I worked for a sponsor of Patrick Racing in 2001. Roberto Mereno reported losing the color in his vision and his vision narrowing after repeated laps at speed. He is actually one of the first drivers to say anything at the track that weekend.
I can't imagine what it must be like to do 235+ mph for 500 laps. I am not surprised it could induce G force induced unconscious. I am pleased they didn't run this race.
@@dazuk1969It wasn't the speed because they were doing that at Fontana and Michigan. The problem was the G loading at a much shorter oval. Fontana and Michigan had straights a half mile long for drivers to rest up and the banking at Texas was much steeper so there was no rest from the G loading.
@@danielhenderson8316 Exactly. Texas is basically a lab centrifuge with the speed the CART cars are running. The fact the turns are 24° steep vs the 20° and 18° in Michigan and Autoclub just exacerbated the G-loading. The drivers are getting their blood pulled from their heads each time they take the turns.
Definitely the right call. Just gotta say that 1990s - early 2000 CART was among the all-time great motorsports. Fast cars, lots of superb drivers, tons of passing, multiple winners, powerful engines. I really miss it and I was sad to see IRL survive and CART die. These cars are so beautiful too. These cars at big ovals and road courses like Elkhart Lake was perfection!
no doubt. Total agreement, "sad to see IRL survive and CART die." I quit watching Indy car racing as a whole. Thought Tony George's league was bush league.
The "mistake" was putting teams to do the testing, they should have made the first testing sessions with an outside driver and car, so they could have avoided the sandbaging
They did. I'm with you that I hated it at the time, when I was only 17, but I understand it now. Safety in motorsport must be the first priority. I saw too many drivers die in the 90s and the early-2000s.
@@Demise90Racing stop perpetuating that damn myth. None of the drivers were suffering from g-lock, it was heat stress. Let's see you put on 3 layers of nomex, climb into a car and drive it around in 100 degree heat, and see if you don't suffer from heat stress and pass out.
People forget that between the Brack test in December and the race weekend, the CART enine manufacturers had redesigned their intake plenums to cheat the popoff valve (coming to a head a few weekends later in Detroit - the REAL low point for CART as a series). Consequently the engines hat the manufacturers showed up with on race weekend had about 100 more horsepower than the engine from the Brack Dec. test (e.g.an enormous gain). The Series Officials had no way to predict this would happen - yet another contributing factor to the Texas Debacle.
@ethanweeter2732 He probably would've passed out if he did have it wide open. Inertia can be a pain in the a$$, although a lot of other things would be impossible if it didn't occur. For instance: orbits wouldn't be possible.
I've been waiting for you to cover this! I've always thought of this as the CART's version of the 2005 US Grand Prix, but it clearly was a very difficult situation for everyone involved.
I kind of avoided it to be honest. I don't want to focus on too much negativity, but it's an important part of the series history, so I needed to make a video on it sooner or later.
The difference is in the F1 2005 Indy, the FIA did NOT try to salvage the spectacle. In fact they blocked many practical attempts to save it, including a temporary chicane to slow down all drivers and no Michelin drivers allowed to score a point. Here, the CART officials honestly tried to salvage the show; but their big fault was ignoring the drivers' pleas about safety/testing from months before.
A rare instance when a race was cancelled because the drivers are deemed physically unfit to drive for the whole race due to high G forces due to massive speed and banking. It is an embarassing moment for CART but it could’ve been worse if they ran the race as scheduled
I was there. We had gone to see Driven the night before. I was a HUGE CART proponent, hating the IRL with all my being. This was a crushing defeat for CART erasing the triumphs of Indy 2000 and 2001.
CART was in a lose-lose situation with this. If they raced it could of been dangerous and a driver's career could've tragically ended. But since they didn't race it definitely it hurt their reputation and it gave the IRL the advantage and soon became the bigger IndyCar series.
I attended the practice and qualifying the day before. I brought my scanner radio to listen in. I arrived just after Gugelmin wrecked. I remember a number of drivers being asked if they were okay. No direct questions. After qualifying only Michael Andretti seemed to be not happy. I thought he was whining. Paul Tracy was stoked. I arrived that morning, bought my ticket and was told the gates would open later. I scratched my head as to why I couldn't enter. I was sitting in my car when I saw everyone leaving. It took 6 months to get my money back.
it was one of the final nails for Championship Auto Racing Teams, but Champ Car World Series emerged after 2002 and gave a glimmer of hope. they fumbled it pretty hard in 2006/2007 losing Ford, though.
My dad and I had season tickets to TMS back then. Fans really turned on CART after this. Any time CART was brought up they would get booed. The following year there was a season opener event at TMS where one of the things talked about was the track being repaved and Eddie Gossage made the remark that last year some people said the track was too fast, so they made it faster.
The entire cause of this was teams sandbagging during all the tests. They tested before the race and the speeds seemed fine. They were only fine because the drivers were purposefully going slower than they could to not show their hand. As a result, CART thought everything would be fine. If the teams actually ran at full speed, they would have seen this earlier and something could have been done ahead of time.
There was never an official CART test like there should have been, and while drivers weren't sandbagging, they weren't going full tilt. They were also using 2000 spec engines which was also less powerful that the 2001 motors they had in the middle of the year.
Thank you,nailed it.If everyone went wide open this would've been avoided.And to the other persons point,CART should have done wide open testing first,absolutley
I attended the first night race at the new configuration at Atlanta just before this. They were having black outs at that race. I remember billy boat running 234 mph around Atlanta.
Going back to the late 70's, I was fortunate to see a fair amount of Indy car racing at Michigan. The "Norton Twin 200's, all the way into the mid 1990's. The speeds there were incredible.
Thanks for explaining that Cart became Champ. As a viewer in the UK, the politics were never really explained to us and I knew I was watching something other than Indy after 2003.
I think part of the demise in popularity of open wheel racing was that in the 90’s they reached peak speed and Indianapolis. They peaked at this time, no more curiosity over who can push the limit. Now if you set a new race speed record it’s only because it had the least amount of cautions.
