Morning Warm-Up: Toronto 2018

Josef Newgarden continues the championship charge in Canada

For the third time in four races Josef Newgarden will lead the field to the green flag as the American won pole position for this year's Honda Indy Toronto. Newgarden stole pole position on the final lap of the session with a time of 59.4956 seconds. He is attempting to become to the first defending series champion to win at Toronto since Dario Franchitti. Newgarden could become the first driver to win consecutive Toronto since Scott Dixon in 2013. The only other driver with consecutive Toronto victories is Michael Andretti, who did it on three separate occasions. Newgarden knocked off Scott Dixon, who will start on the front row for the second time this season. Dixon won from second on the grid in the first Belle Isle race last month. The New Zealander has won on July 15th once before in his career. He won at Nashville on this day in 2006. He has won multiple times on two different days. He won July 14th in 2007 and 2013 at Nashville and Toronto respectively and he won on August 9th in 2008 and 2009 at Kentucky and Mid-Ohio respectively.

Simon Pagenaud will start third. Pagenaud has started on the front row in three races this season. Last year, Pagenaud did not start on the front row until the 12th race of the season when he won pole position at Toronto. This is his sixth consecutive year starting in one of the first two rows in this race. Will Power makes it an all-Penske row two. Power has not had much success in the 12th round of a season. He has never won the 12th race of the season and nine times he has finished outside the top ten in 13 starts in the 12th round of a season. He does have three runner-up finishes in the 12th round of a season but all three of those results came at Mid-Ohio. Alexander Rossi and Ryan Hunter-Reay make it an all-Andretti row three. Rossi has only had double-digit lap led totals in two races this season. He led 71 laps on his way to victory at Long Beach and he led 46 laps in the second Belle Isle race before a tire puncture after a lock up knocked him down to a 12th place finish. This is Hunter-Reay's first top ten start at Toronto in four years. He had started in the top six in five consecutive Toronto races prior to his stretch of three consecutive years starting outside the top ten in this race.

Takuma Sato qualified in seventh. This is Sato's fourth consecutive top ten start. He is attempting to achieve four consecutive top ten finishes for the second time in his IndyCar career. The first time he did it was last year when he finished in the top ten in the Indianapolis 500, the two Belle Isle races and Texas. Sato will be attempting to achieve three consecutive top five finishes for the first time in his IndyCar career. Toronto marks the eighth start of Jordan King's career and King will start in eighth position. Only five British drivers have had their first IndyCar victory occur within their first ten starts. Those drivers are Dario Resta, Jim Clark, Graham Hill and Nigel Mansell. All four of those drivers won either on their debut or in their second start.

James Hinchcliffe and Robert Wickens make it an all-Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, all-Canadian row five. Hinchcliffe has finished in the top ten in five of six times he has started the 12th race of a season, three of which are top five finishes. He lost his fastest lap after spinning exiting turn eight and causing a local yellow. Wickens could become the quickest Canadian to win their first career IndyCar race. This is only his 12th start and Jacques Villeneuve holds the current record with his first career victory coming in his 14th start.

Conor Daly will start 11th as he got Harding Racing out of round one of qualifying for the first time since St. Petersburg. This will be Daly's 15th street course start. He finished second in the first Belle Isle race in 2016 but a pair of sixth place finishes in the second Belle Isle race in 2015 and in 2016 are his only top ten finishes on street courses. Matheus Leist made it out of round one of the first time since St. Petersburg as well and the Brazilian will start 12th. Leist has finished behind his teammate Kanaan in every street course race this season and Kanaan has finished ahead of Leist by at least six positions in three of the four street course races. Graham Rahal was knocked out of round two by Daly and he will have to start 13th. Rahal 's only street course victory was his first career victory at St. Petersburg in 2008. Two of Rahal's six career victories have come after the month of June. Marco Andretti will start 14th. Andretti has finished on the lead lap in seven consecutive Toronto races. He has never led a lap at Toronto. His father Michael won this race from 13th on the grid 17 years ago today. If Marco were to win today he would break his father's record for worst starting position for a Toronto winner.

Tony Kanaan will start 15th. This is Kanaan's third consecutive year starting outside the top ten for this race. He has not had a top five finish in the last 14 races. This is his longest stretch without a top five finish since he went 27 races between top five finishes from his first career victory at Michigan in 1999 to his third place finish at Motegi in 2001 with 2000 being the only season in Kanaan's career where he did not have a top five finish. Spencer Pigot joins Kanaan on row eight. Pigot has top ten finishes in the last two races. It is the first time in his career he has top ten finishes in successive races. He has been the top Ed Carpenter Racing finisher seven times this season including in three consecutive races. He has been the top finisher in five of seven road/street course races. For the first time in his career, Sébastien Bourdais will not start in the top ten at Toronto as Bourdais qualified 17th. His best finish on street courses since his St. Petersburg victory was 13th at Long Beach and the first Belle Isle race. Bourdais has finished 13th four times this season. Max Chilton will start 18th, ending a string of three consecutive races starting outside the top twenty. Chilton finished seventh in last year's Toronto race.

René Binder qualified a career-best 19th. It is the first time Binder has started inside the top twenty in his IndyCar career. He will become the first Austrian driver to start an IndyCar race in a country other than the United States. This will be Binder's fifth start. He is already the most experienced Austrian in IndyCar history. Charlie Kimball rounds out the top twenty. Toronto is the site of Kimball's first career IndyCar podium finish, as he finished second in the 2012 race. His six podium finishes have come at six different tracks and he has made 44 starts since his most recent podium finish, a third at Sonoma in 2015.

Ed Jones caused a red flag in the first round of qualifying and he will have to start 21st. The two races where Jones was the top Ganassi finisher were street course races and both were third place finishes at Long Beach and in the second Belle Isle race. Zach Veach had his fastest lap deleted after he spun coming to the checkered for the end of group two's session in round one and he will start 22nd. Veach has been the worst Andretti Autosport finisher in eight consecutive races and in ten of 11 races. Zachary Claman De Melo makes his Toronto debut from 23rd on the grid. Claman De Melo could become the sixth Quebec-born to win an IndyCar race. No Canadian province has produced more IndyCar winners.

NBCSN's coverage of the Honda Indy Toronto begins at 3:00 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 3:42 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 85 laps.

Track Walk: Toronto 2018

IndyCar is back in Canada

The 12th round of the 2018 Verizon IndyCar Series season is the final street course race of the season at Exhibition Place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, the lone international date on the calendar. Six different drivers representing five different teams have won a race this season with four different winners in as many races. Six different teams have a driver in the top ten of the championship. With this being IndyCar's only international race, ten different nationalities are represented on the entry list. Five different nationalities are represented in the top ten of the championship.

Coverage:
Time: Coverage begins at 3:00 p.m. ET on Sunday July 15th with green flag scheduled for 3:42 p.m. ET.
TV Channel: NBCSN
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Jon Beekhuis, Katie Hargitt and Robin Miller will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule
Friday:
First Practice: 10:40 a.m. ET (45-minute session)
Second Practice: 2:30 p.m. ET (45-minute session)
Saturday:
Third Practice: 9:50 a.m. ET (45-minute session)
Qualifying: 1:55 p.m. ET (NBCSN will have tape-delayed coverage at 4:30 p.m. ET)
Sunday:
Warm-Up: 11:40 a.m. ET (30-minute session)
Race: 3:42 p.m. ET (85 laps)

Canadians Coming Home

This year's IndyCar season has been a successful one for Canadians and this year's Honda Indy Toronto is set to have three Canadians on the grid, the most in this event since 2011 when James Hinchcliffe made his Toronto debut with Paul Tracy and Alex Tagliani also on the grid. This year James Hinchcliffe heads home on a wave of momentum. 

Hinchcliffe is coming off his sixth career victory after a stellar drive at Iowa to chase down the dominant Josef Newgarden and Hinchcliffe finds himself eighth in the championship. While this season bares the burden of a failed Indianapolis 500 attempt, Hinchcliffe has four top five finishes and eight top ten finishes from ten starts and he rolls into Toronto off the back of three consecutive top ten finishes. After years of hardship in his home race, Hinchcliffe has turned it around the last two years. In each race Hinchcliffe has started sixth and in each race he has stood on the third step of the podium. This is the only track where Hinchcliffe has scored successive podium finishes in his IndyCar career.

Hinchcliffe is not known for success in the races after victories. Only once has Hinchcliffe finished in the top ten in the race following a victory and that was last year at Barber when he finished sixth after his victory at Long Beach. 

While Hinchcliffe enters as a winner, Robert Wickens enters as the highest placed Canadian in the championship. A pair of fifth place finishes in the last two races has the rookie sixth in the championship and 107 points behind Scott Dixon in the championship. Through 11 races, Wickens' five top five finishes are the most for a rookie since Carlos Muñoz in 2014. The last time a rookie had six top five finishes in a season was Simon Pagenaud in 2012 but Wickens is trending better than the Frenchman did that season as Pagenaud had one fewer top five finish through 11 races than Wickens' current total.

