Opinion: Andretti Going Out on a Limb for 2011 and Beyond

Ryan Hunter-Reay chose to break the news on Twitter.

"Thanks to all of you! Very happy to continue with a great team. Lots of work to do now, we're up for it," Hunter-Reay tweeted to his nearly 10,000 followers, after signing a two-year deal to remain in the IZOD IndyCar Series with Andretti Autosport, the team that picked him up at the beginning of this season.

Hunter-Reay will look to improve on a 2010 season that saw a victory in the prestigious Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach and a career-best seventh place points finish. To that end, he will spend time testing at Barber Motorsports Park for the next couple of days. "Testing in October is a first for me," he joked, referring to his longtime career path of signing one-year contracts just before the season's start.

But as Andretti retains one of its top two drivers from the previous season, the other one says farewell. After eight years spent driving the No. 11 7-Eleven Dallara-Honda, Tony Kanaan will say goodbye to the team. Kanaan leaves behind a record of 14 wins, over 100 top-10s, and the 2004 IndyCar championship.

Kanaan was, for the past few years, the undisputed leader of the four-car Andretti brigade, at least as far as seniority was concerned. His help with car setups proved immensely valuable to his teammates, and he is perhaps the best mid-pack starter in the sport, frequently passing half a dozen cars on the first lap after subpar qualifying runs.

This year, however, was an unpleasant one to say the least for the Andretti brigade. After a winless 2009 season, an offseason restructuring was designed to strengthen Andretti's racing operations. The team scored two wins, but as had happened for the past few years, driver infighting threatened to tear the team apart.

The Andretti dream team of 2005 they were not. Kanaan, Marco Andretti, and Danica Patrick once again proved that they were an unstable combination prone to feuding on the track and off. Kanaan's frustrations with Patrick - and vice versa - were well-documented all season. Only Hunter-Reay really managed to keep out of the mess and go about his business while maintaining solid relationships with all of his teammates.

That's why he's back for 2011 and beyond. Unfortunately for Kanaan, he became a victim of the money in racing. Despite being the bottom two performers on the Andretti team, Patrick and Andretti have two of the biggest sponsorship contracts in the sport tied to them.

Hunter-Reay, like Kanaan, went into the offseason with no sponsorship, with both of their 2010 primary backers shifting their marketing dollars to Patrick's car, allowing them greater exposure at a lower price. But at a similar level of performance and assumedly a much lower price, Hunter-Reay was easier to retain.

Therefore, it was easy to figure out whose $3 million contract was going to be terminated.

Now Kanaan becomes the most coveted open-wheel free agent in years. Just about every mid-level team in the sport is looking at him with designs on how he can take him to the next level. Kanaan is a warrior that knows how to set up a racecar, weave through traffic, and take a car to the end. Plenty of teams would love to have him to mentor their young drivers.

He'll be in IndyCar in 2011, undoubtedly. KV Racing Technology has two fully-sponsored seats open for next year, carrying the Lotus backing, and after this season's crashfest, owner Jimmy Vasser would certainly love to have a driver that doesn't tear up equipment in one of his cars. Brazilian countryman and Kanaan's former CART rival Gil de Ferran, who leads de Ferran Dragon Motorsports, would love to have Kanaan to mentor another young Brazilian, Raphael Matos, who could really use a teammate. The possibilities go on and on.

The real question is, what will Andretti do without a bona fide lead driver?

Let me rephrase. Performance-wise, Hunter-Reay is lead driver-caliber. He's a proven race winner and will be a championship contender for years to come. But he doesn't quite fit the leader role the way that Kanaan does, in that he's not at the stage of his career where other Andretti drivers are going to look up to him as their mentor. He's been at Andretti the shortest amount of time, for one, and he's also only been in IndyCar about as long as his teammates.

But Andretti doesn't look likely to find a replacement for Kanaan in the fourth car. There is no setup driver anymore. There's one championship-caliber race car driver and two decent drivers that have less than stellar reputations with the IndyCar faithful. Marco still gets criticized from time to time about his level of commitment to the sport. Danica gets it no matter where she turns, especially with her NASCAR experimentation.

Simply put, team owner Michael Andretti has a lot of guts going with the team he has right now for 2011 and beyond.

Perhaps it won't matter. Perhaps with less infighting, the entire team will take its performance up a notch. Kanaan was a different breed of driver than Patrick and Andretti. He was undoubtedly the best driver, statistically speaking, on the team. But he had different expectations and needs than everybody else. Not that those needs were any better or worse intrinsically than those of his teammates, they just didn't mesh.

