The Cooldown Lap: Indy Grand Prix of Alabama

(Ed's note: This feature used to be called "Morning After," but due to events out of my control, I couldn't exactly get it out in time yesterday. As such, instead of taking responsibility, I will simply change the name of the column to "The Cooldown Lap" and give myself two days from now on. I love being my own boss.)

A collection of thoughts sparked by Sunday's Indy Grand Prix of Alabama:

GOOD TO SEE: Marco Andretti contend for a victory. The series needs some strong American drivers, and with Ryan Hunter-Reay looking for sponsorship to run full-time, Graham Rahal looking for a job, and Danica Patrick suffering from Dale Earnhardt Jr. Syndrome, it looks like the youngest Andretti may have to be the one to step up. He hasn't been the same since that Indy 500 flip, that's for sure, but he's gotten more consistent over the years.

DISAPPOINTED NOT TO SEE: More variation in the top six. Besides Andretti, who fell to fifth after pitting, the rest of the top six cars were all owned by Chip Ganassi or Roger Penske. We're reverting to the domination of years past. That's bad.

BIGGEST SURPRISE: Did Mike Conway really beat Will Power out of the pits at one point? Kudos to Dreyer & Reinbold Racing for that. They've taken some quantum leaps forward this year. Honorable mentions: No cars crashing out of the race, Marco's lap 15 pass on Helio, pit strategy screwing Will Power as much as it did.

LEAST SHOCKING: Takuma Sato finishing last. To be fair, though, this time he didn't have an accident, and that's a start. One of these days he'll start getting the hang of it. Honorable mentions: The "Park Milka" trend on Twitter, almost no passing, Danica Patrick at the back of the pack.

THE SIMONA REPORT: After being featured in an IndyCar video on YouTube that showed her drawing the track blindfolded, Simona de Silvestro finished 21st at Barber after being spun with five laps to go. She now ranks 20th in points. For the record, Simona's blindfold trick is cool but not totally unique - if you've ever watched DTM broadcasts on the Speed Channel, often times they will show a driver in the series analyzing the track with a blindfold. To her credit, though, Simona's one of the most accurate I've ever seen.

NEXT YEAR'S RACE: ...needs to feature a lot more passing, especially up front. I don't care how beautiful Barber Motorsports Park is - I think we've all gotten over that. We don't want a Formula 1 event every year.

IndyCar Race Review: Indy Grand Prix of Alabama

Helio Castroneves took the checkers in the inaugural Indy Grand Prix of Alabama, for his first IZOD IndyCar Series win in 14 starts. It was Castroneves' 15th career IZOD IndyCar Series victory and 21st overall in American open-wheel racing. It was also the third consecutive win for Team Penske, which scored the other two with teammate Will Power.

Helio's first win of the year was never a certainty, however, as he did not hold the lead until late in the race. In fact, Marco Andretti held the point for the majority of the event, and Power, strong as his car was, led in the early stages.

Power and Mike Conway started on the front row. The start was clean, save for Scott Dixon's early jump, as was much of the race. Drivers found the new racetrack to have very few passing zones, and only the most daring were able to perform solid overtakes.

As such, many felt that an alternate pit strategy could help facilitate a solid run. Many drivers were banking on a race with a lot of long green flag runs, setting up whoever had enough fuel to go to the end to take victory. Drivers who decided to pit early included Alex Tagliani and Dan Wheldon.

In another stroke of bad luck for Takuma Sato, his car lost power early in the race. The KV Racing Technology crew managed to get him going again, however, and returned him to the race 21 laps down. Sato lost another lap before the finish, but at least salvaged a race with the car completely intact.

Sato was the only driver to finish more than four laps down, however. In fact, nobody crashed out of the event, though Milka Duno and Hideki Mutoh found themselves involved in off-track excursions, and Simona de Silvestro was turned around late in the race.

Under the Sato caution, Power, Conway, and many of the other leaders pit, facilitating a changing of the guard at the front of the field. The two pit again on lap 42, with Conway taking on the red alternate tires and beating Power out of the pits. Their pit strategy, however, got them caught behind a lot of cars for much of the race, and neither were really factors in the finish.