This will be Wickens' first race in Canada since August 30, 2009 when he finished fourth in the Atlantics race at motorsport. This will only be his second start on the Exhibition Place circuit. He finished seventh in the 2007 Atlantics race held at Toronto. Wickens has won in his home country before. He won the second race of the 2005 Formula BMW USA weekend held in association with the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix at Montreal. 

Zachary Claman De Melo makes his Toronto IndyCar debut this weekend. The French-Canadian raced the previous two years at Toronto in Indy Lights and after he finished 13th in both races in 2016 he finished second and third in the two 2017 races. While both Hinchcliffe and Wickens have stood on the podium this season, De Melo has yet to crack the top ten and his only lead lap finish this season occurred in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, which coincidentally was Claman De Melo's best finish of the season of 12th. It is his only top fifteen finish this year. 

Paul Tracy is the only Canadian to win at Toronto with him doing it in 2003 and 2013. Tracy is also responsible for the most recent home victory for a Canadian when he won at Vancouver in 2004.

Is This the Time For a Sébastien Bourdais Turnaround?

The Frenchman started out the 2018 season in a better position than his dream start to the 2017 season but the last few weeks have been hard on Bourdais.

Bourdais' only top ten finish in the last six races was eighth at Texas and his average finish in the last six races is 15.667. He has started in the top six in three of the six races but he has started 15th or worse in the other three. He has not led a lap in the last five races after starting the season with leading at least one lap in the first six races. 

On the bright side for Bourdais he has made it to the Fast Six session on the last three occasions and he is one of the better active drivers at Toronto. He has an average finish of 5.307 at the track and he has finished in the top ten in 12 of 13 starts. Bourdais has started in the top ten every year he has been at Toronto and he has started in the top five on nine occasions. His four pole positions are second most all-time in this event behind only Dario Franchitti who had five Toronto pole positions. Bourdais has completed 1,065 of 1,072 laps in his 13 starts and he has six consecutive lead lap finishes in this event.

Bourdais finds himself tenth in the championship on 254 points and he is at a precarious position with the drivers ahead of him on the verge of pulling away and making it difficult for Bourdais to pick up a few more spots in the remaining six races. He is 25 points behind Simon Pagenaud in ninth with Hinchcliffe a point ahead of Pagenaud. Bourdais is 104 points outside the top five of the championship despite being in the top five after each of the first five races of the season. Since returning to full-time IndyCar competition in 2013, Bourdais has never finished better than tenth in the championship.

Honda's Hopes

Chevrolet has won seven of the last nine Toronto races and Honda has been the title sponsor for all of those races. The good news is Honda heads into one of its marquee events leading in victories with a 6-5 edge over Chevrolet thanks to Hinchcliffe at Iowa and Honda has had at least two cars on the podium in ten of the first 11 races. Iowa was only the second race this season where Chevrolet had two cars finish in the top five but through the first four street course races this season, Chevrolet has only one top five finish, a second in the second Belle Isle race at the hands of Will Power. Honda leads the Manufactures' Championship with 922 points to Chevrolet's 820 points.

Honda looks to sweep the street course races this season. The manufacture enters four-for-four after Bourdais won at St. Petersburg, Alexander Rossi won at Long Beach and Scott Dixon and Ryan Hunter-Reay split the Belle Isle weekend. All five Honda teams have won a street course race in the last two seasons. 

Scott Dixon is the man responsible for the two Honda victories at Toronto in the DW12-era and both came during his memorable sweep of the 2013 doubleheader. It also capped a streak of three consecutive victories that launched the New Zealander into the championship fight. Five years later, Dixon leads the championship by 33 points over Josef Newgarden with 53 points covering the top five. Those two victories started a streak of seven consecutive top ten finishes at Toronto but Dixon has not finished in the top five the last four years. In 13 Toronto starts Dixon has never started outside the top ten, he has seven top five finishes and 11 top ten finishes.

Andretti Autosport will look to shake off a horrendous Iowa weekend in Canada and it has been a kind place to the Andretti drivers. Ryan Hunter-Reay and Marco Andretti have each completed 885 of 886 laps run at Toronto since the event returned to the schedule in 2009. Hunter-Reay won the 2012 race but last year's sixth place finish was his first top ten finish since that victory after six consecutive finishes outside the top ten, four of which were finishes outside the top fifteen. Hunter-Reay has started outside the top fifteen in the last three Toronto races. Andretti finished fourth in last year's race and he has three top five finishes and eight top ten finishes in 11 starts. Like Hunter-Reay, Andretti has started outside the top ten in the last three Toronto races and he has never started better than eighth in this race.

Alexander Rossi finished second in last year's race after starting eighth and he has completed all 170 laps in his two Toronto starts. Zach Veach has six starts at Exhibition Place in the Road to Indy series.  He finished second in the first Star Mazda race held in 2012 but in four Indy Lights races his best finish was fifth in 2014.

Graham Rahal qualified second in last year's race but he was shuffled back when a caution came out prior to his first pit stop. While Rahal finished ninth last year and he has three top ten finishes in the last five Toronto races, his lone top five finish remains fifth in the 2010 race. He has ten top ten finishes this season, leading all drivers in IndyCar but he has only three top five finishes and his runner-up finish at St. Petersburg remains his only podium finish. His teammate Takuma Sato enters off a third-place finish at Iowa, three consecutive top ten finishes and four top ten finishes in the last five races. While Sato has three top ten finishes in the last four Toronto races, he has finished 20th or worse five times in ten Toronto starts.

Ed Jones had his streak of four consecutive top ten finishes snapped last week at Iowa. Last year, he retired from the Toronto race after 75 laps due to a mechanical failure.

Penske and Carpenter Look to Keep the Streak Going
Team Penske has won the last two years at Toronto and Ed Carpenter Racing won the two races prior to that with the 2015 victory coming under CFH Racing branding.

Josef Newgarden has won two of the last three years at Toronto and his victory last year came with a bit of fortunate timing with the Tennessean being on the pit lane when the first caution came out. The break aside Newgarden went on to win the race with an average speed of 95.79 MPH, the fastest Toronto race since Paul Tracy won in 2003 with an average speed of 96.189 MPH. The only driver to win three Toronto races within four years is Michael Andretti.

Will Power heads into Toronto with three victories, tied with Dario Franchitti for second most victories in this event's history. Last year, Power suffered his first career lap one retirement after contact in turn three with Scott Dixon broke his rear suspension. Power has only started outside the top ten twice in 13 Toronto appearances and he has started in the top five in ten of the last 11 Toronto races with six front row starts in that time period.

Simon Pagenaud's solid season of eight top ten finishes in 11 races only has the Frenchman ninth in the championship with one podium finish to show for it and he is on the outside of the championship fight with time running out. The Frenchman has yet to have a breakthrough at Toronto. He started on pole position last year, his fifth consecutive time starting on one of the first two races at Toronto, and after being shuffled back during the first pit cycle he roared to a fifth place finish. However, he has never finished on the podium in this race. Pagenaud has never failed to make it out of the first round of qualifying at this event. This has been a rough year on street course for Pagenaud. His best finish is tenth and he has started outside in two of the four races. Last year, he had four top five finishes on street courses. This will be the first time in Pagenaud's IndyCar career he does not have at least two top five finishes on street courses in a season.

Spencer Pigot is coming off his career best finish of second at Iowa and he has three top ten finishes in the last five races after not having a top ten finish in his prior 12 starts. Last year, Pigot had a great first stint at Toronto to drive to eighth passing past champions Ryan Hunter-Reay and Tony Kanaan along the way. An extra pit stop after contact with Takuma Sato derailed Pigot's hopes of a respectable result. While he has finished 19th and 18th in his two Toronto IndyCar starts, he swept the Indy Lights races at Toronto in 2015. Pigot has made it out of round one of qualifying on the last two occasions at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and Road America.

Jordan King will make his Toronto debut. It has been a shaky season for the Englishman. While King has been fast and has had respectable qualifying results, he has been frequently in the barriers. King is coming off his best finish this season, a 12th at Road America and it was his second lead lap finish in seven starts. King will look to end his first round of IndyCar street courses on a high note. His best finish in the previous four street course races was 16th in the first Belle Isle race, his only other lead lap finish this season.

Daly In, Chaves Out at Harding
Harding Racing is a making a substitution for the Honda Indy Toronto and the team is bringing in Conor Daly in place of Gabby Chaves for the Canadian round.

Chaves remains employed with the team but Harding Racing is using the remainder of the season to try out other drivers as the team is looking to expand to a two-car operation next season. Chaves has not put up spectacular results this season but he has been consistently bring the car home and keeping all four wheels intact. Prior to Iowa, Chaves had been running at the finish of every race this season with his retirement at Iowa due to handling issues being his first of the season. His best finish this season was 14th, which occurred at St. Petersburg and the Indianapolis 500.

This will be Daly's fourth Toronto race. His best finish was 12th in 2015 substituting for the injured James Hinchcliffe and he qualified seventh the following year. His average starting position and average finishing position is 14.7. Daly has finished on the lead lap in all three of his Toronto starts.

Road to Indy

All three Road to Indy series are in the second half of their seasons and championship pictures are tightening up.

