Hearts vs Celtic 2-2 Draw: Rolex 24 Daytona Recap

Podcasting from Studio 2520, somewhere near Akron, Ohio. This is Tackling the Chicane.

Special Sun— no, Saturday morning episode here at Studio 2520 as we sort of emerge from a weather event that occurred about a week ago. Yeah, uh, copious amounts of snow. Shit, shit. I usually don't bitch about the winter, but this has crossed a certain threshold for me. Yeah, well, it's different when you're not home from school.

Yeah, you're out there working. You have to get up and deal with starting your car and clearing snow and driving to work and dealing with all those people on the roads. And yeah, I, I agree, especially for— I've long said this, that there will come a time in my life where I don't live in a place that, that snows, that snows. It's just when your hobbies are based on, largely based on weather, Um, it's really— it, it gets to you, right? Especially this time of year.

I mean, we're, we're February, and we still have a few months before anything comes out of the garage. So yeah, yes, it stinks. It's been an unfortunate winter, but, uh, we, we continue to get through it, I suppose. Uh, on the show today, pretty full agenda. Um, we're gonna get up to speed on the Scottish Premiership in the title race there.

We will talk some Celtic as well, who had some midweek European action to take care of. We'll talk a little Premier League, the, uh Uh, I would say a pretty interesting game between Man United and Arsenal that took place the weekend prior. And then, uh, racing side of things, I think we have some words to speak on the, uh, 24 Hours of Daytona from last weekend. We've got breaking news from IndyCar about a new event that I think both of us have opinions about. So, um, I suppose we can start with, uh, Scottish Premiership here and work our way through that agenda.

And last weekend offered, uh, quite a bit of entertainment and frankly I think showed us sort of where these teams stand, uh, in the title race. Of course, I'm talking Hearts, Rangers, and Celtic. It's, it's pretty much firmly a 3-horse race for the title at this point. Um, Motherwell are sort of kind of sniffing around in 4th, but I, I would say it's between these 3 teams. And Hearts and Celtic did square off.

They did battle in Edinburgh on Sunday, and I would say offered quite a bit of entertainment, especially I think if you were a neutral, uh, neutral viewer of this one, you probably were entertained. Um, we knew going in that Celtic kind of needed at least a draw, at the very least couldn't lose any ground on hearts. Um, but a win would have been preferred, and of course now we know that that did not happen— a win, that is. Um, lots to discuss from this one. What, what do you want to sink your teeth into first?

Well, I suppose it's the first— the first point is I'll take a draw over a loss. Yeah. Especially with this, the team that we're watching this year.

Yes. Other than that, it was a good match. It was an entertaining match. We had Negren pretty early. Direct free kick within the first 10 minutes.

10 minutes of the match. That was the 7th minute. And I, I don't know if you picked up on this, I certainly did. The commentary made a very large production about how Celtic have not scored from a direct free kick since 2021. I have it written down.

Turnbull. Yeah, David Turnbull throwback. Um, and then what did Negren do? Not 2 seconds after they finished that little production there, he scores from a direct free kick. And it, I was watching, I watched this live and I was thinking, you know, that feels exactly like a moment where the commentary is going to jinx Hearts here.

And that is exactly what happened. Yeah, I think that's in a lot of sports, I think your mind goes to that immediately because it's, it's coincidental. Yeah. Um, you know, it's like when you're watching a football game and the announcer says something about the kicker right before he kicks. Classic.

Shanks it. And he shanks it or he makes it or whatever.

Um, I, I don't know. It's an assimilation thing with your brain, I'm sure. But yeah, it, it's nonetheless, it's It was an entertaining, um, few minutes, few opening minutes of the match. Um, I have a note here that apparently there were, you know, in the 12th minute, Braga for Hearts kind of threatens, but, you know, heats it up a little bit, but doesn't end up getting a goal. And then, um, I don't think we had much else going on in the first half of this one.