Marco Andretti took the lead after a daring move on Helio Castroneves and held on for an extended period of time. The triumvirate of Andretti, Castroneves, and Scott Dixon maintained their positions for a while, turning the race into a Formula 1-esque parade. Dario Franchitti settled in fourth, while Power pushed his way up to fifth. It appeared that Andretti could win his first race since 2006, as he was in the lead for a race-high 58 out of 90 laps.

But Andretti had to pit with eight laps to go, falling to fifth and handing the lead to Helio as Dixon attempted to cut the interval. But the lapped car of Rafa Matos appeared to impede Dixon's progress, until de Silvestro's spin and subsequent full-course caution with five laps to go bunched the field again.

Castroneves and Dixon broke away from the pack on the restart, but the Iceman was unable to catch the Spiderman.

Penske and Ganassi domination, while uncertain early on, ended up ruling the day, as Andretti was the only driver outside the top six not to drive for the series' top two teams. Andretti Autosport and Dreyer & Reinbold Racing each had two cars in the top 10, while the 10th and final spot was filled by Tagliani and the young but formidable FAZZT Race Team.

Power maintains his points lead, with 136 points, and a 32 marker advantage over teammate Castroneves. Franchitti is third with 94, Justin Wilson holds fourth with 85, and Dixon is fifth with 80.

Next weekend, the series heads to southern California for the prestigious Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. Power won the event in 2008, the final time it was held under Champ Car regulations. Last year, he finished second to Franchitti.

Twittography: Indy Grand Prix of Alabama

Here are some of the photos taken by IndyCar drivers and teams and posted to Twitter during race day at the Indy Grand Prix of Alabama.

Plowey - New helmet for the weekend
AJFoytRacing - Vitor Meira signing autographs
Plowey - Lunch
IndyCarNation - Hello, beautiful
SarahFisher67 - Graham Rahal signing autographs
IndyCarNation - Liza Markle and Davey Hamilton in the pace car
ssaavedra29 - Helmet techs
IndyCarNation - Pace cars on track
DRRIndyCar - Mike Conway and Justin Wilson talking to VIPs in the paddock
FollowAndretti - Indy Lights driver intros
IndyCarNation - Charles Barkley in the KV Racing Technology garage
FollowAndretti - Martin Plowman's Lights car
FollowAndretti - Tony Kanaan and Michael Andretti monitoring the Lights race
RyanBriscoe6 - Meet Charles Barkley
IndyCarNation - Bertrand Baguette
AJFoytRacing - Vitor interview
IndyCarNation - Backstage at driver intros
NicoleMBriscoe - Nicole's in the pits with the Team Penske boys
curtcavin - Dario's car
curtcavin - Team Penske
IndyCarNation - Above the track
IndyCarNation - Look at all these race fans!
IndyCarNation - Helio in the winner's circle
IndyCarNation - The podium
IndyCarNation - The winning Penske crew

IndyCar Race Preview: Indy Grand Prix of Alabama

Round three of the 2010 IZOD IndyCar Series season takes us to the beautiful Barber Motorsports Park, site of IndyCar preseason testing and the Indy Grand Prix of Alabama. The series hasn't actually raced here before, so all we have to go off of in picking the race is those preseason testing results, momentum from the season's first two races, and this weekend's practice and qualifying charts.

They all scream one name: Will Power.

The Aussie has paced the field all year, with no sign of stopping now. Power has a chance to become the first driver to win the first three races of an open-wheel season under Indy Racing League sanctioning if he can win from the pole at Barber. The last time anybody achieved such a feat in another series came in 2006, when Sebastien Bourdais did it in Champ Car.

But despite our throwing our hands up in the air and conceding the win to Power before the race even starts, plenty of other drivers and teams in the field will have a say in the finish. In Firestone Fast Six qualifying, five teams were represented (Team Penske being the only one with two cars in the top six). Among the biggest surprises was Mike Conway, one of last year's backmarkers, who earned his first career front row start. He was among the top five in every qualifying session in which he took part, and had the fifth fastest time in warm up.

