First off, let's talk about the home team, eh? Alex Tagliani, from nearby Quebec, kept himself near the front of the field while Dario Franchitti ran around in the lead for a while. Dario eventually ran off to pit lane and Tags led the race pretty convincingly for a good piece of time. After pit stops and some untimely yellows, Tags was mired back in the field, where he ended up trying to divebomb past Tomas Scheckter, who was in the process of passing a damaged Mario Moraes, and all three cars ended up stuck next to the tire barriers. Tags earned himself a pair of gloves from Tomas, who channeled his inner Roy Halladay to hurl a fireproof nomex fastball at the #34's cockpit.
Ontarian Paul Tracy, former two-time winner at Exhibition Place, was blindingly quick and made some of the wildest and bravest passing moves to be seen on the track today. Unfortunately, a pass for second on Helio Castroneves ended something like this:
Neither driver would give complete fault to the other, but the local fans made it pretty obvious what they thought of the incident: Helio was showered with boos for maybe the first time in his life and the boos got louder every time the video was shown to the fans. Tracy kept his cool, though, shook hands with Helio, and will move on to Edmonton with the knowledge that he at least had a really fast car today.
One of the more perplexing cases of the day was that of E.J. Viso and Mario Moraes. Moraes, who I mentioned had been previously damaged when Tagliani and Scheckter tangled with him, got his damage when Viso shut the door on him going into Turn 3 and clipped Moraes' wing. After the race was over, as the cars were cooling down on Lake Shore Drive, Moraes apparently had the red lenses on or simply wasn't thinking and he speared Viso into the wall going just-about-full speed. Moraes has become a complete nuisance on the track at this point in the season; if Brian Barnhart does not come down on him hard, then perhaps Barnhart isn't the person to run the series.In other Barnhart news, Dario Franchitti may have been gifted the win by a completely baffling decision that had Jimmy Vasser in a complete outrage before the slightly destroyed state of his car became issue #1. Frachitti was on his way into the pits and had already committed to the pits when a yellow came out. Franchitti wasn't penalized, which is just fine, but he was given his position on the racetrack back in front of Paul Tracy. So let's see here: Franchitti went into the pits, ended up behind PT after all was said and done, then was given his position back for no discernible reason. Shortly thereafter, Tracy is trying to pass Helio to catch up with Dario and is knocked out of the race, which Dario goes on to win. SERIOUSLY, WTF?!
Oh, and blogosphere Canadian Bureau Chief MeeshBeer reported via Twitter that E.J. Viso had a bit of a run-in with Rafa Matos after all was said and done. Not sure what happened there, but it's just another bit of drama from a drama-filled event.
OH! I almost forgot to mention: there was passing! It seemed like every pass came with brake-locking and power-sliding and if someone wasn't passing someone else, they were at least taking a look at a pass. As I said, Paul Tracy was a star of the side-by-side driving, but it was happening throughout the field.
My picks were middling at best. Will Power, who easily had the drive of the day -- suffered a flat tire on the wing of Graham Rahal coming to the green flag, went to the back of the pack, managed his way back through the field -- took home a very impressive third. Justin Wilson putzed around mid-pack for a while before finding his way forward again and finishing a respectable fifth. I've already covered Tagliani, and Rafa Matos ended up in a very quiet 10th. Danica actually ended up in the top ten, but that may have been a product of the fact that 8 cars were behind the wall when the checkered flag fall.
Next race is in a fortnight (I love it when I get to use that word) in Edmonton at the City Centre Airport. See you then!
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