Both teams kind of settled into just the ticky tack. Well, it should be mentioned. Well, I don't, first off, ticky tack. I don't know if that describes this game perfectly because it was mostly just long balls, poof it up. These teams, well, okay.

Hearts, I think purposefully made the game that way. Um, it should be mentioned that Lawrence Shankland is out for 6 to 8 weeks, their top scorer, and they had a couple of pretty key, very key injuries for their team. Cami Devlin, who is one of their best players as well, was down. So they were not ragtag by any means, but certainly not full strength. Um, I think Hearts made this sort of a long ball, hoof it up the pitch type game on purpose.

And Celtic just basically stooped down to that level because, well, quite frankly, they're not good. So I, I, I think this game, it did offer a lot of entertainment, uh, but you're not gonna go back and watch and be like, wow, that's the, that's the sexiest football I've ever seen.

Yeah. Well, Celtic tends to play at the pace that they're being played against. Yeah. It feels like I don't see any dynamic happenings in this game. And that is not the mark of a team that wins championships.

No, it never had. You can, that's across any sport. Yeah. Really. You don't.

Fall to the level of your opponent. Yep. So I think we have a goal pretty early in the second half. Finlay. Yeah.

Stuart Finlay header off the corner. I have written down here. So then all of a sudden we're drawn with lots of time left. Yeah. I believe they, that was Hearts' 12th goal from a corner this season, which is insane, and Celtic are notoriously not very good at dealing with set pieces.

So, uh, perfect mixture there. Yep. Uh, again, you just felt like a goal was coming for Hearts, uh, which has kind of been the case every time we've played them. You knew at some point they were getting on the scoresheet. Um, and, and I guess to Celtic's credit, they respond fairly quickly.

In the 62nd minute, Yang taps home. This was all made by the new signing, uh, Thomas Shabanchara, which I'm sure I'm still butchering. But, uh, he, he, considering, you know, hasn't played a lot of football this season and is a new signing, I thought he looked all right. He had a header that nearly— that, that caused some, some effort from Craig Gordon to be saved, um, and he, he does very well to assist Yang's goal, uh, to make it 2-1 Celtic. Um, still didn't feel all that confident by then that, you know, Hearts weren't gonna push for more.

And then of course you have the red card incident which caused a lot of controversy. The cards— yeah, the cards start flying. A yellow card to, I can't pronounce his name, but it's something Cavalera. I'm going Shvanchara for now. Okay.

There you go. And then a red card to Trustee. And I don't directly recall what the incident was specifically. It was a denial of an obvious goal scoring opportunity. Is the rule.

Hearts got on the break. It was basically a 1v1. Uh, Trusty grazes the Hearts player and, um, he gets a yellow at first, which— okay, so when I was watching, every time I've seen that happen, the player always gets a red. It doesn't matter. The, the— it's— it is not a judgment of how hard the tackle is.

It's if you, if you impeded a player in an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, you're getting a red if you're the last defender. Is it always inside the box? No, it's not about— it's, it can happen anywhere on the pitch. If you're— if the referee deems that basically you're the last bastion of defense and you have impeded the attacking player, you're out. See that?

So again, with the rules in this game, because any other, at least in my mind, at any other point in the match, that's the exact intent of the defense is to impede the player. So in this case, and do you see this? This is a hard, firm, and fast rule that if there's a one-on-one, You're supposed to defend with your, with no physical contact. Well, you can, but if the referee deems it a foul, you're screwed. Yeah.

Shit's creeked. Interesting. It'll be one to, you don't see it very often, I suppose. Not a ton. But when it happens, it usually ends up in a red.

That's why when he pulled out a yellow card, I actually laughed. Did he do that? Accidentally, do you think? No, I mean, uh, he must have thought— and here's the thing, I really don't think it's a red looking back. Did it go VAR?