Another driver looking to surprise will be Takuma Sato, starting sixth. Sato was generally fast during preseason testing, and kept his car towards the front of the pack in qualifying. Sato was second in his group in the first session and fifth in the second session.

There are five rookies in the field, with Sato the highest-qualifying of them all. The lowest will be Bertrand Baguette, starting last due to his time being the slowest in his initial qualifying group. Baguette, however, contributes to one of the tightest IndyCar fields in years, as his lap is only about 1.3 seconds off of Conway's lap in P2. (Power, of course, is half a second faster than everybody.)

In Firestone Indy Lights, don't be surprised if J.K. Vernay wins his second consecutive race in two career starts. Vernay, who won in his debut two weeks ago at St. Petersburg, scored the pole position at Barber as well.

Carpenter, Vision Return At Indianapolis

After shuttering operations earlier this year due to lack of sponsorship, Tony George's Vision Racing team will make a triumphant return to the track at the Indianapolis 500, again with driver Ed Carpenter at the wheel of its No. 20 Dallara-Honda.

Carpenter and Vision will work with Panther Racing as a teammate to Dan Wheldon. According to the Vision Racing Twitter account, the cars will be provided by Vision, while the crew and engineering will be handled by Panther. So far, no sponsors have been announced for the effort.

This means that 34 cars have submitted entry blanks for the race, and we're not even halfway through April. Seeing as plenty of last-minute deals usually come together over the course of the month, this year's may be the largest Indianapolis 500 field in years.

As for Carpenter and Vision, it will be their latest and greatest chance to finally make it to Victory Lane. Carpenter will, if he qualifies, make his 100th career IZOD IndyCar Series start. His best career finish is second, at Kentucky last year, which helped propel him to a career-best 12th place finish in points. Ovals have always been his forte, especially Indianapolis, where he finished 5th in 2008 and has four finishes of 11th or better in the last five years.

Joining forces with Panther was about the best move that Vision could make, as Panther's cars have finished second in the prestigious event in each of the past two years. This will be the fourth consecutive year that the team has expanded for the month of May, although the second car did not appear on track in 2008. Last year, the second car was driven by Scott Sharp, the 1996 IndyCar co-champion, who finished 14th.

It will also return George to the track that he ran throughout most of the past two decades. George's contributions to the speedway were immense; while the race lost prestige for a few years as top open-wheel teams preferred to stay in CART, he did raise the American open-wheel driver count exponentially, and brought NASCAR, Formula 1, and IROC to the fabled course. While only NASCAR remains, the Brickyard 400 is considered one of the sport's crown jewels.

Indianapolis 500 practice opens May 15 with rookie orientation. The field will be set on the weekend of May 22-23, and the race itself taked place on May 30.

Where Are They Now? Champ Car World Series

Three years ago tomorrow, the Champ Car World Series commenced its final season on the streets of Las Vegas. It was the first in a planned 17-race schedule, though three races were eventually cancelled, and was won by a young Australian driver by the name of Will Power.

It was Power's first career win in major American open-wheel racing, and it foreshadowed his successes to come, taking victories in open-wheel in every season since. It seems fitting now, as Power dominates the early stages of the 2010 IZOD IndyCar Series, to take a look back at that last season of Champ Car, its participants, and its races, in memory of the "other" form of American open-wheel.

The opener at Vegas heralded a new era for the series: new cars, new teams, new drivers, a new track, and a new TV contract. Power's domination also made it look like a new face would run up front, replacing the old guard, three-time defending champion Sebastien Bourdais. Bourdais had a difficult weekend, qualifying 16th of 17 and failing to complete the final 38 laps.

Of course, however, Bourdais proved that Vegas was simply an aberration by winning the next three races, eight of the season's 14 events, and the championship by 83 points over Justin Wilson. Bourdais parlayed that success into a Formula 1 ride, but a season and a half of poor luck and being outperformed by his teammates led to his dismissal.

