Indy Car Hype: Toyota Grand Prix Of Long Beach (Quick Result)

Over the weekend the Indy Car Series stopped in my home town of Long Beach, California for the 38th annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.  This was my first chance seeing the new cars, engines, and drivers up close and it was awesome!  More on that in a later post though.  This post is to give you the results of the race in case you missed out and for some reason can’t watch a rebroadcast.

First a little background.  The weekend started off with controversy as Chevrolet decided to pull their engines from Chevy-backed teams and replace them with new units.  Per Indy Car rules changing an engine before its “desginated threshold” will cost a team 10 grid spots.  Since most of the top tier teams are powered by Chevrolet engines it meant that the likes of Team Penske and Andretti Autosport had to start in the middle or back of the field.  This left the door wide-open for teams powered by Honda or Lotus engines.

Despite Will Power getting the pole it was Dario Franchitti and rookie Joseph Newgarden who started in the front row (both drivers with Honda engines).  However due to some expert strategy and pit stops Will Power was able to fight his way to the front on a two stop strategy.  In the end Will had his hands full with a very agressive Simon Pagenaud who nearly took the win from Power in the last 5 laps.  James “Hinchtown” Hinchcliffe was granted a third place spot due to his teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay being religated to 7th due to a penalty.

For highlights of the race check out the video below.  Also stay tuned for a full event gallery from the entire weekend!

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