Pictures: Alonso’s Indy 500 car revealed

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The McLaren and Andretti-run IndyCar which Fernando Alonso will drive in this year’s Indianapolis 500 has been revealed.

Alonso will miss the Monaco Grand Prix to take part in the race on May 27th.

The McLaren driver will test an IndyCar for the first time at Indianapolis Motor Speedway today. The test can be watched live here.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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59 comments on “Pictures: Alonso’s Indy 500 car revealed”

  1. He can’t use number 14?

    1. It’s in use by Carlos Munoz.

    2. Further, so long as AJ Foyt has a team, his team gets #14.

  2. This is better than their F1 livery 😑. I’m pretty sure this is more of what people wanted/expected for the MCL32.

    1. Pat Ruadh (@fullcoursecaution)
      3rd May 2017, 15:21

      Hopefully this will influence the 2018 model if they go orange again

  3. petebaldwin (@)
    3rd May 2017, 13:24

    If only the F1 car had that livery…..

    1. Probably their sponsors didn’t agree… oh wait.

      1. Miguel Bento
        3rd May 2017, 14:02

        I see what you did there :-)

      2. Duncan Snowden
        3rd May 2017, 14:43

        Well, maybe Honda didn’t. It’s different in IndyCar because they’re supplying a number of teams, and every car has its own livery. But in F1 I’m sure they’ll have some say over it.

        I’m one of the few who actually likes the F1 livery, but the old solid orange with blue numbers does look good. It’s just a pity the chassis itself is so ridiculous. A CHAMP car from 15-20 years ago would be amazing in that.

      3. What about Chandon, SAP, and Hilton? Pretty sure they all have sponsorship ties to mclaren’ f1 efforts?

    2. @petebaldwin I was about to say exactly the same

  4. Wow that is so, so much better than the horrible, muddled, random-splashes-of-white F1 livery. It makes the F1 team designer look like they don’t know what they’re doing; symptomatic of the race team for several years now!

    1. petebaldwin (@)
      3rd May 2017, 15:53

      In all fairness, I think it’s been a long established fact that the F1 livery designers have absolute no idea what they are doing.

      You only have to look on any of the pages showing fantasy liveries to see what is possible…. I guess that’s the difference between giving the job to an artist and giving the job to an engineer.

  5. Now THIS is a proper orange livery!!

  6. Love it. Love the ‘handwritten’ style driver name on the side ala Bruce McLaren…beautiful touch.

  7. Those IndyCars are soo ugly… It is a pity, because the livery is just gorgeous…

    1. With those side pods it looks like tractor…

      1. that indy car looks like a mutation between rear end of some sort of lmp2 car and a front end of super formula car. Not a very good looking car. Also the driver is much more exposed than an f1 car above the chest.

        1. Driver much more exposed? I don’t think so.

  8. And how cool is that helmet design?! Love it, looks like it’s straight out of the late 70s/early 80s. Hope all goes well for them today.

    1. indeed! is it what it takes? move out of F1 to have these things properly painted?

      1. I know, I shudder at the thought of some of the monstrosities on the grid today – just an incoherent mess of colours. Bottas not included. Hopefully Alonso will adopt this design for next year.

    2. Ben (@dirtyscarab)
      3rd May 2017, 14:29

      Completely agree! I think it’s one of the nicest helmets I’ve ever seen.

  9. Fukobayashi (@)
    3rd May 2017, 14:07

    The helmet design he’s chosen is also retro and fantastic looking

    1. The first thing that came to mind when I saw his helmet was Stefan Bellof and Raul Boesel…

      Looks great and love the styling, but damn it threw me for a moment!

  10. Ben (@dirtyscarab)
    3rd May 2017, 14:28

    His testing session is being streamed live right now on the indycar website. Marco Andretti’s shaking the car down now and Alonso’ll be doing his first laps shortly. Very cool to see it live.

  11. They can shove it up their… you know. That’s what the F1 car was meant to look! this is so simple and beautiful!

  12. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXh9uxthFnk

    Live stream on youtube. Fernando is about to get in the car.

