carpenter win. I did not that people don't like him, but I don't think that that's that big of a story. I think the Romain Grosjean stuff has has faded. Like everybody just wanted to, you know, we saw him in Drive to Survive and you know, we want
him to have success. And I feel like people are like, oh, he's actually just kind of a mid tier guy at best, just like he was in Drive to Survive. I wonder why? That would be a guy getting a fifth win like that would be a that would be a really big racing story. There's the second category of guys, and again, I'm going to leave the Penske guys out of it to some degree. But you know what's a better, what's a better story?
Rossi winning his second, Sado winning another one, Ryan Hunter Ray in a one off winning a second one after. Lee Diffie's Captain America. The most? Of all the things that they do on the broadcast, it's like you are the only person who calls him Captain America. Even it is dressed up as Captain America for Halloween. Kids would be like, aren't you Ryan Hunter Ray?
It is the fetch of of IndyCar, like just just stop trying to make it happen, you know, or, or, or Kyle Kirkwood winning his first, which which seems a little bit unlikely. He's still relatively young in his career and he's he doesn't seem to have a great car underneath him. Like a Sado 1, the the third Sado win would be bananas in a you and I had the discussion about him after he won his second in 2020. Just what a weird like what a
weird legacy he has. And really, I think a much better legacy at Indy than people would look when you look at his finishes, you know, two wins a second, like he's way farther up the list. And I think a lot of people would would like to to say, and if you give him a third, it's suddenly like this guy is. Well. I mean, I'm not sure it's going to happen, but that would be a really interesting discussion of like where you slot Sato. I I know exactly where you slot him at least.
In post World War Two, he, I think at that point he is like equal with Johnny Rutherford. Like he has to be like, and, and Johnny Rutherford's like this weird figure. Like, you know, part of it is because we didn't hear from Johnny Rutherford a lot after he stopped driving.
So like Bobby Unser, who also won three races, is always going to have this kind of outsized level of importance in the sport, partially because of him and partially because of his brother and partially because of his nephew. Johnny Rutherford kind of exists in this weird ether where, you know, he won in 74, he won in 76, he won an 80.
And, you know, it's like, I think, I think those were the three years that he won the race and and he was just kind of around for so many other races that you you end up with this situation where no one quite knows where to put him because he was in that period of racing where we hadn't really fully formed the teams. And unless you were a driver that really like, like you're an AJ Foyt who was so omnipresent throughout the sport, you didn't get the same level of vibe.
And I kind of feel that way about Sato. You know, Sato is hard to like nail down in terms of what his legacy is really going to be, but. You know, interesting throwing him like then you have the real interesting discussion of like him and Frankiti, 'cause it's like if if Sato some, I mean he didn't, but if Sato passes Frankiti in that race of like 2012, Sato has four and Frankiti has two like. Or if Sato, what you know, completes the pass, what was it in 20?
Was it 20/17/2018? I mean, there's that may be a five time winner. It's it's bananas. I know it's, it's it's like right there at the doorstep. Rutherford has his three wins and then was kind of a back marker for the rest of his career. Yeah. I mean, you look at, you know, the major wins in in Johnny Rutherford's career. I mean, he had 27 wins in champ car, you know, and he and he was he had 60 podiums. He won a race in 1986, for God's
sake. Like the dude had a a career that lasted a long time, ran 314 races and and yet he, you know, he won one CART championship in 1980. He was a Sprint car champion 1965. He won three Indy 5 hundreds. And that's really all anybody knows him for. So that's kind of and again with Sato, he doesn't. Have a lot of other wins outside of the five hundreds. Yeah, I mean, you look at Sato
from a historical perspective. He he has six wins total in his IndyCar Series career, 14 podiums, Yet he has, you know, the, the, the two Indy 500 wins and a bunch of other stuff that nobody particularly cares about. I don't know. I do find his position fascinating because I mean you in terms of his indie history, he's right there with Rutherford, but he's clearly didn't have the same level of success as a driver overall, which makes it even harder to
classify him. No, I'll this is a good let's keep doing this. I like this where, you know, if people win where they fit, it's great. You know, I, I think it's going to be I've, I've never liked somebody winning the double or being, you know, the NASCAR thing. So Kyle Larson winning is kind of like that would be a little bit tough to deal with all of that discussion that would come out of it.
