Talk:Indianapolis 500 records

Record coldest temperature
That has got to be a joke. 1992 had air temp, without wind chill, at 51 on the master control tower, and our family had drinks in coolers to keep them warm, at thet track itself. The modern warnings Firestone gives about not being able to guarantee tire safety under fifty degrees is because of 1992, the coldest major race ever, anywhere; I'm changing it. --Chr.K. 08:41, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Where is all of this sourced? (not just the 92 temperature but all of the data) Also are you saying that you are changing this based on your recollection of seeing the tower?  I think that would be a no-no per WP:NOR.
 * There's good authority, but not much written, about the 1915 race having colder temperatures than 1992. Doctorindy 12:55, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The data was given by the master control tower, of both air temperature and track temperature, and relayed via telemetry to ABC Sports coverage of the 1992 Indianapolis 500. The information was seen at the bottom of the screen in the broadcast while showing the view from on board the pace car at the start of the second parade lap. That NPOV enough? As for 1915, I would know more; the coldest I've ever seen (and personally been at, but that of no consequence) is easily '92. --Chr.K. 22:31, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Firestone
Firestone under the Japanese flag? I know they're owned by Bridgestone now, but certainly for most of its 62 victories it was an American company without question. Perhaps two flags would be more appropriate. 99.2.149.85 (talk) 10:05, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Redundancy
One of the following statistics should be removed for redundancy ... unsure which makes more sense to keep.

Highest Finishing Female: United States Danica Patrick, 3rd, 2009 Indianapolis 500

Highest Finish by Female Driver: 3rd Place, United States Danica Patrick, 2009 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.251.88.101 (talk) 19:40, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Indianapolis 500 Race Distance Records
What is this table trying to say? I don't understand it at all. If it is trying to show fastest times over a certain number of laps, it can't be right. There have been race laps faster than Kanaan's 217.128. And surely groups of laps in the 1996 race were among the fastest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.42.166.204 (talk) 21:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * It's supposed to be the official interval records. IMS has always recorded interval records at every 10-lap interval...plus the opening lap, first 2-laps, and first 4-laps records, then 10, 20, 30 all the way to 200. It's in bad need of completion. With that in mind, since the Indy 500 has always been an American race, measured in American units (i.e., 500 miles...with the U.S. unit of "miles" intrinsically linked the core existence of the race itself...the race is based on miles, not an arbitrary distance), do we really need to list the kilometer equivalent? This is not the "Indy 804.67." Adding kilometers badly clutters the charts, and serves no useful purpose. A simple mention of 804.67 km in a sentence below the chart could suffice if km is really necessary. Doctorindy (talk) 17:13, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree that clarity is needed for this chart. I came over to the talk page to understand what on Earth it was trying to say. The title of the section is "Indianapolis 500 Race Distance Records," which makes it sound as if it's going to be, well, distance records, like the furthest distance ever traveled or something. Then you read the numbers and see, wahh, 2.5 miles? Then you see a time that is completely unitless -- is it in seconds? But then you think maybe the precision in the distance (2.500) is actually someone trying to write 2,500 miles, and so the unitless time could be hours, or days... Anyway, you get the idea.

Aside from all that, I really expected to find some race time records. If you look at, say, marathon records, you see times: 2h03:38, 2h03:42. Maybe they don't do that for car races? It shows the top average speed, though, so I guess I could divide by the distance... Seems very odd. &mdash; Sam 63.138.152.219 (talk) 16:36, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

2012
Observing the scoring during the race, I believe they broke the interval average speed records for 70, 80, and 90 laps during the 2012 race. At one point, they were well over 198 mph ave, and were over 180 for almost the entire first half. I'm having trouble tracking down official scoring sheets, but those need to be addressed if they are found. Doctorindy (talk) 16:31, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Flags and other observations
Just a few friendly notes. Doctorindy (talk) 18:42, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * There seems to be a pretty excessive overuse of flag icons on this page, which is being increasingly discouraged on Wiki. Especially in the non-table lists. It makes it difficult to read.
 * Why are cells in tables grouped/justified to make them tall and narrow? Most people view computers on widescreen 16:9 screens, which makes narrow tables really unnecessary.
 * Still trying to delve into whether we need this extent of conversion to (km) and (km/h) that is typically shown on this article. It is not a scientific-based article, and the conversion means very little except mentioning that 500 miles = 803 km.
 * There are quite a bit more 'records' that I can add here from other sources. Will do in time.
 * All drivers get a nationality flag in front of their name, in automobile racing infoboxes. If Wikipedia now discourages this, I discourage submitting to their new-flavor-of-the-week. Meanwhile, Imperial English measurements are used only by the United Kingdom and its 'descendant nations', i.e. the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, et al., and the latter among those have metrication all but complete. Formula 1 automobile racing sideboxes used by Wikipedia consistently have their information presented in metric, as well. The Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, while having a distance ratio based, in the very words of its title, on the Imperial unit system, is an internationally-observed annual event (and was completely intended to be so by the four founders of the event themselves, since its very inception), and a large segment of the planetary population thinks in metric terms, for comparison to other forms of auto racing that they know. As such, I believe the metric option is a vital part of the statistics of the event, and should not be removed simply due to, pardon, a 'provincialism' of thought by American fans. As such, I am reverting the edits made to remove the metric distance and speed statistics, and am even prepared to enter an Edit War to see to it that the international crowd is properly acknowledged. --Chr.K. (talk) 03:23, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

"Most confusing tables on one page" award
I'm looking at the "consecutive victories" & other tables, & I'm seeing "career victory" stats having nothing to do with the subject of the table. Why? This seems really pointless, not to mention confusing. TREKphiler  any time you're ready, Uhura  23:40, 20 May 2017 (UTC)