Bourdais moved on to the Superleague Formula, a European racing series sponsored by soccer clubs that uses a chassis descended from the Champ Car Panoz DP01. There, too, he has seen success, winning one race in each of his first two events, and returning for the full 2010 season.

Indeed, Superleague Formula has proven a refuge for multiple former Champ Car competitors. Tristan Gommendy found a home there after Champ Car's 2008 demise and has never looked back, winning events in each of the past two seasons. But a stronger competitor in the 2007 championship than Gommendy has also made his place in the young division.

Robert Doornbos won Champ Car's Rookie of the Year award in 2007 after winning twice and finishing third in points. "Bobby D," as he is known, was unable to find an IndyCar ride in 2008 when Minardi pulled out of the merged series. He went to Superleague, winning two events and finishing third in points. Last year, he bounced between Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing and HVM Racing, two former Champ Car teams, and had a miserable season, before watching his sponsorship money fall through for 2010. With no other option, Doornbos will compete against Bourdais again in Superleague this year.

Some drivers have made their way into sports car racing, instead of carrying on in the open-wheel ranks. Among them are eighth-place Simon Pagenaud, who competes in the American Le Mans Series; ninth-place Neel Jani, who concentrates on the 24 Hours of Le Mans; and 21st-place Matt Halliday, now racing in the Porsche Supercup. Perhaps the biggest sports-car triumph of an ex-Champ Car driver came this January, however, when Scot Ryan Dalziel was a part of the team that won the prestigious 24 Hours of Daytona.

Katherine Legge, the series' lone female driver, took a similar route by switching her focus to the DTM, Germany's premier touring car championship. There, however, she has languished in the back, with 10 DNFs in 21 starts and a best career finish of 12th, twice.

For a sad majority of ex-Champ Car drivers, however, open-wheel racing in North America remains their goal. With only so many seats to go around, some prominent names are left on the sidelines for the majority of races. Former stars like Bruno Junqueira and Paul Tracy only have rides lined up for the Indianapolis 500 thus far. Oriol Servia and Dan Clarke are out of work entirely.

The biggest travesty of all befell Graham Rahal, who finished eighth in IndyCar points last year but lost a lucrative sponsorship deal with McDonald's. He now runs a limited schedule with Sarah Fisher Racing, with the intent of assembling a full-season deal somewhere to give him a shot at contending for the title. It really says something about the state of the sport in North America when its top American driver not named Danica Patrick can't find a full-time job.

As for the drivers who can count themselves among the employed, however, they're currently running very well. Both Justin WIlson, the 2007 Champ Car runner-up, and Alex Tagliani, who placed tenth, have shown teeth in the first two races of the season. Wilson has won an IndyCar race in each of the past two years, and Tagliani nearly won last year's Toronto race. Jan Heylen currently competes in the Firestone Indy Lights Series and finished in second in the season opener at St. Petersburg.

Power, of course, leads the pack. His story is well-known by now: drafted in by Team Penske last year as a temporary replacement for Helio Castroneves, and given a limited ride after the Brazilian's return, performing excellently in every race. Then, a practice crash at Sonoma sidelined him for the rest of the year with a back injury. He rehabilitated in the offseason, vowing to come back stronger than ever, and thus far the results have been phenomenal.

Of the ex-Champ Car teams now running in IndyCar, many have taken on pay drivers to survive. Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing, Rahal's old team, is one of them, now running Honda-backed Hideki Mutoh. Dale Coyne Racing campaigns the underwhelming Milka Duno. The team in the best shape is KV Racing Technology, which now runs three cars and has backing from the powerful Lotus Cars brand.

Conquest Racing and HVM Racing are the teams that best retain the spirit of the old Champ Car World Series, by bringing European talent over to America and giving them a shot. Mario Romancini and Bertrand Baguette, Conquest's two rookie drivers, competed against one another in the European Formula Renault 3.5 series in 2008. Last year, Romancini ran Indy Lights, winning races, and Baguette won the Formula Renault title.

