I’ve a question maybe someone can answer. I saw footage of a crash where the car went upside down and scooted as long for a spell before coming to rest.
The driver opened his visor fully whilst the crash was going on then closed it again after coming to rest. Why would you do that? I would think you’d want it closed because of the possibility of items coming crashing through the canopy thing? I get why he closed it again for protection in case of a fireball, just can’t figure out why he’d open it whilst busy having a crash
I suspect that the impact and/or air turbulence of going over at those speeds opened his visor for him. Seemed like he was in lala land… trying to process what was happening during the sparkly ride upside down, and then once things settled down he realized “Oh $*** my visor is open” and closed it. But, I could be wrong about that. Being a bit claustrophobic, being upside down in one of those things with the halo/screen does not look like much fun at all. and the implications if there was a serious fire do not seem good to me.
There’s two things that I don’t understand from the 500.
1 IndyCar has announced that the tether on Kirkwoods care did not fail. Ok, how did it sail out of the park then?
Rahal’s problem when told to start engines. They say it was a bad battery but it clearly wasn’t the battery in the starter. What battery are they talking about?
Actually I think you may be right, looks like he reached up and grabbed the chin piece of his helmet possibly to make sure it stays in place, inadvertently un-clipping his visor which popped open on impact.
I think Kyle opened his visor out of habit. I noticed it too and thought it was odd.
Yeah it clearly “failed”. Maybe IndyCar is insinuating that the tether took more force than it was designed for and that’s why it broke? So technically it did as much as it could. But definitely needs to be looked at. That could’ve been really bad.
I think the tether itself was in tact, it broke the spindle or chassis mount on impact. Pretty generous statement if the mounting is not strong enough.
I watched a streaming of the race that had no commercial breaks, the battery they changed out was deep in some bodywork and was the on-board battery.
I did not know they made a movie! This should be fun (or terrible). With an R rating, I think we will get to see some sidewall and maybe a little siping.
The internal battery runs a lot of the electronics but it does not power the starter. It is onboard inside the left Sidepod. No idea why it took so long to unfasten the Sidepod?? If he had made the start, the battery issue would have likely caused more than the 2 lap issue had it happened while the field was at speed. Could have been worse.
Looked like Kyle flipped his visor so he could see what was happening and to be prepared as best as possible. Closed visor upside down like that would have been really dark. Watch his eyes and head movements - he was completely cognizant and alert. Those were intentional moves to open the visor and then tip at the chin, not accidents.
So I’m an F1 guy through and through. I grew up in the UK only moving to the USA when I was 30 in 1990 so I do have some bias! I’m from the Nigel Mansell era and just started karting a year or two after he moved on. Wish I would have raced against him, I know many that did. Having said all this I have never been a big Indy car fan and have only ever seen one live race which was Long Beach (Nige was racing). I did watch the 500 but not live I recorded it to ff through some of it. Can’t deny that it was pretty exciting considering it’s an oval race! The big thing I am impressed with is the efficiency of the safety crews, they are at an incident in an instant. Formula one would do well to take a page out of the Indy car book in this regard. Honestly F1 looks amateurish compared to Indy when it comes to crash incidents.
and the implications if there was a serious fire do not seem good to me.