Colton Herta's championship lead shrunk to eight points over Patricio O'Ward after the Mexican driver took his fourth victory of the season and his first victory since Barber. Herta has 283 points to O'Ward's 275 points. The American has eighth consecutive podium finishes and he has been on the podium in nine of ten races. Last year, Herta finished fourth in the first Toronto race and he started on pole for the second race but contact with the barrier while leading ended his hopes of winning that day. O'Ward finished on the podium in three of four Pro Mazda races at Toronto.

Santiago Urrutia trails Herta by 49 points and he finished third and 11th last year at Toronto. Victor Franzoni won at Toronto in U.S. F2000 in 2016 and he is 67 points behind Herta. Ryan Norman has 189 points with Aaron Telitz on 181 points. Telitz swept the 2016 Pro Mazda races at Toronto and he finished fifth and second last year in Indy Lights. Canadian Dalton Kellett heads to Toronto on 177 points. In seven Road to Indy starts at Toronto, Kellett's best finish was seventh in U.S. F2000 in 2013.

The first Indy Lights race will be at 12:40 p.m. ET on Saturday July 14th. The second Indy Lights race will take place at 12:25 p.m. ET on Sunday July 15th.

Canadian Parker Thompson comes home with 237 points in the Pro Mazda championship and he holds a 46-point lead over Rinus VeeKay. Thompson has finished in the top five of every race this season and he leads the series with three victories. Thompson has won his last three starts in Toronto as he won the second U.S. F2000 race in 2016 and he swept the U.S. F2000 races last year. VeeKay finished third and second in last year's U.S. F2000 races and he has not had a podium finish in the last four races. Carlos Cunha is four points behind VeeKay and he is still looking for his first U.S. F2000 victories after 21 career starts.

David Malukas is coming off his first two career victories after he swept the Road America weekend and he is fourth on 179 points. He is five points ahead of Harrison Scott, who has two victories, a runner-up finish and a pair of third place finishes. Oliver Askew round out the top six on 150 points. Askew has three pole positions but his only podium finish was second in the first IMS road course race. Sting Ray Robb is seventh on 138 points with Robert Megennis on 126 points.

Pro Mazda will race at 10:50 a.m. ET on Saturday July 14th with the second race scheduled for 10:40 a.m. ET on Sunday July 15th.

Kyle Kirkwood has won four consecutive races in U.S. F2000 and the American has 217 points from seven races. Kirkwood holds a 95-point championship lead over Alexandre Baron. Baron won back-to-back races at St. Petersburg and Barber and he had a runner-up finish in the second Barber race but since then Baron's best finish is seventh. Baron won at Toronto in 2014 driving in Indy Lights. Kaylen Frederick has finished runner-up in three consecutive races and he is third in the championship on 112 points, 11 points behind Baron.

Igor Fraga is fourth on the championship on 102 points and the Brazilian's only podium finish was second to Baron at St. Petersburg. José Sierra is three points behind Fraga and while Sierra has five top ten finishes this season he has finished outside the top twenty twice. Lucas Kohl and Rasmus Lindh are tied on 98 points with Kohl holding the tiebreaker with a seventh place finish as both drivers are tied with two third-place finishes and one fourth-place finish. Kohl finished third in the most recent race at Road America. Lindh won pole position for both Road America races.

Calvin Ming is eighth in the championship on 88 points with Darren Keane on 83 points. Keith Donegan and Kory Enders tied for tenth on 79 points. Dakota Dickerson is back for his second consecutive U.S. F2000 round. Dickerson is the current championship leader in the Formula 4 United States Championship. 

U.S. F2000's first race will be at 11:45 a.m. ET on Saturday July 14th with the second race at 9:45 a.m. ET on Sunday July 15th.

Fast Facts

This will be the 11th IndyCar race to take place on July 15th and first since 2006 when Scott Dixon won at Nashville.

This race occurs 17 years to the day Michael Andretti won his seventh and final Toronto race. He won from 13th on the grid, the furthest back a Toronto winner has started.

Newman-Haas Racing has the most Toronto victories with seven. Chip Ganassi Racing has the second most with six victories.

Spencer Pigot could join Paul Tracy as the only drivers to have won at Toronto in IndyCar and Indy Lights.

A.J. Allmendinger is the only driver to win at Toronto in IndyCar and Atlantics.

Only two drivers have scored their first career victory at Toronto: Adrián Fernández in 1996 and Justin Wilson in 2005.

The last time there was a Canadian 1-2 finish was August 10, 2003 at Mid-Ohio with Paul Tracy ahead of Patrick Carpentier.

There have been a total of six Canadian 1-2 finishes in IndyCar history. Those 1-2 finishes are...
Michigan 1992: Scott Goodyear over Paul Tracy.
Homestead 1995: Jacques Villeneuve over Paul Tracy.
Road America 1995: Jacques Villeneuve over Paul Tracy.
Rio de Janeiro 1997: Paul Tracy over Greg Moore.
Gateway 1997: Paul Tracy over Greg Moore.
Mid-Ohio 2003: Paul Tracy over Patrick Carpentier.

There has never been a Canadian 1-2-3 finish.

Since Toronto returned to the schedule in 2009, A.J. Foyt Racing has had at least one car finish in the top ten in six of 11 races.

A.J. Foyt Racing's only victory in Canada occurred on July 3, 1977 with A.J. Foyt winning at Mosport.

This will be the 76th IndyCar race to take place in Canada and it is the 34th time Exhibition Place has hosted IndyCar.

Of the previous 75 IndyCar races in Canada, only six have been won by Brazilians. Emerson Fittipaldi won at Toronto in 1987, Mauricio Gugelmin won at Vancouver in 1997, Roberto Moreno won at Vancouver in 2001, Cristiano da Matta won at Toronto in 2002, Bruno Junqueira won at Montreal in 2004 and Hélio Castroneves won at Edmonton in 2012.

Nine different nationalities have won at Toronto (American, Brazilian, Canadian, Mexican, British, Italian, French, Australian, New Zealander).

The average starting position for a Toronto winner is 3.969 with a median of third.

Three of the last four Toronto races have been won from outside the top five. Only three of the prior 13 Toronto races were won from outside the top five.

The average number of lead changes in a Toronto race is 4.09375 with a median of four.

The average number of cautions in a Toronto race is 3.59375 with a median of three. The average number of caution laps is 14.625 with a median of 12.5.

Three of the last four Toronto races have had fewer than ten caution laps after only one of the prior 13 Toronto races had fewer than ten caution laps.

Possible Milestones:

Scott Dixon is one top five finish away from tying A.J. Foyt for second all-time on 149 top five finishes.

Sébastien Bourdais is one top five finish away from 75 career top five finishes.

Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead eight laps to surpass Tomas Scheckter for 31st all-time in laps led.

Simon Pagenaud needs to lead 65 laps to reach the 1,000 laps led milestone.

Takuma Sato needs to lead 23 laps to reach the 500 laps led milestone.

Graham Rahal needs to lead 21 laps to reach the 400 laps led milestone.

Charlie Kimball needs to lead 38 laps to reach the 200 laps led milestone.

Predictions

Robert Wickens wins in his first IndyCar race in Toronto with a Honda sweep of the podium ahead of Alexander Rossi and Graham Rahal. There will be more lead changes in this race than Iowa last week. At least one Team Penske driver does not make it to the second round of qualifying. There will not be a caution between lap 20 and lap 35 of this race. Other than Wickens, no other rookie finishes in the top ten. Every driver will complete at least 50 laps. Sleeper: Takuma Sato.

Musings From the Weekend: Let's Talk Ovals

IndyCar had a race with 955 passes at Iowa and James Hinchcliffe took the victory on a day where Josef Newgarden wiped the floor with everyone for an hour and a half. We have reached the point of the IndyCar season where drivers are being mathematically eliminated from the championship. The British Grand Prix gave us the Mercedes vs. Ferrari battle we have been waiting for. A notable last name won at Silverstone. IMSA had another great battle in Canada. You know who won the World Superbike races as that series now takes over two months off before its final four rounds. There was a first time winner in the NASCAR Cup series. Something happened in Japan for the first time in 32 years. Craig Lowndes announced his retirement from full-time Supercars competition. Santino Ferrucci may have ended his own career. Here is a run down of what got me thinking.

Let's Talk Ovals
In pondering the 2019 IndyCar schedule it is hard to avoid the topic of ovals and IndyCar's long drawn struggle to attract more oval races and more importantly keep them.

In 2011, the original IndyCar schedule had 17 venues, eight of which were ovals and then earthquake damage forced the Motegi round to be run on the road course instead of the 1.5-mile oval. Since the start of the DW12-era no schedule has had more than six ovals and every time a breakthrough appears to be coming another setback occurs. In 2015, IndyCar had six ovals and when Phoenix was about to enter Fontana and Milwaukee left. After another year at five ovals, the schedule was back up to six ovals for 2017 when Gateway returned and it remained consistent for 2018 but with Phoenix on the way outs IndyCar is on the verge of another step back.

The good news is Homestead quickly emerged as a possible filler for the loss of Phoenix but there is a Band-Aid feeling to Homestead: A temporary fix to a greater issue.

