Headlining this weekend’s festivities at St. Petersburg, the Verizon IndyCar Series are starting their season. 2014 signals a lot of changes for the series, including a new title sponsor, the retirement of a legend in the form of Dario Franchitti, the return of a previous Indy winner in the form of Juan Pablo Montoya, a lot of drivers shuffling teams, and some teams switching powertrain providers. As the season opener is coming up in just two days time, we continue our series of articles covering the various road racing series and important races all over the world. Previously we covered The TUDOR United Sports Car Championship, the 12 hours of Sebring, the Bathurst 12 hour, Formula 1, and the Pirelli World Challenge. This time, it’s all about Indy!

IndyCar stands small in the giant shadow cast by Formula 1 within the international open-wheel collective conscious. Effectively a national championship series, IndyCar punches well above its weightclass in terms of excitement per season, and deserves your interest. Be careful, though, because the whole season will pass you by in a flash. This year, IndyCar has realized that they cannot compete with the National Football League for ratings, and when their season ends after the NLF has begun, viewers jump ship faster than most linemen can run 40 meters. Having realized that, they are starting their season at the end of March, and finishing up at the end of August. That’s right, these crazies are running 18 races in 5 months. 

Click the jump, and we’ll give you the rundown on what to care about, why you should, and how you can watch the action unfold.

History:

The Indycar Series has an unusual past that is both storied and pockmarked with problems. Tracing its roots back to the 1911 Indianapolis 500, Indycar is the oldest running series in American motorsport history. Though the specifications for the cars have changed drastically over the last 100+ years, the race remains the cornerstone of the series, and one of the most well known races in the world. For several years, the series was either completely raced on oval tracks, or at least predominately oval based. Recently, after the infamous Indy Racing League merger with Champ Car, though, the schedule has expanded to include more road course and street course racing including such notables as Laguna Seca and the Long Beach street course. Since there is more emphasis on road course racing in Indycar as of late, in addition to the season championship, there is now a separate “championship-within-a-championship” for the driver who scores the most points on a road courses and driver who scores the most points on ovals.

IndyCar hasn’t really been at the forefront of the public conscious for a number of years, but it is gradually growing in popularity. A relatively stable television package, and the introduction of a title sponsor that is actually interested in ‘activating their dollars’ should certainly help promote the series, the teams, and the drivers for the 2014 calendar year.

Current Season:

This year, the cars remain much the same as they were last year. There are two engine suppliers, Honda and Chevrolet, and the DW12 chassis, now in its third season of competition, are all provided by Dallara. 

Engines:

The 2.2 liter V6 engines supplied by Chevrolet will remain relatively unchanged, continuing to use the twin-turbocharged V6 (produced by Ilmor Engineering). Honda, on the other hand, will be using a new engine in an attempt to become more competitive (Chevrolet has won the manufacturer’s championship for the last two years), and have switched from last year’s single turbo V6 to a new twin-turbo unit (also a 2.2 liter V6). Unlike Formula 1, these engines are not nearly as high-tech, they do not utilize hybrid systems or electric turbochargers, and they are crafted at a much lower cost, limited to only 12,000 RPM, they aren’t stressed nearly as much, and exotic alloys are banned from use.

The Bodywork:

The DW12 was originally designed to accept a number of different “Aero Kit” configurations, with branded kits available from either other chassis manufacturers, provided by the engine suppliers, or crafted specifically for each team. As with the last two years, the issue of Aero Kits has been tabled, this time until 2015. Both Chevrolet and Honda say that they will begin testing new aero configurations for the DW12 at the end of the 2014 season in preparation for launch in 2015. As this is the case, only the standard Dallara spec aero is available for the 2014 season for all teams.

Like last year, there is a low downforce configuration of the wings which is used at the oval tracks, and a high-wing high-downforce configuration used for road and street courses.

Who ended up where?

Chip Ganassi Racing –

Scott Dixon – Target Chip Ganassi Racing #9 Chevrolet Dallara

Tony Kanaan – Target Chip Ganassi Racing #10 Chevrolet Dallara

Charlie Kimball – Novo Nordisk Chip Ganassi Racing #83 Chevrolet Dallara

Ryan Briscoe – NTT Data Chip Ganassi Racing #8 Chevrolet Dallara

Penske Motorsports – 

Will Power – Team Penske #12 Verizon Chevrolet Dallara

Helio Castroneves – Team Penske #3 Hitachi Chevrolet Dallara

Juan Pablo Montoya – Team Penske #2 Verizon Chevrolet Dallara

Andretti Autosport – 

Marco Andretti – Snapple Andretti Autosport #25 Honda Dallara

Ryan Hunter-Reay – DHL Andretti Autosport #28 Honda Dallara

James Hinchcliffe – United Fiber & Data Andretti Autosport #27 Honda Dallara

Carlos Munoz – Cinsay AndrettiTV.com Andretti-HVM #34 Honda Dallara (Rookie)

Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing – 

Graham Rahal – National Guard Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing #15 Honda Dallara