Here's the thing with Larson. I mean, I, I am, I'm as I think many IndyCar fans are, I get annoyed at NBC trying to foist NASCAR drivers on the series and trying to filter everything, which they do. If you watch the coverage on on NBC and on Peacock. Everything. Whether it's Dale Earnhardt junior, who I genuinely like as a commentator, or whether that bearded dude who looks like he should be hosting a Food Network show or maybe does. Host the floor is lava on Netflix.
I'm sorry, Paul, I don't I'm not up on all like like you're saying that it's like he literally hosts a show like that, like or like Jeff Burton, Jeff Burton hanging around that like I I do resent. That a bit as an IndyCar guy, but. I'd love to hear Lee Diffie be like Giggy Giggy giggity, Captain America giggity giggity giggity. Sorry.
But but you cannot deny how talented of a driver like Larson feels like a completely different animal from the normal person who would try to do the double 25 wins in NASCAR 170 top 10s, you know, won the series in 2021. I mean, he's and and he just what, competed for the pole here. I'm like really. And I mean, he just has this ridiculous. I mean, if you haven't gone go to his web, go to his Wikipedia page, you just look at all of the things he won or has won
over the course of his career. It would be a great story, but it would feel there's always this, this was kind of the concern when when they wipe my blanking on the name of the F1 driver, Fernando Alonso came in and everybody's like, oh, Alonzo's just going to come in and like, you know, laugh everybody. And then that's crazy.
But it feels like with Larson, like the danger there, as always is, if he goes out and wins in his rookie appearance and then gets on a plane and flies to Charlotte and competes that evening, it's like it kind of makes the whole series feel like a junior circuit to some degree. And that. So it's a great story on the one hand, but it's also a story that if you're a big fan of IndyCar, you probably shouldn't be rooting for whether and whatever you feel about Kyle Larson as a
driver on an individual basis. Well, and it also, I mean, the chance of him winning the 500 and then also winning the Coca-Cola 600 is minuscule. So, you know, if he wins the 500, he probably will finish, you know, 15th or 20th. And the, the I don't, I do not keep up with NASCAR. But you know, the chance of him also getting a podium finish at
the 600 is is tough. And then for a normal just random fan and be like, oh, so he won that race, but like couldn't even finish in the top ten of the other ones. Like that's how I know which series is better. And that's a completely unfair narrative. None of those things are are fair, but a A. Person just kind of walking by the, the racing section, that's immediately what they would think. Let's talk about Rossi 'cause I feel like Rossi's in a really
interesting spot right now. I mean, it's the guy, obviously he wins his rookie year and it's, and it's always been one of those where it was such a weird year. It was on television, which it never was, you know, and it because it's the 100th anniversary and he doesn't win because he has the fastest car. He wins because they're, they're on a fuel strategy that when that's, that's a legitimate win.
But he's been with first Andretti and now Errol McLaren and it's felt like his equipment has failed him. He's like a, it's almost like he's having a better version of Marco Andretti's career in that he won a 500, but he's only got eight wins. I mean, he's been, he's been, he's run 135 races, he's won eight races, he's got 29 podiums. And he feels like a really, really good race car driver who has either made, has had bad equipment or not a great team set up or has opted for the
wrong things. He clearly, I think has the best car that he's had probably since he won the race, maybe that one year where he was in contention up until about the last 20 laps.