IndyCar isn't new to Homestead. CART and the IRL went there from 1996 to 2010 and like all venues in the 1990s there was a promising start and a decline coinciding with reunification. It has been difficult for IndyCar to gain traction in certain parts of the country. Its heart is in the Midwest and that is fine. You have to be rooted somewhere and its Mecca of Indianapolis is surrounded by venues such as Belle Isle, Road America, Mid-Ohio and Gateway. Long Beach has long been the western capital for IndyCar and while since the turn of the Millennium two southern venues of St. Petersburg and Barber have become favorite spring stops other venues have struggled to spark.

Last year, Gateway returned and it was a hit immediately. Close to 40,000 people attended the first race at the 1.25-mile oval since 2003. Gateway isn't one of the bigger ovals. It isn't apart of the mega-ownership groups of International Speedway Corporation or Speedway Motorsports, Inc. It is an independent track owned by a former driver turned real estate developed based in the area. It didn't have a multi-million dollar renovation. It is nothing special but it put on a heck of an event because the track knew its community, it knew how to draw people out and for the first time in a long time IndyCar appears to have found a place where it is wanted.

Does the Homestead-Miami-area want IndyCar? Does anywhere want IndyCar? IndyCar can go to all these markets but if nobody cares if IndyCar is there then the race is likely going to fail.

There are plenty of ovals in this country and we are in an odd period where it seems 95% of them are struggling. Our expectations have to change. NASCAR races aren't drawing 100,000 people on a weekly basis. Some integral events to NASCAR are drawing closer to NFL size crowds. We can't expect IndyCar oval races, which has been a fraction of NASCAR attendance from the start, to draw 100,000 people but where can IndyCar draw a respectable crowd? Instead of going to a venue and hoping it works IndyCar needs has to be strategic.

Motorsports might not be as popular as it once was in this country but there are race fans in this country. You just have to find them and make them feel wanted. There was a missed opportunity this year for IndyCar with New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Loudon was one of the ovals on the 2011 schedule and it disappeared after one year when the crowd wasn't as great as expected but the track lost a NASCAR race this year and it left an opening at the end of summer and early autumn. It might not have been as big of a crowd as it once was but that Loudon NASCAR race probably still drew 75,000 people and they all lost a race. It might not have worked in 2011 but the conditions have changed and IndyCar can give the New England-area a major event to make up for one lost. It could be one place where the fan base feels a bit of neglect after having two NASCAR races for 21 years. IndyCar should have stepped up and filled that late-September date. There are race fans there. IndyCar needs to connect with them.

Barber Motorsports Park has become a seminal spring event for IndyCar and ten years ago I doubt anyone would have guessed a race in Alabama would be so well supported but it is because there are race fans in the South. Darlington lost a NASCAR race just over a decade ago after having a spring race for over 50 years. NASCAR is still beloved at Darlington and the Southern 500 being moved to its rightful place Labor Day weekend was met with great enthusiasm but it is an underserved market.

If IndyCar can work in Alabama why couldn't it work in South Carolina? I don't know if the racing would work at Darlington but it would be different and IndyCar gets viewers in the Carolinas. We cannot let preconceived notions take over. It might not be the stereotypical IndyCar market but the South has race fans, not just NASCAR fans and the biggest way to get people interest is show interest in the market. If you embrace the fans that exist they will show the love back.

I understand why drivers do promotional events in cities and throw out first pitches at Major League Baseball games and sign autographs at local grocery stores, hardware stores and so on but there are many people that have been left behind at local short tracks across the country. That first pitch at Wrigley Field is nice but most people forget who threw out the first pitch by the time the first batter has stepped into the batter's box.

Where drivers will be received with a warm welcome is a racetrack. Loudon could work but while you think first pitch at Fenway Park is what will promote the race the actual answer might be going to a modified race and talking racing with race fans. The same is true in the South. Take two or three drivers to a late model stock car race and talk racing. Show you are interested. And maybe have the drivers compete now and then. Tony Stewart was a fan favorite because he kept going back to where he started. While he made millions he didn't forget those he met along the way.

After a race like yesterday's, maybe IndyCar needs more short tracks and maybe it needs to go to forgotten short tracks. Richmond would be great and not too long ago Baltimore drew 60,000 people so there is a fan base in the Mid-Atlantic area. Memphis has a short track, a damn good 3/4-mile oval and the Nashville Fairgrounds needs a little love and safer barriers but IndyCar would be very popular if it went to once was a gem. Maybe Indianapolis Raceway Park isn't too small and maybe that is where the season finale should be and it could be run the Saturday night of Brickyard weekend.

IndyCar's ties to American short track racing have been frayed for 30 years and let's not pretend that reconnecting is the answer that will turn every oval race into a sea of 100,000 people with two million watching on television but the little things that should be done are connecting with the local tracks and let them know they aren't forgotten. If you remember the people they will remember you back.

Winners From the Weekend
You know about James Hinchcliffe but did you know...

Patricio O'Ward won the Indy Lights race from Iowa, his fourth victory of the season.

Sebastian Vettel won the British Grand Prix, his first victory in the event since 2009.

Alexander Albon and Maximilian Günther split the Formula Two races at Silverstone. Anthonie Hubert and Pedro Piquet split the GP3 races.

Erik Jones won the NASCAR Cup race at Daytona, his career victory. Kyle Larson won the Grand National Series race.

The #54 CORE Autosport Oreca-Gibson of Colin Braun and Jon Bennett won the IMSA race at Mosport. The #67 Ford GT of Richard Westbrook and Ryan Briscoe won in GTLM. The #33 Mercedes-AMG Team Riley Motorsports Mercedes-AMG of Jeroen Bleekemolen and Ben Keating won in GTD.

Jamie Whincup and Shane van Gisbergen split the Supercars races at Townsville.

Jonathan Rea swept the World Superbike races at Misano. Federico Caricasulo won the World Supersport race.

Nick Cassidy won the Super Formula race at Fuji, his first career victory and the first victory for a New Zealander in the series since Mike Thackwell won at Fuji on August 10, 1986.

Coming Up This Weekend
IndyCar makes it one trip to Canada and specifically the streets of Toronto.
All three Road to Indy series join IndyCar in Toronto.
MotoGP has to get a race in hours prior to the World Cup Final at the Sachsenring.
The Formula E season ends in Brooklyn.
Portland hosts its first major motorsports series in over a decade with Pirelli World Challenge heading to Oregon.
NASCAR has another night race at Kentucky.
The Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters will be near the beaches in Zandvoort.

First Impressions: Iowa 2018

1. Wow. I don't know where to begin after that finish but let's start with James Hinchcliffe being consistent all day. He was passing cars on the first stint and went from 11th to the top three before his first stop. He was stellar and he kept up the pace throughout the race. He never faded while other cars did and he stalked Josef Newgarden, who dominated this race, but in the final stages Hinchcliffe was aggressive while Newgarden was conservative. Hinchcliffe blew pass Newgarden and after being caught with his pants down it was too late for Newgarden to chase down the Canadian. Hinchcliffe deserved this victory. He kept his foot on it all day and Newgarden let his guard down. It was surprising to see but James Hinchcliffe pulled a victory out of nowhere when everyone thought this race was over before we even reached lap 200. He deserved it. It is a big boost for him and the team and it is a great wave of momentum to ride into his home race.

We need to get to the finish.

2. IndyCar ran out of time. Ed Carpenter clipped the wall with six laps to go. By the time the pace car was released and picked up the field there were four laps to go. The pits opened with three laps to go. By the time the field was bunched back up there were two laps to go. When coming to the white flag lapped cars were still mixed between lead lap cars and they could not be moved out of the way and the next time by was the checkered flag.

Caution laps go by so fast at Iowa. The only way it could have been prevented was a red flag but even that would have caused problems and taken a lot of time. It would have been even greater of a mess to sort. There could have been a red flag immediately but a lap would have still been lost because the cars have to get bunched behind the pace car. The earliest they could have had everyone behind the pace car was four laps to go. Let's say they stopped on pit lane with four laps to go. There wasn't enough time. The next time they could have opened the pit lane for stops but you would have had a bunch of cars exiting the pit lane with the coming to two laps to go and you would have had to still organize the cars as they exited pit lane and by the time that was sorted out it would have been the white flag lap and there wasn't enough time.

It is unfortunate but it was an extraordinary circumstance. It is the nature of Iowa and we may never see this again but it a consequence of the procedures needed for an organized race. IndyCar could have said we are going green with two laps to go no matter what but that would have ignored the rulebook in place in terms of opening the pit lane and moving lapped cars to the back of the pack. Somebody would have ended up screwed either way. Would you rather have been screwed because the rules were followed or been screwed because the rules were ignored? Either way you are screwed but I guess you rather be screwed and know the procedure was followed.

IndyCar didn't have enough time and it was no one's fault. It was just the circumstances. It stinks but let's not loose our cool and demand table to be flipped over. This was a great race. We had 284 green flag laps of racing and we saw nearly 1,000 passes, 955 passes to be exact. The ending was anti-climatic but the entire race was great.