And perhaps, as the undisputed leader on another team, Kanaan will take somebody else to the upper echelons of the sport, or at least a top-10 spot in the final standings. Maybe Raphael Matos, Mike Conway, or some other up-and-comer will benefit far more from Kanaan's advice and leadership. Maybe they'll be more patient and easier to work with than Patrick and Andretti were.

It's always sad when any sort of long-term relationship ends. But maybe, just this once, things will work out better for both sides. Maybe the current Andretti trio will mesh beautifully. Maybe Kanaan will be more appreciated elsewhere.

And maybe, we'll see one of the best rivalries that IndyCar has had in a long time next year.

IndyCar Season Review: Marco Andretti

Marco Andretti has the best point-scoring season of his IZOD IndyCar Series career in 2010.

Standing on the bottom step of the podium three times this season, for his first podium finishes since the summer of 2008, Andretti matched his 2009 rank with an eighth place finish in the season standings. His 392 points were the most he'd scored in a season to date.

The third-generation driver entered the season with elevated expectations and a new long-term deal to drive for Andretti Autosport in his back pocket. 2009 had been a rough year for the team; none of the four Andretti cars took any victories, and Marco fared no better than fourth at Texas. However, sponsor Venom Energy Drink signed a long-term deal with the team, looking for heightened results this year.

Sao Paulo, given those expectations, was a nightmare. Andretti had a history with Mario Moraes, whose poor judgment on the first lap of the 2009 Indianapolis 500 knocked both drivers out of contention. This year, during the first lap carnage in that city's inaugural race, an out-of-practice Moraes, who hadn't signed a deal until after preseason testing, went into the first corner too hot and landed on top of an innocent Andretti's car.

Andretti led a lap at St. Petersburg, the site of his first career Indy Lights win in 2005, but only mustered a 12th-place finish. In the inaugural Indy Grand Prix of Alabama, Andretti led 58 of 90 laps and looked poised for his first victory since Sonoma in 2006, but pit stop mismanagement meant he had to come in for an extra stop, and he placed fifth. Neither Long Beach nor Kansas were as strong, and Andretti headed to Indianapolis 13th in the standings, with half as many points as leader Will Power.

Qualifying wasn't too kind to the third-generation Andretti, as 16th marked his worst career Indy starting spot. But unlike father Michael and grandfather Mario, frequent victims of the "Andretti Curse" at Indianapolis, Marco managed to keep up a pattern of alternating DNFs with podium finishes. The youngest Andretti led a lap and finished third in the race, propelling him up three spots in the points.

Andretti followed that up with another third place at Texas, behind Ryan Briscoe and teammate Danica Patrick. He qualified third and led laps early in the subsequent Iowa race, and 2010 began to look as if it would be the young Andretti's best season yet.

But a 15th place finish in that event seemed to kill, for a long time, any momentum that the No. 26 team had. The next five races were mid-pack road course runs, with no truly horrible finishes but no runs better than an eighth in Toronto. Regardless, Andretti's less-than-fantastic road course finishes only ranked him 10th in the sub-championship named after his grandfather, with less than half the points total of eventual road course champion Power.

Back on the ovals to finish the season, Andretti regained his earlier mojo at Chicagoland. Poking his nose into the lead multiple times early in the race, he stuck around until the end and scored his third and final podium of the year. Kentucky and Motegi were both so-so runs, with the team finishing sixth and 11th respectively. When all was said and done, Andretti finished seventh in the oval sub-championship.

Unfortunately for Andretti the driver and Andretti the team, the season finale at Homestead wasn't included in those standings. He qualified a subpar 16th, but patiently worked his way through the pack, leading 10 laps in the final quarter of the race and finishing seventh.

It was a strong day all around for Andretti Autosport, as three of their drivers finished in the top seven in the race and took the first three spots in the championship not occupied by the dominant drivers of Team Penske or Chip Ganassi Racing. For Marco, it was his second consecutive eighth place finish in the series' final standings, and his fourth top-10 in points since entering the championship in 2006.

With the team scoring two wins in 2010, breaking a winless drought that had extended through 2009, the expectations for next year are that all of the Andretti cars will find the winner's circle. Andretti may benefit from the possibility of the team downsizing, as teammates Tony Kanaan and Ryan Hunter-Reay currently do not have the sponsorship to run next year. A smaller, easier-to-manage team for owner Michael Andretti, and better personnel on the team's remaining cars, would likely improve Andretti's chances of scoring solid finishes and race victories in 2011.