HVM also has a rookie driver, Swiss standout Simona de Silvestro, who may prove to be the final graduate of the Atlantic Championship, Champ Car's old feeder series, which shut down earlier this year. Last year, she won four of the series' 12 races and nearly took the championship after leading in points for much of the year. De Silvestro led laps in her IndyCar debut in Brazil and is looked at by many as a serious Rookie of the Year threat.

Of the other four teams to compete in Champ Car in 2007, two - Forsythe Racing and Pacific Coast Motorsports - no longer actively campaign cars in any series. Walker Racing currently runs Indy Lights with Jonathan Summerton, and RSports - now known as Jaguar RSR - campaigns a Jaguar XKR GT2 in various endurance races worldwide. Dalziel, in fact, was one of its drivers in this year's 12 Hours of Sebring.

The diaspora of the old Champ Car World Series is extensive, with many of the former parties unlikely to ever compete against one another again. But its final season provided open-wheel fans with plenty of memories, including those of a fantastic racecar, the early success of some future IndyCar stars, and one of the most dominating season-long performances in open-wheel history by Bourdais. While the infrastructure may be gone, the memories still remain for a small legion of devoted fans.

Andretti Pacifies Retirement; Indianapolis Looming, Future Of Open-wheel Looks Strong

Today's news out of the paddock is that Mario Andretti, now 70 years old, will return to open-wheel racing for a one-shot deal at this year's Indianapolis 500 with Andretti Autosport. The race will mark his first IZOD IndyCar Series start, and his first major professional open-wheel race of any kind since 1994.

He last tested an IndyCar in 2003, flipping end over end in a run at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and retired from the sport then and there. But after so many years out of the cockpit, the itch returned, and he successfully petitioned son Michael for another chance at Indianapolis victory.

In 29 Indianapolis 500 starts, Andretti won only once, in 1969. He nearly won the 1981 race on a technicality, after a penalty to race winner Bobby Unser briefly gave Andretti the honors, but the penalty was overturned four months later. Andretti was notorious for having no luck at the speedway, as everything from crashes to mechanical failure contributed to the coining of the term "Andretti Curse."

Sponsoring the car will be longtime Andretti backers Firestone. The car will carry the number 70.

"I still feel like I have some unfinished business at the speedway," Andretti told reporters. "I had so much bad luck there in the past. And I've always wanted to see how I stack up against my grandson, and how these new cars handle versus the older vehicles that I won my championships in."

"Sure, I'm nervous for him," son and team owner Michael Andretti told the news media. "But I know this is what he wants to do. He's always wanted to race against Marco, and I know he wants to see if he's still got it."

Andretti couldn't have picked a better time to return to the sport.

Just a day ago, his nephew, John, announced that he would also join Andretti Autosport for races at Kansas and Indianapolis. That announcement put two Andrettis in the Indianapolis field, and helped pique Mario's interest. When Michael decided against un-retiring himself, Andretti made a couple of quick phone calls to secure Firestone backing, and in the span of a few hours, the deal was set.

Open-wheel racing in America has been suffering as of late anyway, with many top American drivers failing to land rides. Teams have been eschewing these popular and talented, but sponsorless, drivers for drivers from Brazil and Venezuela that bring their own sponsorship to the teams.

KV Racing Technology owner Jimmy Vasser had nothing but good things to say about Andretti's return. "What can I say? Mario Andretti is open-wheel racing in America. He's done everything there is to do for the sport, and then some. It's even more special for me to see him return to the track, as our new sponsor Lotus was behind him when he won his Formula 1 title in 1978. I look forward to competing against him at Indy. Heck, I might even have to un-retire myself!"

Even in a less prominent open-wheel environment than America saw during his heyday, the return of Mario Andretti to the Indianapolis 500 will be sure to turn heads during the month of may. Sure enough, he will be everybody's sentimental favorite to win this year's running.

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Read the first letters of each word in the title and of each paragraph. Have a fun day!