Now we can get back to the rest of the field.

3. Spencer Pigot finished second, his first career podium finish, his first career top ten finish on an oval and he was great today. He was in the top five for most of it and was really pushing Newgarden and Hinchcliffe. He deserved this podium finish. It is one good result in what has been a rough year for him and Ed Carpenter Racing and he might be back on the back foot next week but you have to take the positives when you can get them. Hopefully there are more days and results like these for Pigot.

4. Takuma Sato finished third! He worked his way to front with Hinchcliffe and he stayed there all day. He wasn't flashy but he kept his nose clean and he has his first top ten finish at Iowa. It has been a good year for Sato. He hasn't been in contention for victories but he has been solid and he brings the car home with good results.

5. Josef Newgarden thought the race was going to be restarted and took tires and instead of finishing second he was dropped to fourth. He rolled the dice on a restart and it never came. He sacrificed nine points with the decision. But it probably shouldn't have been a decision he and his team were forced to make. Newgarden stomped the field today and all I can say is he thought he had this in the bag and was caught out when Hinchcliffe caught and passed him. He and Tim Cindric were caught napping. That was very un-Penske of this team and they are going to get chewed out. These guys will be on their toes for the remainder of the season and it will not happen again. Despite coughing up as many points as he did, Newgarden has gotten back into the championship conversation. He trails Scott Dixon by 33 points, a healthy gap but one that can easily be overcome.

6. Robert Wickens followed Newgarden down pit lane and instead of finishing third he finished fifth. At Phoenix, Wickens didn't take tires and it cost him a victory. Today he took tires in hopes of a shot at victory and he never got the opportunity but once again it was a stellar day for Wickens. The race came to him. He lost some positions early but worked through it and made up positions. He was in the top five and worked his way onto the podium but... I can't call it a bad decision but a bad break has him settling for fifth.

7. Will Power finished sixth and that was as good as he was today despite starting on pole position and leading laps early. He didn't have it but he was good. He got a top ten. What else can you ask for? This is another year where the Iowa pole-sitter was really in contention for the victory and I can't figure out why Iowa is such a crapshoot for the pole-sitter.

8. Graham Rahal was lost at the start of this one and he busted his butt to finish seventh. He just worked at it and it paid off. This has been a good year for Rahal but he needs that little bit more.

9. Simon Pagenaud finished eighth and through 11 races Team Penske has yet to have multiple cars finish in the top five this season. It is another odd fact of this season.

10. Ed Carpenter caused the final caution but he kept running and he finished tenth. Carpenter wasn't really going to do better than ninth today but Ed Carpenter Racing needed this team were both cars ended up in the top ten.

11. Alexander Rossi and Andretti Autosport had the day from hell but he finished ninth and gained ground in the championship. Maybe Rossi would have finished sixth or seventh if he didn't stall on his first pit stop but he wasn't going to win this one.

12. Sébastien Bourdais did 95 laps on his first stint and he finished 11th. That was the best he was going to do today.

13. Scott Dixon had a bad day. It was bound to happen and he is still the championship leader. He lost some ground but he is still sitting pretty.

14. Let's run through the rest of the field: Ed Jones stopped early on the first stint for tires and nobody else followed causing Jones only to lose positions and never challenge again for the top ten. Charlie Kimball and Max Chilton just kept running and finished 14th and 15th respectively. I will get to Marco Andretti and the other three Andretti Autosport cars in a moment. Tony Kanaan was lost this weekend and finished 17th. Zachary Claman De Melo was in this race? He was 18th. Gabby Chaves and Matheus Leist were the only retirements.

15. Andretti Autosport had a complete 180º turn from ten days ago when IndyCar tested at Iowa. It went from top four times at the test to all four cars or three of the four cars in the top ten in practice to two cars starting in the top five to every little thing going wrong. Marco Andretti didn't have it after first practice. We covered Rossi stalling in the pit lane. Ryan Hunter-Reay could not talk to his crew and ran the first 220 laps with no way to tell his crew how to fix his car. He was in the top ten through all of it and then the left rear chamber shims fell out causing the car to be unbearable to drive and that ended his day. Zach Veach was in the top ten, had a tank slapper exiting turn four and his shot at a top ten was over. Somehow through all of it Rossi gained four points on Dixon and remained third and while Hunter-Reay lost two spots in the championship and is now fourth he only lost seven points to Dixon. Rossi and Hunter-Reay aren't out of it.

16. Why doesn't IndyCar have more short tracks? Sneak preview for tomorrow but I am writing about IndyCar and oval racing and the difficult the series is having to find successful venues but why can't this racing take place at Richmond or Memphis or the Nashville Fairgrounds? Why can't the series make Loudon work or why couldn't Milwaukee draw a crowd but Road America an hour north gets 50,000 people for race day? Could IndyCar make Darlington work? What other short track could be an option? How about Bristol even though a crowd of 60,000 would look like a ghost town?

This was a great race today and I know Josef Newgarden nearly won by a lap but a race is more than the leader. There was passing everywhere for positions and then a race happened at the front and we got a surprise winner. Yeah, the ending was unfortunate but sometimes you have back-and-forth football games end on ten-second runoffs. It sucks, it happens, we live and we cannot overlook everything that happened before it.

17. Next week we have Toronto as a post-World Cup Final dessert. Will you be too stuff and drained or will you have enough energy for the race?

Morning Warm-Up: Iowa 2018

Will Power leads Team Penske charge at Iowa

Will Power has another record: Most IndyCar pole positions at Iowa Speedway. The Australian picked up his fourth pole position at the 7/8th-mile oval with a two-lap average of 182.391 MPH. It is Power's 52nd career pole position, putting him one behind A.J. Foyt for second all-time. The pole-sitter has never won at Iowa Speedway. In fact, the pole-sitter has never finished on the podium in this race. The best finish for a pole-sitter is fourth, which occurred in 2008, 2014, 2016 and 2017. The average finish for the pole-sitter at Iowa is tenth. In Power's prior three Iowa pole positions he finished fifth, 17th and fourth but he only led 32 laps, zero laps and 23 laps in those three respective races. Power has won the 11th race of a season three times in his career but all three of those victories came on temporary circuits in Canada. He won at Edmonton in 2009 and 2011 and he won at Toronto in 2016. All five of Power's podium finishes that came in the 11th race of a season occurred in Canada with the Australian finishing runner-up at Edmonton in 2010 and third at Edmonton in 2012.

Josef Newgarden qualified second in what is the third consecutive front row lockout for Team Penske and it is the second consecutive race with Power and Newgarden on the front row. Newgarden qualified 1.231 MPH slower than Power over his two-lap qualifying run. Newgarden has not had a top five finish that wasn't a podium finish since the first Belle Isle race in 2017 when he finished fourth. Only eight of Newgarden's 30 career top five finishes have not been podium finishes. Four of those were on street circuits and four were on ovals but those four finishes on ovals are evenly split between Milwaukee and Pocono. Newgarden's most recent top five finish that wasn't a podium on an oval was fourth at Pocono in 2016. While he starts second, Newgarden had the fastest practice lap yesterday and it was the fastest lap run all day yesterday. His quickest lap was 17.5188 seconds. Newgarden won the 2016 Iowa race from second and he led 282 of 300 laps.

Ryan Hunter-Reay qualified third in what is his career-best starting position in this race. Hunter-Reay's prior best starting spot at Iowa was seventh. Last year's race was the fourth time the Iowa winner started in third position. No starting position has produced more Iowa winners. Simon Pagenaud will start fourth. He has never finished in the top five in the 11th race of an IndyCar season. He does have five consecutive top ten finishes in the 11th race of a season with sixth being his best finish, which occurred at Pocono in 2013 and 2014. Pagenaud did lose an engine in final practice yesterday. Alexander Rossi has his first career top five starting position at Iowa with Rossi rolling off from fifth. Rossi or Hunter-Reay have been the top Andretti Autosport finisher in all ten races this season with Rossi holding a 6-4 advantage over Hunter-Reay. Scott Dixon will start on the outside of row three. Dixon could get his 149th top five finish this weekend and it would tie him with A.J. Foyt of second all-time in top five finishes.

Robert Wickens was the top rookie qualifier in seventh. This is Wickens seventh time being the top Schmidt Peterson Motorsports qualifier this season. In five of the prior six races where Wickens was the top SPM qualifier he ended up being the top SPM finisher. The one exception is the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. Ed Jones started eighth in last year's Iowa race and this year he starts eighth again. However, last year he finished three laps down in 18th. Ed Carpenter will start ninth. He has finished in the top five only five times in the start following a Texas start and he has never finished in the top five in his next start after Texas. His best finish in a start after a Texas start was seventh at Phoenix in 2017 when Texas was his final start of 2016. Takuma Sato rounds out the top ten. Sato's fourth place finish at Road America was only the second time he was the top Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing finisher this season. The only other time Sato was the top RLLR car was the first Belle Isle race, where Graham Rahal retired after an accident and Sato finished fifth. Sato has been the top RLLR qualifier in seven races this season.

