I would like to congratulate Sam Hornish Jr. and Team Penske. Hornish made a great move in the last moments of the race that made for a dramatic finish.

Marco's comments after the race were completely understandible. Having an Indy 500 win slip away on the last strait is certainly a dissapointing thing to have happen. I would have felt the same way.

My hat is off to the Andrettis. Either Michael or Marco could have been unsportsman like in the last laps blocking Sam and sealed the win for thier family. I respect the fact that they were gentleman racers. Marco will eventually get his win. He has shown the potential to be a top contender already.

Best of all it was a safe race. Another thing that I had not noticed until today when I was thinking about the race, is how reliable the cars were. There were no late race engine failures and it did not seem to be much of an issue at all. I remember 500s when top contenders would lead by huge margins only to have an engine let go a few miles from the end.

How did Danica fair?

8th. She had poor timing on a late race pit stop that cost her.

I think she was running too much downforce. She was getting worse fuel mileage than the other front runners. After the race she also commented that her car was not as fast.

[This message has been edited by RACE (edited 05-29-2006).]

I missed it but from the replays it looks like I missed a good race.

One of the best Indys ever. Almost as good as 92 and better than 82.

Marco impressed me a lot. I've watched every lap of every IRL race this year, and he has seemed like an arrogant rookie, a double pain. However, at the 500 he was professional, cool, and collected. He could have blocked Hornish, but let him take his line. Nicely done.

As for Danica, she had it right when she said she "had an eighth place car."

I was also somewhat disappointed to see Little Al drop out due to running over debris. I would have loved to see him claw his way to the top.

And while I don't like Penske, I do like Hornish, and am glad he finally won one.

Flamberge

I agree that it was one hell of a race!
When Marco slammed the door on Hornish in the closing minute of the race, I thought he had it wrapped up. I thought Hornish was going to hang back.
Then he made a hell of a move in the last 2-3 seconds of the race and blew past Marco!
I think this race may have helped to revive open wheel racing in the US. It sure has tweeked my interest.
There are only two things that would have given the sport more "press".
1. If Marco had won.
2. If Danica had won.

I'm quite happy with the results, though.

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Raydar
88 Formula IMSA Fasback.............................. 88 3.4 coupe................................................

Praise the Lowered! Read Nealz Nuze!

I have always thought the Indy 500 was the greatest race in history. And I think this was one of the best. They all played fair game. I will pull for Danica Patrick ever time she races, Because of one racer saying this was not a women's game. She has prov-en that women can do a man's job.
Don

quote Originally posted by Raydar: I think this race may have helped to revive open wheel racing in the US. It sure has tweeked my interest.

This is why I am a strong follower of IRL. Almost every race has a close finish, and every pitstop, restart, and corner counts. It's the best Football offseason sport there is.

Flamberge

quote Originally posted by RACE: I think she was running too much downforce. She was getting worse fuel mileage than the other front runners. After the race she also commented that her car was not as fast.

She (well all of Rahal's team) runs the Panoz chassis which inherently has more drag than the needle nose Dallara. It's also has a road race style pushrod suspension rather than the pullrod style that the Dallara's have (Dallara opted for pullrod because it allowed them to get a lower cleaner profile along the nose cone to the driver, thereby reducing drag on the high speed ovals.)Pushrod can be adjusted more easily and quickly which is helpful when trying to get a good road course set-up (Ganassi's team actually switches from Dallara to Panoz chassis on the road and street races for this reason.)

Ken S.

I like Danica as a driver, I think she has potential,I don't think she has proven anything yet. Carrer she has 2 top 5's and 10 top 10's. That is a good start, but hardly proves anything. Don't get me wrong, I was rooting for her last year, but she wasn't going to win (without an extended caution) because she was out of fuel. I think she is going to change chassis next race, we'll see if that helps.

Shirley Muldowney was the FIRST 3-time TF world champion. Some men have gone on to surpass that (Joe Amato comes to mind) but Shirley was the first, that to me proves she was one of the all time best. She also did it without all the press hype that Danica seems to get.

The only thing that proves anything is winning................Paul

I hadn't kept up with any racing lately, so imagine my surprise to see my main man Eddie Cheever back behind the wheel again. And I like his teammate too, Max Papis. Seemed they were just lucky to keep up with the field in this race. I hope their season improves.

Yeah, Marco was very impressive. Too bad those other rookies wiped out after the first lap. Would have been interesting to see how they work.

quote Originally posted by RACE: Another thing that I had not noticed until today when I was thinking about the race, is how reliable the cars were. There were no late race engine failures and it did not seem to be much of an issue at all. I remember 500s when top contenders would lead by huge margins only to have an engine let go a few miles from the end.

Now that Honda is the only engine supplier of the IRL the engines have been detuned slightly for more reliability (no need to run on the ragged edge if there is no competition between manufacturers). Engine failures should be few and far between.

Ken S.

[This message has been edited by kslish (edited 05-30-2006).]

quote Originally posted by Raydar: Then he made a hell of a move in the last 2-3 seconds of the race and blew past Marco!

Hell, it was more like the last SECOND of the race. Hornish beat Marco by 0.06 seconds.

As for Danica Patrick, I think it's great that she's in the race. I just wish they'd stop treating her like she's the Second Coming. REAL equality comes when people stop remarking on it....

Ed

quote Originally posted by edhering: Hell, it was more like the last SECOND of the race. Hornish beat Marco by 0.06 seconds. As for Danica Patrick, I think it's great that she's in the race. I just wish they'd stop treating her like she's the Second Coming. REAL equality comes when people stop remarking on it.... Ed

I'm not positive but I think it is 0.006 sec.