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After taking the lead with 14 laps to go from Helio Castroneves, Ryan Hunter-Reay would hold off Scott Dixon in the final laps to score his first victory of the season in the Grand Prix of Alabama.

“I had a little contact there with Helio,” Hunter-Reay said. “I feel bad about it. Good thing nobody was affected by it. I drove my tail there trying to stay in front. Great for DHL, great for Chevrolet. Good to be back in victory lane.”

Hunter-Reay would get to Castroneves’ inside in turn nine, though slid up slightly making contact.

“I was still inside of Helio and he came turning down and I hadn’t slowed the car yet,” he said. “I hit him broadside. Didn’t really matter. His strategy is what bit him in the end.”

It marks the 10^th career IndyCar victory for the defending series champion. It also put an end to Penske Racing’s reign at Barber Motorsports Park as they had won the previous three races held there.

For Hunter-Reay, it marks a solid comeback following an 18^th place finish two weeks ago at St. Petersburg due to mechanical problems.

For Andretti Autosport, it marks their second straight victory after Hinchcliffe picked up his first career victory at St. Pete.

“It’s great to come back (and win),” Michael Andetti said. “The team did a great job all weekend and Ryan did a helluva job. This is awesome. So happy for DHL and the DHL car and Sundrop and everybody. Great to keep Chevy’s day going.”

Scott Dixon would make a pass late on Castroneves was second and chase down Hunter-Reay, however he would not be able to make the pass. It marks his fourth runner-up finish at Barber in four starts on the road course.

“It was a bit tough,” Dixon said. “The restart was Ryan went, and then slowed, and then went again. Will (Power) got flustered there and it jumbled up the line. We had the quickest car out there, but obviously will have go buy a bridesmaid’s dress cause we were second again.”

The race featured only one caution right at the beginning, though Dixon said it wasn’t too bad to handle.

“I think when you have a bad car it becomes a lot harder,” he added. “But we had a good car. Congrats to Hunter-Reay. He did a helluva job today.”

Castroneves would hold on to finish third for his second consecutive podium finish of the season. He has now finished in the top seven in each of his four starts at Barber. Castroneves’ day didn’t start out well after getting jumbled up on the initial start of the race.

“I was boxed in and obviously, I saw Dixon try to pass Will and then he got shoved into the side so everybody went wide and all of sudden I went ‘Come on Will! Come on’,” he said. “We got knocked to the back there and we had to change our strategy.”

Castroneves now has the points lead, nine points ahead of Dixon, 13 points ahead of Hunter-Reay.

“I thought we would have been able to hold on, but it was a little tough,” Castroneves continued. “At least we got a podium and we keep gaining points.”

Charlie Kimball would make a pass on Will Power late to finish fourth for his second career top five finish.

“I knew that if I got there in turn 13 that I could get by him,” Kimball said. “I could then get away from him if I got by him as he was saving fuel. I got to thank Will for giving me room there.”

It marks his first top five since finishing second in Toronto last year.

“We had a good weekend,” he added. “It was good all of the race. Those guys in the pit lane did me solid – good clean stops and I just had to drive it at the end.”

Power would round out the top five in fifth after starting off the race in the gravel.

“Just got in the dirt,” Power said. “Nothing more to say there. Definitely a bad start so we just went for a big fuel save.

“I was just trying to keep people behind me. Kimball made a great move. I just had it in my mind that I was going to get this number and make it tough for people to get by.”

On the start of the race, Kimball would make a three-wide move on Hunter-Reay and Power and with Power on the outside, he was into the dirt. The move bottle-necked the field up, causing Oriol Servia and Graham Rahal to play bumper cars, resulting in a spin for Servia. Power fell from second to eighth in that mess on the start. Power would then get off the pavement once again on the restart. That incident marked the only caution of the day.

Simon Pagenaud finished sixth, followed by Marco Andretti, Justin Wilson, Josef Newgarden and rookie Tristan Vautier.

AJ Allmendinger would finish 19^th in his return to IndyCar racing after stalling on pit lane.

“All around, I thought that day went fairly well – up until that stop,” he commented. “I knew that going to two sets to those guys three would hurt us. Trying to learn how this is going. Fell like we’d finish 11^th or 12^th but stalled in the pits. Don’t know why. It wouldn’t rev up and as soon as I put the clutch in, it just stalled. At the end, we pitted so early that we had to save fuel that whole stint. Proud of Penske for all of their hard work. Thanks to Roger for this opportunity.”

