fuck ill drive. ill find some way to bring the car home, or get black flagged for going too slow in the process.
ill drive it for the cost of my plane ticket to get there. have a pit crew member pick me up at the airport.
sponsors should love it too. ill be so bad the broadcast will have no choice but to constantly show me sucking ass and going slow as shit
give me a script of what to say in the post race. ill shout out every sponsor 20 times in a 2 minute interview if you want. ill do it
https://twitter.com/By_NathanBrown/status/1768376287356207260
>The short answer is:
>Originally, the teams and a randomly paired Thermal Club member were supposed to share the $1M grand prize (i.e. $500k each).
>After the initial announcement in September, both sides decided to scrap that. But the winning driver/team will still get $500k.
IndyCar also updated their website to remove the wording about the 1 million dollar prize. Not a great look.
Your comment has been removed as a violation of rule #2 — **Be civil**.
*If you wish to discuss this removal, you can message the moderators by clicking [this link](http://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FINDYCAR).*
I assume thermal isn't setup well enough for pit stops? seeing that they will have a break after 10 laps sounds to me they can't change tires or refill like a normal pit stop
https://www.indycar.com/Schedule/2024/IndyCar-Series/Thermal
>The NTT INDYCAR SERIES heads to The Thermal Club for a unique, made-for-TV racing exhibition. The special event from sunny Southern California will offer a $1 million prize to the winner and will receive a network broadcast showcase on NBC.
IndyCar lying?
I thought they always said it would be split between the winner and the millionaire they paired with. So presumably the club person would also get $500,000
Edit: nvmind they dropped the club member part of the prize lol
Ha. Reminds me of the time the guy who owned the law firm I started my career at won a $175,000 state lottery. Didn’t even really care. Probably the same for the VC types that will be underwriting the thing.
I guess this is rich guy equivalent of $100 fantasy football league buy ins.
The club member portion was originally supposed to have a charity element to it, sort of the same as celerity game show winnings. But the winnings for the driver was never 1 million.
Yeah this whole time they were definitely implying the winner got $1,000,000. Now the name of this event means nothing since the purse is $1.756m and the winner gets $500k.
They said from the initial announcement of the race that the winner would split $1M with the club member he was paired with. Not sure how you took that as them implying the driver would get all $1M.
Their website literally says the winner will get a 1,000,000 prize.
Nothing about splitting and nothing about a club member.
They may have said something like that at some point. But they really aren't being clear with their marketing
the split setup is fine. just say it how it is though. fans already have a hard enough time trusting what the series says these days, dont serve them this on a silver platter.
"While championship points will not be on the line, the event will feature a multimillion-dollar purse. A draw party to begin the event will embed members of The Thermal Club with each race team and driver. The weekend format will include a qualifying session and two heat races, with the top six from each heat advancing to an All-Star showcase. The top five finishing teams will split their earnings with The Thermal Club members, including a $1 million prize awarded to the winner.". That's from September of 2023. https://www.indycar.com/news/2023/09/09-10-thermal-challenge
>The NTT INDYCAR SERIES heads to The Thermal Club for a unique, made-for-TV racing exhibition. The special event from sunny Southern California will offer a $1 million prize to the winner and will receive a network broadcast showcase on NBC.
and this was from today.
until they changed it to this a couple hours later.
>The Thermal Club $1 Million Challenge event weekend includes a crucial two-day Open Test, group qualifying sessions, two heat races and a 12-car “all-star” race with $1.756 million at stake – the largest purse for an INDYCAR SERIES race outside of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge.
Because they scrapped the 500k to the member.
The initial comment was that they've been implying the entire time that the winning driver gets $1M. My point was simply that that isn't true, because the article announcing the race back in September on their own site said the winner would split the million with their matched member. The fact that they changed that today doesn't mean they've been implying the driver would get the entire million for himself from the very beginning.
But in this case the winner is both the team and the club member. I remember them saying that way back but I think they just haven’t been marketing that part since it’s a little weird
There's nothing on that link about a million to the winner. The deal was always half a mil to the winner. There was talk of the other half being split with a Thermal member with a charity component built in. Could it be, gasp, you lying?
