Indycar 2017 Phoenix Grand Prix

2017 Phoenix Grand Prix

Simon Pagenaud got his first oval victory on the one mile oval of Phoenix Raceway.  Pitting late on a pit sequence gained him a lap on most of the field and he dominated the majority of the race leading 116 of the 250 laps.  Will Power finished second,  finally earning a good finish that has eluded him all season, and JR Hildebrand was impressive finishing P3 while driving with a broken hand.

 
 

2017 Phoenix Grand Prix

POLE SITTER:  Helio Castroneves

TOP 10

1. Simon Pagenaud: His first win on an oval!

2. Will Power: His second podium finish at Phoenix.

3. JR Hildebrand : A great finish for JR and for Ed Carpenter Racing.

4. Helio Castroneves: Another fourth place finish has him up to 6th in points.

5. Scott Dixon:  Another Top 5 but also his lowest finish so far this season.

6. Tony Kanaan:  His lowest finish in five starts at Phoenix.

7. Ed Carpenter:  A good return on ovals to start his season.

8. Charlie Kimball:  His first Top 10 of the season.

9. Josef Newgarden:  His fourth Top 10 of the season and still 3rd in points.

10. Carlos Munoz: The 25th Top 10 of his Indycar career.

Different Teams (4):  Penske, ECR, Ganassi, AJ Foyt

Different Countries (6):  France, Australia, USA(4), Brazil(2), New Zealand, Colombia)

 

Fun Facts

4 Lead Changes among 4 Drivers

(Pagenaud, Castroneves, Power, Newgarden)

Average Speed: 144.058 mph
2 Cautions for 32 Laps
 

Next Up...
THE MONTH OF MAY
The GP of Indianapolis on Saturday, May 13th
and
The 101st Running of the Indianapolis 500
Sunday, May 28th

2017 Phoenix Testing

The Indycar season officially starts in two weeks, but the Indycars were on track testing on February 10th and the 11th at Phoenix International Raceway.

Twenty one Indycar drivers took to the track for four 3 hour sessions during the weekend. Each driver was limited to 6 sets of  tires over the two days. They ran over 5000 laps in their 12 hours on track during Friday and Saturday afternoon and night. 
  
JR Hildebrand, running in his first full Indycar season since 2012, led the way with a best lap of 193.234.  Second fastest for the weekend was his teammate and car owner Ed Carpenter and third quickest was Penske's newest driver Josef Newgarden.

Josef Newgarden and Dale Coyne's Sebastien Bourdais were the only two drivers in the Top Ten in all four sessions.

   

Two days of on-track testing for 21 Verizon IndyCar Series drivers and teams were literally like day and night. https://t.co/HzYpNRJzPZ

— IndyCar Series (@IndyCar) February 12, 2017

  

 

To get your Indycar 'fix' and catch all the track action at Phoenix you can check out the full practice sessions on the Indycar You Tube channel.

Josef Newgarden Update Phoenix 2016

 

Josef finished a strong 6th at Phoenix

even though he had to come from the back of the field twice!!

 

image from motorsport.com

 

Josef had such a strong car, and after starting 7th he probably could've easily had a top three if not for an early fueling problem in the pits, and then a bad move by Charlie Kimball that forced him to make an extra pit stop.

  

 

 

Next up Long Beach where Josef has had some pretty good runs despite having only one top 10 in his previous 4 races there. 
Most notably when he was leading the race in 2014 before contact with Ryan Hunter Reay put both of them out.


Cant' wait!!!
Go Josef!!!
post by Alexandra, Age 8

 

Indycar at Phoenix 2016

 

In the first race at Phoenix Raceway for Indycar since 2005, Scott Dixon led the action packed race for his 39th career Indycar win, tying for third with Al Unser Sr. on the All-Time Indycar wins list.

As the green flag dropped at Phoenix Raceway for the Verizon Indycar Series return, pole sitter Helio Castroneves took the early lead, leading the first 39 laps.  Castroneves surrendered the lead on lap 40 to fellow Penske teammate Juan Montoya when his right front tire went down.  Montoya then held control until lap 95, when his right front tire also went down, giving the lead to Scott Dixon, who took it all the way to victory lane.  

 

Huge night for @CGRTeams first win for us at @phoenixraceway can't thank the team enough.… https://t.co/nKWrJXPJyf

— Scott Dixon (@scottdixon9) April 3, 2016

Phoenix Grand Prix TOP 10

1. Scott Dixon: His 39th Indycar win, tying Al Unser Sr. for third on the all time wins list

2. Simon Pagenaud: Takes over the points lead with 2nd place finishes at St Pete and PIR

3. Will Power: Solid start to his season after missing the first race at St Pete.

4.Tony Kanaan: One of only 2 drivers in the race to have previously won at Phoenix.

5. Graham Rahal:  Highest finishing Honda. (sounds familiar to a lot of races last year.)

6. Josef Newgarden:  A good finish considering A rough pit stop and an incident on track with Charlie Kimball were major setbacks.

7. Max Chilton:  Highest finishing rookie in his first ever oval race. 

8. Sebastien Bourdais:  A good finish considering he hit the wall midway through the race.

9. Juan Montoya:  Had a tire go down while leading and never got back up front.

10. Ryan Hunter-Reay:  Some phenomenal passing had him towards the front but some equally crazy bad luck on two yellows left him in a disappointing 10th place.

 

Different Teams: 6 (Andretti, Penske, Ganassi, ECR, KV Racing, RLL)

Different Countries: 7 (New Zealand, France, Australia, Brazil, US, England, Columbia)

 

 

Fun Facts

 

Cautions: 6

Caution Laps: 46

Lead Changes: 3

Leaders: 3

Average Speed: 139.822

 

 

Next race.  April 17th at Barber Motorsports Park in Alabama

Next oval race.....

The 100th running of the Indianapolis 500!!!!!!  May 29th!