Following his win last week, Hinchcliffe wouldn’t be lucky this week as he would stop in turn three as a result of a tire falling off. Without any cautions for the rest of the race, Hinchcliffe was left in the turn.

“We got hit on lap one and as we went there, the tire came off,” he said. “I thought we could get a toe there so that way we could get back out there cause that’s all that was wrong. You dig yourself in a hole. You qualify back there and these things happen. This is just a weekend to forget. Everything that could happen, happened.”

Hinchcliffe joked about being parked there, saying that he had a good view of the people and seeing the back of everybody’s car. He added that he would have taken a nap, but “these racecars were just going by making so much noise that I couldn’t sleep.”

Dario Franchitti would fail to finish the race due to an electrical problem.

2012 IndyCar Series Champion Ryan Hunter-Reay found his way back to the top of the charts after winning the pole for the Honda Grand Prix of Alabama. Hunter-Reay laid down a lap of one minute, seven seconds for the third pole of his career, first pole of the season. His last pole came at Edmonton in 2012.

“This team has done so well this weekend, we just kept progressing and we knew where we needed to work on it,” he said. “I really went to work on my driving as well, and we all did it together here. It’s a great position to start from and now we need to go make it work in warm up and for the race, making these Firestones hang in there for an entire race. That’ll be the challenging part.”

Hunter-Reay finished 18th in the opening event of the season at St. Petersburg after running into some mechanical problems.

Defending race winner Will Power qualified second, three tenths off of Hunter-Reay’s quick time. It marks his third front row start in four starts at Barber Motorsports Park. Power has won two of the three races, including the last two.

Power was running third in the closing laps of the race at St. Pete before he suffered heavy contact from JR Hildebrand under caution. Power would finish the race 16th.

In just his second IndyCar Series start, Tristan Vautier qualified third for his career-best start after starting sixth at St. Pete.  Vautier ran inside the top five for much of the race at St. Pete before mechanical problems took him out of the running.

Scott Dixon would qualify fourth after struggling last week in St. Petersburg. Dixon set a new track record of 1:06.7750 in Segment 1, but was unable to back up that time during the Firestone Fast Six.

“Here the car has been decent the whole time,” Dixon said. “We have just been trying to work out some of the issues that we have had at St. Pete. This isn’t the best track to do it but it gives us a bit of direction. I am a bit bummed about qualifying, you know we were fastest in Q1 and Q2 and then just a bit of missed timing, a bit on my behalf, didn’t go out hard enough and then tried to expect some more from the tires later and it just wasn’t there. So, I don’t think we quite would have gotten a 7.0 that Ryan did, you know we did a 6.7 earlier on new tires but he did a hell of a job and putting a good lap together. You know race day is a different day and hopefully we can move up three spots”.

Charlie Kimball would round out the top five for his best start in the IndyCar Series. His previous best start was seventh at Motegi in 2011.

After leading practice, Helio Castroneves would qualify sixth for his first start outside of the front two rows at Barber.

St. Petersburg race winner James Hinchcliffe qualified 20th.

“We’ve been struggling a little bit this weekend compared to the test,” Hinchcliffe said.”We didn’t have the quickest car, but had enough for Q2… got held up by another car and ended up getting knocked out. It’s frustrating but we’ve got an extra set of reds (Firestone red alternate tires) than those guys now in the race and maybe degradation will come into it tomorrow. We’ll keep fighting and hopefully get the Go Daddy car up in a good position by the end of the day.”

The IndyCar Series will take to Barber Motorsports Park for the Honda Grand Prix of Alabama at 3pm EST on Sunday.

Following his second place finish two weeks ago at St. Petersburg, Helio Castroneves would top the charts with a lap of one minute and eight seconds, 120.781 mph.

 “I think it’s better to be lucky than good,” he said. “Obviously with the yellow in the end a lot of guys probably put tires, but the car felt pretty good. The AAA team felt really strong, the morning unfortunately it was a little bit difficult because seeing that the track has lots of grip and when you have an extra set of tires certainly it helps a little bit. In the end of the day, with A.J. (Allmendinger) and Will (Power) we’ve been actually doing a lot of different stuff out there and it seems to be working.”