I think that was 2019 maybe, but I feel like this is there's a, there's a, there's a, there's a, a stratosphere for Andrew, for Alexander Rossi that he could hit with a second win that he probably won't get without a second win in Indy because a team championship or a drivers championship for the course of the season feels basically impossible for him right now. Yeah, no, I think you're you're right. And it's it's interesting when you look at his career, how much
he he kind of helps. He's in like the Aaron Rodgers category where an early Super Bowl suddenly, I mean, you look at Rodgers career, he's had a lot of playoff unsuccess. But because he has an early title, it's like, oh, he's he's clutch. It's like, is he like, like maybe not. You look at it, you look at his Indy, he's he actually is clutch. His here's his total finishes in Indy, obviously won in 2016 on a timeshare team. You know which that that's even
more impressive. Was 7th the next year, was fourth in 2018, was second in 2019 and in I kind of threw 20 out. He was 27th that year, was 29th the next year, but then was fifth in 2022 and was fifth in 2023. I mean that is that is a dynamite performance. No, he's great. I'm just saying, with only eight other wins, if you took away that first 500, I mean, he hasn't. But you take it away, suddenly it's like, all right, it's the guy who's really good at Indy who's, you know, kind of mid the
rest of the time. So no, I I think that would be interesting. It also you wonder if he gets a second 500 and then he's like, all right, I can now go to F1. Now I have the resume to get the hell out of here. The thing is, and and this was shocking, I was looking at ages. He's 32 years old. He's going to be 33 in September. I mean, he's kind of out of of F1 range now. The the, I got to say the ages of the racers is, is pretty fascinating to me.
So did you know who would you? Who would you guess is older New Garden or Rossi? That's a, these are young guys. And then it's like, no, like Mclaughlin's probably like 29 and Power's like 37. I think that, well, you just gave me one of the here you have the answer. I'm going to say I, I bet new. I'm going to say Rossi's older based on what you just said. New Garden's older New Garden's 33 It's funny you say McLaughlin. Mclaughlin's 30 and it's about to turn 31 and willpower is is
what did you say he's 3/8? No, he's 43 years old. He's the same age as Ryan Hunter Ray, believe it or not.
So so that's the the, the it's interesting because a lot of these guys I think maybe are thinking, oh, I'm going to I'm going to be able to make that jump like Potto award could probably still do it. He's 25, but Alex blows already 27. And so for a lot of these guys, they're not going they're they're they're the IndyCar is about where they're going to be, which doesn't mean that the, you know, winning or losing the race is any more or less important.
But it is interesting contextually the idea that you're going to get any of this particular field able to jump up to the F1 level, especially without Andretti having a team there that might, you know, be more receptive to to to certain drivers. I don't think it's going to happen. I'm going to throw one more, one more. You know what this does their legacy win category and that is Joseph Newgarden, you know, so he he wins last year, he's with Team Penske.
He hopefully he can pull up like his overall stats, but he has a championship, he has a good. 29 wins, 52 podiums, 17 polls, Has won the series twice and obviously what? Oh, no, sorry. But and if he wins the 500 this year, you know, this is a stamp where he's now won back-to-back five hundreds, which puts you in pretty rarefied air. But he also this is kind of a silly thing, but it's something
true. You know what one thing that brought Heli Elio a little bit of differentiation is he had a victory celebration like climbing the fence was part of that thing. It's a kind of like, oh, I want to watch the race and I have a lot of friends who are not into IndyCar, but it's like, oh, I, I, if he wins, I want to see him run up, run up the the fence. The new garden thing of going under the fence into the crowd was really cool last year.
If he does that again, that's kind of like, oh, that's something that's wildly different than anybody's ever done. So I, I think there's a real moment here for Newgarden to grab hold of this series and really stake his claim of being, you know, yeah, it's 33 now, so next. But you know, but really, we'll have a moment and he'll put himself in a stratosphere that he's not in with again that unlike some of the other one time winners like Ryan, Hunter, Ray or Rossi.
I think if Newgarden wins again or or power, Newgarden would be able to vault to a whole another level based on back-to-back and kind of having a a shtick, so to speak. I agree. I mean, right now, so that particular like who's the best, who's the best youngest driver, like that combination of like, you know, clearly, like with this, we're so basically I'm excluding willpower, I'm excluding Scott Dixon because they, as you said, they're both on the tail end of their careers.
So it's like right now to me, and I would actually argue that while Scott McLaughlin has certainly performed quite well, he's not really in this conversation either right now. So to me, it's right now, this is a 2 horse race between Joseph Newgarden and Alex Pello. Those two are essentially fighting for the alpha status in the series.
