Iowa Corn 250 Recap.

Overall Iowa was a great race and it never fails to succeed to do so!

For the first 150 laps the race was marked by plenty of crashing, and both of Ganassi's Target cars were dominating the race. One of the many drivers that were involved in a crash was IndyCar Series Championship contender Will Power crashed just 90 laps into the race in turn 2. Earlier in the race while pulling out of the pits Power hit Charlie Kimball(R), and sustained some damage. This may have been the reason why he just lost it, and ended up going backwards into the wall. Power has a mild concussion from the crash, and will have to pass a test to drive in Toronto in 2 weeks. Will Power ended up finishing 21st, and is now 20 points behind points leader Dario Franchitti.

I would like to point out that Will Power wasn't just the only driver who crashed because of a minor bump in turn 2. Will Power, Takuma Sato, James Jakes(R), Sebastian Saveedra(R), and Ana Beatriz(R) all crashed in turn 2. If I were the IndyCar Series I would pressure the track to get that fixed by next year.

Chip Ganassi Racing as a whole did real well again with Dario Franchitti leading most of the race up until around lap 172 when Tony Kanaan and Marco Andretti took over. Scott Dixon did real well moving from his starting position of 23rd, and finished 3rd. Where did the other Ganassi drivers finish? Dario Franchitti-5th Graham Rahal-15th Charlie Kimball(R)-22nd

Right after Dario's lead faded Tony Kanaan, and Marco Andretti put on a great show fighting for first place for the rest of the race. Tony put up a good fight with Andretti up until about 18 laps left of the race when TK tried to go under Marco, and then Marco pulled down right in front of TK. Right then TK had to fall back, and was a good 4 car lengths behind Marco in second during the rest of the race.

Marco celebrating his win. From:indycar.com

Tony Kanaan congratulating Marco for his race win. From:indycar.com

During the end of the race when Marco was celebrating TK went up to Marco to say congrats, and said he would have done the same thing to win the race if he were in that position. TK didn't even act like he was a on a different race team. This shows why TK is such a class act, and why he is still a fan favorite.

This was Marco's first win since his first win at Infineon Raceway in 2006. This win shows Andretti Autosport can still win, and that Marco can win by himself. Also he makes it look like getting on the pole is nothing when he won the race from a starting position of 17th.

Other drivers that had a good run during Iowa was Panther Racing's JR Hildebrand(R) which finished 4th, and even led a couple laps in the middle of the race. Penske Racing's Helio Castroneves and Ryan Briscoe stayed in the top 10 all night. They finished 6th and 7th. Also Newman/Haas Racing's James Hinchcliffe(R) had another good finish of 9th.


The whole race was a success with Iowa showing their love for Open Wheel Racing with an official race attendance of 35,118.


 Official Iowa Corn 250 results.

1. (17) Marco Andretti, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
2. (3) Tony Kanaan, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
3. (23) Scott Dixon, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
4. (4) JR Hildebrand, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
5. (6) Dario Franchitti, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
6. (10) Ryan Briscoe, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
7. (13) Helio Castroneves, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
8. (8) Ryan Hunter-Reay, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
9. (7) James Hinchcliffe, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
10. (2) Danica Patrick, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
11. (14) Ed Carpenter, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
12. (12) Justin Wilson, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
13. (22) Alex Lloyd, Dallara-Honda, 250, Running
14. (11) Oriol Servia, Dallara-Honda, 249, Running
15. (20) Graham Rahal, Dallara-Honda, 249, Running
16. (15) Alex Tagliani, Dallara-Honda, 249, Running
17. (19) EJ Viso, Dallara-Honda, 239, Handling
18. (16) Vitor Meira, Dallara-Honda, 227, Handling
19. (1) Takuma Sato, Dallara-Honda, 182, Contact
20. (25) Sebastian Saavedra, Dallara-Honda, 114, Contact
21. (5) Will Power, Dallara-Honda, 89, Contact
22. (21) Charlie Kimball, Dallara-Honda, 62, Mechanical
23. (18) Ana Beatriz, Dallara-Honda, 44, Contact
24. (9) Mike Conway, Dallara-Honda, 44, Contact
25. (24) James Jakes, Dallara-Honda, 22, Contact

Milwaukee 225 Thoughts and Reactions.

Although Milwaukee was somewhat entertaining to most including myself, I thought it was pretty much a crash fest with Ganassi dominating for the most part again.

HVM Racing/Simona de Silvestro.

First of all if none of you are fans of Simona by now, I don't know when you will be.  My reasoning is simple, because even after six stitches on one knee, a bad bang to the head, and a broken rib, Simona de Silvestro attempted the next day to get in that ancient car and win a race. Although she wasn't out but maybe 10 laps she showed nothing will get in her way of trying to get out there and race. I will also give a thumbs up to HVM Racing because, even after everything that has happened during the crashes, that whole team works so hard in example the whole team worked non stop from the time of the crash to the early morning hours on that Sunday the Milwaukee 225 was held on.

On another positive note I would like to point out how well Newman-Haas Racing finished during the race with Oriol Servia in 3rd, and James Hinchcliffe(R) in 6th. Although the broadcast for the race actually ran over on ABC, I would have liked to seen Oriol's interview after the race instead of Dario's griping.

Ton Kanaan at Milwaukee. From:sports.yahoo.com

KV Racing had some good luck that quickly turned bad late in the race. E.J. Viso was safely in the top 5 for a good part of the race until he crashed on lap 163.  Also Tony Kanaan looked like he was going to win the race after leading 33 laps, but just lost it going into the front straightaway and crashed. Takuma Sato also had a good race until he had to serve a drive through penalty for hitting a crew member while pitting. How did they all finish? Kanaan-19th Viso-20th Sato-8th

Penske racing had a good turn out as usual with Helio Castroneves having some late race bad luck, with a tire loosing too much pressure. So under caution he had to go in for a pit stop, losing his first place position over Dario Franchitti. Also Helio led 31 laps. Will Power finished 4th, Helio finished 9th, and Ryan Briscoe finished 11th.

Graham Rahal, Dario Franchitti, and Oriol Servia celebrating on the podium after the Milwaukee 225.

Ganassi is still dominating. Dario Franchitti led the majority of the race with 161 laps. The big controversy belongs with Ganassi and Penske during some pit stops Dario hit the front right tire and crossed the pit box line of Will Power. Race Control gave no penalty to Dario, but many fans including me feel that he should have received that penalty for crossing Penske's pit box and hitting Penske's equipment. Dario went on finishing first, and Dixon finished 7th. Graham Rahal had a good race, staying in the top 10 the whole race and ended up finishing 2nd. Charlie Kimball finished a lap down in 14th.

Other interesting things to note.
The race attendance was horrible with an estimated attendance of around 13,000. I think IndyCar needs to come back next year, but not on Father's Day weekend, and they need to find a better event promoter.

The TV ratings for ABC's live telecast were at 0.9. At least it was higher than the ratings with Versus.