James Hinchcliffe qualified 11th. He has five top ten finishes in six Iowa starts but his only top five finish at the track was his 2013 victory, where he led 226 of 250 laps after starting second. Graham Rahal joins Hinchcliffe on row six. He has seven top ten finishes in ten Iowa starts but he has never finished on the podium at this track. His best finish was fourth in 2015. Tony Kanaan will start 13th. Kanaan has seven top ten finishes in the last eight Iowa races. Zach Veach could become the second driver to win at Iowa in car #26 but he will have to do it from 14th on the grid. Marco Andretti won in car #26 at this track in 2011. Dan Wheldon won three short oval races with car #26 with victories at Richmond and Nazareth in 2004 and a victory at Pikes Peak in 2005. Paul Tracy had two short oval victories with car #26 and both came at Milwaukee in 1999 and 2002. The only other short oval victory for car #26 was in 1957 when Jim Rathmann won at Milwaukee.

Sébastien Bourdais improves his average starting position at Iowa in 15th but it is only a minimal gain. His average starting position in his first four Iowa starts was 16.2. This is Bourdais' first top fifteen start at Iowa since he started sixth the 2014 race. Gabby Chaves starts 16th, his best career starting position at Iowa. He has never started nor finished in the top fifteen at Iowa. His best finish was 16th in 2015. Chaves did finished second in the 2013 Indy Lights race at Iowa to Sage Karam. This will be Chaves' fifth short oval race in his IndyCar career. His only lead lap finish on a short oval was his first career short oval start at Milwaukee in 2015 when he finished 11th. Charlie Kimball will start 17th with Spencer Pigot making it an all-American row nine. Kimball's most recent top five finish came 38 races ago when he finished fifth in the 2016 Indianapolis 500. Spencer Pigot is still looking for his first career top ten finish on an oval. He finished 11th at Texas last month with his other oval finishes this season being 14th at Phoenix and 20th in the Indianapolis 500.

Marco Andretti won from 17th at Iowa in 2011 and if he wants to win this year's race he will have to do it from 19th, which would break the record he holds for worst starting position for an Iowa winner. Andretti has not had multiple top five finishes in a season since 2015 when he had four top five finishes. He has not had multiple top five finishes on ovals in a season since 2013 when he finished fourth at Indianapolis and fifth at Texas. His most recent top five finish at Iowa was second in 2012. Zachary Claman De Melo will be making his Iowa debut in IndyCar from 20th position. He made two starts at this track in Indy Lights. He finished a lap down in eighth in 2016 but he finished on the lead lap in sixth last year. In Claman De Melo's first eight career starts he has only been the top Canadian finisher once and that was on his debut at Sonoma last year where he finished 17th after James Hinchcliffe was the first retirement of the race due to electrical issues.

Max Chilton is looking for his first career lead lap finish at Iowa but he will have to start 21st. This is the third consecutive race where Chilton has started outside the top twenty. He has finished a lap down in seven consecutive oval starts with his most recent lead lap finish on an oval being his fourth place finish in last year's Indianapolis 500. He has only four lead lap finishes in 14 oval starts. Matheus Leist rounds out the grid in 22nd. This is Leist's worst starting position in his IndyCar career. He won last year's Indy Lights race at Iowa. The young Brazilian suffered an accident in the first practice yesterday prior to the qualifying session.

NBCSN's coverage of the Iowa Corn 300 from Iowa Speedway begins at 2:00 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 2:40 p.m. ET. The race is schedule for 300 laps.

Track Walk: Iowa 2018

IndyCar's first of three July races takes place at Iowa

The 11th round of the 2018 Verizon IndyCar Series season takes place at Iowa Speedway, the shortest track on the schedule. This is the fourth oval race of the season and through three oval races, Scott Dixon has the most oval points with 156 points. He is 19 points clear of Alexander Rossi with Indianapolis 500 winner Will Power having the third most oval points with 131 points. Ed Carpenter makes it four different teams represented in the top four drivers in oval points with the Carpenter on 128 points, one ahead of Simon Pagenaud and three ahead of Josef Newgarden. Ryan Hunter-Reay is the final of seven drivers with triple-digit oval points, as Hunter-Reay has 122 oval points. 

Coverage:
Time: Coverage begins at 2:00 p.m. ET on Sunday July 8th with green flag scheduled for 2:40 p.m. ET.
TV Channel: NBCSN
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Jon Beekhuis, Katie Hargitt and Robin Miller will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule
Saturday:
First Practice: 11:15 a.m. ET (60-minute session)
Qualifying: 3:30 p.m. ET (NBCSN will have live coverage of this session)
Second Practice: 6:45 p.m. ET (60-minute session)
Sunday:
Race: 2:40 p.m. ET (300 laps)

Can Dixon Pull Away in the Championship?

For the second consecutive year Scott Dixon heads into Iowa as the championship leader but this year the New Zealander has a 45-point advantage, nine points greater than his championship lead at this point last year and he has already won twice in 2018 while he did not win another race in 2017 after Road America.

Dixon has mastered many racetracks IndyCar has gone to but he has not won at Iowa and only one of his last 23 victories have come on a short track. That victory came at Phoenix in 2016. His last short oval victory prior to Phoenix was at Richmond in 2009 and he also won at Milwaukee earlier in that season. Five of Dixon's first 20 IndyCar victories came on short tracks. 

Despite having yet to win at Iowa Speedway, Dixon has had respectable results at the 7/8-mile oval. Dixon has won three pole positions at Iowa and his best finish at the track is third, which he has achieved twice. In 2011, he finished third after starting 23rd and he went from tenth on the grid to finish third in 2016. In 11 Iowa starts, Dixon has six top five finishes and nine top ten finishes, both the most all-time at the track in IndyCar competition. 

While Dixon tops the charts in a few categories at Iowa, he trails in a few others. He has only led 126 laps, still good for sixth all-time at Iowa but he has never led the most laps in an Iowa race, only led more than 50 laps in one Iowa race when he led 76 laps in 2012 and the most laps he led in his three starts from pole position was 17 in 2014.

One other thing against Dixon heading to Iowa is that only once has the championship leader entering Iowa gone on to win the Iowa race and that was Dario Franchitti in the inaugural race at the track in 2007. Chip Ganassi Racing's two Iowa victories came in 2008 and 2009 with Dan Wheldon and Franchitti. Last year was only the fourth time Chip Ganassi Racing did not have a car finish in the top five at Iowa and it ended streak of three consecutive Iowa races with at least one Ganassi car on the podium.

Can Andretti Autosport Take Back Its House?

The most successful team at Iowa Speedway is Andretti Autosport with seven victories from 11 races and with five different drivers taking victory for the team at the 7/8-mile oval. However, the last two years have seen two different teams on the top step of the podium. 

The 2016 race was a disaster for Andretti Autoport with the best starting position for the team being 15th. None of the team's four cars finished on the lead lap and Alexander Rossi's sixth place finish was not enough to cover over how far off the team was in that race. Last year, Andretti Autosport had Takuma Sato start in the top five but three cars start outside the top ten. Ryan Hunter-Reay found something in the race and improved from his 15th place starting position to third, the best Honda in the field but the other three cars were not close to the pace of the #28 Honda. 

Hunter-Reay has three victories at Iowa, the most IndyCar victories at the track. He has five podium finishes in the last six Iowa races with an engine failure in 2016 being the only blemish for the Texas-born driver at this track in the DW12-era. He also had three eighth-place finishes at the track from 2008 to 2011. While Hunter-Reay has the most silverware from Iowa, he has only led in the three races he has been victorious in and his laps led in each victory were 15, two and 37. Hunter-Reay has never started in the top five at Iowa with his best starting position being seventh and he has started outside the top ten in seven of ten Iowa starts. 

Alexander Rossi is tied with Hunter-Reay for second in the championship, each driver trailing Dixon by 45 points. Hunter-Reay holds the tiebreaker with both drivers tied on one victory but Hunter-Reay has three runner-up finishes while Rossi has finished third in three races. Rossi has finished a lap down in each of his two Iowa starts but he had an impressive drive from 17th to sixth in 2016 when ovals were still relatively new to him and he led four laps. Last year, Rossi started 12th and finished 11th as he could not quite crack the top ten. 

Marco Andretti's most recent IndyCar victory came at Iowa in 2011. While Andretti has been competitive at Iowa the aero kit epoch was not kind to him. While he started eighth and finished seventh in 2015, Andretti's worst two starting positions at this track have come in the last two years and he has finished outside the top ten in three of the last four Iowa races. The seven laps Andretti led last year came during a pit cycle. Those were Andretti's first laps led at the track since 2012.

Zach Veach will make his first IndyCar start at Iowa. The Ohioan made four starts at Iowa between the Road to Indy series. His first start at the track came in U.S. F2000 in 2010, a race where he finished fifth and then Andretti Autosport teammate Sage Karam took victory. He finished sixth in the 2012 Star Mazda race at Iowa with his first Indy Lights start at the track coming in 2013 but he finished a lap down in seventh. He finished second in the 2016 Indy Lights race where he led 19 laps and lost the lead after getting caught in lapped traffic. 

