Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward believes the hybrid unit introduced in the middle of this season in the IndyCar Series has regressed the on-track racing product.
The hybrid unit was a collaborative effort between IndyCar, Chevrolet and Honda, and paired the 2.2-litre, twin-turbocharged V6 internal combustion engine – a stalwart in the series since 2012 – with an electrical low-voltage (48V) motor generator unit (MGU) and a 320 kilojoules-per-lap supercapacitor energy storage system (ESS).
The first-of-its-kind unit operates at a maximum of 12,000rpm and allows the driver to deploy and harvest energy for up to an additional 60bhp. When combined with push-to-pass on road courses and street circuits, the output combines to over 120bhp extra, bringing the grand total to more than 800hp.
There have been five races since the hybrid technology made its race weekend debut, which happened at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in early July in an event that was won by O’Ward.
The sample size has been enough, though, that the 25-year-old Mexican shared his stance on the hybrid’s integration into North America’s premier open-wheel championship following opening practice for the Grand Prix of Portland on Friday evening.
“I would say even in Mid-Ohio, it's a simple system,” said O’Ward, who was ninth in the first practice session of the weekend at Portland International Raceway.
“You can push to pass. Instead of using the boost from the engine, it's using it from the battery pack.
“I would say it hasn't been a massive change in terms of what we need to do in the car. Obviously there's more times we need to click this button. I think it's been more of a factor for the racing.
"I think the racing has taken a big step down just looking in Mid-Ohio, Toronto. People don't need to use their push to pass anymore to defend sometimes. That's ultimately just opened doors to less fights on track. At least that's what I feel.”
Chip Ganassi Racing’s Marcus Armstrong, who was third in the session, was also part of the post-practice press conference and shared thoughts on how the hybrid system is more of a safeguard for on-track mistakes.
“It's much like a push to pass system,” said Armstrong.”If you didn't know any better, it's just more power at the push of your finger. It's not too complex.
“I would say it's more of a defense mechanism than an attack, than a form of attacking, if I'm honest. I mean, for example, at Gateway, whenever I felt like I had a bad exit from a corner, I would be able to save myself from being overtaken just by deploying all of my battery. That's almost a comforting thing with your racing.”