Yeah. Okay. He— the ball wasn't even really headed towards goal, and Liam Scales was in the vicinity. Whether or not you deem he would have made any, any impact on the play, I guess, is up to your judgment. But in, in, in live time, the first time I saw it, I thought, okay, he's gonna get a red just because that's the way it usually goes.

So when he got a yellow, that's when I was— first, Celtic were fairly favored. They were getting a lot of calls their way, and frankly, I think was keeping them in the game. Um, so when that occurred, I, I just I had to laugh because I knew that would piss off everyone in maroon, which it did. And then you get the opposite reaction when it goes to VAR and Trustee gets sent off. Celtic have not gotten a red card in the league for 2 years.

Yeah, there's a stat for you. Wow, 2 years. Which, if you're a Rangers fan or really anyone not, uh, in the Celtic camp, you will of course say that that some inherent bias with the referees. Uh, whether or not that's true, who knows. But yeah, first red card in the league for Celtic in about 2 years.

Um, and Celtic then went to the SFA and, uh, appealed the red card. They were unsuccessful, so there was a meltdown in the east side of Glasgow because of course how dare the ref give Celtic a red card. Yeah. Um, which I, you know, looking back was a little soft, but that did change the game. Celtic had to pack it in basically with 10 men for, uh, about 20 minutes and they were not successful because Claudio Braga scored in the 87th minutes for Hearts to equalize.

Yep. And that was it. 2-2. So I think that was fair, a fair result, honestly. And you look at the stats, expected goals for Hearts was 1.66 to Celtics 1.32.

Hearts had more big chances created, more shots in total, 14 to 9, 55% of the ball to Celtics 45%. So really, I kind of think the draw was, uh, where it should have ended up, and it did. Meanwhile, Rangers defeated Dundee 3-0, which means that Celtic now fall to 3rd. Rangers are actually in the, the catbird seat, 4 points down to Hearts now, and Celtic remains 6 points down. Um, and we've got some interesting fixtures this weekend.

Hearts play Dundee United Uh, today as we record away, and then Rangers play Hibernian tomorrow. Celtic have Falkirk, so we will know more about the next chapter of this title race, of course, next time out. But, um, yeah, overall I'd say fair result. Sure. So I don't know I know you had sent a match to watch.

I didn't end up watching that second one, but I did watch the match against Utrecht. Utrecht. Utrecht. Utrecht. Yes.

And that was a UEFA Cup game? Europa League. Europa League. Yeah. I'll never be able to say this straight.

Well, actually, it used to be called UEFA Cup. So weirdly you were— Okay. Kind of right there. Yeah. Yes, the Europa League, which is the second tier of, uh, European competition if you break it down like that.

So the Champions League is the big dog competition. If you win that, you're sort of— you're deemed the European champions. And this cup is basically the step down. Um, I won't get into how you qualify for those. That's a 30-minute chunk by itself.

But Celtic needed a win to move on to the knockout rounds. They were literally in the last spot in the league table, uh, to move on, and a draw would not have been enough. So they needed a win. Utrecht were all but eliminated from the Netherlands, so I kind of figured this would not necessarily be easy, but probably a win in Celtic's favor, which it ended up being 4-2. Celtic scored 3 goals in 20 minutes, which is the fastest they've ever scored 3 goals in Europe, apparently.

Saw that stat, um, and it seemed like it was going to be just a complete steamroller operation. And of course We should know by now that that's never how it's going to be this season. Right. One of the 3 goals off of a handball penalty. Yes.

Which was, yeah. Um, I don't know. That's one of those calls where for, in order for it to be reviewed, the ball has to hit somebody's hand. So how you don't call it a handball, I don't know. Yeah, the handball rule is about as, uh, clear as, uh, pass interference in football.

So that was— who knows— Engels who scored that. Yeah, he got the penalty. Um, Utrecht were kind of a mess the first 20 minutes. Negrin, uh, tapped in, um, a cross ball from Kieran Tierney in the 6th minute. Benjamin Negrin still continues to be our best player this season, always seems to find uh, the back of the net, uh, even if he does nothing else the rest of the game.

