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INDYCAR: Dixon Wins Crazy Race In Edmonton
Helio is penalized for blocking on a restart with two laps to go, giving the win to Scott Dixon. Castroneves then has a complete meltdown. Take the polls and tell us what you think.
Marshall Pruett  |  Posted July 25, 2010  
Dixon was declared the winner on Sunday -- but in the estimation of most who watched the race, the biggest loser was the IZOD IndyCar Series itself. (LAT)
What looked like a convincing Team Penske 1-2 went horribly wrong with just two laps to go at Edmonton on Sunday.

When the dust settled and emotions were brought under control, Scott Dixon celebrated his second win of 2010 and listened from Victory Circle as Helio Castroneves went wild, screaming and shouting at IZOD IndyCar Series officials, eventually throwing his helmet and HANS device, and later clutching series security guard Charles Burns by the shirt as the frustration of being given a drive-through penalty for blocking on the final restart caused the three-time Indy 500 to boil over.




The controversial call, made by race director Brian Barnhart, came after Castroneves was estimated to have blocked his teammate Will Power as the two streaked towards Turn 1 after the green flag waved with just two tours left.

The Brazilian, initially holding the inside line, moved left to take a proper line through the first corner. Barnhart, believing Castroneves was moving out of his lane to block Power, assessed the penalty, effectively handing the race to Dixon while the Team Penske driver refused to heed Barnhart's call to visit pit lane for his infraction. Despite crossing the under the checkered flag ahead of Dixon, Castroneves would be classified 10th, the final car on the lead lap.




“Brian always says that if you’re blocking going into any corner and you are on the right side – especially into Turn 1, you’re going to get a penalty,” said the race winner. “We get told every week, so you could see something was going to happen. Obviously, Will had a pretty good run. The only way from stopping him was blocking. So if that's what you call it, yeah, that's blocking."

His teammate shared the same opinion. "Full marks to Brian [Barnhart] for doing that," echoed Franchitti. "It was the right call."

With his blood pressure back down to triple digits, Castroneves shared a different view of what took place. “I never moved my line. I actually did move him outside. When you go side by side like that with your teammate and they just take it away from you, it’s just absurd.”

Dixon looked set for a third-place finish as cars lined up for the restart, and the Kiwi admitted he was still a bit shocked to find himself on the receiving end of the win.

“All in all, not what I expected to happen at the end. In some ways, I knew those two, Will and Helio, were fighting pretty hard. You could see that the first time Helio passed Will. But to go that far to the right I think in Turn 1, I just continued on with the regular line where it's nice and clean and figured or hoped that they picked up a lot of debris and were going to make it tough through 1 and 2. That's kind of what happened. Pretty strange to not lead a lap and actually win the race.”

If popular opinion is to be considered, Barnhart and the Target Chip Ganassi drivers were the most vocal about Castroneves' penalty. But fans, and even those calling the race, were rather vocal in questioning the call once it came down from race control. From the Versus broadcast team to the IndyCar radio squad, the general consensus was something along the lines of 'Helio got robbed.' But the same couldn't be said for Will Power, who seemed to agree with Barnhart's view of things, while avoiding openly criticizing his teammate.

“Helio had the inside line,” Power said. “I tried to go around the outside, sort of got pushed wide, and Scott got through. I would say a black flag is a pretty harsh penalty, but it is what it is. It was just one of those racing things. When you’re leading on the last restart you want to keep the lead.”

Power, having noticed Castroneves moving left to setup for Turn 1, turned hard left to try and set his teammate up for a pass on corner exit. This simple road course maneuver -- one practiced for nearly a century -- seemed lost on the race director. The anti-blocking rule, one where drivers are instructed to stay in their respective lanes, must be abandoned at some point as drivers enter the phase where a straight ends and a corner begins. In simple terms, there is a phase where the anti-blocking rule needs to be turned on and another when it needs to be turned off, and although the series does indeed delineate between straights and braking zones in regards to this rule, it seems to ignore the need for drivers to setup for corners prior to a braking zone.

While Castroneves' move looked like nothing more than choosing his line on the restart followed by swinging left to prepare for a right-hand turn, the race director considered that practice to deviate from his pre-race mandate.

In a stark contrast of judgement, universal praise came on Saturday for the decision to place Milka Duno on probation, but less than 24 hours later, the same powers of observation appeared to falter when determining the intent of the race leader's move into Turn 1.

Any chance Castroneves might have had to argue his case and to lobby for the result to be overturned was surely lost by his uncharacteristic tirade that went on for minutes after he emerged from the car.

Late Sunday night, and in an act of contrition that likely came at the urging from team owner Roger Penske, Castroneves released the following statement.

“Obviously, I disagree with the decisions made by the race officials on the last restart in today’s race, but there is no excuse for my actions after the checkered flag. I apologize to my team, our sponsors, the fans and the entire IZOD IndyCar Series community for my behavior. My actions were totally wrong and I acted inappropriately to some people who are my friends and people I respect very much. Obviously, I am a very emotional person and today I let my emotions get the better of me and I’m very sorry for that.”

Although the slender Brazilian is hardly a threatening figure, it would be a surprise if his verbal and physical outbursts failed to result in a stiff fine from the IZOD IndyCar Series. No matter whose side you are on, such behavior towards IndyCar officials and employees cannot be tolerated.

