[h=2]RACER@25: Issue No. 165 - Transition zone[/h] Friday, 21 April 2017


By RACER staff




Send
Print
Decrease Increase TEXT




This is the 19th installment in RACER's ongoing 25th anniversary celebration during which we share the 25 most important issues from our first quarter century.
[HR][/HR] [h=3]Related Stories[/h] RACER@25: Issue No. 160 - Danica Mania


RACER@25: Issue No. 145, May 2004 - Power & Influence


RACER@25: Issue No. 138, Oct. 2003 - Road Not Taken


RACER@25: Issue No. 124, August 2002 - Who is Jimmie Johnson?


RACER@25: Issue No. 121, May 2002 - America's Greatest Driver








The 165th issue of RACER came in a time of transition, starting with the arrival of the new Porsche Spyder RS that also marked the return of the German manufacturer to prototype sports car racing in North America with a factory-backed team after a long absence. As Rich Conklin related in our cover story, excitement over Porsche's return was tempered by concerns over a potential upset of the delicate competitive balance of a category that had often run aground over the years following the appearance of a dominant player.
That concern was raised all the more considering the team involved was Penske. Long a superpower in Indy cars, sports car fans also remembered the last time Penske had teamed up with Porsche in Can-Am, resulting in some of the most spectacular racecars ever seen but also such a degree of dominance that it literally killed the series. Would history repeat itself?
Transition was also a theme in the Indy Racing League, where Dan Wheldon had completed the evolution from promising newcomer to ace, managing the rare double of an Indy 500 victory and series championship in the same year in 2005. Ahead of the new season, Jeff Olson profiled the influences and insights Wheldon had gained from his Andretti teammates and what prompted him to move to Ganassi for '06 despite his title-winning campaign.
Jeff Gordon wasn't going anywhere for 2006, deep into his career-long stint with Hendrick Motorsports in NASCAR. But it was still a time of change for one of stock car racing's most popular stars. After a worst-ever 11th-place finish in the point standings, Ben Blake related how Gordon was working to relaunch himself and cope with the challenge of teammate Jimmie Johnson, who had replaced him as Hendrick's wunderkind.
Change was in the air at RACER, too. No. 165 marked the final issue for RACER founder Paul Pfanner and publisher Bill Sparks, who opted to leave the company they had created but had sold majority ownership in to Haymarket Media in 2001. But their departure also would prove to be only a transitional phase...

 

[h=2]RACER@25: Issue No. 200 - Feat of Endurance[/h] Monday, 24 April 2017


By RACER staff




Send
Print
Decrease Increase TEXT




This is the 20th installment in RACER's ongoing 25th anniversary celebration during which we share the 25 most important issues from our first quarter century.
[HR][/HR] [h=3]Related Stories[/h] RACER@25: Issue No. 165 - Transition zone


RACER@25: Issue No. 160 - Danica Mania


RACER@25: Issue No. 145, May 2004 - Power & Influence


RACER@25: Issue No. 138, Oct. 2003 - Road Not Taken


RACER@25: Issue No. 124, August 2002 - Who is Jimmie Johnson?








"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" was a fair summary of the period in which RACER's 200th issue came into being. The gratification felt by the staff at reaching this milestone was tempered by the weight of the challenges everyone was facing in December 2008. The depths of the Great Recession included particularly hard hits to the U.S. automotive industry and so, inevitably, to professional motorsports – and to the media entities that covered them.
Underscoring how much the racing world had changed over the course of our 200 issues, the cover story of the issue detailed the 100 most significant moments in racing since the magazine's launch in May 1992 – and 100 more moments we wanted to happen in the years ahead. How'd we do? Like with all such wish lists, there were some good predictions, some bad.
A best of times/worst of times scenario also was in play for Tony Stewart at the end of 2008. Tom Jensen related how the then two-time NASCAR Cup champion had walked away from the Joe Gibbs Racing he had helped build into a powerhouse to take up co-ownership of Gene Haas' team, which had previously failed to muster much of a challenge. But Stewart would prove the long-term wisdom of his decision by winning a third title with Stewart-Haas Racing in 2011, and helping put in place the ingredients to keep the team a regular contender after he had retired from the cockpit.
For Target Chip Ganassi Racing at the end of '08, it was more a case of going from strength to strength. Having just cleaned up in the IRL with Scott Dixon, the team doubled up for 2009 by recruiting Dario Franchitti – who had preceded Dixon as winner of both the Indianapolis 500 and series title – from Michael Andretti's team. Jeff Olson related how the instant rapport between the two aces helped create an IndyCar superteam before it even turned a wheel.
The flip side of all the uncertainty facing racing at the end of 2008 was that the ultimate owners of the sport – the fans – were more in control than ever before, as we related in our annual look at the sources of power and influence in the sport. While motorsports sponsorship was coming under increasing pressure from corporate belt-tightening, the expansion of TV options and the first glimmerings of internet streaming were making more racing available to more people to view and choose from. That presented both promise and peril to all the interested parties, as Andrew Crask detailed in "Changing Times"