Veach enters Iowa on a bit of slump. He has not finished in the top ten in the last seven races and he has been the worst Andretti Autosport finisher in each race, including the Indianapolis 500 where the team started six cars. Veach has started outside the top twenty in all three of his oval starts in his IndyCar career. Veach did pick up fastest lap at Road America.

Andretti Autosport swept the top four positions at an unofficial test at Iowa Speedway held the Wednesday after the Road America race. Hunter-Reay was the fastest at 17.72 seconds with Rossi, Andretti and Veach in tow and 0.08 seconds covering the top four.

Can Ed Carpenter Racing Find Some Magic?

The little team that could has not won since the 2016 Iowa race and last year Ed Carpenter Racing had a great chance at victory lost when J.R. Hildebrand got caught in lapped traffic. Ed Carpenter Racing has been through a difficult spell to start the 2018 season but the last few weeks have seen things start to go in the little team's favor.

Spencer Pigot has finished in the top ten in two of the last four races with an 11th at Texas. He finished eighth at Road America after starting tenth and Pigot will be making his first IndyCar start at Iowa. Pigot has only made one start at Iowa in his Road to Indy days. That came in Indy Lights in 2015 where Pigot finished eighth, one lap down, after starting ninth. He is still looking for his first top ten finish on an oval. 

Ed Carpenter has scored 128 points in his three starts this season and he trails Max Chilton by six points in the championship. Carpenter finished seventh at Phoenix and was runner-up in the Indianapolis 500 after leading 65 laps, the most in the race, from pole position. It is the first time Carpenter has had two top ten finishes in his first three starts in a season since 2008 when he finished fifth at Homestead and finished sixth at Motegi. Carpenter has started in the top ten the last two years at Iowa but his best finish between the two races is 12th. He finished fourth and fifth in 2013 and 2014 respectively and those are his only top ten finishes at the track. The only time Carpenter has led laps at Iowa was in 2013 when he led 18 laps.

Will Team Penske Keep Up Its Oval Dominance?

Team Penske picked up it first Iowa victory last season but the man responsible for that victory, Hélio Castroneves, will not be in Sunday's race. While the team is without Castroneves, Team Penske has won four consecutive short oval races, it has won nine of the last 14 oval races and the team has had a car on the podium in nine consecutive oval races.

Josef Newgarden moved up to fourth in the championship after he scored his third victory of 2018 in dominating fashion at Road America. Newgarden has been one of the top drivers at Iowa in the DW12-era. In six starts he has three top five finishes and four top ten finishes with his last four results being second, second, first and sixth. Newgarden has led a lap the last three years in this race. While the finishes have been strong for Newgarden his starting positions have been suspect. He went from 21st to 2nd in 2014 and he started 16th in last year's race before he wound up in sixth. 

An engine problem at the start of lap one at Road America has kicked Will Power back to fifth in the championship and Power will look to rebound at a track where he has three consecutive top ten finishes. Off the back of three pole positions, Power has an average starting position of 5.3 at the short track, second all-time to only Castroneves. Power's worst starting position at Iowa was 11th in 2008. Iowa is the only active oval where Power has multiple starts at and has not led 100 laps. He led 23 laps last year but it was only the third time he has led an Iowa race. He has led 57 laps in his career at this track.

Simon Pagenaud has completed 1,699 of 1,700 laps in his six Iowa starts and he has four top ten finishes including with two coming in the last two years. Pagenaud led 11 laps from pole position in 2016 and two laps last year but those are the only laps he has led at this track. He finished seventh last year in this race and he is coming off a seventh place finish at Road America with the Frenchman still on one top five finish this season.

The lack of top five finishes has been a story for Team Penske this season.

Through the first ten races in 2017, Team Penske had multiple top five finishers in seven races with multiple podium finishers in five of those races. This year Team Penske has yet to have multiple cars in the top five and the only time the team has had at least three top ten finishers were the two Indianapolis races where four cars were entered in each race. Since joining the IRL in 2002, the prior longest streak without multiple top five finishers from the start of a season was 2008 when the team didn't have a double top five performance until the team's sixth race at Milwaukee. The team did not have a double top five performance until the 13th race of the 2000 CART season when Castroneves and Gil de Ferran finished 1-2 at Mid-Ohio.

While Andretti Autosport swept the top four at the Iowa test, Team Penske had the fifth, sixth and seventh fastest times in that session and all three were within two-tenths of a second of Hunter-Reay.

Indy Lights

Indy Lights is back for its tenth of 17 races this season and regardless of the winner this weekend we will have a new team in victory lane at Iowa. Carlin had won three consecutive years at Iowa but that team is no longer on the grid. Schmidt Peterson Motorsports won five times in Indy Lights at Iowa but has not fielded cars the last two years. Panther Racing and Bryan Herta Autosport have also won in Indy Lights at Iowa but neither are field cars today. 

With seven consecutive podium finishes and eighth podium finishes from nine races, Colton Herta leads the championship with 245 points and he is 17 points clear of his Andretti Autosport teammate Patricio O'Ward. Herta started on pole position for last year's Iowa race before finishing fourth. O'Ward's only Iowa start came in Pro Mazda in 2015 where he finished third behind an Andretti Autosport 1-2 of Weiron Tan and Dalton Kellett.

Belardi Auto Racing's Santiago Urrutia has dropped to 44 points behind Herta as the Uruguayan has not stood on the podium in his last four races. Victor Franzoni picked up his first career Indy Lights victory in the most recent race at Road America. The Juncos Racing driver has 193 points. Aaron Telitz and Ryan Norman are tied on 160 points with Dalton Kellett on 151 points. 

The 100-lap Indy Lights race is scheduled for 12:15 p.m. ET on Sunday July 8th.

Fast Facts

This will be the seventh IndyCar race to take place on July 8th and first since 2012 when Ryan Hunter-Reay won at Toronto. 

This year's Iowa race takes place on Dale Coyne's 64th birthday. Dale Coyne Racing has had a car entered in three of the seven races to take place on his birthday. The best finish for a Dale Coyne-owned car on his birthday is fifth by Bruno Junqueira at Toronto in 2007.

Dale Coyne Racing has only one top ten finish at Iowa and that came in 2012 when Justin Wilson finished 12th. 

Sébastien Bourdais has finished ninth and eighth in his last two Iowa starts. Zachary Claman De Melo finished eighth and sixth in his two Indy Lights starts at Iowa. 

Josef Newgarden is the only driver to win at Iowa in IndyCar and Indy Lights. Max Chilton and Matheus Leist are the only other drivers entered in this year's IndyCar race with Iowa Indy Lights victories. 

Newgarden along with Tony Kanaan and James Hinchcliffe could join Dario Franchitti as the only drivers to win at Iowa with two different teams.

Despite having to failed to qualify for the Indianapolis 500, James Hinchcliffe's 61 oval points is more than nine drivers who have started all three oval races this season.

Of the 20 drivers to have started all three oval races, Tony Kanaan has the third fewest oval points with 44 ahead of only Ed Jones and Zach Veach.

Graham Rahal has completed 2,690 of 2,700 laps in ten Iowa starts with seven top ten finishes. He has an average finish of 9.1 and he has led 19 laps at Iowa.

Takuma Sato has never finished in the top ten at Iowa and he has finished outside the top fifteen in six of eight starts.

A rookie has finished on the podium at Iowa twice. Hideki Mutoh finished second to Dan Wheldon in 2008 and Sage Karam finished third in 2015. 

Robert Wickens was the first rookie to finish on the podium in the history of the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and he was the first rookie to finish on the podium at Phoenix since Jim Guthrie won there in 1997.

Ed Jones has four consecutive top ten finishes. 

Charlie Kimball led 10 laps in last year's race after leading only seven laps in his prior six Iowa starts. His best Iowa finish is tenth. 

Gabby Chaves has finished 16th and 17th in his two Iowa starts.

No driver has scored their first career victory at Iowa.

American drivers have combined for seven pole positions through the first ten races. This is the most pole positions for American drivers through ten races since the 2001 IRL season when American drivers won all 13 pole positions that season.

American drivers had combined for seven pole positions from 2014-2017.

An American driver has never started on pole position at Iowa. 

The average starting position for an Iowa winner is 7.181 with a median of fourth. 

The average number of lead changes in an Iowa race is 10.727 with a median of ten. 

The average number of cautions in an Iowa race is five with a median of five. The average number of caution laps is 55.727 with a median of 57.

Possible Milestones:

Sébastien Bourdais is one top five finish away from 75 career top five finishes.

Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead eight laps to surpass Tomas Scheckter for 30th all-time in laps led.

Josef Newgarden needs to lead nine laps to reach the 1,300 laps led milestone.

Simon Pagenaud needs to lead 65 laps to reach the 1,000 laps led milestone.

James Hinchcliffe needs to lead 89 laps to reach the 800 laps led milestone.

Takuma Sato needs to lead 23 laps to reach the 500 laps led milestone.

Ed Carpenter needs to lead 25 laps to reach the 400 laps led milestone.

Graham Rahal needs to lead 21 laps to reach the 400 laps led milestone.

Charlie Kimball needs to lead 38 laps to reach the 200 laps led milestone.

