Formula 1 wasn’t the only motorsport with its season opener during the weekend. The 2010 Indy Car season got started on Sunday on the streets of San Paulo, Brazil. This race was, problematic from the start. This was the first race in this new street course and it showed. When weather wasn’t plaguing the drivers the nature of the course was. There was a section on the main straight that had a section of recently ground down asphalt and someone forgot to mop up the dust!
Some of the rookies weren’t doing so great either. Former F1 driver Takuma Sato got a little too friendly with the brakes and caused a huge pile up right as the race went green the first time. Then, Mario Morales made the same mistake and literally ran over Marco Andretti. Marco had to sit there with Mario’s car on his head for a few minutes until they were able to get a crane to pull it off. Amazingly, he took it pretty well.. but then again he was probably still fuzzy from the concussion.
When the dust settled it was Will Power and Team Penske on the top of the podium. Check out the race highlights below and a detailed wrap up of the race on Indy Car’s website.
It has been confirmed that the Aussie driver Will Power is going to be a permanent part of a three car Team Penske team in 2010. Will Power first started driving for Penske last year when he filled in for Helio Castroneves as he dealt with legal troubles. Once getting into a Penske car Will demonstrated some serious skill and ability to run up front. Check out the video below for Will’s comments and reaction to getting picked up by Mr. Penske for 2010.
Take a world class race track, add a large helping of Indy Car racing and a dash of Formula D, mix thoroughly and bake tires until smokey and that’s how you get the Indy Grand Prix Of Sonoma. Northern Cali was definitely the place to be this weekend if you’re a racing and drift fan. Formula D was epic and dramatic (more on that later) and the Indy Car race saw another appearance by Dario Franchitti and Ryan Briscoe on the podium. The race started with a first lap pile up which gobbled up points leader Scott Dixon and ultimately kept him mid pack for the majority of the race. This freed things up for Dario to take the lead and fend off Briscoe until he saw the checkered flag. With the rate that the points lead is changing its practically impossible to make even an educated guess at who will win the title this year….just the way I like it! Check out the video below for race highlights.
On Sunday Scott Dixon officially scored his 20th win at Mid-Ohio which makes him the winningest driver in the modern Indy Car series history. Dixon has pretty much conquered it all: road courses, street courses, ovals, super speedways, and short tracks. And I doubt he is getting tired of any of this in the slightest.
Perhaps he felt something special was going to happen this weekend because almost every driver in the front pack said Dixon was “unstoppable” on that day. Dixon’s major “threats” (I use the term loosely) consisted of Justin Wilson at first until he had a huge mishap in pit lane. From that point on Ryan Briscoe and Scott’s teammate Dario Franchitti fought each other for a chance at Dixon. However their dog fight just slowed them down and put Scott that much farther ahead. It was truly a masterful performance by the kiwi champ. Check out the video below for the highlights.
It was a strange night last Saturday when the Indy Cars came to Kentucky for the Meijer Indy 300. Due to “issues” with the asphalt there was no qualifying and practice was only 75 minutes. Then, race officials decided to give the teams several oval aerodynamic options and threw in the “overtake” option just for flavor. There were 20 lead changes and very fast laps but when it was all said and done Team Penske’s Ryan Briscoe took the checkered flag with Ed Carpenter coming in an extremely close (0.0162 of a second) 2nd place and Tony Kanann capturing the bronze finish. I could say more but you really just have to see it. Check out the video below for highlights.
This Will Power guy is pretty good isn’t he?! When Helio Castroneves came back after that whole legal fiasco everyone thought Mr. Power would be left out in the cold but Captain Penske decided to keep the kid on for a few races and was that ever the right decision to make. Will pretty much dominated the entire weekend. He won pole position and once the green flag dropped on Sunday he walked away with it with both of his Penske teammates behind him. There was some dicing around in the mid pack but for the most part it looked like it would be a Penske 1-2-3(Power, Castroneves, and Briscoe) but Scott Dixon was able to chop off the tail of the Penske dragon to take third spot on the podium. Towards the middle of the race there was a scary moment in pit lane when AGR driver Tony Kanaan’s fuel system had a malfunction and his car caught fire. Luckily crew members from A.J. Foyt Racing and Team Penske came to Tony’s rescue, dousing the flames and pulling him out before he was seriously injured. Tony was later reported to have suffered some 2nd degree burns on his hands but is otherwise ok. No word if he’ll have to sit the next race out but I’ll keep you posted. Check out the video below for all the race highlights.
A little late with the race report again folks sorry about that. Anyhow down to business. The Indy Car series made its return to our Canadian neighbors to the north once again this past weekend for the Toronto Indy. This race had been a long time comming for Canadian super star Paul Tracy. Unfortunately his return was short lived when Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves shoe-horned Tracy’s car into a barrier thus ending his weekend. Natrually Helio was subject to a sonic wall of boo’s for taking out the hometown hero. However the real story was up front with Dari Franchtti, Ryan Briscoe, and Will Power dicing at each other up front. In the end Dario’s cool head kept him in front of the Penske cars and on to the victory. Check out the highlights below.
Over the weekend reigning Indy Car champ Scott Dixon scored his 19th career win at the Sun Trust Indy Challenge at Richmond VA. With this win he is now tied with Sam Hornish Jr. for most wins in Indy Car history. This was also a 1-2 victory for the Target Chip Ganassi team and with Dario Franchitti finishing 2nd he was able to snatch the series point lead away from Ryan Briscoe of Team Penske. It looks like Penske and Ganassi are going to be trading punches for series title for the rest of the year. Oh, and before I forget, Graham Rahal scored his second career podium by landing the third spot. The only other time Graham’s feet touched podium plywood was when he won his debut race last year. Check out the video below for highlights from Richmond.
Yeah I realize I’m a little late with the race report but hey I’m human dang nabbit! Anyway if you didn’t catch the Iowa Indy 250 this weekend you shouldn’t be surprized to know that Mr Ashely Judd AKA Dario Franchitti took the victory this weekend for the second year in a row at that track. It was looking like points leader Ryan Briscoe had the race on lock but with 50 laps to go Dario snatched the lead away and held him off until he saw checkered flags. Check out the video below for the highlights.
The Indy 500 is so huge that when its over sometimes it feels like the end of the season when really its still just the start. One week after Helio Castroneves drank the milk in victory circle the Indy Car caravan hit the Milwaukee Mile for the ABC Supply/AJ Foyt 225. After having such a great run at Indy Helio Castroneves hit just the opposite in Milwaukee as he had trouble in qualifying and had to start way from the back. His teammate and last year’s winner Ryan Briscoe had much better luck as he captured the pole position.
On race day Briscoe lead much of the race while Helio, Dario Franchitti, Scott Dixon, and Graham Rahal chased him down and for the most part he fought them all off. However towards the closing laps of the race Scott Dixon was able to grab the lead away from Briscoe and take it home for his second win of the season and to take over the overall points lead. It was a pretty awesome race. Check out the video below for the highlights.
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