Round 9: DXC Technology 600, Texas Motor Speedway, June 6-8.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Round 9: DXC Technology 600, Texas Motor Speedway, June 6-8.

With the IndyCar Grand Prix, having been just a month a go, the races are now coming thick and fast.

This will be the 22nd 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 and it was the first night race in the history of AOWR. It was won by Arie Luyendyk, driving a Panoz G-Force-Oldsmobile for Treadway Racing but the event was not without incident.

During the race, the electronic timing and scoring equipment malfunctioned in the pit area, causing unexpected scoring errors. Billy Boat was placed as the race leader and took the checkered flag as the winner. Arie Luyendyk, who felt he had been robbed of the win, stormed victory lane, where he was lunged at by Boat's team owner, A. J. Foyt. Quickly the fight broke up. The next morning, it was determined that Luyendyk actually was the official winner. Foyt refused to return the trophy. Luyendyk received a replacement, and the "official" trophy years later, presented to him by track president Eddie Gossage. 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.

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 km/h)
Team Green,
Reynard 01i-Honda HR-1 V8t,
CART FedEx Championship Series.

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Last Year's Race:
At the start, polesitter Josef Newgarden lead teammates Simon Pagenaud and Power, with Alexander Rossi moving up three places to fifth behind Robert Wickens who was already putting the pressure on Power. However, the first full-course yellow came out as Matheus Leist's, car dramatically caught fire, forcing to rapidly exit the cockpit at Turn 3. Behind the top six were Dixon, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Sebastien Bourdais and Takuma Sato.

On the Lap 14 restart, Pagenaud tried to go around the outside of Newgarden, lost momentum and had to cede second place to Power. Six laps later, Dixon moved past Kanaan for sixth after a strong run out of Turn 2. Zach Veach got past Sato and soon got around Bourdais and onto teammate Hunter-Reay's tail. Up front, Rossi got around the outside of Wickens to grab fourth place on Lap 24.

A.J. Foyt Enterprise night got worse sill, as Kanaan pitted on Lap 27 complaining of a right-rear issue, possibly suspension, as he had brushed the wall at Turn 2.

At the front, Newgarden was holding around a 1 second lead over Power, who was running just three-tenths of a second ahead of Pagenaud, whose mirrors were filled with Rossi’s car. Pagenaud and Rossi got around Power on Laps 43 and 44 respectively and just a little further back, Veach found a way through the rest of the top 10 drivers, jumping to sixth.

Bourdais was the first of the top 10 runners to stop on Lap 55, who now with fresh rubber, was lapping at 217mph, 6mph faster than the leaders. Newgarden came in leaving Pagenaud, Rossi and Wickens running in the top three, the latter having just gotten around Power who was struggling with a lack of grip from his front tyres.

Pagenaud and Power pitted on Lap 63, with Dixon stopping two laps later and Rossi pitting at the end of Lap 67. Following the round of pitstops, Pagenaud took the lead by 2.5sec over Newgarden with Power a further 1.6 seconds back with Wickens 3 seconds behind and being chased by Dixon, Rossi, Hunter-Reay, Bourdais, Sato and Marco Andretti.

Wickens caught up with Power, going around 5mph faster, as all three Penskes appeared committed to either nursing their tyres or saving fuel. He passed Power on the front straight to take third and then got around Newgarden. On lap 95, Wickens took the lead going around the outside of Pagenaud. A few laps later there were further issues for Team Penske, as Newgarden had to pit early with blistering on the front right tyre. Power lost two places to Dixon and Rossi, dropping to fifth.

On new tyres, Newgarden started slicing up the field but now two laps down, while Dixon and Rossi got around a faltering Pagenaud on Lap 114 as his right-front tires began to blister. He stopped on Lap 119 and Power did likewise, with Dixon coming in a couple of laps later. In contrast, Wickens and Rossi were able to continue on to Laps 126 and 127 before stopping and although they lost the lead to Dixon, they were now well ahead of Pagenaud and Power who’d dropped to sixth and eighth, as the Penske’s heavily reduced pace at the end of the previous stint.

With 140 of the 248 laps completed, Dixon led Rossi, who had just passed Wickens for second place, as the Canadian got stuck behind a backmarker. Newgarden had to drop out of fourth plce for his third stop as his tyres started blistering again.

On Lap 154, Dixon’s lead was now 10 seconds over Rossi, followed by Wickens, Bourdais, Pagenaud, Hinchcliffe, Hunter-Reay, Sato, Power and Rahal. Sato stopped on Lap 156, leaving only eight cars on the lead lap, which became seven as Bourdais pitted on Lap 166. As he rejoined he got in the way of Pagenaud, allowing Hinchcliffe to move into fourth.

On Lap 173, Wickens dived into the gap between Ed Carpenter’s car and the white line that defines the track boundary. It unsettled the Wickens' car and the tail swung out collecting Ed Carpenter's car and the pair of them headed backward up the track and into thewall. Carpenter fully admitted he was at fault for squeezing Wickens. This brought out the second full-course yellow.

Dixon, Rossi, Hinchcliffe, Pagenaud and Hunter-Reay, the only drivers left on the lead lap, all stopped. Rossi then came in but the refueler struggled to get the fuel into the car and Rossi dropped down the order. However, Hunter-Reay had to stop again, allowing Rossi back up to fourth.

On lap 194, Hunter-Reay passed Hinchcliffe, around the outside into Turn 1 to move into third. Rossi caught up with Hinchcliffe nd managed to pass both him and Hunter-Reay in one move, down the front straight on Lap 198. In the meantime, Veach and Jones were notified they’d be given a drive-through penalty for jumping the restart.

The yellow flew again on Lap 205. Power had moved up onto the tail of Hunter-Reay, with the car moving up the track in the wake, just where Claman De Melo had put his car, having just rocketed past Rahal. Power collided with the Claman De Melo and both were out on the spot. Power was issued with a post-race penalty.

The frontrunners took the opportunity to make their final stops, with Dixon, Pagenaud, Rossi, Hinchcliffe, Hunter-Reay and Rahal emerging in that order. The restart saw Pagenaud try to threaten Dixon but it didn’t work and he soon dropped back from the leader and had to defend from Rossi. In the mean time, Newgarden was served a drive-through penalty for jumping the restart. He would finish 14th, four laps down.

Rossi twice drew alongside Pagenaud on the outside, along the front straight but couldn’t make the move stick at Turn 1. Pagenaud’s defense was faultless, trying to break the tow and moving down to the inside line, forcing Rossi to test the outside line but to no avail.

Dixon let his lead dwindle over the closing laps behind the backmarkers but still won by 4.3 seconds over Pagenaud, who scored his first podium finish of the year.

Rossi took third ahead of Hinchcliffe, Hunter-Reay, Rahal, Sato, Bourdais, Jones, and Charlie Kimball who scored Carlin-Chevrolet’s second straight top-10 finish, albeit one lap down.


Pole:
Josef Newgarden, two-lap average time of 46.996 seconds, 220.613 mph, (355.042 km/h)
Team Penske
Dallara IR18-Chevrolet Indy V6

Last year's winner:
Scott Dixon,
Chip Ganassi Racing.
Dallara IR18-Honda HI18TT V6 Indy

Laps: 248
Distance: 372 Miles (598.676 Km)
Time: 2:00:53
Average speed: 177.250 Mph (285.256 km/h)

Cautions: 3
Laps: 29

Race broadcast: NBCSN, 8:00pm ET.