Predictions

I want Marco Andretti to win because that would be the story of the weekend and he will not start in the top five. At least seven cars finish on the lead lap. Scott Dixon loses points but still leads the championship by at least 30 points. Will Power finishes in the top ten but is not the best finishing Penske driver. Max Chilton improves his average finish, as does Gabby Chaves. Ed Jones neither qualifies nor finishes in the top ten. Matheus Leist does not finish on the lead lap. At least three drivers lead a lap but finish at least one lap down. Sleeper: Zach Veach.

Musings From the Weekend: Now We Can Talk Schedule

June ended on a hot note and July only got hotter. A familiar livery got its first victory in over five years. Frontrunners were dropping like flies in Austria. Formula Two is having clutch problems. Two former Formula One drivers won in Super GT. Every session was close in MotoGP and Marc Márquez's marvelous ride earned him his fourth victory of the season and extended his championship lead. There was Kyle-on-Kyle violence in Chicago. Frédéric Gabillon won the Oval World Challenge; therefore, Frédéric Gabillon is the best oval racer in the world. Who saw that coming? Here is a run down of what got me thinking.

Now We Can Talk Schedule
I have a rule that you can't talk about the next year's schedule until halfway though the current year. It is now July. Six months are behind us. It is time to have our first conversation about the 2019 IndyCar Series season and the first thing that comes to mind is are more races in danger than we previously thought?

Phoenix is already gone. Texas is doing its yearly bluff that IndyCar might not return but one of these years it will be true. Pocono has been getting better attendance each year but will 2018 be enough to warrant a 2019 return? Toronto has been in an odd place since 2015 and it feels like that race is slowly getting squeezed out of Exhibition Place. Sonoma seems to be on the fence. Belle Isle might have been seemed to be in greater damage a month or a month and a half ago when it seemed like protests were held weekly in the city. It appears to have calmed down but it only takes the right pissed off local citizen to pull the plug.

That covers six of 16 current venues. They are not all going to disappear, Belle Isle will be fine, but nobody would be surprised if another joined Phoenix out the door. I am hopeful all will stay on but it could be a quiet exit for another venue, just like Phoenix. This year's Phoenix race wasn't the greatest in the world but it wasn't a disaster. For three years Phoenix remained stagnant and while it was home to IndyCar's preseason testing the issues with on-track action was too much to overcome or at least a stellar crowd didn't cancel it out. There wasn't anger behind this split. In the past we have seen IndyCar leave venues with a bad taste in everyone's mouth. That wasn't the case and the same could be true for all the venues above.

The departure of Phoenix exacerbates IndyCar's big problem of lacking races at the front end of the schedule. For the last three seasons there have been three weeks between the St. Petersburg season opener and the second round of the season. Losing Phoenix adds another week to that gap. I am ok with IndyCar having two consecutive weeks off once in a while. The August break is understandable but I do not think it is good the series has one race and then goes dark for a month.

There is no quick solution. Long Beach is April 14th. That isn't budging and I don't blame it. Next year does pose another problem and that is Easter falls on April 21st, a weekend when Barber would normally fall. It would make sense for Barber to be the following week on April 28th but NASCAR is at Talladega that weekend. Barber was run in early April for the first four editions and it could be a stopgap replacement on April 7th but there would still be a three-week gap between St. Petersburg and the second round of the season. So we are right back where we started.

Homestead has been floated out as the possible replacement for Phoenix. It would not be irrational to race there in March. IndyCar went there for 15 years between CART and the IRL and outside of the final two years, which were held as the season finale in October, Homestead was frequently one of the first races of the season in late winter or early spring.

I don't see Homestead being a net-gain and that is a problem for IndyCar and one that should be explored (and will be explored here) at a later date. Where is IndyCar wanted? Where do people want to see IndyCar? I am not sure Miami is it. There is no sign Miami is it. Why go? How many times has IndyCar gone to an unknown market in hopes of sparking interest but wound up gone before most people ever knew the series came to town? There isn't a lot of time for research and trial balloons and when races drop off the schedule a replacement has to be found quickly but IndyCar needs not to jump at the first open venue but work to finding the right venues for the series. Not saying the series isn't but let's go to venues that are most likely to succeed long-term.

Let's say Homestead does fill the space between St. Petersburg and Long Beach, what does that mean for Barber? Would the race still be April 7th to avoid Easter and the Talladega NASCAR race? Would the race move to May 5th and not only create a back-to-back with the Grand Prix of Indianapolis but also create six consecutive weeks of on-track action from Barber to the Grand Prix of Indianapolis to Indianapolis 500 qualifying to the Indianapolis 500 to the Belle Isle doubleheader to Texas?

I think we could be looking at Barber moving to April 7th and if Homestead is added to the schedule it would be the week prior to Barber because the week after St. Petersburg is the 12 Hours of Sebring. That would create a five-week stretch of St. Petersburg, an off week, Homestead, Barber and Long Beach but it would create another issue in not only having Easter off but April 28th and May 5th off, three consecutive weeks off before the Grand Prix of Indianapolis. We moved the problem from late March to late April. We moved the problem, not solved it. Terrific.

Pocono has had really good races and the crowd has grown slightly from the first race back at the track in 2013. Is it enough for the track and series to continue? You have to hope so because there aren't many other tracks that will produce the same kind of racing that Pocono does and IndyCar needs not only ovals but another 500-mile race is nice to have. There shouldn't be just one 500-mile race. IndyCar needs these longer races to liven up the schedule and mix it up between the short ovals and street courses.

I don't see the summer changing but I am still concerned. Besides Toronto and Pocono, I am concerned about Iowa. The crowds aren't what they once were at the 7/8-mile oval for all series. The NASCAR races didn't look good in June. The IndyCar races the last few years have had smaller crowds. There is some push for the race returning to a night race but I am not sure that would be the answer. After all, the track wanted an afternoon race and it wanted a late-afternoon race at that. This year's race is a more reasonable hour but something is going to change soon at Iowa and with no NASCAR Cup race in sight I wonder how long it will continue to host IndyCar, especially if the crowd continues to shrink.

At the end of the season, we think Sonoma will be back but that has been put on the fence and the loss of Sonoma would open a spot for the season finale. Sonoma has been on the schedule since 2005 but has resembled Phoenix in terms of lack of crowd and on-track action. Gateway has a lot of momentum of becoming the season finale since the crowd was outstanding last year but even the track is not sure it wants to move from a Saturday night late in summer to an afternoon Sunday in September against the NFL.

IndyCar has been presented with a great opportunity to end its season on network television when NBC takes over but I am not sure it is worth cutting off its nose despite its face. Gateway drew close to 40,000 people in year one. I do not think IndyCar should take its one promising race and rip it out of the ground and hope it will have the same flourish elsewhere in the schedule. Hulman & Co. CEO Mark Miles talked about date equity when he got the job and this is a chance to stand his ground. Despite how enticing it may be to have the finale at Gateway it needs to consider what is best for Gateway. I think the series should let it be.

What happens with the coveted season finale spot? Sonoma is the boring bet. It has been good to IndyCar but it hasn't been good for IndyCar. I don't think any other race could move to the season finale position and there isn't a track out there waiting in the wings to take over that spot and provide a positive atmosphere for crowding a champion.

A lot will happen over the next few weeks and months and we have to talk about where IndyCar should go, not in actual locations but in terms of philosophy and what the schedule should look like and I am not talking about Cleveland and adding nine ovals. We need to come up with a long-term game plan. IndyCar had stability for a short period and now it is back to a revolving future. There are a lot of positives around IndyCar but there is a sense of uncomfortableness that never seems to go away.

Winners From the Weekend
You know about Frédéric Gabillon and Marc Márquez but did you know...

Max Verstappen won the Austrian Grand Prix.

George Russell and Artem Markelov split the Formula Two races. Callum Ilott and Jake Hughes split the GP3 Series races.

The #99 JDC-Miller Motorsports Oreca-Gibson of Stephen Simpson, Chris Miller and Misha Goikhberg won the 6 Hours of the Glen. The #66 Ford GT of Joey Hand and Dirk Müller won in GTLM. The #96 Turner Motorsport BMW of Markus Palttala, Don Yount and Dillon Machavern won in GTD.

Kyle Busch won the NASCAR Cup race from Chicago, his fifth victory of the season. Kyle Larson won the Grand National Series race. Brett Moffitt won the Truck race, his second consecutive victory and third victory of the season.

Francesco Bagnaia won the Moto2 race from Assen, his fourth victory of the season. Jorge Martín won the Moto3 race and took the Moto3 championship lead.

The #39 Lexus Team SARD Lexus of Heikki Kovalainen and Kamui Kobayashi won the Super GT race from Buriram. The #11 Gainer Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 of Katsuyuki Hiranaka and Hironobu Yasuda won in GT300.

Coming Up This Weekend
IndyCar is in Iowa.
NASCAR is back in Daytona.
Formula One concludes three consecutive weeks of racing at Silverstone.
IMSA will be at Mosport.
Supercars have a pair of street races in Townsville.
World Superbikes has its final round for over two months at Misano.
Super Formula has its first race in two months at Fuji.