Um, of course, the own goal in the 10th minute, which was given to us by, um, Vasilis Barkas, the goalkeeper for Utrecht, who played for Celtic, uh, before this club, and he was notoriously very, very bad. This was pre- Uh, tackling the chicane. But, uh, yeah, I remember him playing for Celtic and Celtic fans not liking him. He, uh, he manned the sticks the season before Ange came, and that was the last time Celtic did not win the title. So you can see how that went.

Uh, 3-0 into the— into halftime. Not a whole lot to say. Celtic definitely took their foot off the gas after going up. Oh, okay, actually a goal. 44th.

Yeah, 44th. 3-1. Uh, Utrecht get one back, uh, and you're feeling pretty much fine still. Then again, kind of come out flat and Utrecht get one in the 62nd minute, and I was like, uh-oh, surely they're not gonna 3-2. 3-nothing.

Yeah. Yeah. 3-2 gets a little tight. And especially with that much time left to play, almost 30 minutes to play. Well, and I texted, when I texted you, it was 3-nil.

Like I texted you in like the 20th minute. It was like, oh, looks like we're moving on. Yeah. I didn't, I don't think I responded right away because it's like, yeah.

I did watch the replay of that match, by the way. It was later that evening, but, um, Trusty, uh, in the 66th minute. So now we're 4-2, still feeling a little bit better, but anything can happen with that amount of time left.

Um, thankfully things, nothing really happened after that. So yeah. Just 3 minutes of stoppage and then that was pretty much it. So yeah, good on Trusty to get that header, went up for the ball and put it in the back of the net. The very clutch timing there and his 2nd goal in like as many weeks for Celtic as a defender.

So interesting there. He's actually going to be gunning for a World Cup roster spot with the USMNT, so keep an eye out on Austin Trusty. That might be a name you will be familiar with this summer. We shall see. But that win 4-2, uh, ensured that Celtic made it to the playoff round of the Europa League, and they found out their fate.

They will be playing Stuttgart from Germany, who are currently in 5th in the Bundesliga. Uh, That is going to be a tough tie, unfortunately. That's a pretty shit draw. Yeah, uh, as it were. But you know what, never say never.

Knockout tournaments are strange, as you know. Um, weird things can happen, and a lot of times teams that really aren't in that great a form in the league will make deep runs regardless. So It's kind of all we can hope for at this point. When is that match? February 19th.

Oh, got a little time. So yeah, 2 weeks, 3 weeks. Um, first leg— it's a 2-leg affair, so first leg will be at Celtic Park Thursday, February 19th, and then the following week in Germany. So 11:45 AM kickoff in Germany. That's odd.

But, uh, yeah, unfortunately we could have been drawn against Ferencvaros of Hungary, which would have been a lot easier on paper at least. But that is the way it goes. I remember last year when we made the playoff round of the Champions League, our reward was Bayern Munich. So seems like we've been just getting fucked by these draws. But, uh, whatever, uh, we'll see what happens.

Looking forward to that, um, and a good weekend in the Scottish Premiership coming up. We'll see if things change at all. You never, never really know. Um, as for the Premier League, Arsenal fell to Manchester United, uh, last weekend in a pretty spectacular match. Um, 2-3 was the final.

Arsenal 2, Man United 3. Man United get an 87th-minute winner, uh, courtesy of Matheus Cunha, uh, in, in pretty dramatic fashion. There were some, some bangers in this game. Um, Patrick Dorgu, who weirdly ended up getting a hamstring injury right after this match and is out for like 10 weeks, but he scored, uh, one of the best goals you will see, uh, for Manchester United in the 50th minute of this game. So that has to be highlighted.