I was actually at this "race". Huge CART fan growing up, living in Texas at the time so my dad and I went up for the weekend. Everything was pretty much fine until Maurício Gugelmin crashed in practice. The huge g-forces of the wreck started causing concern late Friday. We had a radio scanner so we could listen in on all the different team radios, and also radios at the track from things like media and marshals. Then Saturday things started to get worse, and we figured there was a good chance it would get cancelled. Even though it sucked that we didn't get to see the race, I think they made the right call to cancel it. Just not worth the risk to the drivers or spectators.
I watched the broadcast. I was immensely impressed that CART placed safety ahead of money. The cars were too fast. That’s scoreboard over every other series, imo.
Great presentation of the details and events that happened in your content. Although many people may have been frustrated, it was the right thing to do. Racing fans already know what it is to lose a legendary driver during a race and that possible tragedy didn't happen because they made the right decision looking back now.
Nice thanks for this post. 👍 I was there! The speeds were redicouls but awesome to watch. Was there for all 3 days. Would like to thank Eddie G. He sent out word that if we presented our tickets we could get a full refund. Amazing track promoter. Thanks Texas Motor Speedway for the memories!!
For those commenting about the G Loads, the link to the ABC Broadcast is here: ruclips.net/video/wVyfgh3TVCM/видео.html . The main point that Navy Captain David Brown (who also died on the Space Shuttle Columbia) at 17:00 mark was that fighter pilots would hit 5-9 Gs for several seconds and that the space shuttle would hit 1.5-3 G for about 8 minutes while the drivers would have had to face 5-6 Gs for almost 2 hrs and 45 minutes in the Texas heat.
Here's GilDe Ferran's 241 mph average at Fontana... ruclips.net/video/DF8GTL0_rMA/видео.html Guessing he was getting close to 250 on the straights? Closest example I could find...
Rusty Wallace hit 228 in a cup car that was running a non restricted motor, that was about 30 moh faster than the regular race pace and had no drafting help. Those champ cars would have hit 250+ in the draft easily
I still think CART made the right decision, hearing the NASA doctor talking about it and knowing about G-LOC, it was absolutely the right call, looking back on it. CART took a PR hit not racing, but the PR hit would have been way, way way worse if they had raced and someone had got hurt or worse
Someone did get hurt. Mauricio Gugelmin passed out in practice and hit the Turn 1 wall and didn't stop until Turn 4. He was injured enough he flew home before the race.
I think that, if you look in the whole situation, it was a lose-lose situation. It was a matter of what was less painful. But then I remember it's CART, and they *still* managed to screw it up.
This was bullshit, drivers were not suffering from g-lock. It was 100 degrees in the middle of summer in DFW, drivers were ill prepared to suffer through the "heat stress" than risk of dieing due to g-lock. These are not fighter pilots, cause Indycar still races the same track conditions as they did then. They don't have drivers dropping dead from g-lock, that's a damn myth, stop perpetuating it.
You should do a video on the Las Vegas IRL debacle in 2011….. where (unlike CART), the IRL simply chooses to ignore its drivers concerns & an absolute tragedy occurred.
Don’t forget the 1999 Charlotte race that killed three spectators. I watched that race in 1998, IRL was running 8 to 9 seconds a lap faster than the Winston Cup cars lap record, a couple cars were approaching 230mph going into turn 3 It was cool to watch but one heavy crash in three years ended it. The Charlotte roval would have been a better race and they would have needed so much downforce in the infield. But IRL was all round track then as I recall.
That chicane in Baltimore was a clusterf**k. Lol great race, terrible conditions. Wish they would have repaved those crappy streets in downtown Baltimore. Great video!
2001 was the tipping point for CART. It's also when Penske went back to the Indy 500 and then left CART for good. They also got bad PR for running after 9-11, even if it was international.
No Dan's head was struck by deris and the catch fence/wall, he didn't know what hit him. Thank God. Other than the fireball he drove through, his accident had more similarities to Scott Brayton's than it did anything else. And it happened in 2000 cause Dale Earnheardt mentioned his death during the prerace coverage, not 2011..
@@Rob_Moilanen it’s called Google, you should try it…”the fatal accident occurred on Oct. 16, 2011, and claimed the life of the popular two-time Indy 500 winner from England.”
@@Rob_MoilanenAre you stoned? Wipe the sleep outta your eyes before commenting. #1) Dan Wheldon was killed in 2011. #2)like stated in the above comment, Had they taken a similar approach in canceling that race before it got started then Dan Wheldon would still be here. That's what the original comment stated. #3) Reading comprehension is important.
I also remember the drivers were really upset with Rahal because he lobbied for the race at TMS. When they started experiencing vertigo and eventually canceling the race, they threw Bobby under the bus. Im sure there's footage somewhere...
I remember in the weeks leading up to the race there were many CART drivers who were very vocal about not wanting to race at Texas. I would've loved to have been a fly on the wall at the driver's meetings and CART official's meetings to find out what really happened.
That was bullshit, I mean it was DFW in the heat of the summer with drivers wearing 3 layers of Nomex, of course drivers didn't want to suffer through that. It was too fucking hot to be racing.
I was camping there that weekend and was so pissed off they cancelled it and didn't even offer a refund or a future discount ticket. I don't understand why they couldn't do something to slow down their cars.
I'm an open wheel novice. This is awesome. I'm not into the weeds but I was a CART fan and didn't like IRL.....Would love to see a track where these guys could do 300.....safely....of course....none of those exist, but it would be awesome.
This was one of the reasons for the demise of CART. The track surface issues (and shortening of the race) at Rockingham for the inaugural running of a race in the UK was another.
This was the age of Speed TV and everyone thought that racing was going to be profitable for other series than NASCAR. Racing is just too expensive unless you race cheap junk like NASCAR, or have millions to burn like F1.
The high G forces actually were manifested in blood being pushed away from the brain and into the body as the drivers sped through the steep banked turns. You can imagine how this affected the drivers.
