2011 IndyCar Grand Prix of Long Beach - Racing on the street course for the Toyota sponsored race
Published by Pat W
Welcome to the live thread for the 2011 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, the third round of the IZOD IndyCar Series.
This classic street course has been hosting races for over 30 years, starting with Formula 5000, changing to Formula 1 for several years before switching to a long career as part of the CART schedule, joining Champ Car when that series succeeded CART. As one of the jewels in the crown of American open wheel racing it was always going to be the very first pick of the Champ Car events to join the now-unified IndyCar Series.
It may have a long tradition but it is also a fast street track with narrow sections and unforgiving concrete walls and a bumpy concrete surface. The racing is hard and the attrition can be high. The fastest part of the course is the start/finish straight - how will the drivers manage the new double-file restarts at Long Beach after they failed at St Pete, the last street course they ran?
Remember on road/street courses drivers must run the hard (black) and soft (red) compounds at least once. The TV broadcast will no doubt remind us of this often.
Weather Forecast: This is California.
Race Distance: 85 Laps
Start time: Any time within the next half hour (IndyCar is awful at publicising start times which are never rigid).
Starting order
(I include primary sponsor for identification purposes)
Will Power took his customary Vettel-like pole, but behind him the order is very much mixed up with some talented drivers in underperforming teams running well. Let's hope it makes the racing exciting!
| Pos | Driver | Team |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Will Power | Verizon / Penske |
| 2 | Ryan Hunter-Reay | DHL / Andretti |
| 3 | Mike Conway | Window World / Andretti |
| 4 | Oriol Servia | Telemundo / Newman/Haas |
| 5 | Justin Wilson | Z-Line Designs / Dreyer & Reinbold |
| 6 | Helio Castroneves | Auto Club / Penske |
| 7 | Dario Franchitti | Target / Chip Ganassi |
| 8 | Scott Dixon | Target / Chip Ganassi |
| 9 | Alex Tagliani | Bowers & Wilkins / Sam Schmidt |
| 10 | Tony Kanaan | GEICO Lotus / KV |
| 11 | James Hinchcliffe | Sprott / Newman/Haas |
| 12 | Ryan Briscoe | Penske Truck Rental / Penske |
| 13 | Vitor Meira | ABC Supply / AJ Foyt |
| 14 | Marco Andretti | Venom Energy / Andretti |
| 15 | Sebastian Saavedra | Conquest |
| 16 | Graham Rahal | Service Central / Ganassi |
| 17 | EJ Viso | PDVSA Lotus / KV |
| 18 | Simona De Silvestro | Nuclear Clean Energy / HVM |
| 19 | Raphael Matos | Automatic Fire Sprinklers / AFS |
| 20 | Danica Patrick | GoDaddy / Andretti |
| 21 | Sebastien Bourdais | Boy Scouts / Dale Coyne |
| 22 | Takuma Sato | Lotus / KV |
| 23 | James Jakes | Acorn Stairlifts / Dale Coyne |
| 24 | Charlie Kimball | Novo Nodisk / Ganassi |
| 25 | Paul Tracy | Dragon |
| 26 | Ana Beatriz | Ipiranga / Dreyer & Reinbold |
| 27 | JR Hildebrand | National Guard / Panther |
If you are in the US you can see this race live on Versus.
If you are in the UK it is on Sky Sports 4.
If you are new to IndyCar racing or have any questions generally, do please ask in the comments as I am bound to have forgotten something crucial here! Enjoy the race.