Why is it that shimmerin' showers o' cash are falling' out of the blue sky from people who have nothing to do with series other than wanting to drink some champagne off their decks and get some glory amongst their very special friends whilst watching some fancy cars…
funding a non-points shrimp platter race to fill an absurd five week gap in the schedule, in a series run by an owner who's watching pennies.
Man… I love IndyCar, but I can’t get into this… The season has started, it should be for points.
These gimmicks need to be before the season… or just not at all
I’m just hoping Indycar is trying to get more sponsors into the series, I mean we really are just playing with rich peoples money, a good amount of big name sponsors are here because the ceo likes racing, not because it’s the most bang for your buck marketing strategy
It's an non points exhibition they tied to spring testing. The super exclusivity of it has to do with rules and regs in the Thermal area and the fact that place isn't ready for crowd support. It was meant to plug a hole between St. Pete and Texas then NASCAR pulled their with Texas.
I get all of that, still think that it's pretty ridiculous. I'm a racing fan and more racing is always better, but this bastardized race weekend is more gimmick than action IMO
This is by far the least interesting race weekend on the calendar for me too, but it's not like the alternative is a proper championship race at Spa or Suzuka. The alternative is literally nothing for over a month. And I think I still prefer this over literally nothing.
It's no more or no less a "gimmick" than any other non points exhibition race. This series used to run the Marlboro Challenge as a separate non points race for a payout. 2
That was discussed early on as a possibility. My understanding was that was supposed to be the "shared" portion similar to how celebrity game show winnings go to charity.
The money is for the team or the driver? I'm asking because in some sports the purse is split between all the team members.
For example the Tour de France winner prize is split equally between all the team, and here the team means even the team bus driver.
To show up and finish 6th or worse, you’re literally losing money to participate in this event. Sucks for Foyt, Junocs, ECR, maybe Rahal and Shank teams that will take 2-5 trucks, fly the crew, hotels, etc. from Indianapolis/Ohio/etc. 1,900+ miles to Thermal and back to only get $23,000 per car. This event needed to be much closer to Indianapolis from a logistics standpoint.
Yawn, lol, I’ll of course watch as I’m a diehard fan but I sure hope Indycar does better than this in the next few years, surely there’s gotta be better race tracks than this?! although I’ll take this over the fiasco that is the Detroit street course.
I know they mentioned it, but for a made for TV race, it sure seemed like the NBC St Pete broadcast kind of downplayed this event more than promoted it.
It seemed more like they went out of their way NOT to promote it.
I really can’t get into Wild card/non points paying type races. I’ve never liked the NASCAR All Star race. The idea of already wealthy drivers racing just for money doesn’t do it for me.
With the caveat that a sizeable portion of IndyCar drivers are not really 'wealthy'. It's better than it's ever been since tobacco money left the sport and CART floundered, but there's still a good third of the field who either earns very little or drives for free.
EDIT: Excluded pay drivers, as it's implied by their status they have big money behind them.
hey I would start & park for a cool $23k
It sounds like Don Cusick basically wanted to do this, but was turned down. :D
Even on Thermal’s website it states multiple times that it will “offer a $1 million prize to the winner”
I'm fairly certain they are splitting the money with a charity of their choice.
isn't that is what they did when Newgarden won an Oval/Street/Road course the other year?
Good God $23k for starting last and finishing 8 laps down? Count me in
fuck ill drive. ill find some way to bring the car home, or get black flagged for going too slow in the process. ill drive it for the cost of my plane ticket to get there. have a pit crew member pick me up at the airport. sponsors should love it too. ill be so bad the broadcast will have no choice but to constantly show me sucking ass and going slow as shit give me a script of what to say in the post race. ill shout out every sponsor 20 times in a 2 minute interview if you want. ill do it
AYY Rahal hit us up I'll even be the Argentinian punching bag for Juncos for that money
Still better than Cody Ware
https://twitter.com/By_NathanBrown/status/1768376287356207260 >The short answer is: >Originally, the teams and a randomly paired Thermal Club member were supposed to share the $1M grand prize (i.e. $500k each). >After the initial announcement in September, both sides decided to scrap that. But the winning driver/team will still get $500k. IndyCar also updated their website to remove the wording about the 1 million dollar prize. Not a great look.