Alex Tagliani would time in second fastest, seven-hundereths off of Castroneves. Tagliani finished 10th at St. Pete.

“I am really proud of what the team accomplished here this weekend,” he said. “Obviously we are accustomed to being in the Firestone Fast 6 last year. I really didn’t like using the Port-a-Potty in the back of the grid. We struggled on the new tires. These tires are different. These are road course tires. We also had a chance to test here and the team came prepared.”

Rookie Tristan Vautier continued to impress after running up front most of the race last week as he timed in third fastest. Vautier, though, ran into mechanical problems at St. Pete which relegated him to a 21st place finish.

“It was good,” he said. “It was disappointing at the end of the first practice to cause a red because of a mistake, but no, I’m very happy with the car that the team has given me today. I think that I still have some room to keep improving, and we need to carry the momentum from today into tomorrow.”

Simon Pagenaud was fourth while Will Power rounded out the top five. Power led testing last month.

“We definitely have a bit of work to do with the Verizon car because we’re just off the pace a bit,” he said. “We were running top five all day, but we really had to push to get there. We’ll get together tonight and work to figure out how to improve for qualifying tomorrow.”

After struggling in St. Pete, Scott Dixon was sixth in practice, followed by EJ Viso, A.J. Allmendinger, James Jakes and Takumo Sato.

James Hinchcliffe, who picked up his first career victory at St. Petersburg, was 15th on the chart.

“Today did not go as planned, but you get these days in racing,” he said. “We had a couple of things go wrong in the first session, and the way the yellow fell in the second (session) we didn’t really get a proper run all day. I think we can get the Go Daddy car up there tomorrow when it counts. I think it’ll be a challenge, but that’s what they pay us the big bucks for.”

The IndyCar Series cars will take to the track tomorrow for qualifying, with the race scheduled for Sunday afternoon at 3pm EST.

Before the rain fell from the skies in the afternoon, the ARCA Racing Series cars got on the track and were able to make some laps in preparation for the race at Talladega Superspeedway later this year. At the end of the shortened session, Venturini Motorsports drivers swept the top four spots.

Daytona race winner John Wes Townley topped the charts with a speed of 180.264 mph, leading Venturni Motorsports’ four Toyotas.

“The test was great,” Townley said. “We unloaded, made a few changes – some things we wanted to try, and picked up right where we left off (at Daytona). Despite the rain, I think we got what we needed. This is the same car we won with at Daytona, and it’s still fast.”

Back in Daytona in February, Townley was in second place with seven laps to go while Bobby Gerhart led. However, as the field came off turn four, Gerhart slowed immediately, moving to the inside which allowed Townley to get by. Gerhart would stall on the inside of the track a lap later, out of gas. There’d be no caution due to his Chevrolet being out of the way. Townley then held off rookie Kyle Larson to take the checkered flag. It marked the first win for Venturini Motorsports on the 2.5-mile oval.

While the two tracks may race the same, Talladega is wider, allowing for drivers to run more comfortably three-wide.

“The biggest thing that stands out to me is the room you have to race at Talladega,” Townley commented. “It gets a little edgy at Daytona when you start going three wide, but here (Talladega), you can run three-wide comfortably, and squeeze in a fourth car when you need to.”

Milka Duno was second, two tenths off of Townley. She started the Daytona race second in February and led the first 11 laps before mechanical problems took her out of the race.

In just his first laps on at Talladega, Celeb Armstrong would time in third, three tenths off of Townley.

“What struck me most about Talladega, in comparison to Daytona, was the wide open space,” Armstrong said. “There is so much more room. Daytona is a lot narrower than it looks on TV. Talladega is one awesome track. We started out pretty quick, fell back a little, but I think we could have been faster had it not rained.”

Justin Boston was the driving the fourth car for Venturini, placing fourth on the charts, four tenths off of Townley.

“I thought the test went really good,” Boston said. “Collectively, as a (Venturini Motorsports) group, it was awesome. For me, personally, it was a comfort thing – building my confidence for when we return. But today was really more important for us as a team, than for me as a driver.

“The track definitely feels a lot bigger (than Daytona) going down the straightaways. The other difference I noticed was the access roads – getting onto and exciting pit road is different.”

Current points leader Mason Mingus rounded out the top five, seven tenths off of Townley.