 

RACER@25: Issue No. 236, Dec. 2011 – Losing Lionheart

Wednesday, 26 April 2017


By RACER staff




Send
Print
Decrease Increase TEXT




This is the 21st installment in RACER's ongoing 25th anniversary celebration during which we share the 25 most important issues from our first quarter century.
[HR][/HR] Related Stories

RACER@25: Issue No. 200 - Feat of Endurance


RACER@25: Issue No. 165 - Transition zone


RACER@25: Issue No. 160 - Danica Mania


RACER@25: Issue No. 145, May 2004 - Power & Influence


RACER@25: Issue No. 138, Oct. 2003 - Road Not Taken








A shadow of sadness and doubt fell over the sport and RACER in the last months of 2011. Dan Wheldon's shocking death on October 16, 2011 during the opening laps of the IZOD IndyCar Series season finale at Las Vegas Motor Speedway defined the issue and hit the RACER team hard on a personal level. Wheldon had been a cheeky but welcome presence in our lives since he came to America, and Robin Miller's moving tribute stirred our emotions but made us grateful we'd been fortunate enough to know him.

On the day of Wheldon's death, the Lucas Oil Off-Road Series lost Rick Huseman, so there was little to brighten our mood as we rolled onward to 2012. But racers carry on, and there were still champions to be celebrated.

John Oreovicz profiled Dario Franchitti's impressive IndyCar title conquest for Target Chip Ganassi Racing. RACER editor David Malsher's feature on newly crowned Firestone Indy Lights Champion Josef Newgarden revealed a rising star with a big personality and even bigger potential. Tony Di Zinno's story of Dyson Racing's American Le Mans Series championship-winning effort underscored the fighting spirit of one of the foundational teams in American racing. Little did we know that that Dyson fighting spirit would soon be part of RACER's story of survival and rebirth as we approached our 20th anniversary.

Edd Straw profiled the unusual path Bruno Senna took to Formula 1 and how he overcame unusual challenges presented by his famous uncle's legacy. Tom Jensen explored the fuel mileage battle that was changing the nature of NASCAR competition. Todd Veney examined Matt Hagan's NHRA Funny Car "déjà vu" championship ambitions for Don Schumacher Racing.

 

It's been said you can't go home again, but RACER founders Paul Pfanner and Bill Sparks had the opportunity to do just that when Haymarket Media offered them the chance to reacquire the company they had started twenty years earlier. The fateful call came in early December 2011, and the next 100 days saw a flurry of activity to make the improbable deal happen. Working secretively with RACER's editor-in-chief, Laurence Foster, Pfanner and Sparks put together a plan they named "RACER 3.0" and secured the backing of RACER-1.0 era investors Rob and Chris Dyson. Their goal was to relaunch the company with the 20th-anniversary edition of RACER magazine and then focus on rebooting RACER.com, in-house agency Racer Studio and reviving the flagging fortunes of RACER's sister title, SportsCar, which had been published by the company for the SCCA since 1984. The deal was finally done on March 18, 2012, and Pfanner and Sparks walked into the office late on the morning of March 19, 2012 to reassume control of the company.
The company they returned to was a faint shadow of what it once was commercially. RACER circulation was less than a third of what it had when the founders left the company in December 2005, but thankfully, RACER still had a world-class creative team in place. With barely a month before an all-new RACER was to be revealed to the world during the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach weekend, Laurence Foster, editor David Malsher, executive editor Andrew Crask and art director Rob French set to work on a totally revamped magazine that carried the theme "Game Changers." The cover feature spotlighted the recently introduced DeltaWing Le Mans and ALMS prototype that was the striking vision of designer Ben Bowlby, ALMS entrant Duncan Dayton, the original game-changer Dan Gurney and serial entrepreneur and game-changer Don Panoz. An expansive In Focus photo section by Rick Graves gave RACER's readers full access to this radical sports car that polarized the racing world.





