Oct. 18 newsstand: Lloyd & other stuff

Alex Lloyd to TCGR
We had this yesterday, but here is a redux from Eurosport.

Lots more stuff: Lloyd to TCGR & Mutoh possibly to AGR?
Robin Miller follows up with the Lloyd-to-TCGR story, with some good quotes from Chip about the development program: “Because finding good Indy-car drivers is tough and they can’t learn anything by sitting around, they don’t get any faster if they’re not driving. We’ve got plenty of cars and ideas and now we’ve just got to find a way to get him in a car.” ... “I have every intention of having (Scott) Dixon and (Dan) Wheldon in my cars for years to come, but my team was really impressed with Alex when he tested – they raved about him."

Robin says Chip might farm Lloyd out to another team (say, D&R), rather than run a third Target car (the last time TCGR did that, they had by far their worst season in their IRL history).

Some other big stuff from Robin: Aguri Suzuki is possibly looking at taking his $ to AGR to put Hideki Mutoh in the No. 27 car. Suzuki has partnered with Fernandez & Panther so far to field cars for Roger Yasukawa and Kosuke Matsuura in the last couple of years ... if Canadian Club goes to NASCAR with Dario (which I still think is unlikely given sister product Jim Beam already has a strong NASCAR presence with Clint Bowyer). ... he furthers the Justin Wilson-to-Newman Haas story (and staying in Champ Car) ... RLR fired 12 employees and Vision has apparently cleared house in its engineering department.

The Halloween Surprise
An announcement is brewing on Oct. 31 regarding the IRL. Curt Cavin says in his Oct. 16 blog that it "is significant with driver, race and series implications." Possible league title sponsor? In the above notebook, Robin Miller corroborates some Internet rumors that Budweiser/Anheuser Busch might be involved in the announcements, which makes sense now that Busch has some free cash to throw around motorsports now that it isn't sponsoring NASCAR's Happy Hour Series and Dale Jr.'s car (one would think Kasey Kahne is probably a bit cheaper).

Not quite sure what this means for the future, but
IPS driver Sean Guthrie recently tested Playa Del Racing's IndyCar at Chicago. Given it's a Panoz, it's highly unlikely there's anything there beyond an Indy one-off.

Stock cars and Sam
Since we have this story every day, let's continue with JPM's version: moving to NASCAR isn't easy.
Says JPM of Sam Hornish Jr.: "Right now, I would think he's thinking about bailing (on NASCAR). But he's just got to be patient. I asked him why he wasn't running Busch, and he said his team doesn't have enough people. If they want him next year here, he should be running as many races as he can right now. He needs seat time and he needs miles."

Short tracks, through the eyes of an owner
While we're on NASCAR, the IRL was founded on guys like Tony Stewart and dirt-trackers. Here, Tony talks about short-track racing, and also hints at some problems -- everybody who is anybody in USAC-style open-wheel racing in America is getting wrapped up in some NASCAR driver development program where they get buried running ARCA until they're too old to try IndyCars.

And finally
IndyCar.com notes Ethanol's growing impact in America.