Tom Hessert was sixth, followed by Bobby Gerhart, Korbin Forrister, Cody McMahan and Galen Hassler. Gerhart, a previous Talladega winner, tested a pair of cars – a new car and the car known as “Sweet Pea”, which won the race back in 2001.

“Both of the cars we tested are former Daytona winners,” Gerhart commented. “In fact, there are four Daytona wins between these two cars – two apiece. One of our goals was to find out which car is the best, and leave it at that.”

In total, 17 drivers took to the track during the session that was shortened by three hours due to rain.

 

2013 ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards
	Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega Alabama
	Open Test Results (4-3-13)
	NO	DRIVER/HOMETOWN	CAR	TIME	SPEED
1	15	John Wes Townley/Watkinsville GA	Toyota	53.122	180.264
2	35	Milka Duno/Caracas Venezuela	Toyota	53.311	179.625
3	55	Caleb Armstrong/New Castle IN	Toyota	53.465	179.108
4	25	Justin Boston/Baltimore MD	Toyota	53.581	178.720
5	32	Mason Mingus/Brentwood TN	Toyota	53.842	177.854
6	77	Tom Hessert/Cherry Hill NJ	Dodge	53.875	177.745
7	5	Bobby Gerhart/Lebanon PA	Chevrolet	54.179	176.747
8	22	Korbin Forrister/Cedartown GA	Dodge	54.330	176.256
9	38	Cody McMahan/Chilhowie VA	Ford	54.670	175.160
10	40	Galen Hassler/Columbia MO	Dodge	54.826	174.662
11	13	George Cushman/Waterville NY	Chevrolet	54.865	174.538
12	40	Eric Meisner/Brighton CO	Dodge	54.884	174.477
13	90	Grant Enfinger/Fairhope AL	Ford	55.034	174.002
14	90	Buster Graham/Lafayette LA	Ford	55.063	173.910
15	40	Dustin Knowles/Trussville AL	Dodge	55.097	173.803
16	40	Mark Meunier	Dodge	55.145	173.651
17	27	Barry Fitzgerald/Sykeston MD	Ford	56.981	168.056
	40	Joel Willman/Fort Hood TX	Dodge	NT
	40	Dominick Casola/Holmdel NJ	Dodge	NT
	40	Cody Lane/Port Richey FL	Dodge	NT

In hopes to getting the season off to a strong start, Tony Kanaan did that last weekend at IndyCar’s season opener at St. Petersburg, finishing fourth.

“It’s always good to have a good start obviously,” he said. “I had a few of those in the past years.

“I think as a team we did a great job. Still got to do better. We want to win races and finish both cars on the podium. But it was a good weekend.”

One of the things that Kanaan credits to their early season success is the off-season preparation, recalling they didn’t have time to prepare last year.

“If you remember right, I was signed already, but Rubens (Barrichello) and E.J. (Viso) signed like late March, right before the championship started, so we had to hire people and do a bunch of things,” he said. “We already started a little bit behind. My engineer (Eric Cowdin) couldn’t come to work until January for contract reasons. We didn’t have a lot of time to really get organized the way we wanted.”

He added that with him and teammate Simona de Silvestro, they’ve been able to work on their program since last September. As a result, he finished fourth while she finished sixth.

“Simona brought a lot of spark and light into the team,” he commented. “I enjoy working with her. I have no problem teaching her whatever I can. But I like to see this young girl that wants to do well, because that’s her opportunity. That obviously pushes me to my limit. I’m going to admit that she’s extremely fast. I said that even before she was my teammate, so I’m not trying to make any excuses.”

He added that the key is that they keep working together to make KV Racing better as the year goes on.

“I’m going to beat her sometimes, she’s going to beat me sometimes,” he continued. “We’re going to be cool. She’s not going to like the days I finish ahead of her and likewise. As long as we use that to our advantage, it’s going to be awesome.”

 

The top five finish at St. Pete marked Kanaan’s 107th top five finish in his career, tying him for 10th all-time with Helio Castroneves and Gordon Johncock.

“I’m nowhere near ready to retire yet,” Kanaan pointed out. “So hopefully being part of the record book, it’s awesome, you’re part of history, you did well in your career. I didn’t know about my top -5 finishes. That’s awesome. I don’t count them a lot.”

On top of that history, Kanaan is closing on the consecutive start record that is currently held by Jimmy Vasser.

