Australian V8 Supercars Now Using Overtake Button!

It was one year ago that the innovation of a power boost feature on Indy race cars was introduced. The system that requires a turbo-charged engine, boosts the car's power output from 5 to 20 bhp for a limited time. The range in boosted output is based upon whether the engine is set to run a rich or lean fuel mixture (a lean fuel mix will yield up to 20 bhp while a rich mix will result in around 5 bhp since the engine is already set-up close to optimum output). The power boost feature can only be used a total of 20 times during a race and includes a 10 second delay between uses.

The "push to pass" system has resulted in some interesting race strategies concerning whether the system should be used to overtake another car (offensively) or used to prevent other competitors from overtaking you (defensively).

The following video was produced last weekend prior to the Indy Edmonton race by one of Versus Television's race announcers, Jack Arute. Arute talks strategy concerning the Edmonton track. It gives us a good idea of how this innovation is making the Indy car circuit quite a bit more interesting...

While researching this piece I ran headlong into a similar feature now being used in the Australian V8 Supercars' circuit. In the following video you'll learn how Greg Murphy uses this system while overtaking the competition...

Since NASCAR continues using carburetors making the Indy car power boost system unworkable, perhaps they need to take a hard look at the Australian version of the "Overtake Button"!

Resource: http://www.crash.net/indycar/news/150529/1/indycar_series_introduces_push_to_pass.html