Will NASCAR Play the TV Game or Redefine It?
Part two of NASCAR’s Moment. Paul Pfanner looks at the sport that wrote American motorsport’s TV playbook as it faces a reset of its own, with its biggest broadcast partner now part-owning a rival and its own sports car series passing it on YouTube.
Why Is Roger Penske Taking His Automotive Business Private?
Roger Penske already runs the company. Paul Pfanner asks why he’d spend $3.9 billion buying out everyone else.
The Power of Now
We can bring nearly anything to a screen, yet people keep paying more to be there in person. Paul Pfanner looks at what that tells us about racing and live entertainment, and why the present moment carries so much value.
Let the Car Move
The Velocity Collective imagined the Blackbird 66 a decade ago, and now it finally moves. Paul Pfanner on making the spot in half a Sunday, and the Dan Gurney question behind it.
The Race Beyond the Race
Paul Pfanner closes his six-part series on what should come after IndyCar's IR-28. With the sport's audience growing fast on FOX, he argues the next Indy car should be an instrument of human expression, one that lets fans see the driver, for a series ready to upshift to the next gear.
The Driver
Chip Ganassi just passed Roger Penske for the most championships in IndyCar history. Paul Pfanner on the racer behind the record, and why he is nowhere near done.
Marque Down
The car brands you grew up with are being repriced all at once, and the sport that depends on them hasn't gotten the invoice yet. Paul Pfanner on Porsche, the yen, China, and a pattern he has watched form before.
It Was Never Just the Car, It’s Who gets the Seat
Paul Pfanner published the magazines you grew up on. Fifth in his series on the next IndyCar, on the half of the question the IR-28 can't answer: who still reaches the seat.
The New IndyCar is No Accident
The new IndyCar IR-28 didn't come from nowhere. Paul Pfanner traces the forces that shaped it, and the cars that were drawn but never built, to show how the sport arrived here and the choice it faces next.
What Comes After Faster?
Paul Pfanner on what the next Indy car should be built to prove once raw speed has reached its useful limit. Third in his series on the future of the sport.
The Fastest Thing Off the Shelf?
Paul Pfanner asks whether IndyCar has permanently turned its race car into standard equipment, what that trades away, and why the choice that builds what comes next has to be made now.
The Museum and the Paddock
Paul Pfanner sets the reimagined IMS Museum against today's paddock and asks what the Indy car after the IR-28 should add to a century of cars that made change visible
Invent the Future
Paul Pfanner on why the new 2028 IndyCar sent him back to the race-car designs he drew as a teenager, now rendered with AI, and what a sport loses when it settles for being a show.
Standing Still at 230 Miles Per Hour
Paul Pfanner on why IndyCar's new car is frozen on purpose, now that a broadcaster owns a third of the series, and what that costs in a world moving faster than 230 mph.
The Future Arrived Looking Familiar
Paul Pfanner on IndyCar's new IR-28, and what a race car is for once the meaning leaves the machine.
The Age of Distribuption is Now
Paul Pfanner on the word he coined in 2017 for IndyCar's leadership, and the decade of evidence that has since caught up with it.
Who Pays The Witness?
Motorsport no longer needs magazines to reach its fans. Paul Pfanner on the independent people who make the work worth saving — and the spirit of RACER magazine he still believes in.
Jeff Krosnoff Has Been Gone Almost as Long as He Lived
Paul Pfanner remembers his friend Jeff Krosnoff, thirty years on from his tragic death.
Real Just Got Expensive
Paul Pfanner makes the case that the flood of machine-made content is raising the price of the few things no machine can fake.
The Best is Now
Paul Pfanner on people still arguing over who won The Split — and why the best version of IndCar is the one happening now.