Indy Racing League - 2015

The Motorsport season of the New World is reaching full speed this weekend. After the two classic endurance appointments
of Daytona and Sebring, it's time now to welcome the IndyCar Series 2015 together with the little sister IndyLights

Following is a brief update on the most reverred open wheels series in the U.S.

TEAM and DRIVERS

With almost every team making changes for the upcoming season, a little summary can be very helpful:
A J Foyt will race two cars this year for the whole season, with Sato confirmed and Hawksworth moving from Bryan Herta Autosport.
Andretti is committing with four cars for the whole season. Hinchcliffe is leaving the family to join Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, while Simona De Silvestro and Justin Wilson share car n. 25
Bryan Herta doubles his presence with two cars appointed to Howard, coming back in the series and Gabby Chavez, fresh winner of the last Indy Lights season.
CFH Racing is born from the merging of Ed Carpenter and Sarah Fisher and it will have three cars for carpenter, newgarden and filippi. Mike Conway is leaving to join the Toyota team in the WEC.
Ganassi doesn't change much except for Briscoe leaving the seat to the young Karam, already involved in the 2014 Indy500.
Dale Coyne will partner with Huertas and the Italian rookie Francesco Dracone, while Wilson is joining Andretti for at least the Indy 500.
KV Racing is relying on European drivers for this season with Sebastian Bourdais and the other rookie Stefano Coletti from GP2. The other Sebastian, Saavedra, won't race this season.
Rahal Letterman is downsizing, leaving only one car on track for Graham and Filippi moving to CFH.
Schmidt Peterson changes both drivers: Jakes and Hinchcliffe for the Russian Aleshin and Pagenaud moved to Penske.
Penske expands to four cars and welcomes Simon Pagenaud.


CALENDAR

The calendar has been shortened from 18 to 16 race. Actually it was supposed to be 17 but the last minute cancellation of the
season opening race in Brasilia, Brazil, due to some sudden political changes has further reduced the number of races.
The only race entering the 2015 calendar is the Gran Prix of Louisiana, while the double race of Houston won't take part in this season
as well as one of the 2 in Toronto.  


RULES

On the field we'll see much more sofisticated looking cars, due to a new aerodinamic
package provided by Honda, which reminds us of the F1 aerodynamic kits for the years
2008-2010.
Several are also the changes that we will notice on track. First of all no standing starts
in 2015. Too many, in fact, the failures during the starting procedure in the last couple
years, some of which led to dangerous pile ups (last of them at the Indianapolis Gran Prix
with Saavedra walking out of a completely destroyed car). Pit selection will be based on the
team performance in the previous race and not more on the driver's performance
Prior to the race, the qualification groups will be based on the last session of practice
and not anymore on the first one.

The point system has also been revisited by moving the double point assignation from MAVTV
and Pocono to Sonoma that will be the only one beside the Indy500 to award double points.

 
Time now to get ready! The Firesonr Gran Prix it's just around the corner!!



Picture from bu30sports.com