Um, it was actually Arsenal that took the lead early in this one in the 29th minute via an own goal, and I think Arsenal had not dropped points or definitely had not lost this season when they scored first. So that was sort of a— this was sort of an odd situation, um, in the Premier League. Imbirmo for Man United equalizes in the 37th minute, and then of course you have that amazing Dorgu strike in the 50th. Then it was Mikel Merino who it looked like he was going to rescue a point for Arsenal in the 84th minute, but of course Cunha was there to, to break the hearts of the Gunners. All of this means that Arsenal are now down to just a 4-point lead at the top of the table.

Manchester United— excuse me, Manchester City and Aston Villa, of all teams, still just 4 points behind the league leaders. And after all the turmoil this season and last, all the drama, it's Manchester United who are in 4th place with their interim manager Michael Carrick, ahead of Chelsea, ahead of Liverpool, ahead of teams like Newcastle, Everton, Sunderland, Tottenham, who are in 14th. Um, so it's just funny how this season's playing out. It really is quite strange. I still think Arsenal are in the— are the favorites to go on and win.

I think City just are not consistent enough. Would— but would Aston Villa be in 2nd place if they're— is it the, the goal differential? That's all difference. So City is a lot better than Conference.

Essentially, you've got basically, I call that your top 3, not really your top 4. Yeah. You know, but still, I understand you have to rank. Yeah. So, so 8 points between United in 4th and Villa in 3rd.

It's very much, I'd say, a 3-horse race for the title right now. Um, but Man United are in that Champions League spot, so that's a huge accomplishment for them given they finished 15th last year. So in a big payday, Liverpool continued to be not very good. No wins in 5 matches. Uh, people are starting to get pissed off with Arne Slot, their manager, even though he won the league last year.

And I'm not so sure he survives much longer if the form continues to be bad. Uh, hard to say.

Hero to zero. Yeah, that is incredibly quick. Yeah, in, in the Premier League, of course. Uh, looking at the bottom 3 before we move on, it's still firmly these 3 teams that have a lot of work to do. Weirdly, West Ham, who are in 18th but 5 points back from safety, have won their last 2 matches.

But Nottingham Forest have continued to be in good form recently, so Forest are actually 5 points safe from the drop zone. West Ham in 18th. Burnley, I, I'm starting to think you can wave goodbye to them on 15 points. And Wolves are, are Wolves there with 8 points. Again, still looking to not have that record of the worst Premier League team of all time.

What is the city that they play in? Uh, Birmingham. They're a Birmingham club along with Aston Villa. Yeah, right. That's the Robert Plant.

Yes, I was gonna say, that's a little trivia. Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin, that is his team of choice. So, uh, you'll see him fairly often at Wolves matches. Uh, Robbie, I, I don't think you're particularly enjoying this season, but, uh, so be it, I guess. I guess.

I don't know, maybe it's a cash dump or write-off for, for him. You would think he's, he's probably donated some money to that to that club. But, uh, yeah, that'll do it for the soccer side of things. Uh, Liverpool take on Newcastle today as we record, which is probably your best match of the weekend. Tottenham-Man City in theory would be good, but Tottenham sucks, so not really.

Um, so we'll have more to say on that next time out. Will Arsenal, uh, keep a 4-point lead? Will they grow their lead? Will it shrink? More to come.

But, uh, for now, I think we can go ahead and switch into the world of motorsports. And, uh, I think we both wanted to, to touch a little bit on the 24 Hours of Daytona. Which occurred last weekend. And, uh, yeah, let you get that started. Uh, well, always, it's always nice to have this at this time of year.

It's kind of a, it's, it's a day, it's a, it's a full day of if you want to commit to it. I know people that do that traditionally.

Few people are, are able to because of, you know, life gets in the way of sitting in front of the TV for 24 hours. But yeah, I watched most of the, the, uh, unfortunate caution in this race. Um, I, I watched a little bit before I went to bed and then I couldn't sleep. So I got up, I think it was 3 or 4 in the morning. Um, so that, that hour that I watched the caution, They had a tremendous weather fog-related incident there which resulted in a 7-hour caution.