Steve Olvey and Terry Trammel had to be given complete control of track safety because the drivers would not do it. Mario Andretti said that every safety feature is a speed penalty so they had to be mandated on all teams. Dr. Olvey once noticed drivers getting out of their cars after a race, complaining of headaches, nausea, vomiting and flushed red skin. Dr. Olvey mandated every driver take a blood test after the race and he found out the carbon monoxide levels were well above normal. Now drivers have air filtration systems. After a series of serious foot injuries, Dr. Trammel ordered the nose of the cars to be longer and the driver's feet to be place behind the front wheels giving them more protection. If Dr. Olvey said it was too dangerous to run this race, most of the drivers would not argue with him.
Think you can do a video on the Baltimore race? I live in the area and loved the race weekend with ALMS, but I am not sure if it was a good race for the drivers or the city. Pretty sad because here in the mid-Atlantic states, we do not have easy access to IndyCar races
8:00 5.5G is not double of what a jet fighter pilot Can experiment. It is actually only slightly half of what a jet fighter pilot can endure, since a jet fighter can produce accelerations up to 9G.
Kenny Brack & TMS have a real history with each other, did the pre race test, then over a year later after the ''race'' he'd sustain his record (and bone) breaking accident on the backstretch in IRL.
It's not the speed number, it was the constant G load the drivers were facing. At Texas that year, drivers were experiencing about 6 G loads for about 90% of the lap. They would briefly hit that at places like Michigan and Fontana, but they had almost a half mile of straight to recover.
@@danielhenderson8316 Well, I guess that's what I am saying. Those 8 MPH somehow keep the G's below the threshold. It's amazing and very unfortunate that, THAT is the limit (not like 250 or 300 which they would never run)
@Demise90Racing yea it sucked for sure man. Luckily we'd come to see qualifying the day before so I got to still witness CART at speed at TMS. It was absolutely insane seeing the speed in person.
Agree with the previous comment. Thank you for making it and allowing us to know more of the facts. I thought that race would be Indy Jr…. They made the right decision.
It's interesting to see the difference in the crowd size from back then to recent years. It reminds me exactly of how the crowds at Fontana thinned out over the years. How much longer will Indycar go to Texas with what seems like very little interest? At this rate, the Indy 500 will be the only superspeedway race and that will be a shame.
This was also the first year Texas was any good for a long time. I think the next two years will be make or break with Texas. I was really pissed off when I found out Pato O'Ward had a sweetheart deal that gave you box seats, merch, and access to pit lane for a meet and greet for $400 a person. I would have jumped all over it, but it wasn't promoted until 2 WEEKS before the race and I couldn't move any time off by that point. If he does that again next year, I'll jump all over it and be on the look out.
(1) At that moment, canceling the race was the right move. (2) Getting to that point is a cataclysmic managerial failure. Apocalyptic, as it turns out. (3) I loved those IRL races at Texas.
I still don't get why they didn't run the road course with the speedway aero package that they had. It would have been a lesser show for the people who'd bought tickets, but it would still at least BE a show.
woah. i'm honestly surprised that this race got the green light. OF COURSE cars going 220mph+ around a track that small would cause problems like that. it made perfect sense when you laid out the numbers... if they were going to do something like this at all they would've been better off going to a super speedway like Daytona, or building their own track that was bigger than 2.5mi. granted that probably wasn't feasible at the time, but building a new facility that can safely accommodate the speeds their cars could run at would've been a much preferable option than subjecting their drivers and equipment to that much sustained lateral g-forces at a track that has no business hosting a series that has cars that fast. it sounds like the CART publicity disaster that day was unavoidable as soon as they added Texas to the schedule. and now that i think of it, this is probably the reason why series like NASCAR limits the top speed of their cars to around 200mph. i thought it might've been because of their tyres, but this makes a lot more sense to me. 🤔
I'm glad they put safety above profit/money there. This could have been a horrible disaster if drivers would pass out at high speeds in a field of over 20 cars.
Great vid. The one thing I will say that you got wrong is 5.5 g’s is not double that of a fighter pilot.. some fighter jets reach up to 11 or 12 g’s.. I get your point tho it’s super human g’s
The link to the race is here: ruclips.net/video/wVyfgh3TVCM/видео.html . The main point that Navy Captain David Brown (who also died on the Space Shuttle Columbia) at 17:00 mark was that fighter pilots would hit 5-9 Gs for several seconds and that the space shuttle would hit 1.5-3 G for about 8 minutes while the drivers would have had to face 5-6 Gs for almost 2 hrs and 45 minutes.
I remember being mad as hell when this was cancelled. I didn’t care for the IRL but their races at Texas were fantastic, so I assumed faster cars would be even better racing. That’s not how it works.. CART had everything going for it in the 90s, even giving Bernie and the boys a bit of a scare. Cars were sexy & looked like they were doing 200 mph in the paddock! ……..Good times…..
wow those are symptoms of hypoxia, the Gs were probably restricting proper blood flow to their head which explains a lot. that’s crazy that those cars were that fast
I was an IRL fan at the time over CART and I made fun of them at the time for not doing it. But, I’ve always thought it was the right decision and I have little doubt that someone would’ve been killed.
When it comes to the risk of severe injury &/or death of that many drivers eclipsing 135 mph, it's best to error on the side of caution, fire-bombing your reputation, losing millions of $$, instead of killing dozens of fellow human beings for profit & grandeur. Safety 1st people!
There was a scandal later that year when it came out that the engine manufacturers had found ways to cheat the blow-off valve that limits boost, so the engines had more power already than they were supposed to. And they didn't bring road course wings with them to increase downforce, and it wouldn't have been safe to just build a duckbill spoiler with stuff from Lowes.
so, i still dont understand why IRL could race there and CART couldnt and what the difference is with Las Vegas. Las Vegas also has 20 degrees turns, as Texas has. Can somebody explain me both questions? Thank you!