Beyond RACER's stunning redesign by French, the production quality of the magazine received a dramatic upgrade, with beautiful heavy white paper stock along with a larger page size and expanded page count. Some hard decisions were made to cut RACER's frequency from 12 issues to eight in light of the declining advertising market ,while the cost of a basic subscription price was nearly doubled. It was a big gamble, but it soon paid off as RACER's circulation and advertising support began to climb again after seven years of decline. The magazine had been off the newsstand for several years and would take several months to resolve, as would many other critical challenges facing the company.
Pfanner dedicated the 20th anniversary issue to his late friend Jeff Krosnoff and titled his column "Stay Hungry" to honor his spirit. His 20th anniversary message to RACER's readers laid out the mindset of the RACER 3.0 era:
"Racing is ultimately about driving and managing change faster and better than your competition. With RACER. RACER.com and other RACER-branded offerings we intend to do just that."



The issue's Game Changer theme was captured movingly by renowned technology, media and business innovator Diego Rodriquez, who declared: "Game changers are created by people who focus on disparate ideas, rather than on inventing new ones. The most impactful – Steve Jobs, Colin Chapman, Gordon Murray, Jim Downing – are magpies who collect the best ideas they can find from other people, companies and industries, and then synthesize them into breakthrough innovations."
So it was for RACER's creative leader, Laurence Foster, (an aerodynamicist who forsook a career in Formula 1 to become an editor at Autosport) as he pulled together the content for Issue 241.



Following Foster's Game Changer's theme, brilliant racer and engineer Gil de Ferran examined the innovative mind of Chaparral creator Jim Hall. Indy 500 hero Dario Franchitti examined his own hero and mentor, Jackie Stewart, and how he changed the world of racing. Three-time world champion Niki Lauda revealed Bernie Ecclestone's disruptor gene that made him the king of Formula 1. Cars are game-changers too, and Rick Graves' beautiful images showcased the 1961 Cooper-Climax T-54 that altered the DNA of the Indy 500 and Colin Chapman's pivotal 1978 Lotus 79, which redefined how racing cars interacted with the air flowing over and under them.



David Tremayne's insightful feature "Get Back in Your Box" dove into the thorny subject of over-regulation in Formula 1. Honda Performance Development's founding president Robert Clarke put forward a compelling argument for how racing should seize the opportunities present in the coming decade of change to mobility and society. Mark Hughes asked the question "What if?" regarding Gilles Villeneuve's planned move to McLaren in 1983 that sadly never came to pass. RACER's favorite illustrator Paul Laguette even a created fantasy Tamiya model car box art to illustrate what could have been.

The Andretti family has been the heart of RACER since the beginning, and it was fitting that Mario and Marco were the subjects of the RACER Interview. Jeff Olson looked into the evaporation of ovals from the IndyCar schedule and Tom Jensen's feature on NASCAR icon Jeff Gordon titled "Taking Stock" looked deep into the motivation and mindset of a man who has graced RACER's cover more times than anyone else. Todd Veney's "Off the Record" confronted the reality of speed and ET records no longer being part of the NHRA drag racing's narrative.

 

[h=2]RACER@25: Issue No. 244, Aug. 2012 - Great Cars[/h] Monday, 01 May 2017


By RACER Staff








[HR][/HR] [h=3]Related Stories[/h] RACER@25: Issue No. 241, May 2012 - Game Changer - the RACER 3.0 era begins


RACER@25: Issue No. 236, Dec. 2011 – Losing Lionheart


RACER@25: Issue No. 200 - Feat of Endurance


RACER@25: Issue No. 165 - Transition zone


RACER@25: Issue No. 160 - Danica Mania








In stark contrast to today's era of spec cars, restrictive rules and "balance of performance," one central founding principle of RACER Magazine has been that great racecars are competitors, too. We believe that they create meaning and storylines that generate an equal amount of emotional appeal relative to the great drivers, tracks and races that define the history of the sport. So, it was natural that RACER editor-in-chief Laurence Foster (an aerodynamicist in his previous life) chose to make this an enduring issue theme only four months into the RACER 3.0 era.


