Dear Heretic: The short answer to your question is: "No. Renault is
just getting "dialed in" and I expect them to be the best of the
rest at Indy. I'm picking J.T. and F.A. to finish 3rd & 4th.
It will be Honda that pushes too hard here, I think and I'm afraid Jenson will
end up parked alongside Takuma with a smoking engine. The humidity &
ambient temp are both very high this week -- and I think the stress will be
pretty brutal on the machines as well as drivers on race day.
It could be that Ralph & Juan Pablo will take each other out of the race
again, but if they don't they'll be pushing for a podium, too.
You're right that Ross Braun will be careful, but not TOO careful this week
(and we know that there are no team orders so there won't be any
"blocking" by the number two red car). I do, though, expect some
interesting pit strategy to give Michael as much access to the open track as
possible near both the end and beginning of his stints.
I'm also expecting Kimi to be fast; I just hope his engine isn't wound too
tightly. Wouldn't it be fun if the Mac/Merc combo returned to the glory days
and we got to see Michael and Kimi dicing the way we did when Mika put Michael
down here at Indy? Alas, I don't think it's very likely - Jim W (Reference Heretic
6-8 - Is Renault trying too hard ?)
The Heretic replies:
Hi Jim,
I apologise for being so late in replying – another case of my day job
interfering with motor racing.
The benefit is that I can now answer with 20-20 hindsight. It turned out
that Renault just did not have the grunt and BAR comfortably stepped into that
second spot.
I do not even know why Barrichello is still pretending that he is
allowed to race Michael. Who is he fooling?
We may have to wait for a while longer for McLaren to get there. Now
they are fighting off Toyota!