Not exactly, uh, edge-of-your-seat content for a good chunk of the night section of the Rolex 24. That is usually when I like to watch the most because it looks cool on TV. Uh, but they didn't run a ton, uh, under the lights because of the fog, right? Um, but I guess that's, uh, out of anyone's control. Um, but yeah, this is an event that each year I, I kind of enjoy more and more.

Um, as, as I watch, um, it's just Well, firstly, it's an incredible sporting achievement to, to operate a machine for 24 consecutive hours. I think it, you know, even just getting the car across the line is a huge achievement. And yeah, it's incredibly impressive. Of course. Um, and this, as far as 24-hour endurance races go, this is this plays a bit of second fiddle to obviously Le Mans, which is even more challenging, um, just because of the way the course is laid out and the weather and such.

Um, but yeah, of course. I mean, now this race didn't necessarily test that endurance factor as a regular race would. When you run for 7 hours at 20% capacity. Um, you know, I, I like watching IMSA because of the, the different, the platforms of cars that are on the track at the same time. Yeah.

So that makes it interesting. It does. Um, And of course in that, what are they calling it now? It's GTD or which, well, the lower, the lower street, not street class, but the lower class GTD and GTD Pro. Those cars are really fun to watch because they're like very close to the performance cars that are available to, yeah.

The general enthusiast.

Um, but yeah, other than that 7-hour caution, um, we had, uh, Felipe Nasr was the overall winner. Of course, that's a Porsche Penske car, their 3rd consecutive victory in this event. Yeah. And that tends to happen, uh, because they've— teams will get the right combination of driver and they'll figure out the car.

Um, you know, of note, people don't usually think Cadillac when they think performance, but here we are. They've been in the top 3, I think, for the last several years. Um, and they finished second and then, uh, Renny Rast, uh, Renee, Renny, I don't know how you pronounce it, but anyhow, um, in third. And I believe that was an M-powered BMW car. So yes.

I, I thought it was gonna be— it looked for most of the beginning of this event that it was gonna be Penske and Porsche domination again, which no one really wants to see them go 1-2 and just blow everyone out. But the rest of the field, uh, ended up getting, you know, very competitive. The Cadillac, Jack Aitken, at the end there was pushing for the win. Obviously didn't get it done, but, um, after 24 hours to see, you know, a true battle for the lead with, you know, a few minutes left was pretty crazy. And we saw that in, I think it was the GTD class as well, uh, there was a really good battle at the end.

But, uh, yeah, it did, it did end up being the Porsche Penske Uh, effort for the 3rd consecutive year. Yeah, so of, of note for us, uh, Meyer Shank finishes 5th overall in the GTP class. Um, the only really notable name on that team this year was Alex Palou. Yeah, Kaku Ota is a Super Formula guy in Japan and did an IndyCar test over the offseason. I think— I don't think he's gonna get a seat this year in IndyCar, but I've watched interviews with him and he says his goal was to race IndyCar.

So I think you'll be hearing more from him in the future. Um, Connor Zilich is a name that if you're already not familiar with, he was driving for Cadillac, but he is basically NASCAR's next big thing. Um, 19 years old, he won 10 Xfinity races last year, didn't win the championship because of their amazing format, which got changed first— did get changed this year, probably because in part Connor Zilich did not win the Xfinity championship, right? Um, but yeah, he's a guy that you are going to know about in NASCAR, I think. He will be racing full-time in the Cup Series this year, I think with, uh, Trackhouse Racing.

Um, and I— he's sort of a— I'm sure you could, could have figured this out— he is a bit of a road course ace, uh, which is why he was so good in sports car driving as well. So that's a name you'll probably hear a lot of in NASCAR this season. Yeah, um, just looking down the list here, the other Meyer Shank car finished 9th, so they had 2 cars in the top 10. Yeah, that— some notable names on that team are, uh, Scott Dixon and AJ Allmendinger. Yeah, Tom Blomqvist has been racing IMSA for Meyer Shank forever.

