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Indy 500 Bump Day 2010 - Highs and lows

Every year at the Indy 500 time trials, bump day usually provides plenty of drama as the field gets set for the Greatest Spectacle In Racing. And not only did this year’s bump day live up to the hype, but the closing hour left viewers and fans catching their breath with everything that unfolded.

Lead Story - Kanaan’s conundrum
The story that dominated the day was that of Tony Kanaan’s troubles in getting into the field. An annual favorite to win the race and take the pole in recent years, Kanaan found himself on the outside looking in today after a qualifying crash on Saturday that caused heavy damage to the 7-Eleven car.

To make things worse, Kanaan took out his repaired car in morning practice, and crashed again in turn one in an episode of the worst kind of déjà vu. Kanaan’s team picked up the pieces (pun intended), pawned off some parts from other Andretti Autosport cars, and put Kanaan back ont he track. And Kanaan responded by firmly putting his car in the field. The man earned his paycheck today and showed just what he’s made of, that is for sure.
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Paul Tracy and Barry Green reunite for 2010 Indy 500

Paul Tracy tweeted some news news today revolving around 2010 Indy 500 effort that Barry Green is going to wire up the ol’ headset and call race strategy for Mr. Chrome Horn in the duo’s attempt at winning the Indy 500 for a second time. Ok…. In reality Paul is still vying for a first win at the Brickyard, while Green seeks to put an exclamation point on the 1995 Indy win he captured with with Jacques Villeneuve. Speaking of 1995, that race finish was nearly as controversial as the 2002 race, so Green has gotten both ends of the proverbial stick when it comes to winning and losing the Greatest Spectacle In Racing.

This reunion puts Tracy with his former team owner from the FedEx Championship Series (a.k.a. CART) when he drove for Team KOOL Green. Tracy said that the two have “unfinished” business to tend to at the Brickyard. But can Tracy pull the rabbit out of the hat, beat the likes of Ganassi and Penske, and exorcise the ghosts of the 2002 race? Doubtful, of course. I wonder, though, what kind of celebratory exhibition Paul Tracy might put on if he were to somehow win the 500 mile race.

He’s had a long time to think about it.

USA Today also has a real news story about these developments: Barry Green to work with Paul Tracy in Indy 500

Scott Dixon is again the king of Kansas

The fans at Kansas Speedway today experienced an episode of Déjà vu as they watched Scott Dixon run away with the Road Runner Turbo Indy 300 for the second year in a row. Dixon led the most laps in a race that started out with a tight and competitive run at the front, and ended with a total blowout by the New Zealander.

The only thing that made the latter part of the race interesting were a string of yellows that kept the field in touch with the leader. But as the race came to a close, Dixon had 18 Honda push-to-pass “shots” with only 15 laps to go, and it was his race to lose. And for a guy with ice-water in his veins, it was a walk in the park.

The field took the green at about 2 p.m. ET, and I was amazed to see a nicely formed field of 2-by-two race cars. That’s how a race start is supposed to look, and a huge improvement over the sloppy starts of the past few races.
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Oval opener brings reversal of fortune during Indy Car Kansas qualifying

Indy Car has finally been un-caged this week, set free from the narrow concrete-canyons of Sao Paulo and Long Beach and unleashed on the tri-oval at Kansas Speedway. And with this change in scenery comes a change at the front of the grid, and tonight there are a bunch of drivers breathing deep sighs of relief to be back in the Midwest on an oval. Others that have had so much success early in the season have been left scratching their heads and wondering how they went from the front to the back.

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Indy Car’s new three-tiered championship a good move but is no magic pill

The talk amongst Indy Car fans today was the announcement by the IRL that they will be adding two new championship titles to the series. The head honcho, Randy Bernard, declared that the series will be adding a “road course” championship and an “oval” championship to the agenda for 2010. That means this weekend’s race in Kansas will be the inaugural race for the yet to be named “oval” championship. Additional, they say that these two new titles will be named by the fans, although they haven’t announced how that will happen yet. Perhaps the oval championship trophy might be named “The Foyt Cup”, or the “Harroun Trophy” (and while this fan involvement is great, I think a better idea would be to find title sponsors for each cup).
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Long Beach Diary - Notes from the beach

Every year in mid-April those of us in southern California head out to the beach for the three day festival of speed at the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.  This year was the second year that Indy Car returned to the crown-jewel of street races, and the weekend was full of action including a first time win for a budding star in the Indy Lights ranks, a win by an American in Indy Car, and a fantastic American Le Mans sprint race on Saturday afternoon.

I journaled on the fly via a tired old smartphone about the action at the track, and below is a diary of my weekend at the beach.
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Indy Car puts on great show at Kentucky

*SPOILER ALERT*

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Wow, now *that* was a race.  After a season of snoozers, Indy Car made up for it with a bona fide thriller that ended with Ryan Briscoe running wheel-to-wheel with Ed Carpenter in the closing laps and squeaking out a win by 81-thousandths of a second.   And that’s no a typo.  Ed Carpenter almost won his first Indy Car race tonight, and put on a heck of a show for the fans at the track and those watching on VERSUS.

