Teams looking for Gen-6 knowledge in Vegas test

By Mar 6, 2013, 1:00 PM EST
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Las Vegas Motor Speedway will open up one day early for an Sprint Cup Open Test session tomorrow, giving drivers and teams an opportunity to learn more about the Generation 6 cars.

The lighter, sleeker Gen-6 cars – which were designed to improve the racing products on intermediate tracks such as LVMS – continue to be a riddle for everyone in the garage. So far, the new cars have put on two relatively subpar shows at Daytona and Phoenix (with Denny Hamlin being particularly pointed in his comments on the subject after the latter race), but at the same time, the learning process remains ongoing.

That, as well as 1.5-mile tracks like LVMS making up the bulk of the calendar, makes Thursday’s test so important for the teams.

“It will help us a ton,” Stewart-Haas Racing crew chief Steve Addington said to NASCAR.com after last weekend’s event at Phoenix. “It’s just learning. It’s going to take us a few races, I think. The Las Vegas test will help (but) it won’t tell us what will happen when we get 43 cars out there again.

“We need to try to get some time to run with a couple of cars and see…how it affects the car on the mile-and-a-half tracks. We’ve got teammates; we can get out there with three cars and see what it does to the cars. We’ve got to use that.”

Teams were able to gain some initial knowledge on the Gen-6 cars at another 1.5-mile oval, Charlotte Motor Speedway, this past January.

As for tomorrow’s test at Vegas, it is expected to run from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. PT, and the session will be free and open to the public.

Will Power shows Flavor Flav what time it is in IndyCar: ‘This is the highlight of the weekend’

By Jun 4, 2023, 11:00 PM EDT
Will Power Flavor Flav
Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment
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DETROIT – When Flavor Flav unexpectedly showed up in Team Penske’s pits for the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix weekend, Will Power knew what time it was.

So the defending NTT IndyCar Series champion dropped it on the man who made oversized clocks as fashion accessories famous.

And he used the kind of wordplay that was the pride of Public Enemy (the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame rap group led by Chuck D with Flavor Flav as loyal sidekick).

“I said to Flavor Flav, ‘You know, people today are going to have to ‘Fight the Power,’ ” Power said with a broad smirk, referencing one of Public Enemy’s most memorable and strident anthems. “And it was true! They had to ‘Fight the Power.’ ”

With a second place in Detroit, the No. 12 Dallara-Chevy driver earned his best finish since last September and impressed a musical hero who apparently attended his first IndyCar race this weekend and promptly fell in love with the sport.

After being interviewed by NBC Sports’ Kevin Lee during the Peacock qualifying broadcast Saturday, Flavor Flav made the rounds.

He met with Roger Penske in Team Penske’s at-track headquarters, freestyled in an on-stage cameo during Steve Aoki’s Saturday night concert in Hart Plaza and then rode with Power in a pickup truck around the 1.645-mile street course during driver introductions Sunday morning.

Flav was wearing a red No. 12 shirt that Power believes was purchased at a track merchandise trailer.

“That is the highlight of the weekend,” he said. “Flavor Flav was wearing my shirt, man.”

It was a dream come true for the two-time IndyCar champion and 2018 Indy 500 winner. Power, 42, grew up listening to Public Enemy with his buddies in Toowoomba, Australia, and they went nuts when he posted photos with Flavor Flav to his personal Facebook page.

“My friends are like, ‘Dude, you should just quit racing now. You have made it to the top,’ ” Power said. “We all listened to Public Enemy, and they would never believe that I actually would be hanging out with Flavor Flav. That is nuts. I’ll have to go Vegas to hang out with him. Maybe we’ll do a rap together.”

“Yeeaaah, boy!” third-place finisher Felix Rosenqvist, who apparently might have given “It Takes a Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back” a few spins while growing up in Sweden, chimed in during the postrace news conference.

The only disappointment for Power was coming up 1.1843 seconds short of beating Alex Palou.

Flav had promised to celebrate on the podium if Power had won the race.

“He is the most positive dude you will ever meet,” Power said. “Pretty cool experience. Pretty cool to put it on your personal Facebook.

“All your friends that you went to school with, they’re like, ‘Man this dude is big-time, he’s hanging out with Flavor Flav. ‘I sat next to Ice-T at dinner. I have also had dinner with Slash from Guns N’ Roses. I wish I got videos of those ones as well so I could put it on the personal Facebook

“No one cares about race cars or that I won the Indy 500. It’s like, ‘You had dinner with Slash, you know Flavor Flav.’ Yeah!”

Power already has in mind some future musical guests he’d like to meet, starting with another of Detroit’s own.

“I’m more of a ’90s rap guy, but if I met Eminem, that would also be epic,” Power said. “Ice Cube’s the one, man. If I could meet Ice Cube or Snoop Dogg in Long Beach. Why doesn’t someone bring them to Long Beach? Maybe they should have an Ice Cube day. That would be dope.”