CART cars were much faster than IRL cars which meant the vertical g-forces were significantly higher. Vertical g-forces are when the blood flow is decreased to the brain which causes blackouts etc. The Las Vegas track has more of a straight to allow drivers to "rest" in between the banked corners.
I watched back then, l thought it was cool that the cars were so fast drivers were blacking out. I didn't want them to be at an oval, I don't think ovals are great. I loved CART before and after this race. I hated when it died, had all the pieces but was managed poorly. I will forever say CART in the 90s-2000s was the best, best drivers, best cars, best tracks
I don’t understand why CART didn’t try a restrictor block off plate or make it mandatory to add weights to the car anything to slow them down or even make it that they couldn’t run wide open throttle
Because they had about 10 hours to find a fix for about 30 cars. Cutting the boost enough to slow the cars down would blow every engine in the field according to the engine manufacturers (even though reliability wasn't very high).
I'm thinking not necessarily because of the speed of the cars. Texas is a handful and change for handling. Even NASCAR drivers say that this track should be lengthened or something...
i was just thinking that. if they were to run at relatively small ovals like this, that would've been the best route to go i would think. but maybe the NASA guy advised against that?
Besides timing, G Suits would be a disaster. They work by constricting blood flow to your limbs so more of your blood will stay in your head or torso. Add in the Texas heat, no power steering, and over 2 hours of racing and you'd probably have to amputate everyone's arms and legs.
Adding wing would add more downforce which would increase the G load. This issue also came up on Saturday afternoon so getting any shipment of parts was impossible to receive for the entire paddock by Sunday morning.
@@FerrariConceptXThe speed would have gone down because of the drag, but the G loading would probably increase due to the extra grip provided by the extra downforce.
Yeah when you get to the point where you have driver's feeling like they were going to loose consciousness it's time to rethink running at a facility....🏎️🏎️🏎️
Penske left in 2002 because Marlboro was going to pull their sponsorship if they didn't go back to Indy. Ganassi spent 2002 running a team in CART and in IRL until giving up on CART at the end of that year.
I worked for a sponsor of Patrick Racing in 2001. Roberto Mereno reported losing the color in his vision and his vision narrowing after repeated laps at speed. He is actually one of the first drivers to say anything at the track that weekend.
I can't imagine what it must be like to do 235+ mph for 500 laps. I am not surprised it could induce G force induced unconscious. I am pleased they didn't run this race.
@@dazuk1969It wasn't the speed because they were doing that at Fontana and Michigan. The problem was the G loading at a much shorter oval. Fontana and Michigan had straights a half mile long for drivers to rest up and the banking at Texas was much steeper so there was no rest from the G loading.
@@danielhenderson8316 Exactly. Texas is basically a lab centrifuge with the speed the CART cars are running. The fact the turns are 24° steep vs the 20° and 18° in Michigan and Autoclub just exacerbated the G-loading. The drivers are getting their blood pulled from their heads each time they take the turns.
Definitely the right call.
Just gotta say that 1990s - early 2000 CART was among the all-time great motorsports. Fast cars, lots of superb drivers, tons of passing, multiple winners, powerful engines. I really miss it and I was sad to see IRL survive and CART die. These cars are so beautiful too. These cars at big ovals and road courses like Elkhart Lake was perfection!
no doubt. Total agreement, "sad to see IRL survive and CART die." I quit watching Indy car racing as a whole. Thought Tony George's league was bush league.
@@ronlentz4094 yeah, I HATED Tony George! I really believe he ruined American open wheeled racing.
Yes as far as I'm concerned the sport died with CART.
2001 was like an endless barge of death blows for CART, and aviation, and civil engineering in general.
NASCAR and F1 too
Skyscrapers had a bad year as well...
#CART was useless from the beginning, and proved ineptitude here.
@@fobbitoperator3620 "Skyscrapers had a bad year as well..." -- It was, however, a bumper crop year for Islamic Terrorists.
@@StsFiveOneLima As an organisation maybe but the cars were way better than the IRL ones.
I remember this. And honestly looking back now I believe they made the best decision. Although at the time I was frustrated about it
Absolutely. I think everyone was extremely frustrated at the call. But at the end of the day, the call very well may have saved a driver's life.
The "mistake" was putting teams to do the testing, they should have made the first testing sessions with an outside driver and car, so they could have avoided the sandbaging
👍
They did. I'm with you that I hated it at the time, when I was only 17, but I understand it now. Safety in motorsport must be the first priority. I saw too many drivers die in the 90s and the early-2000s.
@@Demise90Racing stop perpetuating that damn myth. None of the drivers were suffering from g-lock, it was heat stress. Let's see you put on 3 layers of nomex, climb into a car and drive it around in 100 degree heat, and see if you don't suffer from heat stress and pass out.
People forget that between the Brack test in December and the race weekend, the CART enine manufacturers had redesigned their intake plenums to cheat the popoff valve (coming to a head a few weekends later in Detroit - the REAL low point for CART as a series). Consequently the engines hat the manufacturers showed up with on race weekend had about 100 more horsepower than the engine from the Brack Dec. test (e.g.an enormous gain). The Series Officials had no way to predict this would happen - yet another contributing factor to the Texas Debacle.
100? That's insane! What a screw up
@@lightfeather9953 No one ever knew this could be a problem before the event.
They would know Brack was not going full throttle:
cough: Honda
@ethanweeter2732 He probably would've passed out if he did have it wide open. Inertia can be a pain in the a$$, although a lot of other things would be impossible if it didn't occur. For instance: orbits wouldn't be possible.
gotta love how Castroneves was racing back then, and still is. Also enjoying seeing Franchitti in the Gordon Murray vids
Mr franchitti has the best job on the planet now, I would love to drive a t50 or t33 for a living
Will Power too
I've been waiting for you to cover this! I've always thought of this as the CART's version of the 2005 US Grand Prix, but it clearly was a very difficult situation for everyone involved.
I kind of avoided it to be honest. I don't want to focus on too much negativity, but it's an important part of the series history, so I needed to make a video on it sooner or later.
