1. What an amazing drive by Mike Conway. He deserves the win. A great day for Dale Coyne Racing taking two spots on the podium.
2. Great race by Ryan Hunter-Reay. Choosing the alternate tire for his second stint was a mistake but second is still great.
3. And there is a race tomorrow at Belle Isle and I am happy about that.
4. I thought this was the best race ever held at Belle Isle. The 2.3 mile configuration is much better than the 2.1 mile race.
5. Penske and Ganassi has yet to win this year. Meanwhile, Foyt, Coyne and KV have.
6. Great race for Josef Newgarden finishing seventh.
7. Tough finish for Ryan Briscoe. Had a shot at a top ten before running into the tires. Hopefully John Barnes doesn't fire him before race two.
8. Scott Dixon had a great run considering he was run over on lap one. Still finished fourth. This really speaks to the durability of the DW12 chassis.
9. Justin Wilson has finished ninth, eighth, third, twentieth, fifth and third. Not bad.
10. Will Power has finished sixteenth, fifth, sixteenth, twenty-fourth, nineteenth and eighth.
11. James Jakes has been impressive and his teammate Graham Rahal picked up his game. Rahal finished ninth, ahead of Jakes who finished tenth.
12. Tough break (hopefully not literally) for AJ Allmendinger. Hopefully he can recover for race two and hopefully tomorrow isn't his final IndyCar race of 2013.
13. Alex Tagliani didn't have much go his way today.
14. ABC needs a new broadcast crew. Murray Walker is available and turning 90 this October. I'm sure he'd be more lively than the current three in the booth.
15. Belle Isle Park looks beautiful. Track might not be the greatest but the Park sure looks like it makes up for it.
16. I cannot wait for race two tomorrow. Let's see if the rain holds off.
Race Two
1. Great win for Simon Pagenaud and a great win for Sam Schmidt, Ric Peterson and Davey Hamilton.
2. Great run by James Jakes finishing second.
3. Mike Conway might not have won the $50,000 bonus but I give him the best odds to win the $100,000 bonus at Toronto.
4. The drought continues for Penske and Ganassi.
5. Great day for Honda sweeping the top five and an even better weekend sweeping the two races in Chevrolet's backyard. Maybe Chevrolet should consider funding a second race weekend at Michigan International Speedway
6. Sebastián Saavedra got Dragon Racing their first top ten of the season on his birthday. Not a bad day for him at all.
7. How Helio Castroneves and Marco Andretti are tied for the points lead and neither has won a race is beyond me.
8. This was not as good as race one.
9. This was a long day.
10. Lots of damage heading into Texas.
11. Texas can't come soon enough.
12. Thumbs up to the doubleheader format. Maybe it should be done at most if not all road and street course races. It would get IndyCar on television much more than it is now and the more you are on television the more of a chance you catch the eye of viewers. I guess. I don't know. I am just trying to come up with another positive for doubleheaders.
13. In all seriousness though, the doubleheader format was great and I can't wait until NBCSN gets to do Toronto and Houston.
14. IndyCar has to do something to get new life in the ABC broadcast. They can't leave ABC but at least ask them to get some new bloody announcers. Marty Reid, Eddie Cheever and Scott Goodyear might all love IndyCar racing but I love IndyCar racing and would do a much better job. The pit reporters are fine. We can throw out names until we are blue in the face but not now. Let's focus on getting a new team for 2014.
15. I feel bad for AJ Allmendinger. He deserves a shot at another oval.
16. And now we are on to Texas. Which very well could be the best race of 2013.
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