We mentioned earlier today that top 10s in either qualifying or the race in the IZOD IndyCar Series have been spread around the grid fairly evenly. Here are some other stats of note beyond the top 10 disparity numbers:
- Entrants from Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing (right) have been shut out of victory lane since Sonoma last year, when Ryan Briscoe won. That’s only a stretch of five races in between, but is the longest such streak since open wheel unification in 2008 (four in a row last year from Texas through Toronto was the longest).
- Tristan Vautier took the first 10-spot grid penalty of the year. Coincidentally, his teammate Simon Pagenaud was the first victim of it last year at St. Petersburg. Long Beach last year had 12 grid penalty victims as all Chevrolet teams and a handful of Lotus runners performed unapproved engine changes.
- Long Beach’s podium finishers from A.J. Foyt Racing, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing and Dale Coyne Racing represented the first race under IndyCar sanction to not have a driver from Penske, Ganassi or Andretti since Motegi 2003. The last Champ Car race, Will Power’s Long Beach win in 2008, featured a podium made up of entrants from KV Racing Technology and the now-defunct Forsythe Pettit and Pacific Coast Motorsports teams (Franck Montagny and Mario Dominguez).
- And, lastly, Brazil will mark the one-year anniversary of Power’s last win. Who would have thought that was possible last April?