The 2005 US Grand Prix was way worse.
The difference is in the F1 2005 Indy, the FIA did NOT try to salvage the spectacle. In fact they blocked many practical attempts to save it, including a temporary chicane to slow down all drivers and no Michelin drivers allowed to score a point.
Here, the CART officials honestly tried to salvage the show; but their big fault was ignoring the drivers' pleas about safety/testing from months before.
A rare instance when a race was cancelled because the drivers are deemed physically unfit to drive for the whole race due to high G forces due to massive speed and banking.
It is an embarassing moment for CART but it could’ve been worse if they ran the race as scheduled
Absolutely! A bizarre reason for the cancellation of a race, but one that was the right call for sure.
It was damned if you do, damned if you don't for CART.
Yes; would you rather have fans disappointed? Or risk a driver- or drivers- dead? Very easy decision
@@Demise90Racing SO why didn't they run the inner track?
@@thedave7760 wouldn't make sense as road course and oval configuration cars are substantially different.
I was there. We had gone to see Driven the night before. I was a HUGE CART proponent, hating the IRL with all my being. This was a crushing defeat for CART erasing the triumphs of Indy 2000 and 2001.
Driven didn't help either lol.
@@maryschulz8605 you’re right
CART was in a lose-lose situation with this. If they raced it could of been dangerous and a driver's career could've tragically ended.
But since they didn't race it definitely it hurt their reputation and it gave the IRL the advantage and soon became the bigger IndyCar series.
I attended the practice and qualifying the day before. I brought my scanner radio to listen in. I arrived just after Gugelmin wrecked. I remember a number of drivers being asked if they were okay. No direct questions. After qualifying only Michael Andretti seemed to be not happy. I thought he was whining. Paul Tracy was stoked.
I arrived that morning, bought my ticket and was told the gates would open later. I scratched my head as to why I couldn't enter. I was sitting in my car when I saw everyone leaving.
It took 6 months to get my money back.
The fact it was cancelled the same weekend Driven bombed at the box office what crucial for CART.
it was one of the final nails for Championship Auto Racing Teams, but Champ Car World Series emerged after 2002 and gave a glimmer of hope. they fumbled it pretty hard in 2006/2007 losing Ford, though.
My dad and I had season tickets to TMS back then. Fans really turned on CART after this. Any time CART was brought up they would get booed. The following year there was a season opener event at TMS where one of the things talked about was the track being repaved and Eddie Gossage made the remark that last year some people said the track was too fast, so they made it faster.
I love your videos about IndyCar history. Being from Scotland i only got into the sport in 2008, so it's fun to learn about the series past.
Thank you very much! I'm glad you enjoy the videos. I love when I have Scottish folks here. I'm Canadian but my mum is a Scottish immigrant.
The entire cause of this was teams sandbagging during all the tests. They tested before the race and the speeds seemed fine. They were only fine because the drivers were purposefully going slower than they could to not show their hand. As a result, CART thought everything would be fine. If the teams actually ran at full speed, they would have seen this earlier and something could have been done ahead of time.
There was never an official CART test like there should have been, and while drivers weren't sandbagging, they weren't going full tilt. They were also using 2000 spec engines which was also less powerful that the 2001 motors they had in the middle of the year.
Thank you,nailed it.If everyone went wide open this would've been avoided.And to the other persons point,CART should have done wide open testing first,absolutley
@@danielhenderson8316 full tilt with the boost turned down and full fuel
I attended the first night race at the new configuration at Atlanta just before this. They were having black outs at that race. I remember billy boat running 234 mph around Atlanta.
Fighter pilots train themselves to pull 9 G’s but they are also wearing G-suits that keep blood where it’s supposed to be.
Going back to the late 70's, I was fortunate to see a fair amount of Indy car racing at Michigan. The "Norton Twin 200's, all the way into the mid 1990's. The speeds there were incredible.
Thanks for explaining that Cart became Champ.
As a viewer in the UK, the politics were never really explained to us and I knew I was watching something other than Indy after 2003.
I think part of the demise in popularity of open wheel racing was that in the 90’s they reached peak speed and Indianapolis. They peaked at this time, no more curiosity over who can push the limit. Now if you set a new race speed record it’s only because it had the least amount of cautions.
I love how the CART president accidentally called it the Firestone 500 - the name of the IRL race at the time.
Just stumbled upon your channel a few days ago. Keep up the great content! IndyCar needs more people like you.
Thanks Chad! I appreciate it. Glad you enjoy the videos 👍
I was actually at this "race". Huge CART fan growing up, living in Texas at the time so my dad and I went up for the weekend. Everything was pretty much fine until Maurício Gugelmin crashed in practice. The huge g-forces of the wreck started causing concern late Friday. We had a radio scanner so we could listen in on all the different team radios, and also radios at the track from things like media and marshals. Then Saturday things started to get worse, and we figured there was a good chance it would get cancelled. Even though it sucked that we didn't get to see the race, I think they made the right call to cancel it. Just not worth the risk to the drivers or spectators.
I watched the broadcast. I was immensely impressed that CART placed safety ahead of money. The cars were too fast. That’s scoreboard over every other series, imo.
And it was because they respected Olvey so much.
You always know which races to bring up that throw me into Nostalgic bliss haha Thank you for another BANGER!
Great presentation of the details and events that happened in your content. Although many people may have been frustrated, it was the right thing to do. Racing fans already know what it is to lose a legendary driver during a race and that possible tragedy didn't happen because they made the right decision looking back now.
Nice thanks for this post. 👍 I was there! The speeds were redicouls but awesome to watch. Was there for all 3 days. Would like to thank Eddie G. He sent out word that if we presented our tickets we could get a full refund. Amazing track promoter. Thanks Texas Motor Speedway for the memories!!
My brother and I talked about this while it was happening. We were both sure they'd cancel it.