Opinion: Something's Gotta Give at Andretti

It's been a story all year, but things may finally be coming to a boiling point between the four full-time IZOD IndyCar Series drivers at Andretti Autosport.

Kentucky seemed to bring out the worst in the team, when their three lead drivers - Danica Patrick, Tony Kanaan, and Marco Andretti - all began to race each other like rivals and not teammates. In fact, while Kanaan gave a hearty congratulations to third-place finisher Dan Wheldon after the race, he had nothing for his AA teammates.

It's a far cry from 2005, when the dream team of Kanaan, Wheldon, Dario Franchitti, and Bryan Herta swept the top four spots at St. Petersburg, won the Indianapolis 500 with Wheldon, and otherwise destroyed all competition.

Last year was AA's first winless season in IndyCar. Patrick may have finished a career-best fifth in points, but she couldn't find victory lane as she had in Motegi two years ago. This led to a massive restructuring of the business formerly known as Andretti Green Racing, with the "Green" (Kim Green and Kevin Savoree) taking over the race promotion aspect of the business and team owner/namesake Michael Andretti continuing to operate the race team.

The results have been better this year - Kanaan won at Iowa, while new driver/IZOD darling Ryan Hunter-Reay took the prestigious Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. Hunter-Reay, Kanaan, and Andretti rank sixth, seventh, and eighth in points, respectively - the best drivers in the series not to be employed by Chip Ganassi or Roger Penske.

But Patrick's been woefully off the pace, regularly finishing towards the back in road and street course events and not giving strong oval performances consistently enough to put her in the top 10 in points. It's been a trying year for the all-world media personality anyway, with her well-documented stock car struggles adding to the problem, but a six-position drop in the standings after last year's consistent run is a huge problem.

The worst part for Andretti is that all three of these feuding drivers are locked into their contracts for the foreseeable future, while the team's other drivers are looking for the right sponsorship combinations.

Patrick's contract runs through next year and contains an option for 2012, though you wonder if she'll attempt to jump to NASCAR full-time if the money is right. Andretti has a long-term deal that is basically guaranteed by nature of his father owning the team. Kanaan and the 7-Eleven team have been together since 2003, making them one of the longest-tenured driver and team combinations in the sport.

Meanwhile, Hunter-Reay's future remains uncertain for the umpteenth consecutive year due to sponsor concerns. Andretti also has under contract an Irish driver by the name of Adam Carroll, whose prowess in A1GP should have landed him a ride in Formula 1 this year. Andretti, which operated the American team in the nationality-based racing series, became familiar with the driver as he won the series' final championship. Current Andretti Firestone Indy Lights driver Charlie Kimball raced for the team in A1GP, and they have always been high on his talent; he sits third in points in that series with four runner-up finishes in 12 starts this year.

Put simply, all three of those feuding drivers could be replaced, and the team would probably be much better off.

Hunter-Reay is nothing less than a ray of sunshine on AA. He's shown a willingness, nevermind the ability, to work with every driver on the squad, and perhaps it is that good karma that has rendered him the team's best driver this year. He's also IZOD's golden boy, having held a personal services contract with the brand for a while now, and is without contest the best American open-wheel driver in the world right now.

Meanwhile, the feuding between his three teammates all year has been a cancer that must be eating away at owner Michael Andretti's patience. Earlier this year, Andretti compared his job to that of a "kindergarten teacher" in an interview with Versus' Jack Arute. Again, it's a far cry from 2005's dream team.

RIght now, all AA can do is tough out the next two races while attempting to figure out what to do about next season. Without all of the stupid infighting that has plagued the team all season, they may have had somebody challenging for the championship. Somebody may need to leave the team before this can happen.

Obviously, the two weak links are Marco, who hasn't won a race since 2006 and occasionally seems disinterested on-track, and Danica, who is showing once and for all this year that she isn't the driver the media has hyped her up to be. But of course, these are the two drivers with the most ironclad contracts of all, being family and a megastar, respectively.

But you have to wonder if the team would take the financial hit to buy Danica out of her contract and let her try NASCAR full-time. Remember that the announcer at the ESPY Awards called her "NASCAR's Danica Patrick," not "IndyCar's Danica Patrick." NASCAR, which is already experienced at hyping up popular drivers during their on-track struggles (see Earnhardt Jr., Dale), is probably doing more with the Danica brand than IndyCar right now. On one hand, that's a problem for IndyCar, which could use all the publicity it can get; on the other, she's already established herself in IndyCar and is far less of a novelty in the open-wheel cars these days than she is as a transitioning rookie stock car driver.