AP: Briscoe edges Carpenter to win Kentucky 300

Whether or not you like Tony George, you had to root for Carpenter.  He ran a clean race, and seems to be a pretty nice guy and a good oval racer.   It would have been fantastic to see him get the first win for himself and his team.  But the Penske juggernaut  could not be stopped.  Briscoe did exactly what he needed to do to win, and he did it.

Tony George was interviewed by VERSUS at the end of the race, and was looked pretty disappointed.  I’m sure it would have put a feather in his cap to win this one, especially in regards George no longer running IMS.  But it wasn’t to be.

The new aero rules and the addition of push-to-pass on the Dallaras were a big hit, and Graham Rahal praised the changes after the race, claiming that he passed more cars tonight than he had in passed in the rest of his open wheel oval career.  I’m not sure that’s saying that much, but Graham’s point is understood.  The IRL needed to do *something* to make the 1-1/2 mile ovals exciting.

The race was also made exciting with some new players in the mix for a chance.  Not only did Ed Carpenter have a great race, but Tony Kanaan had a solid finish and mixed it up at the end and had a legitimate shot to win if the leaders tangled and crashed out (which almost happened several times).

Indy Car should be careful to declare that everything is perfect now, but tonight’s race was the best of the year.

The Indy Car Series stays close to home next week and takes to the road course at Mid-Ohio.

Franchitti fast at Toronto, takes pole

Dario Franchitti battled with Graham Rahal, Justin Wilson, and Will Power in today’s Firestone Fast Six qualifying session and won the Peak Pole Award with a lap of 1:01.0 at Exhibition Place in Toronto.

Will Power proved that he is deserving of this part time ride at Penske. He fell just short of winning the pole and will start on the outside of the first row. Power is driving a sweet-looking yellow car with blue accents, sponsored by Penske Truck Rental, and it drives as fast as it looks.
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Congratulations to Dale Coyne Racing

The committment to racing shown by Dale Coyne and his team can be summed up with a few incredible statistics:

25 years
558 starts
1 win

That elusive win #1 came on Sunday at Watkins Glenn, and in dominating fashion.  Justin Wilson was in a league of his own on Sunday, and ran away with his second career victory in the IRL.   The win was remarkeable for the 2009 season in which only Penske and Ganassi had won races until Sunday.   But Wilson is fantastic on the road courses, and DCR has focused their efforts on the street and road races in particular, and it paid off in a big way.

Dale Coyne has been a loveable loser for years, especially in the Champ Car camp.    Dale was always running his team on a shoestring, and usually showed up Champ Car’s opening race in Long Beach without any drivers announced, or sometimes even signed.   But he always answered the bell, and in recent years has been very competetive with Bruno Junqueira and Justin Wilson giving him a major performance boost.

Congratulations to Dale Coyne and his hard working crew.   Their love and committment toward the sport of auto racing is something to appreciate.

Be sure to check out Dan Barnes nice piece at Canada.com chronicalling the big win.

Canada.com:  Perfect weekend leads to Coyne’s first victory

Briscoe dominates Indy Car qualifying to take pole at the Glenn

Ryan Briscoe was almost a second faster than the rest of the Indy Car field on July 4th, taking the top spot in the Firestone Fast Six.  Briscoe has been hooked up for the last few weeks, and the pole at the Glenn is his second this season.

Briscoe ran the natural-terrain road course with a lap time  1:28.597 at 136.935 mph, beating out Justin Wilson and Scott Dixon who will start 2nd and 3rd respectively.

Dario Franchitti looked very quick, but a major shunt in the final moments of qualifying ruined his shot at the pole. His Dallara sustained heavy rear-end damage, although it appeared to be repairable and Dario should start somewhere in the top 6.   The official starting grid will be released later today at Indycar.com.

Helio Castroneves didn’t have a good day at the Glenn, and failed to make it out of first round qualifying.  He was knocked out after qualifying P7 in Group B. He should start 14th  (the official grid has not been released at time of post).

The race tomorrow might just be for second place, with nobody holding a candle to Briscoe today.    A quick glance at the qualifying times below shows a large group drivers were running laps in the low 1:29’s, so if Briscoe drops out for any reason, this race could be up for grabs.

Paul Tracy is back for this week’s race in a PKV car, but struggled.  He’ll start deep in the field after getting knocked out of qualifying in round 1.

The Camping World Grand Prix at the Glenn airs tomorrow at 1 p.m. ET on ABC.

Pos	Driver	       Best Time
1	Ryan Briscoe	01:28.6
2	Justin Wilson	01:29.3
3	Scott Dixon	01:29.7
4	Mario Moraes	01:29.8
5	Graham Rahal	01:30.0
6	D.Franchitti	Crash
7	Mike Conway	01:29.2
8	Danica Patrick	01:29.2
9	Marco Andretti	01:29.4
10	Tony Kanaan	01:29.4
11	EJ Viso	        01:29.6
12	Dan Wheldon	01:29.9
13	Hideki Mutoh	01:29.8
14	H. Castroneves	01:29.9
15	Paul Tracy	01:30.6
16	R. Hunter-Reay	01:30.4
17	Robert Doornbos	01:30.6
18	Raphael Matos	01:30.5
19	Milka Duno	01:33.7
20	R. Antinucci	01:31.2
21	Ed Carpenter	01:31.7