Schmidt Peterson Motorsports – 

Simon Pagenaud – Schmidt Peterson Hamilton Motorsports #77 Honda Dallara

Mikhail Aleshin – SMP Racing Schmidt Peterson Motorsports #7 Honda Dallara (Rookie)

KV Racing – 

Sebastien Bourdais – Hydroxycut KVSH Racing #11 Chevrolet Dallara

Sebastian Saavedra – AFS KVAFS Racing #17 Chevrolet Dallara

A.J. Foyt Enterprises – 

Takuma Sato – ABC Supply A.J. Foyt Racing #14 Honda Dallara

Dale Coyne Racing – 

Justin Wilson – Dale Coyne Racing #19 Honda Dallara

Carlos Huertas – Dale Coyne Racing #18 Honda Dallara (Rookie)

Ed Carpenter Racing – 

Ed Carpenter – Fuzzy’s Vodka Ed Carpenter Racing #20 Chevrolet Dallara (Oval courses only)

Mike Conway – Fuzzy’s Vodka Ed Carpenter Racing #20 Chevrolet Dallara (Road and street courses only)

Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing – 

Josef Newgarden – Florida Lottery/SFH Racing #67 Honda Dallara

Bryan Hurta Autosport/Bowen & Bowers Motorsports – 

Jack Hawksworth – Charter/Castrol Edge BHA/BBM with Curb-Agajanian #98 Honda Dallara (Rookie)

Who to watch:

The Ganassi squad looks pretty stout again this year, and after a switch from Honda powerplants last year to Chevrolet engines this year, they should pick up some good speed at the oval tracks. 

Three-time champion Scott Dixon is back to defend his 2013 victory with his familiar #9 Chip Ganassi Racing team. You can bet that the Kiwi will not be resting on his laurels, and will attack with all his full arsenal from the word go.

Tony Kanaan has been signed to Chip Ganassi Racing, replacing his friend Dario Franchitti. Kanaan slots into the team Dario retired from, inheriting his engineer, crew, management, etc. lock stock and barrel. This move puts Kanaan in the catbird seat, and could be his best chance at repeating championship glory since he won it back in 2004. Kanaan won the Indy 500 last year with KV Racing, and will be looking to use that momentum to propel him further in 2014.

Graham Rahal has told Racer Magazine that 2014 will effectively be his put up or shup up year, and stated that “there’s no excuse” this year because he has the engineering, the team, the strong budget to work with, and great management. I’m a fan of his, for obvious reasons… After a disappointing year in 2013, the Rahal Letterman Lanigan team has dropped to a single entry for Graham, focusing their resources in order to play to his strengths better.

While Ganassi changed from Honda to Chevy, Andretti chose the opposite approach, believing Honda’s new engine will provide them with the competitive edge they need to succeed. 

At the risk of parroting words from the mouth of Marshall Pruett (racer.com), I think that 2013 was the Helio Castroneves’ golden year, and he failed to bring it home in the final stretch. 2014 will see the 38 year old driver on the downward slide. By virtue of having signed Juan Pablo Montoya, Helio has effectively been slotted into ‘driver #3’ status within Team Penske, and will be overshadowed by both Montoya and teammate Will Power. 

As the dark-horse of the series, never count out Simon Pagenaud. I’ll leave it at that.

How to watch:

All IndyCar events this year appear to be available live. The majority of the races will be broadcast on NBC Sports Network, with the exception of this weekend’s St. Petersburg event, the two races at Indianapolis, and the two races on Detroit’s Belle Isle. All of the races will also be broadcast on SiriusXM channel 211

Commenting will again fall to Leigh Diffey (anchor), Townsend Bell (color), and Jon Beekhuis (pit report) while the series is on NBC Sports. Allen Bestwick will replace Andy Reid (anchor), assisted by Scott Goodyear and Eddie Cheever (color) when the series is broadcast on ABC.

Schedule:

Race 1 – Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg – March 30th

Race 2 – Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach – April 13th

Race 3 – Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama – April 27th

Race 4 – Grand Prix of Indianapolis – May 10th

Race 5 – Indianapolis 500 – May 25th

Race 6 – Chevrolet Indy Dual in Detroit Race 1 – May 31st

Race 7 – Chevrolet Indy Dual in Detroit Race 2 – June 1st

Race 8 – Firestone 600 in Fort Worth, TX – June 7th

Race 9 – The Shell and Pennzoil Grand Prix of Houston Race 1 – June 28th

Race 10 – The Shell and Pennzoil Grand Prix of Houston Race 1 – June 29th

Race 11 – Pocono INDYCAR 500 – July 6th

Race 12 – Iowa Corn Indy 300 – July 12th

Race 13 – Honda Indy Toronto Race 1 – July 19th

Race 14 – Honda Indy Toronto Race 1 – July 20th

Race 15 – Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio – August 3rd

Race 16 – ABC Supply Wisconsin 250 – August 17th

Race 17 – GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma – August 24th

Race 18 – Fontana, CA MAVTV 500 – August 30th

 

Ryan Long has produced an excellent IndyCar Spotter Guide, and it is available for download as a PDF before each event at IndyCar.com.

All photos sourced from IndyCar.com