Provided that the sponsors are willing to stick with the team, this opens up a spot for either Carroll, Kimball, or even Wheldon (now a free agent) to return to AA. Wheldon's "gone home" before, per se, as the current Panther Racing driver actually made his IndyCar debut in 2002 with Panther before replacing the retiring Michael Andretti in 2003.

It becomes far stickier to try and buy out your own son's contract, especially when Venom Energy stepped in to save that marginally funded team last year. Meanwhile, Kanaan has shown he's still got it as the second-best driver on that team, and it would be a mistake to let him go - especially because Penske would likely snap him up as a replacement for Ryan Briscoe, who has been rumored to be on the hot seat for a few weeks now.

Watching Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing, you can see a certain chemistry between the drivers. Penske's trio of Briscoe, Helio Castroneves, and Will Power have done interviews and appeared on TV together, and the team is (barring Edmonton) often all smiles. Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti get down to business for Ganassi and stay out of each other's way, showing a great respect for one another at all times.

It's become clear that the current driver ensemble at Andretti is never going to find said chemistry. Somebody has to go. None of the team's current drivers are irreplaceable, like Sam Hornish was for Panther and Sebastien Bourdais was for Newman/Haas. Nobody currently on the team has taken Andretti to heights that it will never see again without them - in fact, they've mostly taken the team to new lows that can be done without.

The Andretti drivers need to understand that they can be replaced. The series' closest thing to an all-American team could do worse than taking a gamble and doing just that.

IndyCar Race Review: Peak Antifreeze Indy 300

If Saturday's Peak Antifreeze and Motor Oil Indy 300 will go down in history as the final IZOD IndyCar Series race at Chicagoland Speedway, the fans in attendance and watching on television certainly got everything they hoped for in a finale.

Dario Franchitti held off a hard-charging Dan Wheldon after a daring call in the pits gave him the late-race lead, producing the 17th-closest finish in IndyCar history. His victory closed some of the gap on points leader Will Power, who had been leading late in the race but ran out of fuel with five laps to go to finish way down the running order.

All in all, the race featured a record-breaking 25 lead changes among 11 drivers. Ryan Briscoe dominated the early stages of the event, battling side-by-side with Marco Andretti for a good chunk of the race's early stages. Briscoe, the polesitter and defending race winner, led 113 of the race's 200 laps, though he could only muster an 11th place finish.

Meanwhile, the top four drivers in the finishing order - Franchitti, Wheldon, Andretti, and Ryan Hunter-Reay - all led at least two laps, with Franchitti's 28 tops among them. Franchitti actually did not lead until the very end of the race, when his team gambled by not taking tires under the final caution. While Briscoe could not keep others from leading laps while he was out in front, Franchitti managed to do just that

Some of the drivers who spent time up front were surprising, to say the least. Wheldon, Vitor Meira, and Alex Lloyd all led a handful of laps. Even the part-time entries of Ed Carpenter and Sarah Fisher spent time up front; Fisher stayed out under the race's second caution to gain the point, but managed to hold a top-three position for many laps after the green flag dropped.

Unfortunately for the little guys, nobody was really there at the end besides Wheldon. Meira salvaged a ninth place finish, but Fisher was the first car a lap down in 15th, Carpenter pulled out after 179 laps when his team couldn't get fuel into the car, and Lloyd crashed out to finish 21st.

Heartbreak was no stranger to the series' top team, either. Power nearly lost control of his car in the early laps of the race, making a fantastic save, a feat he would have to replicate a couple of other times before the night was over. Power drove his heart out all night, showing a level of talent we had previously only witnessed from him on the road and street courses, and was a contender for victory until the very end.

Unfortunately, Chicagoland left Power and his Team Penske crew with Indianapolis 500 deja vu: a fueler error ended all hope for a strong finish. At Indy, it was Power driving off with part of his fuel assembly; at Chicago, the team didn't quite get enough in the car to make it. To his credit, Power was surprisingly upbeat in post-race interviews, looking forward to the challenge of maintaining his points lead over the final three races.

With three races to go and Kentucky up next on the schedule, Power's points lead has shrunk from 59 to 23 over Franchitti. It may be a race between those two alone; third-place Scott Dixon is 85 points out, while no other driver is within 100.

Opinion: The Plight of the American Open-Wheel Racer, Pt. 2

Last month, the American open-wheel racer was an endangered species.

