The Paddock Pulse: May 26 Edition

You may notice that this week's Paddock Pulse is a little lighter on the links than usual. It's because so many of my fellow word butchers out there that I normally link to are out at the Speedway instead of posting from under their usual bridges or rabbit warrens or whatever. Their incredible luck (or planning and foresight) is your loss, but we still have a good handful of links for you to peruse.

Hit 'em after the jump!

• Exhaustion (and how Paul Tracy Helps Legitimize Indianapolis) [Drive Hard, Turn Left]
  In the second paragraph of this blog, there is admission of listening to "I Am Indy." That, folks, takes some serious COJONES. That's like saying, "Yeah, I party down to Glen Campbell music." Oh great. Now I have "Wichita Lineman" going through my head. THANKS A LOT.

• The Best To Never Win The Indianapolis 500 [Oilpressure]
  George has a very admirable list here, but let's be frank. The best driver to never win the Indy 500 is ME. How do I know this? Intuition. Never mind that my best speed in iRacing at Indy is a 40.1 - it's the racecraft, yo. I've got mad skillz - all I need now is the millions of dollars to prove it. I'll get back to you on that.

• Indy: Steph’s preview [Planet-IRL]
  Stephanie's a newbie to IMS, which means she hasn't been beaten up by a yellow-shirt or experienced the stomach agony from her first tenderloin sandwich. Also, she hasn't been accosted by Hobbson and forced to explain the Andretti Transitive Property while hopping on one leg and writing the recipe for poutine simultaneously. She never knew what she was missing.

• Don't Make an IndyCar Driver Angry, You Wouldn't Like Them When They are Angry [pressdog.com]
  You know what I haven't figured out? Why nobody has hired Bill to work for IMS or IndyCar. It's clear that this guy not only loves the sport, but the sport loves him back. I mean, Danica Patrick invited him into her hauler for an interview. She only does that for certain people, you know. And yet, P-Dog accomplished this feat without having a douchey goatee or creepily stalking her. That's schwerve, people. Schwerve.

• He ain’t a race fan… he’s my brother [the_race_gIRL]
  Reading Monica's article brought back all of the joys of bringing first-timers to the Indy 500. There's something just wonderful about introducing people to something this awesome. Except when the fruit of your labors is having to take their picture next to a Danica cutout at the Meijer's store off the 465. Dude, weren't you even listening to all that history and tradition and stuff?

• What They Don’t Tell You About the 500 — Part V [The Silent Pagoda]
  I beg you to read this missive from Hobbson - as well as the other four parts - because it could save your life or, more importantly, your sanity. He's not kidding about the rain of debris from the grandstands that could imperil your health, nor is he joking about the "500-Mile Club" that inexplicably dwells in the vicinity of the pee troughs. Some scars do not heal.

Final Thoughts

I will be going out of town on vacation starting on Saturday. I may or may not get a chance to post our usual Paddock Pulse feature next week, depending on the availability of Wi-Fi in Left Buttcheek, Nowheresville. Rest assured, though, I'll be back in the groove before Texas.

In the meantime, I encourage you to check out my SBNation Indy 500 Preview which I wrote to edumacate all those folks who don't live and breathe this stuff like we do. You may not think it says much that you don't already know, but this is the first IndyCar-related article to hit the SBNation.com front page ever... and that's progress, baby!