The inaugural Grand Prix of Indianapolis was a much bigger success than some expected, but it also revealed a few areas within the Verizon IndyCar Series’ road course game that would benefit from review.

The crash triggered by polesitter Sebastian Saavedra’s stalled No. 17 KV AFS Racing Chevy has generated the most debate as questions regarding each car’s anti-stall systems and crash debris that struck bystanders continue to build.

RACER spoke with IndyCar President of Competition Derrick Walker (ABOVE LEFT) to get answers for some of the most pressing questions, starting with Saavedra’s starting line incident, which the young Colombian attributed to a failure of the anti-stall system when he attempted to launch from the grid.

After reviewing the data from Saavedra’s car, Walker and his technical staff found multiple root causes to the No. 17’s stall.

“We looked at all the data because we wanted to know,” he said. “There’s no doubt the system that we have is not perfect, is not consistent enough to do what we need it to do. Could Sebastian have done something different to make it work? Yeah, I think his actions contributed to that. But to put it all on his shoulders is unfair, because I think all of us would recognize that the manufacturers and the system itself needs to be a lot better.

“It has to be foolproof, it has to be idiot-proof so even someone like me could use it successfully, and that would be the system that you would want because the consequences of these systems, being as inconsistent as they can be, is catastrophic, as we saw.”

The series has taken some heat for the wonky nature of the spec anti-stall systems found on the Dallara DW12 chassis, but it’s worth nothing that 21 of the 23 drivers/cars on the GP of Indy grid did not stall. Along with seeking improvements to the anti-stall systems, the series is also looking at other areas that can be improved with its standing start procedures.

Drivers perform the equivalent of standing starts every time they leave their pit stalls, and also do practice starts at the end of pit lane, but the track surface in the pits rarely matches the track surface where the race starts take place. Look for IndyCarto give drivers a chance to practice starts from their grid positions in the future.

“Could we have, in hindsight allowed them time in the morning to physically go out and practice in the exact locations of where they stopped?” Walker asked. “Could we have made a session available to them in hindsight? We could have and we should have. Because if you do a standing start in pit lane or concrete and you go out on the tarmac on the spot and you do the same launch, you will have to adjust because obviously the grip levels. So we need to look at that too. So there’s enough work to go around that includes more than just the [anti-stall] system.”

Closing out the anti-stall topic, IndyCar mandated the system’s activation on each car for the 2014 season; from 2012-’13, it was an elective item for manufacturers to enable.

“The anti-stall thing has been one of those things that, if you really ask the manufacturers how much work they really put into their anti-stall, I don’t think it’s as much as we could have wanted,” said Walker. “For obvious reasons, they’re driven to performance, not how to prevent stalls with their engine. But then again, if you stall your engine and you don’t finish a race, it is an important part. So again, we are going to be looking at that and if we could make changes before Detroit we certainly will.”

Walker took advantage of the location of the start – directly below the Pagoda tower – and allowed teams to place a spotter directly overhead to alert their drivers to any problems that occurred. A flagger was also used at ground level next to the grid – one tasked with waving a yellow flag if a stall was seen. Yet between both alert systems, Saavedra, while sitting first on the grid, was struck first by Carlos Munoz, coming all the way from 19th, and then by Mikhail Aleshin, the 25th and final car in the field.

Given the exceptional distance between Saavedra and those cars, the fact that he was drilled by both cars at such a high rate exposed the need for more safety and stall alert measures to be employed.

“Absolutely,” Walker acknowledged. “It is something that we need to look at. But in this particular situation, if you look what happened, yeah, there was a flagman, but how anybody sees that at the speed they are going and trying to focus on what you’re trying to do, how you can catch that? But we also made available and allowed all spotters to get on the front end of the building who can clearly see it. And there was a car in 19th, there was a car that was last, there was ample time for somebody on the radio to tell them – and the spotters did not do their part.”

Walker went onto explain one of the two drivers who hit Saavedra did not have a spotter for the standing start, and the other was splitting his time between two drivers and was communicating to the other driver at the time of the crash.

Each car is equipped with an in-cockpit yellow light system that Race Control triggers when a caution period happens. Asked if IndyCar could either use that system to let drivers know a stall has happened, or if another, dedicated cockpit alert light could be added for standing starts, Walker wasn’t sure if it would be a cure-all to keep the Munoz’s and Aleshin’s from hitting a stalled car, but said it worth investigating.

“It’s not simply about giving them lights, or a one-item way of making everything better,” he said. “I know that’s not what you are implying, and it’s something we’ll look into, but if you look as we are looking at, what happened? How could we have prevented it? Why would the team not put a spotter on the roof? Why wouldn’t they? Previously, they were allowed on the other side of the building to watch where most of the racetrack is. But this time we said you’re allowed on the front for that very reason. And the guy who was last, who had all the time in the world to slow down, nobody was going to run into him, he was the last guy on top of them.

“And so, you look at the team and you say, well, the short answer is the cockpit warning light could be a way to help, but moreover, we need to have a number of failsafes in place so if one doesn’t do the job, we have two or three that will reduce the chances of this kind of crash happening again.”

Walker also expects to add more distance between grid spots next year at Indy.

“We’ve got the FIA spacing but, if you look at what we did at Long Beach – because we had the room – we actually spaced them even more,” he added. “And that was the spacing that we need. Here, we didn’t have the room to do it because we’re stuck with the start and finish line so you back it up, we didn’t have the room. There’s isn’t a lot more we can go without moving the rear cars into [oval] Turn 1, but we’ll do all we can to give drivers more room.”

Flying debris not only hit people standing next to the grid, but also went high enough to strike folks in the starter’s stand. Of the logical improvements for 2015, expect to see the pit wall lined with debris fencing as seen at Formula 1 and MotoGP events.

“Certainly, a debris fence, a tall-enough one, is needed,” Walker confirmed.

The final bone of contention from the GP involved restarts. Drivers complained about the slow speeds IndyCar called for and the long wait to reach the start/finish line, which some believe led to contact and even a crash between Juan Montoya and Graham Rahal.

“Well, there’s a couple of points to that,” said Walker of the complex restart issues. “If you crowd the car in front and you can’t see squat, then that’s your choice. You can’t hold back – you can’t look back and leave a huge space, either. It’s all right. I think if the drivers are saying that they cannot start consistently correctly with the way the rules are right now, you’d have to say we need to change the rules, because the last thing the fans want to see is all this bashing and crashing and whatnot. But if you look at the last restart, we said on the radio, don’t jump out of line, don’t do this, don’t do that, and the start was perfect. As others have been.

“So when you look at the incidents of the St. Pete, the concertina effect, if the lead car does what it’s supposed to do and brings the pack down to the restart lane at pace car speed, that’s what it’s always been. That’s what always happened; we never regulated that enough and they started coming off the last corner and the fans are saying, ‘Has it started?’ Because the lead cars were already on it and the back of the field was two corners behind.

“When we took away the double-file starts, we tried to say, ‘OK, let’s get the field under control and create the best exciting start we can.’ If we look at the starts in single file, the restarts in single file, they’re still pretty exciting. The last restart, in which everybody did everything the way they should and nobody bumped somebody at the backside in Graham’s case or punched them into the wall, the start was fantastic and they were still all over each other going into Turn 1. I think to the driver’s point, if you’re telling us that we cannot consistently do that, that it’s too restricted, that you’re asking too much, then clearly we have to look at it.”​