Franchitti navigates his TomTom car to Victory in Iowa

Under the threat of weather and weepers, Target Chip Ganassi driver Dario Franchitti navigated his TomTom liveried car through traffic and an extraordinary amount of attrition to capture his second win of the season and his second win at Iowa Speedway, while for the 3rd race in a row, Penske driver Ryan Briscoe did the lion's share of the work, leading the most laps, only to finish second.

A combination of aggressive, sometimes ambitious driving, "the bump", and drivers way off the pace, made the event more of an obstacle course than a race at times, the proof of which can be seen on the timesheets with only 13 of 20 drivers finishing the race. But the full grandstands enjoyed several side by side stints and even a couple of passes for the lead, making this afternoon's race much more entertaining than some of IndyCar's recent outings.

The 250 lap race got off to a seriously shaky start, once again barely making it through lap one before the first caution flew when E.J. Viso, who wouldn't have any luck at all if it weren't for bad luck, lost the back end of his HVM car and found the wall, collecting two of his competitors, Ryan Hunter-Reay and Robert Doornbos in the process.

"It's very tough. This is the seventh DNF that we have," said the very disappointed Viso. "At this point, it's getting out of our hands. We've had so many kinds of issues. This time I don't know how to describe it."

While Viso and Hunter-Reay called it a day, the Newman Haas Lanigan crew managed to repair the damage and get Doornbos back out on track late in the race where he was able to pick up a few positions and valuable championship points. This was just he start of the attrition however as there were four caution periods in the first 55 laps, taking out several cars in the already depleted field for this weekends race.

Next to find the wall was Dale Coyne Racing's Justin Wilson who had been running well until that point.

"It's disappointing to go out of the race so early," said Justin. "I was hoping we could get a good result for everyone on the Z-Line Designs team, but unfortunately we had a problem with the front roll bar which was stuck in full stiff. That made the front of the car too responsive and eventually it caught me out."

The rest of the field barely able to get up to speed and run some green flag laps, Mario Moraes and Raphael Matos both found the wall within seconds of each other on lap 53. According to Moraes, he lost control trying to avoid the already out of control Matos. This ends Moraes' streak of top-10 finishes.

The last of the unlucky was another driver suffering from a season of bad luck, Tony Kanaan, who was a victim of "the bump" and cold tires, losing it as he was getting back up to speed following his pit stop.

"I have been caught in the third turn for the past three years. I think it was a combination of the cold tires and me pushing a bit too hard. We had a good car this weekend. The Team 7-Eleven guys have been working so hard but unfortunately we keep running into bad luck. We need to keep our heads held high and focus on next weekend's race in Richmond."

Amidst the carnage however were some stellar drives.
One stand out had to be Dreyer & Reinbold driver Tomas Scheckter who looked like he was shot out of a cannon on the start moving all the from 16th to 10th on the first lap. Scheckter, driving most of the race like a man possessed, would get as high as second at one point, but would settle for a finishing position of 6th. D&R teammate Conway also ran uncharacteristically well, earning his first top ten finish this season, coming across the line in 8th.

AGR's Hideki Mutoh quietly drove to the front of the pack to finish a season high 3rd. Mutoh finished in the runner up position last year at this event. 2008 Iowa Corn 250 winner Dan Wheldon came across the line in fourth, giving Panther it's sixth consecutive Top Ten result, while Team 3G driver Jacques Lazier managed to stay out of the way and out of trouble to bring the car home in 13th.

The series now heads to Richmond, the last of this string of 6 consecutive ovals, before traveling north east for some street and road course action.


TOP 10 POST-RACE QUOTES:

DARIO FRANCHITTI (No. 10 TOM TOM, first): "I like driving here. We tested at Iowa last Wednesday. The Target guys did a really, really good job coming up with a setup, and they were awesome in the pits. I just went out, did my job and hung on, made some good moves in traffic and here we are. More than anywhere, today is a team win because those pit stops moved us up in track position."

RYAN BRISCOE (No. 6 Team Penske, second): "It was a great day for Team Penske. Dario (Franchitti) had a bit more than us when on cold tires. On the restarts, he was a bit better than us. We were quickest throughout the middle of the stint. I was hoping I would be able to catch him in traffic, but he just got a bit more luck with those guys and actually opened up the gap. It was a tough one but a great day. The car was awesome. We had to make a bit of changes on the first pit stop, but from there the car was great."

HIDEKI MUTOH (No. 27 Formula Dream, third): "I was hoping to be one step up on the podium. This is one step down. But it's still a podium finish, so I'm happy. The Formula Dream team gave me a very good car." (On recording his best finishes at Iowa): "It seems like Iowa is my favorite track because of the results. Maybe it should be."

DAN WHELDON (No. 4 National Guard Panther Racing, fourth): "It's a good result for Panther Racing and the National Guard; to finish fourth here with this level of competition is something we can build on. There's a bunch of good guys on this Panther team, and they're all working very hard, and I know we all want to get back to victory lane together. I always tended to lose a few places on starts and restarts, but once the car came in it was as good as anybody out there. Toward the end of the race, I should have made some more aggressive changes with the front wing, because I had some understeer. My race was relatively low key. I was loose at the start of each stint, but once the car settled down it was good. I'll take a top five, and it's some good momentum to build upon. This is a good track. As it starts to lose even more grip, it's going to become even more fun. I know a lot of people say that Iowa is in the middle of nowhere, but you know what, we get such a great crowd and they're so enthusiastic. As a driver you could put me in paradise, but if there's nobody in the grandstands then it's not good racing."

SCOTT DIXON (No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing, fifth): "We tried to go with two different strategies, and it looks like Dario (Franchitti) just had a stellar day. Once we touched (with Helio Castroneves' car), we cycled back. And once we got back in traffic, it was really tough. We should have done much better, but at least one of the cars did well this weekend."

HELIO CASTRONEVES (No. 3 Team Penske, seventh): "We just couldn't get the Team Penske car quite right today. It's difficult to get the car exactly how you want it on a short oval when you don't have the opportunity to practice very much. It was a long day out there. Toward the end of the race, I think I was a bit too conservative. I had a lot of understeer, and we just didn't tweak the car enough on that last stop. I don't think that the front wing was the problem because we were back in the game for awhile, but we didn't have enough there in the end. The good news is that it's not even halfway through the season and we still have plenty of races ahead of us to improve and work towards the championship. Now we just have to keep our heads down and focus on Richmond."

DANICA PATRICK (No. 7 Boost Mobile/Motorola, ninth): "We started off with a good car, but it just wasn't our day. We got a couple flat tires at the beginning of the race, which was a bummer, but then we just changed up the strategy a bit, which allowed us to lead a few laps. But then the yellows started to come out, and we were at the wrong place at the wrong time. But it was a top-10 finish for us, so if this is the worst finish we have this season, I can't complain."

ED CARPENTER (No. 20 Menards/Vision Racing, 10th): "The bumps were a factor. The car was loose over those bumps the whole race, and I had understeer in Turns 3 and 4, especially in traffic. We were pretty limited on what we could do to take understeer out of the car because I was afraid of what that it would do over the bumps. It's disappointing, because this is a great racetrack, and I'd really like to see them fix that bump. I know they tried, but we'd like to see them try something different. We're happy to be coming back the next two years, so I think it would be in all of our best interests if they tuned it a bit to open it up and make it a more exciting race. It's a top-10 but not one we can be proud of since we didn't really feel like we beat anybody. We just rode around and didn't crash like a lot of others."

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Full results of the race on Iowa Speedway

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