INDYCAR: Toronto Delivers Three In A Row For RHR, Chevy

IndyCar

INDYCAR: Toronto Delivers Three In A Row For RHR, Chevy

Ryan Hunter-Reay and Chevy made it three race wins in a row, taking an improbable victory at Toronto after Franchitti, Power and Dixon had forgettable days.

Marshall Pruett | Posted July 08, 2012

The season started with Team Penske placing a stranglehold on Victory Lane and the points table, but one driver has managed to rip the championship lead from their hands and steal the momentum that made Will Power look like a sure thing just two months ago.

Andretti Autosport's Ryan Hunter-Reay not only took his third consecutive win on Sunday in Toronto, but also streaked out to a 34-point lead in the quest for the 2012 IZOD IndyCar Series title.

Taking nothing away from RHR's flawless performance, his path to the checkered flag was eased when a miscue in the pits dropped pole-sitter Dario Franchitti to the back, a flat tire and broken wing took Will Power out of contention, a blown engine for Scott Dixon cleared the three fastest drivers from the lead pack.

After moving to first place on Lap 49 of the 85-lap event, the American was the class of the field, motoring out to a seven-second lead before a late yellow ended the event under caution.

"We saved the tires and gapped them at the end," he said. "Three in a row. I don’t even know what to think about this. It shows that this team can get it done on all venues. It’s a great group to work with. This is a special one for sure. I’ve got to take this in. This is where I’ve been for three years now and everything’s clicking.”

The Andretti Autosport also wished nothing but good fortunes for one of his rivals in qualifying at the remaining rounds.

"It's very important, because every time I've won, Dario [Franchitti] has been on the pole," he said with a big smile. "I hope he gets a lot of poles this year."

Behind RHR, Ganassi Racing's Charlie Kimball had the finest day of his career, charging hard throughout the race on the way to earning second.

"It feels like it’s starting to become pretty familiar," Kimball said of his comfort as a second-year IndyCar driver. "Now that I’m here, it’s a pretty big deal. The car was great all day. All I had to do was turn the wheel and press the pedals."

Showing visible confidence behind the wheel, Kimball displayed a blend of smarts and aggression as he used fresh tires to his advantage on Sunday.

"From the start we had a really good car, making spots up," he said. "I think we put ourselves in a good position setup-wise and strategy-wise. Qualifying I missed the top six by like a 10th, so we had a couple extra sets of tires to play with. That came into play towards the end of the race."

He also completed a 1-2 for American drivers for the second time in a span of two races.

A.J. Foyt Racing's Mike Conway finally put an end to a horrible season with help from his pit crew take third.

"It was a good day," said Conway, who made time in the pits and under braking. "We started out kind of hanging in there. I could see the other guys were going off around me. Kind of hung in there, was picking off people. The car was really strong down into turn three. I could pretty much pass everybody without using the 'push to pass' too much."

Tony Kanaan's run to fourth was typical fare for the Brazilian veteran. If qualifying 18th wasn't bad enough, the KV racing driver lost all of the positions he gained when he struck a tire exiting the pits during his first stop and was assessed a drive-through penalty.

Thanks to an alternate fuel strategy--one that saw Kanaan, Hunter-Reay, Pagenaud and Briscoe, among others--pit during the first 22 laps, TK was able to overcome the penalty when the running order was shuffled as the leaders pitted. His final stop came a bit too early and required heavy amount of fuel-saving efforts. Despite being passed repeatedly towards the end, it all came back to Kanaan with attrition in the last three laps.

“I had to work a lot," said a somewhat pleased Kanaan. "I disagree with the [drive-through] call, but after that, same story. Front to the back, back to the front.”

The result marked TK's fifth top 5 of the season.

Oriol Servia, 2012's most pass-happy driver, came from nowhere to claim fifth. Qualifying 16th, the Spaniard didn't factor among the leaders, but capitalized on the opportunities in front of him to salvage his fourth top 5 since the Indy 500.

“I’m just happy for the team," said the Panther DRR driver. "I had to use my patience because I was getting frustrated with some of the guys. They took themselves out and I finished fifth. Not bad."

Beyond Hunter-Reay achieving a Hat Trick, the biggest news to come from the race involved misfortune for the early leaders and the general lack of crashes and mayhem.

Franchitti led away from the start, but with his handling still off after struggling in the pre-race warmup session, Power took the lead on Lap 5 and never looked back. Franchitti's teammate, Scott Dixon, suffered a major engine detonation three laps later, leaving Justin Wilson, Sebastien Bourdais and RHR in the hunt, albeit from a decent gap behind.

Bourdais took third from Wilson, whose car began to oversteer badly, and those five held station until RHR dove into the pits from fifth on Lap 22. Graham Rahal locked up his brakes on the bumps in Turn 1 the following lap, which brought out the first caution of the day.

Franchitti's chances ended when he was stopped too far from the wall when the pits opened on Lap 26. Unable to connect the fuel probe, he fell to 20th while the team jacked the back of his car over and then had to wait on a full load of fuel after most of the other cars had returned to the track.

Wilson's initial undoing came with a slow pit stop when his car was dropped before all the wheels were tightened. His weekend, which started off badly when he struck three crew members in the opening practice session, ended when his Honda-powered car experienced an overboost condition entering the straight, and with the sudden acceleration swinging the back of his car out into the marble, contact with the right rear corner would put an end to his day.

Power looked set for his fourth win of the year until being caught out by the early pit strategy that played to RHR's favor when the yellow for Rahal came out. The Aussie then put the finishing touches on his hopes by hitting the back of Josef Newgarden's car. The resulting broken front wing and punctured tire left Power in 15th.

"The broken wing…I just touched the back of [Newgarden's rear wheel] pod," he said. "These things are so weak. We had the quickest car in town today. There’s not much more to say. I should have known. You can’t touch the front wing on anything."

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Simon Pagenaud led 22 laps, but had to save fuel and duck into the pits for a splash of E85 to make it to the finish. Before that final stop, Pagenaud's on-track conduct drew the ire of INDYCAR for what they deemed as blocking when Josef Newgarden attempted to pass the Frenchman for third in Turn 3 on Lap 78. Running long into the braking zone, Newgarden stalled as he avoided hitting the tire barrier. Stranded, the yellow flag flew to get him going again, setting up a mad dash on the Lap 82 restart.

Pagenaud would have 30 seconds tacked on to his race by the series for his maneuver on Newgarden.

“I don’t know if I should be happy or mad," he said. "Strategy didn’t pay off for us. I don’t really understand why I got penalized at the end there.”

Bourdais looked like a podium was on order for the Dragon Racing team after recovering from the same wish-we'd-pitted-when-RHR-did strategy error Power suffered from, and with a run on Kimball on the restart, chased RHR to Turn 1, ending up in second, but far to driver's left. Kimball, seeing an opening on the inside at the apex, went to fill the space with his car, but took a shot in the right rear from Conway, which knocked him into Bourdais.

Bourdais was the only one to pay for the Conway/Kimball contact, ending his impressive run against the wall.

After the race, the four-time Champ Car champion offered a blunt assessment of the scenario.

"I passed Kimball and he just puts me in the wall," he said. "It’s like he shouldn’t be standing on that podium; he doesn’t deserve it.”

Kimball's take was somewhat different on how things went down.

"He made the move," he said of Bourdais. "When we got to the apex, he made contact with my side pod. Because I'd been forced to go through the marbles, I slid out, and Sebastien on the outside wasn't even wheel-to-wheel. It was to the point where he was starting to fall back behind me. I thought he was backing out of the move to set up for turn three."

Bourdais would be credited with 14th.

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