He had a few races in in 2024 for the Meyer Shank IndyCar team. Colin Braun is, uh, also a, uh, sort of a sports car ace but has raced a couple times in IndyCar for Dale Coyne as well. So, uh, there were a lot of IndyCar guys or IndyCar adjacent guys sprinkled around the grid. Uh, the LMP2 era motorsports, which ended up being last in their class. Had guys like Logan Sargeant.

Yeah. And Jacob Abel, who I got a picture with at the Indy 500 last year because he got bumped. Oh yeah, yeah, I remember. He does not have a seat in IndyCar this year, so yeah. Uh, and then Will Power did his first 24 Hours of Daytona in GTP— GTD Pro.

Yeah, that was a Mercedes-AMG car. Um, just going down the list here to see if there's any other notable drivers.

What's his name? Romain Grosjean. Oh yeah, yay, in GTD. Uh, that was a Ford Mustang, which unfortunately did not— uh, didn't even finish, so Yeah. So it's just real quick on that particular car that the GTD is actually available to the public and it is exactly as you see on track.

So starting, starting sticker price is $350,000. Most of them are actually being built for closer to $500,000.

And just real quick, it starts out as a Mustang GT. It gets shipped to Multimatic Racing in Canada, and they cut off from the base of the windshield forward and from the B-pillar, which is right behind the driver's seat, back. And those 2 parts are bespoke to racing. So it's a Mustang in theory, but not really. Um, check it out.

I mean, check out the GTD. There's tons of articles on it. It's pretty impressive. Jim Farley, CEO of Ford, was behind this because he is a big IMSA guy. He was interviewed and talking a lot.

Yeah. And he races, uh, in IMSA. So it's nice to have the CEO involved in motorsport because then you get cars that are interesting. Not just, you know, milquetoast ridiculousness. So, but yeah, unfortunately they didn't have such a great run this year.

But that could be due to the fact that the car is essentially new. I mean, it's, it hasn't been around very long. So maybe they have some things to work out with it. But yeah, unfortunately neither Ford entry finished Um, the Gradient Racing Ford Mustang managed 518 laps, um, with a mostly sports car crew. Um, yeah, a couple other IndyCar guys were there.

Scotty Mack was there. So always cool to see the names that get involved in this event, but, um, pretty unsurprising finish with Porsche Penske getting the win. Um, but, uh, definitely a series I'd be interested in watching a little more often. Of course, you have to pack it into the, the agenda of everything else, so yeah, no promises there. But well, yeah, I would, I would not be opposed to maybe spending a little bit more time on the ramp-up to that race next year because it's really in the— it's a everything's over by the time this comes around.

So it would be easy to do so. It's an IMSA weekend in Detroit, by the way, just saying. Yeah, so you kind of get double your value if you go to Detroit because it's an IndyCar and IMSA event. Uh, that— it— that's what they would call like a sprint in IMSA. It's a 100-minute race.

So, well, we've talked about trying to do that this year. Um, we'll just have to, we got to get on that if we're going to, because it's already February. So yeah, that would make for a long week. I guess. I mean, you just take a little break in between.

Yeah. Yeah. Easily could. So, but all right. Uh, One last thing before we move, and, uh, talked about this a little bit off air.

The Freedom 250 was announced for IndyCar last, uh, basically last afternoon, yesterday I suppose. Uh, that's an event that apparently is taking place this season, August, across the what is it, Capitol Mall or whatever, 8 months to figure out how they're gonna pull that one off.