For those commenting about the G Loads, the link to the ABC Broadcast is here: ruclips.net/video/wVyfgh3TVCM/видео.html . The main point that Navy Captain David Brown (who also died on the Space Shuttle Columbia) at 17:00 mark was that fighter pilots would hit 5-9 Gs for several seconds and that the space shuttle would hit 1.5-3 G for about 8 minutes while the drivers would have had to face 5-6 Gs for almost 2 hrs and 45 minutes in the Texas heat.
Imagine how fast they'd go at Talladega or Daytona
Probably 260MPH plus lol. It would be outrageous.
At some point they'd be drag limited.
Here's GilDe Ferran's 241 mph average at Fontana...
ruclips.net/video/DF8GTL0_rMA/видео.html
Guessing he was getting close to 250 on the straights? Closest example I could find...
Rusty Wallace hit 228 in a cup car that was running a non restricted motor, that was about 30 moh faster than the regular race pace and had no drafting help. Those champ cars would have hit 250+ in the draft easily
I still think CART made the right decision, hearing the NASA doctor talking about it and knowing about G-LOC, it was absolutely the right call, looking back on it. CART took a PR hit not racing, but the PR hit would have been way, way way worse if they had raced and someone had got hurt or worse
100%. It was the right call in the end.
Someone did get hurt. Mauricio Gugelmin passed out in practice and hit the Turn 1 wall and didn't stop until Turn 4. He was injured enough he flew home before the race.
I think that, if you look in the whole situation, it was a lose-lose situation. It was a matter of what was less painful.
But then I remember it's CART, and they *still* managed to screw it up.
@@danielhenderson8316 yea But His injuries werent fatal. Luckily.
Would have been a Certain Fatality. Major Catastrophe was avoided.
A fascinating story. Good job on the video. I understand that driver's vision was getting black at the edges which is a sure sign of impending G-Loc!
That is potentially hypoxia I believe.
This was bullshit, drivers were not suffering from g-lock. It was 100 degrees in the middle of summer in DFW, drivers were ill prepared to suffer through the "heat stress" than risk of dieing due to g-lock. These are not fighter pilots, cause Indycar still races the same track conditions as they did then. They don't have drivers dropping dead from g-lock, that's a damn myth, stop perpetuating it.
You should do a video on the Las Vegas IRL debacle in 2011….. where (unlike CART), the IRL simply chooses to ignore its drivers concerns & an absolute tragedy occurred.
This will happen at some point. That's for sure.
Don’t forget the 1999 Charlotte race that killed three spectators.
I watched that race in 1998, IRL was running 8 to 9 seconds a lap faster than the Winston Cup cars lap record, a couple cars were approaching 230mph going into turn 3
It was cool to watch but one heavy crash in three years ended it.
The Charlotte roval would have been a better race and they would have needed so much downforce in the infield. But IRL was all round track then as I recall.
F1 1994 when senna died & nascar 2001 when dale sr died
That chicane in Baltimore was a clusterf**k. Lol great race, terrible conditions. Wish they would have repaved those crappy streets in downtown Baltimore. Great video!
Repaving it wouldn’t have fixed it. They went over railroad tracks.
2001 was the tipping point for CART. It's also when Penske went back to the Indy 500 and then left CART for good. They also got bad PR for running after 9-11, even if it was international.
Well, after watching this video, I could tell if a similar thing happened in Vegas in 2011, Dan Wheldon most likely would have still been alive.
No Dan's head was struck by deris and the catch fence/wall, he didn't know what hit him. Thank God. Other than the fireball he drove through, his accident had more similarities to Scott Brayton's than it did anything else. And it happened in 2000 cause Dale Earnheardt mentioned his death during the prerace coverage, not 2011..
@@Rob_Moilanen it’s called Google, you should try it…”the fatal accident occurred on Oct. 16, 2011, and claimed the life of the popular two-time Indy 500 winner from England.”
@@Rob_MoilanenAre you stoned? Wipe the sleep outta your eyes before commenting. #1) Dan Wheldon was killed in 2011. #2)like stated in the above comment, Had they taken a similar approach in canceling that race before it got started then Dan Wheldon would still be here. That's what the original comment stated. #3) Reading comprehension is important.
@@BrandonYoung-mn9zs beat it dumbass, you've got your timeline all wrong.
@@Rob_Moilanen you really are incapable of admitting fault aren’t you
Love this channel, love old vintage indy car content. Keep it up, liked and suscribed
I also remember the drivers were really upset with Rahal because he lobbied for the race at TMS. When they started experiencing vertigo and eventually canceling the race, they threw Bobby under the bus. Im sure there's footage somewhere...
I remember in the weeks leading up to the race there were many CART drivers who were very vocal about not wanting to race at Texas. I would've loved to have been a fly on the wall at the driver's meetings and CART official's meetings to find out what really happened.
That was bullshit, I mean it was DFW in the heat of the summer with drivers wearing 3 layers of Nomex, of course drivers didn't want to suffer through that. It was too fucking hot to be racing.
@@Rob_MoilanenYet they would go to Fontana and run faster in the same heat...
@@danielhenderson8316 uh you know Fontana is near'ish to the ocean right? It's not the same "heat", as near DFW. Don't get it twisted.
@@Rob_Moilanen It still gets to triple degree weather in SoCal.
@@danielhenderson8316 yeah, but don't clown like it's the same "heat", I've lived near LA and DFW, they are not geographically comparable.
It was absolutely the right decision to cancel the race. It was the first race that the HANS device was mandated in CART
They made the right choice, a "sorry fans but we gotta postpone the race" is a heck of a lot better than " our condolences to those who died today"
I was camping there that weekend and was so pissed off they cancelled it and didn't even offer a refund or a future discount ticket. I don't understand why they couldn't do something to slow down their cars.
The drivers were perpetuating a damn lie, it was heat stress, not g-lock that they were suffering from.
@@Rob_MoilanenI guess you will never understand the human body has limits.
@@Rob_Moilanen so since you’re repeating this what’s your proof? What’s the point in lying about heat?
