Comming Back To IndyCar

Honda will have at least one rival engine manufacturer to compete against in 2012. In a press conference earlier today, the ICS managment confirmed a rumor that had been floating around the internet for the past week: Chevrolet is preparing to return as a engine supplier - and they didn't rule out designing aero kits as well.

The US auto company, which is the cornerstone and biggest peice of the General Motors empire, has a long history in all forms of American racing, including what is now IndyCar. The brothers Louis and Gaston Chevrolet, Swiss immigrants to the US, raced cars of their own design and manufacture at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in it's early years. More recently, Chevrolet-badged Ilmor engines competed in the series from 1986-1993, and again from 2002-2005.

Chevrolet will once again partner with Ilmor Engineering, this time around to build and service twin-turbocharged V6 engines of a maximum 2.4 litre displacement, as specified by the 2012 IndyCar technical specifications. While the details were not clearly spelled out in the announcement webcast, it is reasonable to assume that the Chevy/Ilmor partnership will work much the same as the one between Honda and Honda Performance Developement, where the latter company buys the engines, rebuilds them to racing specs, and then leases them out to the teams.

This would certianly make the deal palatable to the US taxpayers, who last year shelled out roughly $50 billion to keep General Motors from declaring bankruptcy! While GM claims to have fully repaid this loan -  and ahead of their promised schedule - there are those in the businees/finance world who claim that they have simply performed a fiscal 'slight of hand', moving funds (and debts) from one ledger book to another.

"Our vision is to design, build and sell the world’s best vehicles – and racing is one of the best ways to showcase what we can do," said Tom Stephens, GM vice chairman of Global Product Operations. "Re-entering Indy-style racing will help us take our advanced engine technology to the upper bounds of what’s possible. And it will also provide a dynamic training ground for engineers, who’ll transfer the technologies we develop for racing to the products we sell to our customers."

Also present at today's announcement was Mike Kelly, senior v.p. of marketing for series sponsor IZOD, who had this to say; “Today’s announcement about GM’s commitment to the IZOD IndyCar Series is one more sign of the growth of our sport. We clearly have momentum and we couldn’t be prouder to be a part of it. The increased competition that Chevrolet will bring to the series and the added marketing support that a company of their stature brings, is a win/win situation for everyone involved. 

"This will send a signal to other manufacturers that our sport provides a great marketing platform for their brands and the IZOD IndyCar Series is the place to be in 2012."

I wonder if the folks in Dearborn MI - aka: Ford Motor Company - are paying attention?