First Impressions: Toronto 2014 Race One

Sébastien Bourdais picked up his second Toronto victory ten years after his first at Exhibition Place

1. What a race by Sébastien Bourdais. It's been a long journey back to the top step of the podium for Bourdais. From a rough year and a half in Formula One, to a fair amount of success in sports cars, Bourdais has picked up his thirty-second IndyCar victory nearly seven years after his thirty-first. Fun fact, eighteen of Bourdais' thirty-two victories have come from pole position. 

2. Hélio Castroneves finish second while championship contenders Will Power and Ryan Hunter-Reay struggled. Power finished ninth, Hunter-Reay retired after contact with the wall while trying to passing Tony Kanaan, who finished third. Power had a good run but was never close to challenging his teammate and Hunter-Reay put himself in a position he didn't need to be in. There is still another race today but things are appearing to fall Castroneves' way

3. Simon Pagenaud nearly had his day end on lap one after contact with Luca Filippi spun the Frenchman and blocked the track but Pagenaud recovered and came home in a hard fought fourth. He also kept his championship hopes alive by not giving up.

4. Scott Dixon rounded out the top five, Graham Rahal finished sixth, Charlie Kimball had a Charlie Kimball-like day, starting on one of the last three rows but finishing in the top ten and James Hinchcliffe matched his career best finish at his home race with another eighth place finish.

5. Who would have thought KV Racing would have won a race before Tony Kanaan and Ganassi Racing won at the beginning of 2014? Nine different winners in 2014 and by the end of today, there very well could be ten different winners.

6. Not a bad first race. No one had a massive shunt and will be fighting to make the start of race two. That is good news. Today has a World Superbike race day feel. One race, followed by some support races in the middle and then another race to close out the day. Maybe IndyCar should consider this format going forward for doubleheaders.

7. Nice to see IndyCar get a back bone and move Ryan Briscoe, Juan Pablo Montoya and Power to the rear of the field but what took so long? They had announced they weren't going to lose their positions at the end of Saturday and all of a sudden Sunday they are at the back. You got to make a call and stick by it, not flip flop back and forth.

8. One more point of inconsistency. Last year at Houston, race two was lined up by entrant points from before the race weekend, not after race one at Houston. This year, race two at Toronto is lined up by entrant points after race one at Toronto. What will the ruling be going forward if needed again? Who knows!

9. A little less than four hours until race two, rest up everybody.