What better car to represent the concept of the RACER Great Cars Issue than perhaps the greatest of them all? Foster chose the mighty Porsche 917/30 SCCA Can-Am championship-winning ride of Team Penske's iconic first driver, the late Mark Donohue, as Issue No. 244's cover subject and he commissioned talented Portuguese artist Riccardo Santos to create one of RACER's most popular covers of all time.

The other cars that made the RACER Great Cars short list were McLaren Honda MP4/4, the Porsche 956/962, the Johnny Lightning VPJ Colt Ford, Lotus 72 Ford, Williams FW07 Ford and McLaren M23 Ford.
RACER's editors asked some great racers: What was the best racecar you ever drove and which car do you wish you had driven? Marcus Gronholm, AJ. Foyt, Tony Stewart, Richard Petty, Dario Franchitti, Niki Lauda, Rubens Barrichello, Scott Pruett, Mark Webber, Gil DeFerran, Tom Kristensen, Bobby Rahal and Mario Andretti delivered insightful and in some cases, surprising answers.

Some of racing's most respected designers shared which cars they admired most. The insights of Gian Paolo Dallara, Gordon Murray, Bruce Ashmore, Patrick Head, John Barnard and Adrian Reynard celebrated some of the most revolutionary cars ever created. RACER's editors also looked at some of the sport's greatest head-to-head battles: Maserati 250F versus the Vanwall VW5, Mercedes versus Auto Union and Lancia Stratos versus the Ford Escort.
An engine is the heart of any great racing car, and RACER examined three of racing's greatest and longest-lived powerplants: the legendary Offenhauser, the Ford Cosworth DFV and its IndyCar cousin, the Cosworth DFX. Writer Edd Straw explored the greatness of recent racing cars in a feature titled "Modern Classics."

IndyCar veteran Oriol Servia and RACER's Richard James examined the then-new McLaren MP4C sports car that translated decades of McLaren engineering excellence into a winning formula for the road.


RACER editor David Malsher's interview with the dynamic duo of Dale Coyne and the late Justin Wilson reminded all of us why we love underdogs. The RACER In Focus by Rick Graves featured the Muscle Milk Acura HPD ARX-03a IMSA American Le Mans Series P1 Prototype straight off the racetrack and a victory at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca only a few days before. The car was deliberately not cleaned before the shoot so its scars of battle could remain on full display.

 

A few pics from April Free Breakfast
Event coverage is here:
https://www.tamparacing.com/forums/ev...ne-cruise.html

 

RACER@25: Issue No. 277, June 2016, The Great Teams Issue: Team Penske at 50

Friday, 05 May 2017



By RACER staff

For a half century, one team has defined American racing to the world through its unrivaled accomplishments and an unrelenting drive to achieve perfection in almost every category of the sport. Team Penske truly is the benchmark of excellence by which all of motorsport is measured, so it was no surprise that RACER's editors chose to honor Roger Penske and his team on its 50th anniversary with 2016's RACER Great Teams Issue.

the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw8FFzON2ls

Renowned artist Ricardo Santos artfully captured the scope and enduring performance of Team Penske's success across a full spectrum of pinnacle racing series with his cover illustration that featured the legendary 1973 Can-Am championship-winning Porsche 917/30 of the late Mark Donohue, John Watson's Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix-winning 1976 Penske PC4 Ford, Rick Mears' 1988 Indy 500-winning Penske PC-18 Chevy and Juan Pablo Montoya's 2015 Indy 500-winning Verizon Team Penske Dallara Chevy. Amazingly, Issue No. 277 marked the 27th time Team Penske had been prominently represented on the cover of RACER, a number challenged but not beaten by Ferrari and Hendrick Motorsports.
The centerpiece of the Great Teams Issue was an expansive feature titled "The Penske Way," and Team Penske's unmatched 16 Indy 500 victories were front and center. From SCCA's USRRC, Trans Am, Can-Am, F5000, USAC, the Indy 500, Formula 1, NASCAR and IMSA, Team Penske competed and won. Often they did so with what Mark Donohue once called "The Unfair Advantage." One such example was detailed in a feature titled "Secret Weapon," when Team Penske shocked the world at Indy in 1994 with the reveal of the mighty 1000hp Mercedes-Ilmor pushrod V8 engine that dominated the race.

