Ganassi’s Dario Franchitti won his third IndyCar championship in four years starting the race in 8th position only in the season’ finale at Homestead Miami Speedway. Series leader Will Power (Penske) was forced to abandon the race after damaging his suspension.
Even though the Scot led most of the race and finally won the crown, it was his teammate Scott Dixon who won the race. Right from the start, the Ganassi teammates took control of things when polesitter Franchitti and Dixon settled in first and second place until lap 33 when Andretti Autosport's Tony Kanaan worked his way into contention and managed to split the duo. Meanwhile Power had fallen as low as ninth in the first stint but picked up pace in the second half, coming back to fourth behind Franchitti, Kanaan and Dixon, and ahead of the other two Penske drivers. But that was not going to be enough for the championship, especially once Franchitti had clinched the two bonus points for leading the most laps. And then came the terminal blow to Power's title hopes, when he understeered into the Turn 4 wall on lap 134. Six laps were lost on repairs, and Power was soon back in again, not convinced that all the damage had been resolved. He eventually climbed from the car, and could only watch from the sidelines. After the last restart Dixon broke clear, disappearing up the road to claim victory while Kanaan suddenly had his hands full fending off teammate Danica Patrick. As Dixon went on to win by 2.7 seconds, Patrick finally muscled her way past Kanaan with a lap to go, holding on to clinch the runner-up spot by 0.0111s. Briscoe lost his chance of victory by pitting just before the yellow for Power's incident, but recovered to fourth ahead of teammate Castroneves. IRL Homestead Season Final Results Pos Driver Team Time/Gap 1. Scott Dixon Ganassi 1h52m08.5580s 2. Danica Patrick Andretti + 2.7587s 3. Tony Kanaan Andretti + 2.7698s 4. Ryan Briscoe Penske + 3.7827s 5. Helio Castroneves Penske + 5.3324s 6. Vitor Meira Foyt + 7.2126s 7. Marco Andretti Andretti + 8.3637s 8. Dario Franchitti Ganassi + 11.1401s 9. Dan Wheldon Panther + 22.2521s 10. Graham Rahal Newman/Haas + 1 lap 11. Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti + 1 lap 12. Alex Lloyd Dale Coyne + 1 lap 13. Ed Carpenter Panther/Vision + 1 lap 14. Alex Tagliani FAZZT + 1 lap 15. Bertrand Baguette Conquest + 1 lap 16. Sebastian Saavedra Conquest + 1 lap 17. Raphael Matos De Ferran Dragon + 1 lap 18. Takuma Sato KV + 1 lap 19. EJ Viso KV + 2 laps 20. Hideki Mutoh Newman/Haas + 2 laps 21. Justin Wilson Dreyer & Reinbold + 2 laps 22. Sarah Fisher Sarah Fisher + 3 laps 23. Simona de Silvestro HVM + 3 laps Retirements: Milka Duno Dale Coyne 170 laps Will Power Penske 143 laps Ana Beatriz Dreyer & Reinbold 42 laps Mario Moraes KV 25 laps
Recent Articles
|
Racing Multimedia
Recommendations |