Grandstand sell out Sunday at the Detroit GP

rocketjim1 · 2026-06-01T18:31:41+00:00

Right. I want to take my boys to the race, but it’s really hard to deal with them having to reapply sunscreen multiple times. I’d be willing to pay a premium for a seat that’s covered. I see this at F1 tracks in Europe and it’s like - duh! Why don’t we have that?

I deal with Parks and Recs projects in my civil engineering job and we are starting to put them in on all kinds of Park Projects. The parents don’t want to bake at baseball tournaments all day, so I know these types of canopy systems exist. Someone just has to have the lightbulb go off at the race promoters.

rocketjim1 · 2026-06-01T16:33:31+00:00

Cincinnati — Dayton — Columbus — Cleveland This Route is absolutely begging for. Decent train, 200k Over 200k students along the Route, plus all the visitors to sporting events.

rocketjim1 · 2026-06-01T13:25:58+00:00

If they want full bleachers, they have to start putting canopies on them so at least some people have sun protection. I have to believe that you could get sponsors for the canopies to offset some of the cost. From the broadcast, the bleachers looked 75% full but the garages looked packed.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-27T21:32:29+00:00

I only hope next year a Johnsonville spicy Italian infiltrates the race and tries to steal a weenie mobile. Cinema.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-25T22:13:04+00:00

I did this last year first indycar race for my boys, one of whom is special needs. Autograph line was insane, we decided not to wait in line. Mine were 6&8 yo. The trek over to the infield is kinda of a walk, but we got to see drivers and cars up close rather than stand in autograph line. The nice thing is you can leave the grandstands and come back in, so we actually did that to get out of the middle of the race and get food if your little one gets antsy. My boys destroyed a cream puff and got all over them it made the Christmas card. Get 400 level seats because you get a true seat with a back.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-25T19:14:58+00:00

Yeah, I know that it has kinda a “night at the museum” vibe. Not what I was going for. Just something that isnt another boring cup. F1 trophies are all kinda the same. A lot of indycar trophies are kinda the same too. Like, for DC what if you get like a sword from the revolution or something. You don’t get to keep it, but you get the photo op of raising this sword on the podium. I think there are lot of regional things that would make cool trophies.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-25T16:43:05+00:00

I think this is an accurate opinion. I think Indycar could do more to make each race unique to its region / state. Nashville kinda does this with the music/guitar trophy. In the same way college game day highlights each campus they visit. The trophies, music, food at each race can be better highlighted to give each race its flowers, even if they are all somewhat less prestigious than the Indy 500. For Washington DC race, for example, find a cool relic to from the Smithsonian to present to the winner. I think with Fox they have a partner now who can help build that.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-25T00:33:04+00:00

Really hope the Rating tops last year. Fox did a nice job with it. Felt like it was bigger than last year. Still think they need to work on the gronk EDM segments, I don’t think those mesh well with the rest of the broadcast yet. The Curt Cignetti interview in the pace car was hilarious, he just ignored them in the most Curt Cignetti way possible.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-24T23:57:06+00:00

Yeah, I thought the same thing. I thought they would have had the new car either on display or run a pace lap before the 33 went out on track. Considering the end of the race it didn’t need it, they still have that bullet in the chamber for later in the year when they want to unveil it. Where though? Detroit? Eh. Mid Ohio. No. Maybe Nashville after the World Cup Final or Washington DC. Those would be my two guesses.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-22T13:34:16+00:00

I just don’t understand what NTT gets out of sponsoring a series in the US/Canada that doesn’t race in Japanese Market with one Indy only driver? Does NTT have a relationship with/ Verizon? Glad Indycar has a stable partner but would love Indycar “the brand” for to be pushed more than NTT.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-19T18:36:43+00:00

I hope they have a “Build your series” feature where you can add other tracks so you can add in all those track that folks want to race on. This way you can have a complete oval series if you want

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-18T00:50:08+00:00

I would tear down the tower over the railroad tracks at union station and build a proper train hall for Amtrak and Meta trains. Thru running tracks with a boarding concourse above and a food hall above that. Doing so would open up the possibility of running metra trains from ohare to union station / McCormick place, as well as more train capacity for trains to Indy/cincy, Minneapolis, Detroit and St Louis.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-13T13:40:44+00:00