The RACER Great Teams issue wasn't just about one team, though, and none was more fitting for recognition than Corvette Racing, which has taken America's sports car into battle on the world stage and onward to victory since the turn of the century. Marshall Pruett's insightful "The Sum of All Parts" looked at the men and teamwork behind the Corvette's remarkable record at Le Mans and in IMSA.
Formula 1 is all about the team and in "Glimpsing Greatness" Paul Fernley examined brave and visionary F1 teams that had the right stuff but came up short in results. In "Silver and Gone," RACER looked at Mercedes-Benz's 1955 Grand Prix effort that set the template for the modern era. The feature "Perfection Postponed" looked at McLaren-Honda's nearly perfect 1988 Grand Prix season that stands today as one of the greatest on record and as a reminder of how far today's McLaren-Honda alliance has to go. "Impero Rosso" celebrated the brilliance of Ferrari and Michael Schumacher during the first five years of the 21st century.
The business and competitive model for the modern NASCAR team is defined by the multi-car vision and financial commitment by Rick Hendrick in building his Hendrick Motorsports championship-winning dynasty. In "Stronger Together," Tom Jensen explored the motivations and spirit of the man and his team that changed the NASCAR game forever. In "The Human Factor," Gary Watkins examined the tech-savvy teamwork inside the cutting-edge world of World Endurance Championship competition.
Related Stories

RACER@25: Issue No. 247, Winter 2012 - Technology Issue debuts


RACER@25: Issue No. 244, Aug. 2012 - Great Cars


RACER@25: Issue No. 241, May 2012 - Game Changer - the RACER 3.0 era begins


RACER@25: Issue No. 236, Dec. 2011 – Losing Lionheart


RACER@25: Issue No. 200 - Feat of Endurance

As a footnote to the Great Teams Issue narrative, RACER's connection to Roger Penske runs deep. In 1996, Roger asked Paul Pfanner and the Racer Studio team to help him launch his new California Speedway (now Auto Club Speedway) in Fontana, California. A byproduct of this was the development of a new icon and logo for Roger's famous racing team and a contract to provide creative and marketing services for the Penske Motorsports racetracks: California Speedway, Michigan Speedway, North Carolina Speedway and Nazareth Speedway. An interesting twist to the story came in 1999 when former Penske Motorsports and Penske Corporation President Rich Peters assisted RACER founder Paul Pfanner during his negotiations with UK-based Haymarket Media that ultimately led to the majority of Racer Communications being acquired by the publishers of Autosport, F1 Racing and Motorsport News. At the time, Rich Peters predicted that Pfanner and his investors would eventually have the opportunity to reacquire the company and 11 years later he was proven right!
Pfanner has often cited Roger Penske as one the key influences in his life and his love of racing from an early age, so it is safe to say RACER would not have existed nor would have it prospered without Penske's validation and collaboration in RACER's first decade. Today, RACER is once again in the hands of the founders and stands as the largest general interest racing publication in North America and is respected as one of the best in the world. RACER.com leads the Alexa.com motorsports media website rankings for the United States and is widely regarded as the authoritative and trusted voice of American racing.

 

The Best Car Scene is Tampa Racing!
Tampa Racing has the best Florida Car Scene Year Round!
Florida's Best Import Car Scene is Tampa Racing!
Tampa Racing sets another record: number of readers on Tampa Racing
at the SAME time: 3,302!
Currently Active Users

There are currently 309 users online. 1 members and 308 guests
Most users ever online was 3,302, May 5 at 02:11 PM.

Upcoming Events for the Next 14 Day(s)

-------------------------------------------------------
So Tampa Racing reset the counter and mercy sakes! June 22 2016, Another record set for
number of readers on Tampa Racing at the same time: 2,041
-------------------------------------------------------

Currently Active Users

There are currently 222 users online. 2 members and 220 guests
Most users ever online was 2,041, 06-22-2016 at 06:36 PM.

Upcoming Events for the Next 14 Day(s)

----------------------------------------------------
The previous record was 2,668 set on August 29 2015
far exceeding the 1,900+ from the "old days".....
and yes folks, as the primary poster accused of "ruining the site"
I accept full responsibility.....

 

Free Special Edition download of INDYCAR 2017 Indianapolis, etc

http://www.racermagazine-digital.com...ial?pg=50#pg50