Round 9: Rainguard Water Sealers 600, Texas Motor Speedway, 9th-10th June, 2017.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Round 9: Rainguard Water Sealers 600, Texas Motor Speedway, 9th-10th June, 2017.

This will be the 20th consecutive year that Texas Motor Speedway has held this event. On June 7th 1997, the Indy Racing League held the "1997 True Value 500", the 6th round of the fledgling series at Texas Motor Speedway, or TMS. It was the first night race in the history of AOWR and was won by Arie Luyendyk, driving a Panoz G-Force-Oldsmobile for Treadway Racing. Since then it has been a perennial event on the IndyCar series calendar.

From 1998-2004, the track hosted a second race in October and in 2007, the race distance was increased from 500 to 550 km. In 2011, the 'Firestone Twin 275s' were held, made up of two 275km races, separated by a "halftime", with half points awarded for each race. The grid for the second race was decided by a random draw, which proved so unpopular the twin race format was scrapped the following year. In 2014, the race was further extended to 600 kilometers.

In 2001, CART added the "Firestone Firehawk 600" at TMS for April 29th, to their calendar. However, after practice and qualifying, the race was cancelled as drivers reported vertigo like symptoms and vision problems, after sustaining high lateral forces of 5.5G, while driving in
excess of 230 mph or 370 km/h on the 24 degree banking. TMS sued CART, after it emerged CART officials had ignored repeated requests to test their cars before the race. This resulted in a legal settlement, estimated to have been around $5–7 million, which CART paid to TMS. Many pundits have cited the law suit and settlement as a key reason for CART's eventual demise.


Last year's race was scheduled for Saturday June 11, 7:50 p.m. Central Time. Due to heavy rain, it was rescheduled for the next day at 1:06 p.m. but didn't start until 1:49 p.m. because of issues with the track's drainage system.

Once the race got underway, pole sitter Carlos Munoz lead until lap 37, with the lead changing from Newgarden to Hunter-Reay and then Hinchcliffe on laps 38 and 41. On lap 42, Newgarden and Daly collided. Newgarden suffered a fractured collar bone and wrist. There was a caution period of nearly 30 laps in order to repair a SAFER barrier. At 2:42 p.m., the race was Red flagged on lap 71 due to more heavy rain. Under the IndyCar Series rules, the race could only be declared officially finished after lap 125, it was therefore suspended.

With more rain forecast for Monday and issues surrounding some drivers participating in the 24 Hours of Le Mans the following weekend, IndyCar announced the race would be restarted on the evening of August 27, 2016 at 8:15 p.m., continuing from lap 71, with James Hinchcliffe as leader.

Once the race resumed, Hunter-Reay took the lead from Hinchcliffe but on lap 79 Hinchcliffe regained it, pulling away from the field, where he more or less stayed until the penultimate lap 247. On lap 232, Aleshin and Hawksworth came together bringing out the final caution. On the restart, Hinchcliffe was persued by now second place Graham Rahal. On the final lap, Rahal got inside Hinchcliffe on Turn 3 taking the lead. Hinchcliffe caught up with Rahal on the front stretch, with Rahal crossing the line, only 8 thousands of a second before Hinchcliffe.

Following the race, Hinchcliffe and Schmidt Peterson Motorsports were deemed to have violated dome skid wear rules during the race. The team was fined $20,000 and 25 points were deducted from the cars entrant points and from Hinchcliffe's points total.

Some Trivia:
Driver with the most wins, 4.
Hélio Castroneves: 2004, 2006, 2009, 2013.
Team with the most wins, 8.
Team Penske: 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013.

Track Layout:


Length: 1.5 Miles (2.4 km)
Turns: 4

Lap record: Paul Tracy, April 28 2001. 0:22.542, 239.552 mph (385.521 kmh) Team Green, Reynard 01i-Honda HR-1 V8t, CART FedEx Championship Series.

Last year's winner:
Graham Rahal, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
Dallara DW12-Honda H16RTT.

Laps: 248
Distance: 372 Miles (598.676 Km)
Time: 2:29:25
Average speed: 144.901 Mph (233.195 km/h)

Cautions:
5, laps 53.

Race broadcast:
NBCSN, 8:00pm ET.