IRLblog.com

photo: Ron McQueeny

When I was at Homestead Miami Speedway, I had the opportunity to catch up with Pippa Mann of Panther Racing after the Firestone Indy Lights open test session had ended and ask her a few questions.

IRLblog: How did the opportunity for you drive in the Firestone Indy Lights come about and how does it compare to driving in the World Series by Renault?

Pippa:  I have been looking over to coming over to the states since I ran in the World Series by Renault.  That is pretty much as high as you can go in Europe unless you have money behind you.  In Europe it is still pretty closed off for woman drivers as well.  My manager was speaking to a few people to see if there was anything out there.  The opportunity came up to meet with Panther Racing.  Panther was encrusted on having another European driver over and actually wound up with two of us.  They had me over to Sonoma and I met John Barnes as well as other members of Panther Racing.  They called me up and offered me a contract and here I am.

IRLblog: How does it feel to be one of the higher anticipated rookies in a Firestone Indy Lights with this seasons rookie class as large as it is?

Pippa: I just hope that I can do a really good job for these guys.  They have a great oval car.  It’s a fantastic car.  I hope to do really well on the ovals.  I am still very new at it.  Riding in traffic is still something that I have to get used to.  Last year these guys had a slightly tougher time with road courses, so we have been working really hard over the winter and we now feel we have a much better road course car for this year.  Everyone is really looking forward to this season.

IRLblog: Since Homestead is your first time driving on an oval, how does it compare to road courses in the sense of ease to learn?  Is it harder to learn road course driving or oval driving?

Pippa: Back in Europe when you drive road courses, you have these very big 180 degree turns on tracks such as Monza called parabolics which are very fast fifth and sixth gear, pretty much flat out corners, and so for a road course driver it is easier to learn ovals because it is really two parabolics put together.  It’s actually flat out and the way the car reacts and behaves is very similar.

IRLblog: How does it feel to be picked up by a team such as Panther Racing?

Pippa: It is an incredible oppurtunity for me and you have to look at their past success and how many races they won on ovals last season.  I am looking forward to the first oval race as well as the first race in St. Petersburg.

Before the lunch break today Panther Racing’s Pippa Mann found the extra speed in her car to propel her to the top of the speed chart yet again.  She seems to be setting the pace for the Firestone Indy Lights rookies as well as the veterans.  It is definitely media day here at the Speedway.  As I walk around the garage areas I am starting to see more and more drivers being interviewed by members of the media.  It is not as lax as it was yesterday in the garage area and on pit row.   You have 5 Firestone Indy Lights drivers that have best speeds today at 187 mph with the rest of the field trying to catch up.  Jay Howard is on track in the Palm Beach International Raceway car (PBIR).  PBIR is the slowest on the track today despite having the 2006 Firestone Indy Lights champion in the cockpit.  The top five in the speed charts currently are Pippa Mann, Ali Jackson, Sebastian Saavedra, Martin Plowman, and Mario Romancini.  We will see how the rest of the day plays out with Firestone Indy Lights testing wrapping up at 3:45 p.m.  You can continue to watch the live timing and scoring by clicking the link below:

Firestone Indy Lights live timing and scoring

photo: Pippa Mann getting ready to take to the track

Yes…  You read the title correctly.  IRLblog is on site covering the IndyCar and Firestone Indy Lights testing at Homestead Miami Speedway.  Today the rookies of the Firestone Indy Lights are on the track.  Teams did not waste any time this morning getting the ball rolling.  With more rookies than veterans scheduled to test over the course of today and tomorrow, I don’t see why they would have.  Drivers such as Brandon Wagner of Davey Hamilton Racing,  Martin Plowman and Pippa Mann of Panther Racing, Mario Romancini of RLR / Anderson Racing, and Junior Strous of ASR-Nelan Motorsports have been turning laps since 9 a.m.  Team PBIR, although a new team has put no stranger to American open wheel racing Jay Howard behind the wheel.  PBIR will not test today but will be on track tomorrow along with the rest of the Firestone Indy Lights teams.

Pippa Mann is the fastest rookie on the track thus far with a best speed of 187.582 mph around the 1.5 mile oval with the majority of the field just 1 mph slower.  You can watch live Firestone Indy Lights Scoring by following the link below.

Firestone Indy Lights live timing and scoring

Well, it would seem that my speculations on this recent posting were correct.  Firestone held a private test for the Firestone Indy lights on the 2.034 mile 11 turn road course at Palm Beach International Raceway on January 26th and 27th.  Among the teams that tested were Genoa Lights with Richard Phillipe, Sam Schmidt Motorsports with Charlie Kimball and Ana Beatriz, and Panther Racing with Pippa Mann and Martin Plowman.  The teams were turning in times around the 1 minute 7 second range on the new road course which was just recently completed in the later half of 2008.  Perhaps we will see the IndyCar Series here for testing sometime in the not so distant future.

These teams along with AFS/Andretti Green Racing drivers J.L. Hildebrand and Sebastian Saavedra will resume testing at Homestead Miami Speedway On January 28th and 29th.

Don’t change that channel. The IndyCar Series championship season might have come to a close, but we still have one more stop on the 2008 schedule. The IndyCar Series is off to Surfers Paradise Australia on October 26, 2008. ESPN Classic will be airing the race live at 10:30 p.m. e.t. Dario Franchitti will be joining the field replacing Dan Wheldon in the #10 Target Chip Ganassi entry. It is rumored that Wheldon has already replaced Vitor Meira at Panther Racing and he will be driving the #4 in Australia. This final race to close out the season comes after a long break since the Chicagoland race. Since this race cost the teams quite a bit since it is on the other side of the globe and their are no points involved, one would think if the drivers and the teams are going to push the cars to the edge of the envelope, or if they are going to be a little more lax about it.  I know what the fans would like to see, the same intense racing they have seen all season.  This final race to close out the season comes after a long break since the Chicagoland race. We look forward to a safe, exciting race and a well deserved off season.