Power, who led the majority of the race and looked set for his third consecutive win, found himself struggling for grip and for pace as he raced to the finish on Firestone Blacks. As the only driver at the front of the field without the stickier Firestone Reds, the points leader was powerless to hold off the charging Castroneves, who motored by and looked set to take his second win of the year until the fateful yellow flag came with victory in sight.

As Castroneves and Power wend side-by-side into Turn 1 on the restart, Dixon followed the Brazilian as Power was forced to the outside. With Dixon promoted to the lead, he led home a Ganassi 1-3, complimenting the win by Earnhardt Ganassi driver Jamie McMurray at the Brickyard 400 earlier in the day. Power finished second for Team Penske, maintaining a 50-point lead in the championship over the third-place car of Dario Franchitti after 11 of 17 races.

Ryan Briscoe finished fourth for Team Penske, who was never able to threaten for the podium after bending his rear suspension early in the race, and Ryan Hunter-Reay came home fifth, once again the top finisher from the Andretti Autosport stable. Repeated contact, mistakes or heavy traffic blighted the day for all three of his teammates, as they finished between 11th and 15th.

After a race filled with his own tussles, Paul Tracy upheld Canadian honors, taking sixth for KV Racing. In either a sign of the team's fortunes turning around, or of an impending apocalypse, KV Racing's entries finished sixth through ninth, with the normally crash happy trio of Moraes (seventh), Viso (eighth) and Sato making it to the finish. But the impressive 6-7-8-9 by KV wasn't accomplished without some contact along the way.

HVM Racing's Simona De Silvestro looked set for her best finish of the season until Viso intervened, and despite his drive-through penalty, the Venezuelan driver managed to recover to finish ahead of teammate Sato. De Silvestro would cause the final yellow flag after running out of fuel, settling for 22nd after running between sixth and seventh early in the contest.

Alex Tagliani will hope to soon forget the painful two-race stint in his native country. Both races ended with Tag in the wall, with Mario Romancini an innocent victim this time around. Tag's dancing partner at Toronto, Tomas Scheckter, finished 19th. His teammate, Justin Wilson, had his day ruined by his own mechanical issues thanks to a broken damper, finishing 23rd. Panther Racing's Dan Wheldon suffered the same damper-related issue, taking 20th.

You can be assured that questions as to whether Barnhart made the right or wrong call will be a hotly debated topic for the next week, but in a twist on the controversial finish to the 2002 Indy 500 -- a race that was also overseen by Barnhart -- this time, Castroneves and Team Penske came out on the wrong end of the decision.

I'm willing to bet a call was placed between Paul Tracy and Barry Green Sunday night, where a lot of laughing and snickering took place...

Results Sunday of the Honda Indy Edmonton IZOD IndyCar Series event on the 1.973 mile Edmonton Airport Circuit, with order of finish, starting position in parentheses, driver, chassis-engine, laps completed and reason out (if any):

1. (3) Scott Dixon, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
2. (1) Will Power, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
3. (4) Dario Franchitti, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
4. (5) Ryan Briscoe, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
5. (8) Ryan Hunter-Reay, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
6. (15) Paul Tracy, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
7. (14) Mario Moraes, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
8. (6) EJ Viso, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
9. (13) Takuma Sato, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
10. (2) Helio Castroneves, Dallara-Honda, 95, Running
11. (16) Marco Andretti, Dallara-Honda, 94, Running
12. (24) Tony Kanaan, Dallara-Honda, 94, Running
13. (10) Raphael Matos, Dallara-Honda, 94, Running
14. (20) Bertrand Baguette, Dallara-Honda, 94, Running
15. (21) Danica Patrick, Dallara-Honda, 94, Running
16. (23) Vitor Meira, Dallara-Honda, 93, Running
17. (11) Hideki Mutoh, Dallara-Honda, 93, Running
18. (18) Alex Lloyd, Dallara-Honda, 92, Running
19. (12) Tomas Scheckter, Dallara-Honda, 90, Running
20. (22) Dan Wheldon, Dallara-Honda, 90, Running
21. (9) Justin Wilson, Dallara-Honda, 88, Running
22. (7) Simona de Silvestro, Dallara-Honda, 87, Out of Fuel
23. (19) Alex Tagliani, Dallara-Honda, 52, Contact
24. (17) Mario Romancini, Dallara-Honda, 52, Contact
25. (25) Milka Duno, Dallara-Honda, 4, Handling


Race Statistics
Time of Race: 01:50:37.0551
Winners average speed: 101.666
Margin of Victory: 2.6688 seconds
Cautions: 4 for 10 laps
Lead changes: 4 among 3 drivers
Lap Leaders: Power 1 - 34, Dixon 35, Power 36-77. Castroneves 78-94, Dixon 95.
Point Standings: Power 420, Franchitti 370, Dixon 349, Briscoe 324, Hunter-Reay 316, Castroneves 305, Kanaan 291, Wilson 252, Andretti 244, Wheldon 243.

(The video below, including Brian Barnhart's instructions during the driver's meeting, was posted a few hours after the race. After watching it, take the new poll we've added.)












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