And I think I mean, Pelo, he's been so good in so much of of his time in IndyCar. And I mean, you look, last year he he won three races in a row and four out of five. The one that he didn't win in that stretch was Indy. And this year he comes in and he's won two races. He's at a podium, he's finished fourth, he's finished fifth. He's been the most consistent driver that hasn't cheated so
far this season. And so I agree, it's like two of one to have won the title, the racing title of the series in 20/21/2023, currently leading in 2024. If he's able, especially with this equipment package, which does not seem to be on the same level as Penske's equipment package, if he can win this year, that I think cements him as the top kind of mid level driver, mid mid age driver, the the alpha of the series moving forward. So I I do think that that's a fascinating implication.
Yeah, no, I I agree. Apparently there's anybody else that would be interesting. Yeah, any. Any of the back markers, I mean no offense, but like, you know, Stingray Rob wins and just be like. Wow that's insane. What the hell does he happen? Connor Daley or you know, Phytopaldi or Lungard or, you know, I, I, I think a very Graham Ray Hall would be interesting. The last of first has always kind of been fascinating. I just don't think he has the equipment or the team to get there.
You know, the only one out there is Marcus Erickson back row, but he seems to have just really struggled with his car and have any kind of set up. But you know, if he wins, that's a first. A second, a first in a three-year span. That would be quite a stamp for him. Yeah. And also boring interview. Just another, wow, this guy's really not fun. Now it's now I think I go back to her to I mean that he's the one guy I think his that his career might be enhanced the most by a win.
Because again, this is a guy who's he's young, right? I mean, he really is young. He just turned 24. OK, that's young at the end of March and he's got seven wins in 86 races. He's got 14 podiums. He is still a kind of that very beginning. You know, the concern with him is, you know, how how dialed in is Andretti, like how how much are they really going to be able
to do out there? And whereas Kyle Kirkwood, that same Marco Mario Andretti thing where he like burns really hot and it's like, can he keep it together for 500 laps? Yeah, Whereas, you know, Kyle Kirkwood's got two wins over 38 races and those are both of his podiums. Like he's been he's had a couple of shining moments and then he's kind of been a he's struggled. He's been mid, mid table at best. I feel like Herda there, there's there's a lot of things to potentially positive come out of
that. And so that'll be interesting to watch. But anyway, should be fascinating, Scott. Any final thoughts I got we got to wrap up here as we're we're kind of at our time limit. But any other things just generally you're looking at as we go into the race? No, I mean it's it's always I love all of the pre way ceremonies. You know, I think we're having Jordan Sparks sing the the national anthem. That's your good Jim Cornelius and is back for the back home again in Indiana.
I moved a little bit this year. I moved a little bit more into section the the B stands. So I'm excited to see that new seats always kind of bounce around a little bit in the same general area. No, I'm, I'm it's always, it's always fun. It kind of always catches up to you. But if you're, you know, yeah, I don't really have any other, any other outstanding thoughts. It's it's going to be fun, exciting. I think I got a new scanner this year.
That's what I'm excited about. I got a new scanner. I think it's going to work a lot better and I'm excited to use that. So there you go. I'm proud of you. That's great. Yeah. Well, I mean, it should be a lot of fun. I hope everybody that's going gets a chance. I mean, I was hoping they would have announced that they're going to lift the blackout by this point, but it's a. Whole another discussion that's just that's. Yeah, we did that last year.
I'm not going to do. I'm not going to do it again, but someday they'll learn maybe. Well, we know we know what'll happen again next year so we can we can do it every 3rd year. It can be like our Tri annual blackout discussion. Anyway I. Want to thank. Everybody for listening, we'll look. We'll talk to you guys next year, those IndyCar fans who stuck through. That's right, next year for the 500. Well, ask for content.
We gave you content. No. And we'll if we see you at the track or if you see us at the track, give us a wave. Come over, say hi. We'd love to talk with you anyway. For Scott, I'm Galen. Thanks for listening to Crimson Cast as we head into Memorial Day weekend. Have a safe time, have a wonderful time. Get out on a lake, do some grilling, and while you're at it, bring back the bison and candy striped rock. We'll catch you folks. On the flip side, that's all everybody.