Other than Marco Andretti, the futures of most American drivers in the IZOD IndyCar Series were shaky at best. Ryan Hunter-Reay was on a race-by-race deal; Graham Rahal and Ed Carpenter were on the sidelines after Indy; J.R. Hildebrand and Jonathan Summerton never had rookie-of-the-year campaigns materialize; Danica Patrick was still testing the NASCAR waters in order to potentially make the jump.

What a difference a month makes - Hunter-Reay has a deal to keep him at Andretti Autosport for the balance of the year, Hildebrand will make his IndyCar debut for Dreyer & Reinbold Racing next month, and Patrick's generally unsuccessful NASCAR runs make you wonder if she'll reconsider.

Hunter-Reay is the biggest feel-good story of the year in IndyCar. On a limited schedule with Andretti, he won the prestigious Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, only to have a couple potential sponsorship deals fall through after that victory. The former series Rookie of the Year and IZOD spokesman been one of the most consistent drivers in the series all season, but even having everything going for him couldn't keep him in the car beyond Watkins Glen. The signing of Adam Carroll, a talented Irish driver with the chops for Formula 1, also seemed to hurt Hunter-Reay's case.

Then, good karma came back to repay Hunter-Reay. Andretti's existing sponsors, including IZOD, Snapple, Ethanol USA, Inland Industrial Services Group, and the Michael Fux Foundation, announced just before Watkins Glen that they had stepped up funding to keep Hunter-Reay in the car for the rest of the season. Not only that, they created the charitable initiative Racing for Cancer, dedicated to Hunter-Reay's mother, who passed away in the offseason.

Of course, Hildebrand is a bit of a feel-good story himself. The man they call "Captain America" won last year's Firestone Indy Lights title for Andretti, but besides some time testing Marco Andretti's car this year, he'd been generally out of open-wheel, instead competing in the American Le Mans Series. But with Mike Conway still on the sidelines at DRR, and two tracks coming up that Hildebrand performed well at in Lights last year, he became the perfect fit for the No. 24 team.

Mid-Ohio yielded a third-place finish last year for the young American driver, while Infineon Raceway, his self-proclaimed home track, was the site of his fourth and final victory of the year. There is also the outside shot that he may run at Edmonton for the team, the final race before Conway's return that does not yet have a driver under contract. Hildebrand won at that track in Lights last year as well.

But while these instances are progress, the sport still does not have many American drivers under long-term contracts. Patrick and Marco Andretti over at Andretti Autosport are the only drivers with guaranteed futures at the moment. The team will certainly try to bring Hunter-Reay back, but it all depends on sponsorship. Hildebrand's deal, for the moment, is for two races only.

Rahal is still looking for a bit of certainty after having driven three different cars over the course of this season, with some spotty results. Carpenter and Vision Racing, the team owner by ex-IRL czar Tony George, have not been heard from since the end of May. Townsend Bell runs Indianapolis only these days, Davey Hamilton's bid to run races after Indianapolis was dashed by de Ferran Dragon Racing's totaled racecars, and Sarah Fisher still has a long way to go sponsorship-wise to bring her team to full-time status.

Worse, while the trend of open-wheel stars jumping to stock cars may continue with Patrick, few NASCAR competitors seem willing to go to at least Indianapolis and compete for the proposed $20 million prize that would come with winning the Indianapolis 500 and Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.

Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart, two of NASCAR's finest that grew up with 500-mile dreams in the state of Indiana, have passed on the idea. Juan Montoya, perhaps the driver with the best shot, doesn't seem too keen on it, either. Robby Gordon hasn't been able to make something happen, and ex-F1 pilot Scott Speed and Team Red Bull, despite potentially making a great fit, have not commented on the possibility. Meanwhile, at the press conference introducing the New Hampshire IndyCar race for next year, Dario Franchitti downplayed the possibility of making such a run.

The series also has to bring in more American equipment in order to maintain relevance in the United States. Yes, Firestone is an Akron-based tire company with a storied history at Indianapolis. But Dallara is an Italian chassis manufacturer, and Honda is a Japanese engine builder. As many Americans as there are who drive Hondas, it doesn't hurt to have an American brand promoting the sport, something that disappeared in open-wheel once Ford pulled out of Champ Car at the end of 2006.

The new-for-2012 engine regulations, providing for (as a maximum) a 2.4 liter turbocharged V6, should open up that category to more American brands. But if the series sticks to a single chassis manufacturer for 2012, the only American company with widespread fan support that is in the running is Swift, which also provides chassis for the Japanese Formula Nippon Series.