I'm an open wheel novice. This is awesome. I'm not into the weeds but I was a CART fan and didn't like IRL.....Would love to see a track where these guys could do 300.....safely....of course....none of those exist, but it would be awesome.
Ahh yes; back when Indycars actually looked Cool
At least we got a few more years of Champ Car after CART. 2004-2006 Cosworth cars were some of my favorite.
This was one of the reasons for the demise of CART. The track surface issues (and shortening of the race) at Rockingham for the inaugural running of a race in the UK was another.
This was the age of Speed TV and everyone thought that racing was going to be profitable for other series than NASCAR. Racing is just too expensive unless you race cheap junk like NASCAR, or have millions to burn like F1.
Big Indycar fan here. Those cars were fast. They were they height of Indycar engineering, sight and sound. I miss them
Going in circles makes you dizzy especially at. Faster rates appreciate the video
The high G forces actually were manifested in blood being pushed away from the brain and into the body as the drivers sped through the steep banked turns. You can imagine how this affected the drivers.
It would have been insane to see them race at 236MPH+, but the right call was made to cancel the race.
97 Fontana , Gulgelmin pole speed 241 mph
Steve Olvey and Terry Trammel had to be given complete control of track safety because the drivers would not do it. Mario Andretti said that every safety feature is a speed penalty so they had to be mandated on all teams. Dr. Olvey once noticed drivers getting out of their cars after a race, complaining of headaches, nausea, vomiting and flushed red skin. Dr. Olvey mandated every driver take a blood test after the race and he found out the carbon monoxide levels were well above normal. Now drivers have air filtration systems. After a series of serious foot injuries, Dr. Trammel ordered the nose of the cars to be longer and the driver's feet to be place behind the front wheels giving them more protection. If Dr. Olvey said it was too dangerous to run this race, most of the drivers would not argue with him.
Think you can do a video on the Baltimore race? I live in the area and loved the race weekend with ALMS, but I am not sure if it was a good race for the drivers or the city. Pretty sad because here in the mid-Atlantic states, we do not have easy access to IndyCar races
Absolutely. I also want to do a video on the whole history of the event.
8:00 5.5G is not double of what a jet fighter pilot Can experiment. It is actually only slightly half of what a jet fighter pilot can endure, since a jet fighter can produce accelerations up to 9G.
I chuckled at that part too.
they are talking sustained forces, for durations as long as mentioned. 9G is what they can do in short bursts of only a few seconds.
Kenny Brack & TMS have a real history with each other, did the pre race test, then over a year later after the ''race'' he'd sustain his record (and bone) breaking accident on the backstretch in IRL.
It always amazes me that 235 is too fast but 227 is driveable lol
Those 8 MPH are everything
It's not the speed number, it was the constant G load the drivers were facing. At Texas that year, drivers were experiencing about 6 G loads for about 90% of the lap. They would briefly hit that at places like Michigan and Fontana, but they had almost a half mile of straight to recover.
@@danielhenderson8316 Well, I guess that's what I am saying. Those 8 MPH somehow keep the G's below the threshold. It's amazing and very unfortunate that, THAT is the limit (not like 250 or 300 which they would never run)
You're wrong, here's why...
"I believe you've misunderstood me, we're actually in agreement."
*chirp chirp chirp
I remember to this day walking up to the gate with my Pops for the race and finding out it was canceled AT THE GATE!! Crazy
Damn, I would have been devested if that happened to me.
@Demise90Racing yea it sucked for sure man. Luckily we'd come to see qualifying the day before so I got to still witness CART at speed at TMS. It was absolutely insane seeing the speed in person.
Genius Kenny Brack. Pedaling the car when you're testing whether the track is feasible.
Agree with the previous comment. Thank you for making it and allowing us to know more of the facts. I thought that race would be Indy Jr…. They made the right decision.
It's interesting to see the difference in the crowd size from back then to recent years. It reminds me exactly of how the crowds at Fontana thinned out over the years.
How much longer will Indycar go to Texas with what seems like very little interest? At this rate, the Indy 500 will be the only superspeedway race and that will be a shame.
This was also the first year Texas was any good for a long time. I think the next two years will be make or break with Texas. I was really pissed off when I found out Pato O'Ward had a sweetheart deal that gave you box seats, merch, and access to pit lane for a meet and greet for $400 a person. I would have jumped all over it, but it wasn't promoted until 2 WEEKS before the race and I couldn't move any time off by that point. If he does that again next year, I'll jump all over it and be on the look out.
I think they prevented a black weekend that time, if only F1 did the same in May 1994 we still have Ayrton.
CART stands for Cars Aren't Racing Today
(1) At that moment, canceling the race was the right move.
(2) Getting to that point is a cataclysmic managerial failure. Apocalyptic, as it turns out.
(3) I loved those IRL races at Texas.
Rahal was allowed to test the track with Brack. Shell was based in Houston. I was at this event. The right decision was made.
I still don't get why they didn't run the road course with the speedway aero package that they had. It would have been a lesser show for the people who'd bought tickets, but it would still at least BE a show.
I miss this style indy car!
I was sitting in the stands right in front of the pits when they started pushing cars back into the garages and they announced the race was canceled.
I was one of those fans. It was crazy
woah. i'm honestly surprised that this race got the green light. OF COURSE cars going 220mph+ around a track that small would cause problems like that. it made perfect sense when you laid out the numbers... if they were going to do something like this at all they would've been better off going to a super speedway like Daytona, or building their own track that was bigger than 2.5mi. granted that probably wasn't feasible at the time, but building a new facility that can safely accommodate the speeds their cars could run at would've been a much preferable option than subjecting their drivers and equipment to that much sustained lateral g-forces at a track that has no business hosting a series that has cars that fast. it sounds like the CART publicity disaster that day was unavoidable as soon as they added Texas to the schedule.
and now that i think of it, this is probably the reason why series like NASCAR limits the top speed of their cars to around 200mph. i thought it might've been because of their tyres, but this makes a lot more sense to me. 🤔
I'm glad they put safety above profit/money there. This could have been a horrible disaster if drivers would pass out at high speeds in a field of over 20 cars.