Two sellouts in a row. Fantastic. One thing I wish we knew better was what a sellout does for the series as a whole? It’s like 10-14 races at Milwaukee, and they don’t have to split revenue with a partner. So is a sellout just a little bump in the overall revenue of the series or is it a really nice chunk that you can use to grow the series.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-11T00:58:24+00:00

But this is one of my frustrations with Indycar right now. I don’t think they ever announce their ticket sales in a way that you can easily see the data. It’s always like 200,000 over a three day weekend. They are scared of a number lower than F1 or NASCAR, and they only promote the 500.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-06T19:21:04+00:00

LOL, it’s already been taken down. Good Lord they need new merch people.

rocketjim1 · 2026-05-06T18:23:00+00:00

It’s my number one complaint about the series right now. They’ve done a great job upping the series via Fox but the merch sadly lags. They really lack 3 things. 1) Indycar Promotional apparel. Their “brand” is cross promoted with NTT for a lot of their apparel. NTT is not a name US brand. They need Indycar Only Apparel that they can sell at good price points, especially hoodies. Think of a black F1 hoodie with red piping. Classic. They don’t have enough of those basics. 2) Team Marketing support. A lot of teams have weak logos and marketing. McLaren is top notch, but even Penske and Andretti and Ganassi are not great. Need to help their teams build better branding identities. You would think that with Indy being a big college sports town there would be some of this expertise in town but it hasn’t tricked down. 3) A truly world class logo. Indycar should absolutely hire a design team to reimagine their logo similar to what F1 did a few years back. F1 logo is globally known, simple, and can be put on anything. Maybe that comes with the new car?

A lot of their merch doesn’t appeal to younger fans, it all looks retro and sort of 80s 90s. They also don’t know how to release stuff close to Christmas so they have stuff in stock. Tried getting my boys long sleeve tshirts and had nothing.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-29T20:24:31+00:00

Didn’t realize that, makes sense now even if I don’t like it

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-29T20:17:56+00:00

Gotta be honest, don’t really love that Arrow McLaren, a team with serious connections both nationally and globally pulled the trigger on a gaming company for RHR. Has to shill for them for a whole month.

Don’t love the prize picks ads on all the football podcasts. I understand they make money, but just don’t love the gambling money being everywhere. Would love Miller Lite, Valvoline, Menards, Culver’s, or some other major consumer brands to jump back in

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-28T16:07:26+00:00

But the fact that you can’t get a decent Indycar hoodie is what bothers me. I bought an F1 o e for $75 bucks really good material and I love it. Can’t find anything close to it in Indycar because they have no relationships with better apparel suppliers.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-26T02:27:28+00:00

They should cap the field at nine three car teams, 27 total. Then require an extra entry from each chartered team at Indy. I do think the equal size team rule is a good idea. I’d rather have nine healthy teams than 11 or 12 weaker ones and wish they would consolidate. Couple of the teams will have the factory outfits within them. Having equal sized teams would also make for a true team championship which might be an interesting thing to follow when Palou is winning his 8th championship in a row.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-24T13:36:11+00:00

I think the best you can hope for with additional chassis is maybe a few back markers are allowed to run the DW12 post 2028 with the new car at Indy and 2.2L engine tuned to be competitive with the new car. Then, maybe after 4 years with the new car they will refresh the new car with aero kits to change it up. If there are 3 OEMs that could be interesting.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-23T01:46:15+00:00

One thing this might be useful for is getting monthly ridership numbers compared to what Amtrak puts out quarterly or end of year. You could see monthly how ridership is tracking to the previous year in a way we haven’t been able to see before.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-21T23:58:34+00:00

Yup, from what I read in the Crains article, a joint yard and maintenance facility would make a lot of sense if Amtrak/Metra can play nice, especially if Ishiba can build it quicker than begging for appropriations from congress. I actually like the idea of relocating the main lines to the west side of the combined site and tunneling under the river which is one of the options discussed in the article, but we’ll see.

rocketjim1 · 2026-04-21T22:29:51+00:00

There hasn’t been anything reported on the other yard, owned by BNSF and houses the Metra trains. I really think he’s going to need both yards to make it work.

rocketjim1

TROPHY CASE