Part of the reason why NASCAR flourished and American open-wheel racing declined was the preservation of American values in one niche as the other moved towards becoming a minor-league F1. NASCAR remains to this day dominated by Americans. The sad reality is that, in order to firmly entrench a sport in a country's consciousness, you have to embrace some of that country's core values - Americanness, if you will - even when they may bring the product down a little bit.

Part of the reason why IndyCar is great stems from the fact that these are some of the "fastest drivers in the world," representing every inhabitable continent and over a dozen countries. But American fans need more American drivers to back. The series also visits Canada, which has Paul Tracy and Alex Tagliani; Japan, besides all the engines in the series, can get behind Hideki Mutoh and Takuma Sato; although Australia is now off the schedule, fans down under can embrace two-thirds of Team Penske; Brazilian fans have about a third of the series to get behind.

American fans don't really have those drivers or that equipment to strongly identify behind in IndyCar right now; they just have the races on their own soil. Danica is too polarizing a figure at this point, when plenty will bash her for her lack of on-track production, instead of just appreciating the strides she's helped make for women in motorsports. Marco hasn't won in nearly a presidential term, and Hunter-Reay needs a long-term deal to keep him in the sport. We can't even bring up Rahal until somebody signs him to a solid deal, either. The quick fix of NASCAR drivers in the 500 seems unlikely.

Has the series made progress over the past month? Yes. The American open-wheel driver is now a "protected" endangered species, with every intent on rebuilding its population over the next few years. But wholesale changes may still need to come before the sport can once again rival NASCAR in popularity - and that means a little more red, white, and blue on the track.

IndyCar Race Review: Firestone 550k

In Ryan Briscoe's first Texas race for Team Penske, in 2008, he started and finished third. In his second, last year, he started and finished second.

Briscoe continued his positive Texas trend in last night's Firestone 550k, leading 102 laps and opening up a big gap on a hard-charging Danica Patrick in the later stages for his first win of the 2010 IZOD IndyCar Series season. His victory helped make up for Penske's disappointing Indianapolis 500 last weekend, when Briscoe crashed and finished 24th, and teammates Will Power and Helio Castroneves barely cracked the top ten.

But that's not to say that the night was a complete success for Penske; Castroneves was taken out of the race just past halfway when Mario Moraes squeezed him into the wall. Power, who had been running third in the late stages of the race, had to give up his position to pit for fuel with four laps to go, falling to 14th, one lap down.

Instead, the top team overall in the Texas tilt was Andretti Autosport. Besides Patrick's second-place finish, Marco Andretti placed third for the second week in a row, and Tony Kanaan wound up sixth. Ryan Hunter-Reay, in his first race since having thumb surgery and potentially his last race for Andretti due to sponsorship reasons, placed seventh.

In between the Andretti cars were the two Chip Ganassi Racing teams of Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti, respectively. Franchitti managed to lead 86 laps of the 228-lap race, but after losing his clean air was never quite the same.

Alex Tagliani and the FAZZT Race Team continued to show promise, but were once again bitten by bad luck. Tagliani led 33 laps, third most in the field, but a lap 167 pit stop in which fueler Phil McRobert did not remove the fuel hose before Tagliani put the car in gear altered the entire course of his race. Adding insult to injury, the team fell seven laps short on fuel and had to pit before the end of the race, falling three laps down and finishing 18th.

Texas was not generally kind to the series' six rookies. While Alex Lloyd and Dale Coyne Racing carried on their momentum from a fourth-place finish at Indy, crossing the line eighth, Lloyd was the only rookie driver to finish on the lead lap. Meanwhile, Mario Romancini was the only other rookie driver to finish, two laps down in 17th.

Three rookies - Bertrand Baguette, Simona de Silvestro, and Takuma Sato - were involved in crashes that prematurely ended their nights. De Silvestro had a particularly fiery crash in which safety crews struggled to remove her from her burning car. The last rookie, Jay Howard, experienced mechanical failure after 37 laps to finish last.

The next IZOD IndyCar Series race will be the Iowa Corn Indy 250 at Iowa Speedway in two weeks. Franchitti won last year.

IndyCar Race Review: Indianapolis 500 (Updated)

Dario Franchitti took his second Indianapolis 500 checkered flag in the past four years after easily leading more than two thirds of the event.

Franchitti's victory, taken under caution over Dan Wheldon and Marco Andretti, made team owner Chip Ganassi the first owner to win the crown jewels of American stock car and open wheel racing in the same season.