Man, I was there and it sucked they had to cancel the whole weekend. At least I got to see a few laps. They were fast af though, lol.
instead of building tracks for the cars build cars for the tracks. i loved texas . cheers from germany.
Great vid. The one thing I will say that you got wrong is 5.5 g’s is not double that of a fighter pilot.. some fighter jets reach up to 11 or 12 g’s.. I get your point tho it’s super human g’s
The link to the race is here: ruclips.net/video/wVyfgh3TVCM/видео.html . The main point that Navy Captain David Brown (who also died on the Space Shuttle Columbia) at 17:00 mark was that fighter pilots would hit 5-9 Gs for several seconds and that the space shuttle would hit 1.5-3 G for about 8 minutes while the drivers would have had to face 5-6 Gs for almost 2 hrs and 45 minutes.
I remember being mad as hell when this was cancelled. I didn’t care for the IRL but their races at Texas were fantastic, so I assumed faster cars would be even better racing. That’s not how it works.. CART had everything going for it in the 90s, even giving Bernie and the boys a bit of a scare. Cars were sexy & looked like they were doing 200 mph in the paddock! ……..Good times…..
... Good Tyre Testing Data At Any Rate... MENTAL SPEED'S....
wow those are symptoms of hypoxia, the Gs were probably restricting proper blood flow to their head which explains a lot. that’s crazy that those cars were that fast
I was an IRL fan at the time over CART and I made fun of them at the time for not doing it. But, I’ve always thought it was the right decision and I have little doubt that someone would’ve been killed.
FTG
The speeds were too high for the car they drove too.
This was significant but the last nail in the coffin was the Toyota and Honda withdrawals and Penske moving to IRL
G-LOC from the high banking and *vertical* G loads. Right call, the carnage would have been bad
When it comes to the risk of severe injury &/or death of that many drivers eclipsing 135 mph, it's best to error on the side of caution, fire-bombing your reputation, losing millions of $$, instead of killing dozens of fellow human beings for profit & grandeur.
Safety 1st people!
Wonder if they could've reduce boost even more or added more wing(thus add drag)
There was a scandal later that year when it came out that the engine manufacturers had found ways to cheat the blow-off valve that limits boost, so the engines had more power already than they were supposed to. And they didn't bring road course wings with them to increase downforce, and it wouldn't have been safe to just build a duckbill spoiler with stuff from Lowes.
so, i still dont understand why IRL could race there and CART couldnt and what the difference is with Las Vegas. Las Vegas also has 20 degrees turns, as Texas has. Can somebody explain me both questions? Thank you!
CART cars were much faster than IRL cars which meant the vertical g-forces were significantly higher. Vertical g-forces are when the blood flow is decreased to the brain which causes blackouts etc.
The Las Vegas track has more of a straight to allow drivers to "rest" in between the banked corners.
NASCAR would been like pull them belts tight boys you got race
I watched back then, l thought it was cool that the cars were so fast drivers were blacking out. I didn't want them to be at an oval, I don't think ovals are great. I loved CART before and after this race. I hated when it died, had all the pieces but was managed poorly. I will forever say CART in the 90s-2000s was the best, best drivers, best cars, best tracks
I don’t understand why CART didn’t try a restrictor block off plate or make it mandatory to add weights to the car anything to slow them down or even make it that they couldn’t run wide open throttle
Because they had about 10 hours to find a fix for about 30 cars. Cutting the boost enough to slow the cars down would blow every engine in the field according to the engine manufacturers (even though reliability wasn't very high).
Doesn't matter. Indy cars at Texas put on one of the greatest races every year.
Between 1999 and 2002 indycar was rusdian roulette according to Patrick Carpentier
amazing that the track could have a single bump, let alone be "too bumpy." like, the track has one job.
I'm thinking not necessarily because of the speed of the cars. Texas is a handful and change for handling. Even NASCAR drivers say that this track should be lengthened or something...
Cart series cars were crazy!!
Imagine if they had G-suits!!? Maybe even faster.
i was just thinking that. if they were to run at relatively small ovals like this, that would've been the best route to go i would think. but maybe the NASA guy advised against that?
Besides timing, G Suits would be a disaster. They work by constricting blood flow to your limbs so more of your blood will stay in your head or torso. Add in the Texas heat, no power steering, and over 2 hours of racing and you'd probably have to amputate everyone's arms and legs.
would it be too dangerous to use that package with bigger wings? or availability was the issue?
Adding wing would add more downforce which would increase the G load. This issue also came up on Saturday afternoon so getting any shipment of parts was impossible to receive for the entire paddock by Sunday morning.
@@danielhenderson8316 they would increase drag wouldn't they? wouldn't that reduce speeds and reduce Gs?
@@FerrariConceptXThe speed would have gone down because of the drag, but the G loading would probably increase due to the extra grip provided by the extra downforce.
Yeah when you get to the point where you have driver's feeling like they were going to loose consciousness it's time to rethink running at a facility....🏎️🏎️🏎️
2 and a bit ywars later this track would become VERY memorable for Kenny Brack for all the wrong reasons...
Was this a 600 mile race?
It was not. 600KM. But even that was false cause it only worked out to being 588KM after they re-measured the track.
I remember a protest sign held up by some fans:
Cowards
Aren't
Racing
Today
Lmao really? I never knew about that.
Yep...confirmed.
or Candy Ass Racing Team...
Isn’t that when penske and ganassi started to leave for Indycar?
Penske left in 2002 because Marlboro was going to pull their sponsorship if they didn't go back to Indy. Ganassi spent 2002 running a team in CART and in IRL until giving up on CART at the end of that year.
Mandate the top gear and ring and pinion gear for 225mph MAX. Would not affect engine rpm nor chassis set up.
I remember drivers saying feeling like they passed out in the turns
Michael Andretti was experiencing symptoms of vertigo during practice sessions. That’s some scary stuff.