I— so every— doing a race on city streets is a challenge enough, and they start to prepare for, let's say for example, the the race in Detroit months ahead of time. They start with the barriers and the fencing and all that stuff, rerouting traffic, changing this, doing that. And then you add to the fact that we're dealing with one of the highest security sectors of— in the highest security sector. So you've, You're in, you have the problem with the actual infrastructure of the race. Then on top of that, you've got all this worry about having all these people so close to the mall and the White House.

And I don't know, I, I predict a shit show, but we'll see what happens if it ever even comes to fruition. First off, it is an executive order that our president signed to have this event. Like I said off air, you do not announce an event and have it in the same year because that— no one could ever possibly pull that off with good— like, and expect it to be good.

For example, IndyCar in Arlington for this year, which is in March, they announced that like January of last year because you have to market the event, you have to prepare for the event, you have to do all these things you just talked about. That's years in advance. Not 8 months. So now Donnie goes, here's an executive order. We want you to race in the Capitol.

You have 8 months. I will say this though. If someone is going to be able to accomplish, and this isn't a kudo or anything, but that's the guy who's going to get it accomplished in 8 months. Just because, look at the— it'll happen. Right.

Now, as I said, what the quality of it will be, personally as a race fan, no desire to go to Washington, D.C. Zero. I think we both know what the quality of this event is going to be, if we're being honest. Yeah, I think you're going to see quite a bit of the president present. Here's the thing.

I wonder if they'll put him in the, uh, Mario Andretti, the, the double, the 2-seat. I don't think you can fit in there for one. I— look, I don't have a single good thing to say about this event for about 6,000 reasons, but is this really the time you want it? I'm an IndyCar fan. Is this really the time we want to get involved with the politics of DC?

You really want to attach your series to what's going on right now? Really? Yeah, just from a marketing perspective. Well, I mean, now that depends on what your view of what's going on right now is. Okay, so I suppose There are plenty of people who, who do not have that viewpoint.

They think that what is going on is perfectly fine. Then there is the other side who think that what is going on is perfectly egregious. So, you are going to have that. It does not really matter who is in the White House. Had this been something under the past president, you would have the same reaction from the other side, you know?

Yeah. It's just the way things are. Personally, I don't like politics attached to any, any sport, but it's inevitable, I suppose, or at least as of late, it is. So it's going to be interesting to see if it happens and, and what the quality of of the event's going to be. I don't anticipate much, so, but we'll see.

It feels like disaster. What is the predicted weekend? August 23rd through the 25th, I think. Okay, so yeah, I mean, you don't— you really don't— you don't have 8 months, not even. Yeah, 7.

Uh, It's just like, why? Why? I don't know. We'll see what happens. I, I'm not, I'm, listen, I'm not particularly excited about, about it, period.

So I, I don't really have a, an opinion. It'll give us something to talk about for the next few weeks leading up to it. And when it occurs, I do think it's going to happen. It's just, I wouldn't expect anything. Uh, well, it'll probably be something to write home about, but maybe not in the way IndyCar wants it to be.

Yeah, I don't know. It just seems bizarre to me. It is bizarre. And it's like IndyCars, look, historically, they're no, uh, they're no strangers to odd events and in weird street courses like Baltimore and Uh, Nashville had— was very shit, which is why they do the oval now. So it's like, this is not new territory for IndyCar, who are kind of— it seems like they love to just kind of shoot themselves in the foot anytime they get any momentum, which is— this— that's a good offseason podcast.

But IndyCar is the season, or the series, that just hates itself pretty much, you know, with the, the history of the split and all that shit. So this feels like another chapter in the IndyCar history books of why exactly did they do that? Yeah. But, uh, for now I think we'll leave it at that. All right.

Yeah. So that's, I think that does it for this episode. Yes, indeed. All right. We'll be back next week, uh, another week down from the motorsports offseason, and we'll have plenty of soccer to discuss.

This has been Tackling the Chicane, copyright 2026, Studio 2520. For executive producer Richard Tanaka.

And a possible race in Washington, D.C. We'll see you next time.