It’s often difficult to keep track of positions in an IndyCar competition, particularly if you’re in the stands and do not have the blissful luxury of a broadcaster or data stream to point things out. Never ever fear, though: as of this week-end, the league’s vehicles are bring Light-emitting Diode panels that display the driver’s race position in real-time by working together with timing lines embedded within the tracks. They’re also smart enough to switch to pit stop times, so that you’ll know if that tire swap is running too long.
The technology is getting its first genuine shakedown during the Mid-Ohio competition on August 2nd (today, if you should be looking over this in time) at 1:30PM Eastern. However, some groups already see potential dilemmas. While the Light-emitting Diode array is only 0.11 ins thick, it’s still including lower amounts of weight and wind resistance towards the vehicle. There is also a problem that pit teams might be sidetracked with a display only inches away from where they’re working. They could not have much say on the matter, mind you — IndyCar is a spectator sport at its heart, as well as the sacrifices could be justified when they help fans seem sensible of vehicular chaos.