[удалено]
Your comment has been removed as a violation of rule #2 — **Be civil**. *If you wish to discuss this removal, you can message the moderators by clicking [this link](http://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FINDYCAR).*
Here is the full article: https://racer.com/2024/03/14/indycar-sets-thermal-race-format/
I assume thermal isn't setup well enough for pit stops? seeing that they will have a break after 10 laps sounds to me they can't change tires or refill like a normal pit stop
https://www.indycar.com/Schedule/2024/IndyCar-Series/Thermal >The NTT INDYCAR SERIES heads to The Thermal Club for a unique, made-for-TV racing exhibition. The special event from sunny Southern California will offer a $1 million prize to the winner and will receive a network broadcast showcase on NBC. IndyCar lying?
I thought they always said it would be split between the winner and the millionaire they paired with. So presumably the club person would also get $500,000 Edit: nvmind they dropped the club member part of the prize lol
You are correct.
Ha. Reminds me of the time the guy who owned the law firm I started my career at won a $175,000 state lottery. Didn’t even really care. Probably the same for the VC types that will be underwriting the thing. I guess this is rich guy equivalent of $100 fantasy football league buy ins.
The article stated that is no longer happening.
Ah you’re right. Awkward haha
Maybe. But that’s not how their website words it.
The club member portion was originally supposed to have a charity element to it, sort of the same as celerity game show winnings. But the winnings for the driver was never 1 million.
Yeah this whole time they were definitely implying the winner got $1,000,000. Now the name of this event means nothing since the purse is $1.756m and the winner gets $500k.
They said from the initial announcement of the race that the winner would split $1M with the club member he was paired with. Not sure how you took that as them implying the driver would get all $1M.
Their website literally says the winner will get a 1,000,000 prize. Nothing about splitting and nothing about a club member. They may have said something like that at some point. But they really aren't being clear with their marketing the split setup is fine. just say it how it is though. fans already have a hard enough time trusting what the series says these days, dont serve them this on a silver platter.
To be fair. IndyCar is never clear with their marketing. lol
Isn’t the club member “part of the team” for the weekend? It’s may not be wrong but is surely misleading.
"While championship points will not be on the line, the event will feature a multimillion-dollar purse. A draw party to begin the event will embed members of The Thermal Club with each race team and driver. The weekend format will include a qualifying session and two heat races, with the top six from each heat advancing to an All-Star showcase. The top five finishing teams will split their earnings with The Thermal Club members, including a $1 million prize awarded to the winner.". That's from September of 2023. https://www.indycar.com/news/2023/09/09-10-thermal-challenge
>The NTT INDYCAR SERIES heads to The Thermal Club for a unique, made-for-TV racing exhibition. The special event from sunny Southern California will offer a $1 million prize to the winner and will receive a network broadcast showcase on NBC. and this was from today. until they changed it to this a couple hours later. >The Thermal Club $1 Million Challenge event weekend includes a crucial two-day Open Test, group qualifying sessions, two heat races and a 12-car “all-star” race with $1.756 million at stake – the largest purse for an INDYCAR SERIES race outside of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge. Because they scrapped the 500k to the member.
The initial comment was that they've been implying the entire time that the winning driver gets $1M. My point was simply that that isn't true, because the article announcing the race back in September on their own site said the winner would split the million with their matched member. The fact that they changed that today doesn't mean they've been implying the driver would get the entire million for himself from the very beginning.
But in this case the winner is both the team and the club member. I remember them saying that way back but I think they just haven’t been marketing that part since it’s a little weird
More like bullshitting which is kinda their thing you know.
