Indianapolis 500 Recap

I know this last weekend was full of great racing with F1 at Monaco, Nascar at Charlotte, but I think the good old Indianapolis held up to be the most exciting! The 2011 Indianapolis 500 was probably the most exciting Indy 500 since 1989, when Al Unser Jr. crashed on the last lap, and Emerson Fittipaldi took the lead and won the race. Many events that just continued to happen over the course of the day just made this an exciting race.

Starting with the fact the Penske had no affect on the outcome of the race at all. In fact all Penske drivers finished a lap down, or more. Let's see where they finished Power in 14th, Castroneves in 17th, and Briscoe in 27th. They fouled up on many things for instance when Will Power left the pits on a caution, and lost a tire, so he lost some track positions while having to go back in. Let's face it even IndyCar's powerhouse can have a strenuous Indy 500!  If nothing like that happened at the Indianapolis 500 people would never pay attention to it. I'm sure Roger Penske isn't too happy, and someone will be fired for sure. Also noticing the fact that Andretti Autosport's old team manager Tom Anderson was working for Sam Schmidt Motorsports on Sunday. Andretti Autosport had problems just getting into the race with Mike Conway and Ryan Hunter-Reay not even fast enough to do just that on Bump Day. So Michael Andretti(team owner) that Sunday afternoon decided to make a deal, and  buy Bruno Junqueira's ride. Even with all the trouble Danica Patrick ended up leading some laps near the end of the Indy 500.

With a couple of the biggest teams going down the hill for this years Indy 500 lets talk Ganassi. As usual they are expected to dominate the Indy 500, and yes they did for the most part. They led 141 laps as a team, but could not market off of anything with a bad fuel strategy for the race with Dario Franchitti having to go in for a pit stop with just a couple laps left of the race. Where did they finish? Rahal- 3rd, Dixon 5th, Franchitti 12th, and Kimball(R) 13th.

Out of all the race teams up near the front all season I've noticed that Newman/Haas might actually have caught to Penske and Ganassi. Oriol Servia led a couple laps and stayed up near the front all day, and was even a threat during qualifying for the Pole Position. He ended up finishing 6th for the Indy 500. Servia is also third in the 2011 IndyCar Series Point Standings, only 44 points behind leader Will Power.

Simona signing autographs with her burnt hands. From:http://www.speedtv.com/

Simona de Silvestro of HVM Racing has proven herself to hold up to her new nickname the "Swiss Missile" during the race. On Thursday May 19th, she hit the wall on turn three and flipped over going into turn four. She suffered from second degree burns on her left hand and third degree burns on her right hands. Even after all that she got back into the car and qualified 24th with burns on her hands. She survived the first couple laps of the race, but ended up brushing the wall on lap 3 and tearing up part of her suspension. She continued to stay in the race up until about lap 40, but could not continue with her car tore up.

What happened at the very last lap of the Indy 500 was what really blew everybody's mind. When J.R. Hildebrand(R) leading the race hit the wall on turn four, allowing Dan Wheldon to pass him for his second Indianapolis 500 win. What happened to Hildebrand? His spotter said that Wheldon was close enough to pass him so Hildebrand went up into the marbles to pass Charlie Kimball. Going up into the marbles is what caused Hildebrand to loosed traction and finish second after hitting the wall. Hildebrand will be thinking about this the rest of his life, but it was his spotter's call to send him up there and crash. Wheldon was nowhere close enough to attempt to pass Hildebrand for the lead. 

Team owner Bryan Herta with race winner Dan Wheldon.

Dan Wheldon's win without a doubt was a huge one with this being the only planned race for him this year. Will they race any more races in 2011? Well Bryan Herta thinks so, but at the moment he is not sure which ones. This summer they are supposedly set to be the team to test the 2012 Dallara IndyCar. Herta even said the prize money is enough to run the rest of the season, but originally had planned to start up in 2012 when the new cars come out. Well let's wait and see maybe William Rast will come back as the teams main sponsor for the season.