This time, Franchitti managed to hang on in a full-length race, after winning a rain-shortened contest in 2007. He did more than hang on, though - until pit stops in the second half of the race shook up the running order, he utilized clean air to dominate much of the event.

The two major early stories of the race were Tony Kanaan and pit crew failure. Kanaan started 33rd after a disastrous qualifying weekend, but worked his way up through the field quickly. Meanwhile, the pit crews of Will Power, Scott Dixon, and Raphael Matos all made crucial errors in the first third of the race, with Power driving off with part of his fuel assembly and Dixon and Matos losing wheels on the same set of pit stops.

Blocking was also at issue during much of the event. Graham Rahal was black-flagged after blocking Franchitti and later Dan Wheldon. Wheldon was actually the victim of two huge blocks early in the event, with the other coming from John Andretti. A handful of drivers received black flags over the course of the race for blocking others, with a late-race penalty sabotaging the chances of Townsend Bell to score a good finish.

Turn two victimized a handful of cars over the course of the event, including Davey Hamilton, Bruno Junqueira, and Matos, not long after his pit issues. Franchitti continued to hold the point, however, with very few challenges - polesitter Helio Castroneves didn't lead at all until the latter stages.

Indy often can reward the perseverance of the less prominent teams in the sport with a legitimate shot at glory. Dreyer & Reinbold Racing had three of its four cars lead parts of the race, with Tomas Scheckter, Mike Conway, and Justin Wilson all briefly helming the point. Scheckter faded as better cars passed him, while Conway and Wilson had to pit for fuel.

Conway was the victim of a spectacular last-lap wreck that handed the race to Franchitti. He barrelled into Ryan Hunter-Reay's car coming out of turn three and flew into the catchfence, in an incident scarily similar to Kenny Brack's 2003 wreck at Texas and Alessandro Zampedri's incident on the last lap of the 1996 500. Luckily, Conway suffered only a broken leg, compared to the more serious injuries of those two drivers.

Indy can also victimize some of the best teams in the sport. Penske Racing, which attempted to win its 16th Indianapolis 500 as Castroneves went for his record-tying fourth, had a miserable day. Ryan Briscoe, who held a fuel advantage after his last pit stop, wrecked almost instantly after to finish 24th. Power and Castroneves came home 8th and 9th, respectively. Power led early before his pit issue, and Castroneves led with as few as nine laps to go before needing to pit.

After Conway, Wilson, and others had to pit for fuel within the last 20 laps of the race, Franchitti reinherited the lead over Kanaan, who was looking to become the first driver to win the race from the last row. Such a victory would have been redemption for Kanaan, especially considering that he had nearly missed the race this year, and considering his history of bad Indy luck. But he had to pit with a handful of laps to go, handing the bridesmaid position to Wheldon for the second year in a row. It was also the third consecutive year that Panther Racing finished second in the 500.

Andretti, who had been blowing through his Honda Push to Pass allotment all race, came home third after first being classified in sixth. Originally, Alex Lloyd had been classified third, Scott Dixon fourth and Danica Patrick fifth. But all three were ruled as having passed Andretti under caution on the last lap, and his position was returned to him, and those three drivers were knocked down one spot apiece.

Two rookies finished on the lead lap - Mario Romancini in 13th and Simona de Silvestro in 14th. They both got by Franchitti as he attempted to conserve fuel on the final lap. The best finishing Indy 500 special was that of Rahal, which placed 12th.

IndyCar Race Review: Indianapolis 500

Dario Franchitti took his second Indianapolis 500 checkered flag in the past four years after easily leading more than two thirds of the event.

Franchitti's victory, taken under caution over Dan Wheldon and Marco Andretti, made team owner Chip Ganassi the first owner to win the crown jewels of American stock car and open wheel racing in the same season.

This time, Franchitti managed to hang on in a full-length race, after winning a rain-shortened contest in 2007. He did more than hang on, though - until pit stops in the second half of the race shook up the running order, he utilized clean air to dominate much of the event.

The two major early stories of the race were Tony Kanaan and pit failure. Kanaan started 33rd after a disastrous qualifying weekend, but worked his way up through the field quickly. Meanwhile, the pit crews of Will Power, Scott Dixon, and Raphael Matos all made crucial errors in the first third of the race, with Power driving off with part of his fuel assembly and Dixon and Matos losing wheels on the same set of pit stops.

Turn two victimized a handful of cars over the course of the event, including Davey Hamilton, Bruno Junqueira, and Matos, not long after his pit issues. Franchitti continued to hold the point, however, with very few challenges.