“Trying to beat Jimmy Vasser on the most consecutive starts will be great,” Kanaan commented. “I think by the time we get to Baltimore, that’s when it’s going to be. Hopefully him being my boss, he will let me do that. Hopefully he won’t sit me out for a couple races because I’m going to beat his record.”

The race at St. Petersburg saw a lot of passing, including a three-wide finish just behind Kanaan. He also predicts that will continue on to Barber Motorsports Park this weekend with everyone having a chance to test there.

“I think the racing will be really exciting,” he added. “Last year we already witnessed that with a lot of passing, a lot of action. I don’t expect anything different.”

One of the changes that was made this year to add to the competition is some weekends will see back-to-back races, with a race on Saturday and then a race on Sunday. Kanaan feels that it’s going to be tough on the mechanics and equipment.

“I’m not going to make a judgment call before we do it because, I don’t know, that my work will be extremely successful as far as fans and TV ratings,” he said. “But as far as me, I’m extremely concerned about it. I know the way I finished the St. Pete race on Sunday. If you told me I had to race on Monday, it was going to be a tough ask. It’s going to be hard on us. Obviously I’m a workout maniac. On that matter I’ll be well-prepared. But you never know.

“It’s going to be tough. I’m not going to say I like it or dislike it right now, but that is definitely a concern as far as how we’re going to deal with that.”

After finishing 13th or worse in the 14 starts she made last year, Simona de Silvestro made the move to KV Racing Technologies for 2013 in hopes of better results. With one race under her belt, she is off to a good start after finishing sixth in St. Petersburg.

De Silvestro ran within the top five most of the race, falling back to sixth in the final laps as the handling went away after going with the red tires while most of the drivers around her went with the blacks.

“It was just a big relief that we started off the weekend really strong, qualified up front and pretty much raced up front the whole race,” she said. “So it was really good. I think it was a big confidence boost for me and the team.

“I think now we can clean up a few things to be even better.”

In speaking of the tires, she said she lost the tires at the end, saying it was more set-up related rather than compound related.

In making the team switch, beyond the results on track so far, one of the benefits that she is already seeing this season is having Tony Kanaan as a teammate.

“He has a lot of experience. I feel like we have a good friendly competition going on in the team,” she said. “I think we really push each other every session. I think the team gets better that way. I think that’s going to make us pretty strong the whole season.”

One of the other things with the switch was from Honda engines to Chevrolet engines.

“It’s definitely great to be with Team Chevy,” she said. “As soon as I signed with KV, they embraced me with open arms. It’s been going really well. I think the engine is awesome. It’s been really fast. It showed it the whole weekend. In the lead, there was always a Chevy engine.”

She added that she has enjoyed the relationship so far, in seeing that they are always trying different things each week and the communication is pretty open across the board.

The next race will another test to see whether she can keep things going strong, or whether she will fall off and the run at St. Pete will be considered a fluke. In three starts at Barber Motorsports Park, she has finished 21st, ninth and 20th.

“We had a pretty good test there,” she said. “I think the race in St. Pete was really competitive. Everybody was racing really hard. I think we’re going to see the same thing at Barber.

“Last year I thought it was a pretty exciting race, quite a bit of passing, which we didn’t see in the past. Hopefully it’s going to be the same this year and it’s going to be pretty action-packed hopefully.”

Beyond that, there is the challenge of the ovals later on this season, which she admits is her weak link.

“I’ve done one test only with KV Racing so far, Texas, and it went pretty well,” she commented. “I think with Tony’s experience I’m going to be able to follow his lead a little bit on that and try to improve on that.

“I think that’s going to be the key for me this season on the ovals.”

With the success, that does put her in the spotlight and a role model for other young girls out there who want to get into racing.

“Well, I think the biggest thing for any kid, if you dream about something, I think if you put the effort behind it, you be able to achieve your dream,” she said. “I’ve been really lucky that people saw that I wanted to become a racecar driver at a young age. A lot of people saw that and they helped me throughout my career. I think the biggest thing is not to give up and to really focus 100 percent behind their goal, and their dreams should become reality.”

“There’s been a lot of talk about it in the off-season, when that first one was going to come, what we had to do to get there. My answer was always the same. We had to minimize the mistakes.”

On Sunday, James Hinchcliffe did just that and in the end, he was able to pick up the victory in St. Petersburg for his first career victory.

