Last Sunday's thrilling three-wide finish to the Argent Mortgage Indy 300 was
not only the second closest three-way finish in IRL IndyCar Series history, it
also marked the 50th time in just 111 IRL races that the winning margin had been
decided by less than a second.
source: crash.net Tony Kanaan's victory over Dan Wheldon was by 0.0120 of a second, the sixth-closest finish in series history with Vitor Meira third, just 0.0242 of a second behind Kanaan. The margin from first to third was the second closest 1-2-3 finish in the series' history. "I knew that oval racing had the potential to showcase the most exciting racing, from the spectator standpoint, and I knew that NASCAR had a reputation for close racing. But in our young history we may be redeveloping the standard by which close motorsports competition is measured," IRL founder Tony George said earlier this year. "To the credit of our technical team, they have done a good job of developing specifications and writing rules that, for the most part over the last eight years, has led to the parity on the race track that in turn has produced the close finishes." When it comes to winning nail-biting races, no driver has had more success than double IndyCar Series champion Sam Hornish Jr. Hornish has won five of the 10 closest finishes in IndyCar Series history, including three of the four closest finishes. Hornish defeated Al Unser Jr. in 2002 at Chicago by 0.0024 of a second, the closest finish in history. The week after Chicago, Hornish defeated Helio Castroneves by 0.0096 of a second at Texas Motor Speedway in the third-closest finish in history.
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