Dreyer & Reinbold Racing had three of its four cars lead parts of the race, with Tomas Scheckter, Mike Conway, and Justin Wilson all briefly helming the point. Scheckter faded as better cars passed him, while Conway and Wilson had to pit for fuel. Conway was the victim of a spectacular last-lap wreck that handed the race to Franchitti.

Penske Racing, which attempted to win its 16th Indianapolis 500 as driver Helio Castroneves went for his record-tying fourth, had a miserable day. Ryan Briscoe, who held a fuel advantage after his last pit stop, wrecked almost instantly after to finish 24th. Power and Castroneves came home 8th and 9th, respectively.

After Conway, Wilson, and others had to pit for fuel within the last 20 laps of the race, Franchitti reinherited the lead over Kanaan, who was looking to become the first driver to win the race from the last row. But he had to pit with a handful of laps to go, handing the bridesmaid position to Dan Wheldon for the second year in a row. It was also the third conescutive year that Panther Racing finished second in the 500.

Andretti, who had been blowing through his Honda Push to Pass allotment all race, came home third after first being classified in sixth. Originally, Alex Lloyd had been classified third, Scott Dixon fourth and Danica Patrick fifth. But all three were ruled as having passed Andretti under caution on the last lap, and his position was returned to him, and those three drivers were knocked down one spot apiece.

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.

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!

Twittography: Sao Paulo Indy 300

Here are some of the photos taken by IndyCar drivers and teams and posted to Twitter during race day at the Sao Paulo Indy 300.

LuczoDragon - Front wing shot
LuczoDragon - Team meeting between Jay Penske, Gil de Ferran, and Rafa Matos
LuczoDragon - Engineers watching the telemetry during qualifying
LuczoDragon - A crew member alone in the pits
LuczoDragon - Three DFLDR engineers on their computers
LuczoDragon - Rafa Matos interviewed by local media
LuczoDragon - Rafa Matos and Davey Hamilton
IndyCarNation - New mats
AntonioPizzonia - Former F1/CCWS driver Antonio Pizzonia on the grid
DRRIndyCar - Bia Figuereido's car, pre-race
IndyCarNation - Marco Andretti's car, after the first-turn accident
DRRIndyCar - Rain on the way
DRRIndyCar - Drenched pit lane
DRRIndyCar - The Brazilian fans cheer through the rain
IndyCarNation - The top three cars at the finish

IndyCar Season Preview: Andretti Autosport

Last year, Andretti Green Racing suffered through its worst season since joining the IZOD IndyCar Series, at least as far as the victory column goes. No Andretti driver won a race for the first time in the team's IndyCar history.

It wasn't all doom and gloom in the Andretti pit, however, as Danica Patrick had her best career season to date, finishing 5th in points (best of the non-Ganassi or Penske drivers) with only one DNF at the start of the season. Patrick thus enters this year with the longest running at the finish streak of anybody on the circuit.

Marco Andretti also had a solid year, finishing eighth in points while only failing to finish two races, exhibiting a consistency he had not shown since his 2006 rookie year. The son of team owner Michael Andretti scored two top fives and 11 top-10s, scoring 380 points, a career best.

All told, the four Andretti cars scored five podium finishes (all third places), 16 top fives, and 39 top-10s over the course of the season.

But that wasn't good enough for Andretti Green, which also promoted the races in St. Petersburg and Toronto. Offseason shuffling saw Andretti take over the race team, while former partners Kim Green and Kevin Savoree split from the team to take over the race promotion side of the business. Both sides hope that the result will be greater success in 2010.

Unfortunately, the Andretti cars weren't too fast in the season-opening test sessions. No Andretti car fared better than eighth, which Andretti did in the first and third sessions and Tony Kanaan accomplished in the second. Patrick lagged toward the rear of the field in all three, perhaps still adjusting from her recent stock-car tribulations. New teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay improved in every session, but only had a 14th-place car in the third session to show for his efforts.

While this suggests that a lot of other teams may be faster than the Andretti cars, it is important to note that Andretti cars are normally stronger on the ovals. The last time an Andretti car won a road course race was when Kanaan took the checkers at Detroit in late 2007. Before that, Marco scored his only career victory thus far at Sonoma in late 2006.

Andretti looks to maintain its status as "best of the rest" in 2010, but if the team doesn't step up and start winning some races this year, we may see Patrick bolt to stock cars for good. They have the potential to run well, but have been underachieving greatly the past couple of years, a far cry from their heyday in the mid-2000s.