The moment that changed the race was the final restart when Helio Castroneves overbraked going into turn one, giving Hinchcliffe just enough room on the inside.

However, Hinchcliffe admitted after the race that he thought he would only lead for a couple laps with the tires he was on. hinchcliffe was on the black tires, while the rest of the field were on reds. Team engineer Craig Hampton made the decision to put Hinchcliffe on the blacks after issues earlier in the race while they were on the reds.

“I thought I would lead for a couple laps, but he would catch up,” he said. “For that many laps on technically the slower tires took everything out of me.”

As the laps closed out to the win, team owner Michael Andretti was pretty sure Hinch had it locked it up with 10 laps to go. However, Hinch says he didn’t feel that calm about it till about four laps to go when he opened up a bit of a gap.

“All weekend we really struggled out of the last corner,” he added. “Obviously that leads onto the longest straightaway and best passing opportunity.”

Noting that the Penske Racing cars had been quick there, he knew that there was a good chance he could possibly lose the lead in that section.

“For me the focus was getting out of Turn 10,” he explained. “I knew no matter what I did I was going to be slow compared to him out of the last corner. It was just being absolutely picture perfect lap after lap. I had a couple more overtakes than he did. With four to go I opened up enough of a gap that I could save the fuel I need to save and not make any mistakes.”

For the driver of the No. 27 Go Daddy Chevrolet, it was only a matter of time till he found victory lane.

“The team is good, the car is good, the engineers are good,” he said. “We proved last year the team is capable of winning. It’s down to me on any given Sunday to minimize mistakes.”

Last year, the mayor of Hinchtown finished in the top six in eight of the 15 races on his way to finishing eighth in points. He has also grown to have his own following of fans, from both the U.S and Canada, with his fun loving personality.

“I’ve always tried to be myself at the racetrack,” he said. “I think some people at some points in my career thought that maybe I wasn’t taking my job seriously enough or something like that.”

Hinchcliffe added that hopefully holding of Castroneves proves that a joker off the track can get it done on the track.

While showcasing his personality, he has also brought out a side of him through the marketing with Go Daddy. Last year’s commercials with Danica Patrick in trying to take over the home page displayed that.

The win for Hinchcliffe does mark the first win for Go Daddy in IndyCar as Patrick’s IndyCar win came when she had the Motorola colors.

“I can’t tell you how much that means,” he said. “They obviously took a big gamble on me. I’d only been in the series a year. We won Rookie of the Year, but hadn’t done tremendous things. For Andretti and Go Daddy to take that chance on us. We were in shouting distance of a win a few times last year. It was that last piece that was missing.

“Today, beginning of the season, first race, to get that out of the way, get the Go Daddy car in Victory Lane for the first time, it’s awesome. Thankful for Bob Parsons and everybody at the company. Hopefully it’s a match they’ll carry on for a number of years to come.”

Maybe this is the perfect step that Hinchcliffe had to take to begin to forge his own identity with the car as many made the comment last year that Hinchcliffe was driving Danica’s car.

“Certainly following Danica was a big ask,” he commented. “I guess we put a lot of effort into making sure it wasn’t the guy driving Danica’s car. We really wanted to make it our own by playing off her last year, things like that. I hope now, especially after things like this, You’re the guy driving Danica’s car. Hopefully when we get to the races this year, it will be, That’s Hinch’s car.”

Before the crash at Las Vegas that ultimately claimed the life of Dan Wheldon, it was announced that Wheldon would drive the No. 27 Go Daddy Chevrolet for Andretti Autosport in 2012. After the crash, the mayor of Hinchtown was elected for the ride.

Flash forward to 2013, St. Petersburg is a race that has become one to remember Wheldon as Wheldon had lived in Florida with wife Susie and their two kids. The one straightaway of the course has been named Dan Wheldon way while a memorial has been put in place, wit the winner’s name to be added each year. It was also Susie that would wave the flag to start the 2013 running of the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

At the end of the 110 lap event, it was Hinchcliffe that was able to drive to victory lane for his first career IZOD IndyCar Series victory. It also marks the first IndyCar win for Go Daddy.

