My recent order from Blowout Cards included a box of the 2007 Rittenhouse IndyCar Series trading cards. I don't really know anything about IndyCar at all, really. This is basically just a lottery ticket to see if I could pull the Danica Patrick autograph.
There are 17 drivers on the autograph checklist and you get two per box, so the odds seem pretty good of pulling one of Danica's autos. I don't know if any of the autographs are short-prints or anything, but if Danica's autograph is a short-print I don't want to know about it. I prefer to live in a reality where I can realistically expect to pull her autograph from one of these boxes. Each box has 24 packs, and each pack has 4 cards. The sticker says my box is # 1455 / 3000.
Here's what the pack looks like. Pretty standard foil pack fare.
The checklist is made up of 54 cards, with each group of three cards making a little puzzle that probably looks nice in card pages. Each group features the same format. Driver card, then car card, then another driver card. I wrote the numbers down somewhere, but I can't find them. I got a full base set and some doubles, but no triples in the box.
The card backs also make a puzzle. One card features the driver's basic info like height, weight, hometown, birthday, and racing team. The middle card features a picture of the car. The last card has a few bulleted career highlights for that driver.
One insert set is Indy 500: Road to Victory, which is all about Dario Franchitti's victory at the 2007 Indianapolis 500. I got three cards from the 9-card set.
The card backs make up a puzzle. If I put them in order it looks like they would make up an image with the Indianapolis 500 logo, some kind of tire-themed thing, and more photos of Franchitti.
I got two Shades of Victory cards in the box. This is a black and white insert set about sunglasses. Racing card sets seem to have a lot of cards about sunglasses. Apparently Vitor Meira didn't get the memo about wearing sunglasses for the photo on the back of his card. There are nine cards in this insert set as well.
A.J. Foyt 50th Anniversary cards fall one per box and have a print run of 500 each. I got the sixth card in the nine-card set, numbered # 447 / 500. This one commemorates his 1967 Indianapolis 500 victory.
Lastly, here are my two autographs. No Danica Patrick this time. I got Scott Dixon and Milka Duno. Dixon has had a lot of success as a racer, winning the 2008 Indianapolis 500 and his 4th IndyCar Series championship in 2015. Duno seems to be famous mostly for being a former model and for making other drivers angry at her slow driving. She appears to be out of racing now after making appearances in several racing series.
This is a decent product to break if you can find a good price on a box of it. The Danica Patrick autograph seems to be the only really big hit available, but recent eBay sales on the two autographs I pulled from this box suggest that I was close to breaking even on this one. That's better than I can say for a lot of my breaks, so I'm happy. I'll probably keep picking these up from time to time in search of that Danica card.
This is a decent product to break if you can find a good price on a box of it. The Danica Patrick autograph seems to be the only really big hit available, but recent eBay sales on the two autographs I pulled from this box suggest that I was close to breaking even on this one. That's better than I can say for a lot of my breaks, so I'm happy. I'll probably keep picking these up from time to time in search of that Danica card.
I'd be interested in trading for whatever you don't want. I just mentioned needing some of these cards in a post last week in fact. I have none.
ReplyDeleteI busted another box of this a couple of years ago. If I can find those cards during my big sorting project, I could send you a complete set.
DeleteI busted a box of this myself. Not bad for my autos. My buddy over at Jammin JDcards pulled a Danica from his box. He had it listed for sale, not sure if it still is or not.
ReplyDeleteI basically wanted this box to try and pull the Danica auto or for her rookies.
The Danica card definitely is the big hit in this product. One of these days I'll get it.
DeleteNice find! I honestly didn't realize that IndyCar had even had a nationally distributed set like this. As an avid Indy 500 fan, I'll had to keep my eyes peeled for some of these.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Milka Duno... she might have been the worst racer I've ever seen at Indy. She was a hazard.
They're pretty cool cards. I like that they went with the 3-card triads for each driver and 9-card insert sets. It makes everything display nicely in a binder. I've always hated card companies that make 10-card insert sets, because if you put them in binders there is always that one card left hanging on a second page.
DeleteIt sounds like Milka Duno has had plenty of racing success, but it didn't translate over to IndyCar.
How much is a box of these cards? Can you even find them anywhere?
ReplyDeleteI just did a scan of my usual sources and didn't turn any boxes up. I imagine most of them got busted by people searching for the Danica autograph. Sometimes Blowout Cards blowoutcards.com has them in stock, and sometimes they pop up on eBay. You can find base sets and most of the insert sets pretty cheaply on eBay. The autographs are also fairly common on eBay, depending on who you're looking for.
DeleteOh, and about Milka Duno, she might not have done well in the IndyCar league, but she's no slouch. I've met her several times and she is super nice. I have nothing bad to say about her at all. Check out her page http://www.milkaduno.com/en/about
ReplyDeleteI think you'll be especially interested in her academic accomplishments.
I don't know anything about her outside of her Wikipedia entry. It sounds like she has had a lot of success in her life. I don't have any ill will toward her.
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