    1. Streaming racing cars moving about on a racetrack free on YouTube…I can almost hear the sound of Bernie’s head exploding.

  13. That livery really is a celebration of all things retro. Really nice that they have added the “speedy kiwi” on the side of the nose and the “handwritten” driver name.

    Surprised that so many of the F1 sponsors are on board for the Indy project.

    1. When I take the fact that there is between 62-72k viewers on youtube alone, and over 200k watching in total with a training session with that one car out on track, I think they already earned their money back @geemac!

      I love that livery too, let us hope we can see one far more like that in F1 next year too (and please Honda make the engine live up to it)

    2. @geemac the speedy kiwi is also on the F1 car, but you can hardly see it :(

      1. I had never noticed that before, thanks!

  14. Wow I haven’t seen that many sponsors on Alonso’s race suit in a very long time!

  15. pastaman (@)
    3rd May 2017, 15:53

    He’s got the yellow rookie stripe :)
    https://www.racefans.net/2017/05/03/pictures-alonsos-indy-500-car-revealed/alonso-indycar-2017-2/

    I know it’s necessary but still amusing.

  16. I’m watching the live stream. Hah, I felt nervous for Fernando not to spin out during his first laps!

  17. Last 3 laps by Fernando:
    212.926 mph
    212.926 mph
    212.929 mph
    Incredible consistency!

  18. I’m not sure if it was Mario Andretti or the other commentators, but they just said it very well: “Here he’s being given the type of equipment that is worthy of him”.

  19. Ben (@dirtyscarab)
    3rd May 2017, 16:33

    In the 219 range now. Bear in mind 230 was pole last year, so he’s settled in amazingly well.

    1. Ben (@dirtyscarab)
      3rd May 2017, 16:38

      To put that into context, p32 (and last on the grid) was 222.154mph, so after only a few laps he’s almost up to a respectable quali time.

    2. And I doubt that the car is in Qualifying trim, very respectable time.

  20. I wonder if Alonso will accumulate more miles @ the speedway today, than he has in all of 2017’s F1 effort…

    I swear, Hasagawa has aged badly in the short amount of time he has taken the lead role of the F1 project.

    Good luck to Honda in both the IRL & F1

  21. Interesting that over 500,000 people are watching the stream of Alonso at Indy. Not bad numbers.

  22. Sorry, Also … Wow, that was epic listening in on the driver debrief after Alonso got out of the car.

  23. Interesting, but it looks like every other Indy car. Why is that?

  24. It has a Honda motor and it is still running…?

  25. Ok, what’s faster on a track? Say there’s an open day at Le Sarthe.
    And we put up $ 20million dollar prize to the faster lap. Who gets it – a 2017 F1 car or a 2017 Indy Car?

    1. @bomarcuda
      F1 cars are the fastest cars in the world on road tracks. IndyCars are the second fastest cars in the world.
      Both of them would easily beat LMP1 cars.

  26. Not a bad day.
    Full program covered
    Engine worked
    Hit 222mph
    Hit two birds
    The announcers said they were taking him out for a burger.
    The best part for me was the announcers saying he doesn’t know how to drive in marbles. Laughed out loud when they asked Zak Brown when the sponsors stickers were going on the car. Brown said they already were…

  27. At least we’ll know exactly where he is!

  28. Am I the only one getting a slight Dukes of Hazzard vibe?

  29. BJ (@beejis60)
    3rd May 2017, 20:30

    I really hate Dallara for winning the contract for these generation of cars because the car is proper ugly with a damn fine livery. If only the indy car and F1 team can swap liveries….

    please.

  30. No Mclaren logo anywhere to be seen… is that a mistake?

    1. It’s on the front wing. Nit sure what you’re talking about

  31. If you take a look on Sean Bull’s website, there is a mock up of an IndyCar in the current McLaren F1 livery.

    It doesn’t look too bad, so personally I’m a little disappointed they didn’t go with it.

  32. Fastest lap ~ 227 mph….. nice

  33. Thanks for the pictures :)

  34. It looks less sophisticated but much faster than a F1 car. That “arrowhead” shape is wicked.

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