Providing an equal playing field.........
Posted: Tue Jun 17, 2008 4:38 pm
One of the more familiar sights at any IndyCar Series event is Perkin-Elmer official Jesse Leonard, who can be seen working his way from car to car, extracting samples of 100% fuel grad ethanol from each car for testing; after getting each sample, he carefully notes the number of the vial he inserts each fuel sample in before inserting all the individual vials into a gas chromatograph for testing. Under IRL rules, all fuel samples cannot vary from the current standard by more than 0.10 percent. When asked about the testing and certification process, here's what the soft-spoken Leonard had to say...........
The testing procedures take about five minutes or so and involve a fairly straight-forward process......every car is tested following each practice session, then a random group(top-3 plus three more) is checked followed qualifying and following the race. IndyCar Series rules require that the fuel used be 100% fuel-grade ethanol(98% ethanol and 2% gasoline*). Since 2007, the Indy Racing League has used 100% ethanol as fuel in the IndyCar Series, the first major international motorsports series to use a renewable fuel. The ethanol is supplied by Lifeline Foods of St. Joseph, Missouri and delivered via. tanker to Superior Solvents & Chemicals in Indianapolis, Ind., where it is stored prior to shipment to every IndyCar Series event within North America. (Mod's note #2....when the series travels to Motegi and, starting this year, to Surfers Paradise, the series will use series-certified local ethanol suppliers.) Once the fuel is delivered to each track, Leonard checks the fuel in the truck each day(due to varying levels of humidity each day at the track). As our soft-spoken fuel examiner puts it,
(Mod's note #1...that's essentially the same standard the IOC and other sports organizations have concerning positive drug tests of athletes for steroids or other drugs....in other words, you're responsible regardless of the circumstances.)What we're doing is checking the fuel to make sure they don't have any additives or anything that's not supposed to be there whether they put it there or not.
The testing procedures take about five minutes or so and involve a fairly straight-forward process......every car is tested following each practice session, then a random group(top-3 plus three more) is checked followed qualifying and following the race. IndyCar Series rules require that the fuel used be 100% fuel-grade ethanol(98% ethanol and 2% gasoline*). Since 2007, the Indy Racing League has used 100% ethanol as fuel in the IndyCar Series, the first major international motorsports series to use a renewable fuel. The ethanol is supplied by Lifeline Foods of St. Joseph, Missouri and delivered via. tanker to Superior Solvents & Chemicals in Indianapolis, Ind., where it is stored prior to shipment to every IndyCar Series event within North America. (Mod's note #2....when the series travels to Motegi and, starting this year, to Surfers Paradise, the series will use series-certified local ethanol suppliers.) Once the fuel is delivered to each track, Leonard checks the fuel in the truck each day(due to varying levels of humidity each day at the track). As our soft-spoken fuel examiner puts it,
*---both the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of the Treasury require the ethanol to be denatured w/gasoline for differing reasons; USDA rules require the denaturing so that the ethanol can't be used for human consumption........Treasury rules require the denaturing so that the fuel can be transported across state lines; otherwise, federal law requires the ethanol to be taxed as an alcoholic substance.We take a sample from the truck each day; that's the baseline and we compare each car to the baseline so that there's nothing in the car that's not in the truck. That way, everyone's on an equal playing field.