Wrapup: Iowa Corn Indy 250

I hate to say I told you so...but I really did tell you so! In fairness, so did Oilpressure and, I'm sure, a few other word butchers and perhaps some actual journalists as well.

The fact that Kanaan started way back in fifteenth did seem like it might end up being a bit of trouble, and he very nearly ended up a part of Justin Wilson's first lap spin. However, a lightning-fast pit stop during the first round of stops had Kanaan firing past a surprised Helio Castroneves and Scott Dixon (who ended up hitting each other) to take second. TK sat and watched Dario and Dixon go at it for a while, then had his own run at Dario when Dixon's tires went off a bit. When Dario had his own issues later on, it was Helio's turn to battle with Kanaan -- a battle that was joined by E.J. Viso for a while. Eventually, Tony took the lead and took it for good with about 8 laps to go, racing off into the distance while making Helio look like he was standing still. It was a well-deserved and well-driven victory for both TK and Andretti Autosport.

It's also finally a victory for those who had been the have-nots in this series. The "haves" (cars that, until recently, were red and white) had used their superior engineering and monetary powers to dominate everything in sight for almost exactly two years. Andretti Autosport was always one of those teams with the potential to step back up and knock off the red cars; after all, it used to be the "big three", with Andretti-Green being the third.

Say what you will about Danica Patrick over-stepping her bounds in publicly calling out her team several times at Indianapolis for giving the entire team some really bad cars, but I think we can look at that moment as the turning point of Andretti Autosport's season. Sure, Ryan Hunter-Reay won the race at Long Beach, but that team had looked lost since early 2008. Who's to know what happened behind closed doors between Pole Day and Race Day at Indianapolis, but those cars have suddenly worked like a charm the last three times out.

One other thing about this race: it was really, really fun to watch. There was drafting and passing, side-by-side racing, and actual driving determining the order of finish, all on a 7/8-mile bullring. Iowa was the only race last year before Kentucky that was any good, and the aerodynamic tweaks to the cars and Honda's horsepower boost have only made it better. I could've done without the lapped cars (namely Milka Duno, of course) causing the amount of near-calamity that they did, but that's an integral part of the sport and the driver who does the best job dealing with it often turns out the winner. The racing at Iowa is good, the crowds at Iowa are good, and IndyCar would do well to keep tack owner Rusty Wallace as happy as possible and keep coming back to this track.

We know I got the winner right (for once), but let's have a look at my other picks...

Alex Tagliani's car would be really strong if this were a rally. That FAZZT car is good in both practice and qualifying at just about every track, but turns to complete rubbish when the air is taken off the front wing. One of these times, though, they'll get that setup right and really challenge on the ovals.

Takuma Sato is, perhaps, the second-unluckiest guy in this entire series (with the first being teammate Mario Moraes). For the second time this year, Sato was right up there at the sharp end of the field before the wall inconveniently smashed his car to bits. At Kansas, he crashed out of sixth when he and Mutoh got together on a restart. Today, his inexperience with short ovals proved costly as he got caught up in the wash from a lapped car, understeered into the marbles, and was along for the ride into the wall. Today's crash was particularly tough because, I would say, Sato was absolutely going to challenge for the lead down the stretch. Who's to know how that would've turned out, but we never got the chance to see.

The ladies...barely existed today. Danica was given a mandatory camera shot while she tooled around in 12th-ish, but that was it. Simona's car had all sorts of trouble, including an air-jack hose that got caught and put her left-rear tire changer in the path of her wheel as she jerked the car forward; later on, something simply didn't work and her race was over. Sarah Fisher had some trouble with that evil "grey stuff" off the racing line and, in spite of her best efforts, sat helplessly while her car skidded into the wall. Milka Duno, after nearly wrecking every other car on the track at some point in the first 30 laps, was mercifully black flagged.

The heart rates are down and everyone's breathing again. One weekend off, then we celebrate a little good old American freedom with a 4th of July weekend race at American road racing's ancestral home, Watkins Glen. Incidentally, some signs are pointing to this being IndyCar's last visit to the Glen, as ISC stinks out loud with promotion and sponsors don't like hosting parties on a holiday weekend; it'll be interesting to see what happens there. Until then, I'll try to keep up with the chassis announcements and 2011 schedule updates. Cheers!