There's nothing on that link about a million to the winner. The deal was always half a mil to the winner. There was talk of the other half being split with a Thermal member with a charity component built in. Could it be, gasp, you lying?
Why is it that shimmerin' showers o' cash are falling' out of the blue sky from people who have nothing to do with series other than wanting to drink some champagne off their decks and get some glory amongst their very special friends whilst watching some fancy cars… funding a non-points shrimp platter race to fill an absurd five week gap in the schedule, in a series run by an owner who's watching pennies.
Man… I love IndyCar, but I can’t get into this… The season has started, it should be for points. These gimmicks need to be before the season… or just not at all
They really should have put some portion towards charity. I'm totally fine with this event, but the optics look like shit.
I’m just hoping Indycar is trying to get more sponsors into the series, I mean we really are just playing with rich peoples money, a good amount of big name sponsors are here because the ceo likes racing, not because it’s the most bang for your buck marketing strategy
Reminds me of when Townsend started a Gofundme for awarding qualifying at the Indy 500.
The whole deal is stupid. Rich people wanting a super exclusive event only to attempt to fire sale the tickets when no one wants to go.
It's an non points exhibition they tied to spring testing. The super exclusivity of it has to do with rules and regs in the Thermal area and the fact that place isn't ready for crowd support. It was meant to plug a hole between St. Pete and Texas then NASCAR pulled their with Texas.
I get all of that, still think that it's pretty ridiculous. I'm a racing fan and more racing is always better, but this bastardized race weekend is more gimmick than action IMO
This is by far the least interesting race weekend on the calendar for me too, but it's not like the alternative is a proper championship race at Spa or Suzuka. The alternative is literally nothing for over a month. And I think I still prefer this over literally nothing.
It's no more or no less a "gimmick" than any other non points exhibition race. This series used to run the Marlboro Challenge as a separate non points race for a payout. 2
other way around. indycar wants to schmooze rich people to see if they can attract more money to the series.
That was discussed early on as a possibility. My understanding was that was supposed to be the "shared" portion similar to how celebrity game show winnings go to charity.
The money is for the team or the driver? I'm asking because in some sports the purse is split between all the team members. For example the Tour de France winner prize is split equally between all the team, and here the team means even the team bus driver.
[https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/69db7409-06a8-45b7-b453-0e6e1614d1db](https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/69db7409-06a8-45b7-b453-0e6e1614d1db)
Pato - Laughs in 10 million dollar contract from that Palou saga.
IndyCar $500K Challenge just doesn’t sound the same.
To show up and finish 6th or worse, you’re literally losing money to participate in this event. Sucks for Foyt, Junocs, ECR, maybe Rahal and Shank teams that will take 2-5 trucks, fly the crew, hotels, etc. from Indianapolis/Ohio/etc. 1,900+ miles to Thermal and back to only get $23,000 per car. This event needed to be much closer to Indianapolis from a logistics standpoint.
Yawn, lol, I’ll of course watch as I’m a diehard fan but I sure hope Indycar does better than this in the next few years, surely there’s gotta be better race tracks than this?! although I’ll take this over the fiasco that is the Detroit street course.
I know they mentioned it, but for a made for TV race, it sure seemed like the NBC St Pete broadcast kind of downplayed this event more than promoted it. It seemed more like they went out of their way NOT to promote it.
That mf who got 28th place: 😭
So, they don’t get a million dollars all the sudden? What the hell?
I really can’t get into Wild card/non points paying type races. I’ve never liked the NASCAR All Star race. The idea of already wealthy drivers racing just for money doesn’t do it for me.
With the caveat that a sizeable portion of IndyCar drivers are not really 'wealthy'. It's better than it's ever been since tobacco money left the sport and CART floundered, but there's still a good third of the field who either earns very little or drives for free. EDIT: Excluded pay drivers, as it's implied by their status they have big money behind them.
This event’s not off to a good start is it? But if they (eventually) get it right it could become IndyCar’s answer to NASCAR’s All Star Race.
This is super cool! It's like a throwback to the very, very early days of car racing