“We talked before the race – we were excited before the race,” Hinchcliffe said of his conversation with his engineer. “He was excited to see Hinchcliffe 2.0. I asked what is Hinchcliffe 2.0? Better restarts, better job at conserving the tires. Great to see Go Daddy in victory lane in Indycar. So awesome. To grab the first one here in St. Pete to throw it out to Dan, in his car, is just awesome.”

Hinchcliffe was able to grab the lead from Helio Castroneves on the final race restart on lap 85 and never looked back, keeping about a car length between himself and Castroneves. Hinchcliffe was on the black tires while most were on the reds. The reds were known to be quicker, yet would give up easier.

“Well we knew that was it for us on reds,” Hinchcliffe said. “We knew it was tough to put the old set on. we knew on the last restart that everybody we would be on reds, but we were tough.”

Helio Castroneves would finish second after leading the middle part of the race.

“We were starting to lose (on the alternate Firestone tires) with about four laps to go and I already went from hero to zero and I said, ‘You know what? I don’t want to finish this race without any points at all,’ ” said Castroneves. “Great day for us. It’s a shame we let that one go, but Hinch did a hell of a job.”

Marco Andretti would make a late race charge to finish the race third.

“It’s a good start. Looks like we are going to have to beat (Hinchcliffe) this year,” Andretti said.

The battle for fourth would end in a thrilling three-wide finish at the line that would see Tony Kanaan edge out Scott Dixon and Simona de Silvestro.

“It’s been a good weekend for us,” said de Silvestro, who started a career-best third in her first race with KV Racing Technology. “Unfortunately, we lost a few positions at the end there. We kind of ran out of tires at the end. I think we can be pretty happy with sixth.”

EJ Viso finished seventh, followed by Takuma Sato, Justin Wilson and Alex Tagliani.

The 110 lap race would see four cautions with the first caution coming out on lap 20 after Dario Franchitti got into the wall. Franchitti would come off pit road and push the car through turn three, getting sideways and then into the wall.

“We’ve really struggled with the car,” Franchitti said. “I had to try to make it up somewhere so I tried to drive a little hard there, hit a bump in three and made a mistake. Just a mistake on my end, trying to drive a little hard there, knowing I had to make it up.”

Franchitti added that they made improvements throughout the weekend, but they are a long way away from where they need to be.

The second caution came out on lap 27 after Ana Beatris got into Charlie Kimball, collecting James Jakes and Oriol Servia and JR Hildebrand. Then, Saavedra would get into the damaged Hildebrand, causing Hildebrand to go around and the caution to fly. Simon Pagenaud would have mechanical issues under the caution.

The third caution would come out on lap 45 for debris. Josef Newgarden would have clutch issues under the caution.

“Tried to figure out here, but couldn’t get it working,” Newgarden commented. “It’s a shame for us. We got to try and get some momentum going. Firestone makes great tires, but it’s going to be tough to balance between the reds and the blacks.”

Oriol Servia did lead after not pitting under that caution and would pit under green on lap 63. That was when he would have his mechanical issues, unable to get off pit road.

The fourth and last caution came out on lap 75 when Saavedra would overshoot the corner and hit the wall. He had sustained damage earlier in the race. Then under caution, Hinchcliffe and Power slowed down while Hilderbrand didn’t. As a result, Hiderbrand would drive of the side of Power’s car and hit the wall.

“We were getting ready for the restart, dialing my knobs back, talking to my guys, those guys slowed up and I just ran into the back of him,” Hilderbrand said. “Totally my fault. I couldn’t help getting into him. I’m super sorry to Will. I was just trying to get back on the lead lap there. I was just doing too much all at once.”

Power would get back up into the top 12 after pitting to fix the damage, however would hit the wall in turn four late in the race. He would finish 16th.

“It’s too bad because the Verizon car was definitely fast,” he said. “(About the incident): He came over and apologized after the race. He said he was just looking down at his steering wheel and he just ran over the top of me. It’s just a mistake but that happens in racing. Then I made another mistake there at the end and it cost us four more places. Tough day but we just have to move forward and look ahead to Barber (April 7).”

Defending series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay would spend multiple laps on pit road with throttle issues.

Rookie Tristian Vautier would have mechanical problems on lap 70 after running inside the top five most of the first half of the race.

“We had a motor issue, nothing that we can control,” Vautier said. “I think we did well with what we could control so there’s not much more you can do about that. I had a lot of fun. Wish I was still out there. we can’t really be mad at anyone; it’s just a part of racing.”