Notes Taken During the 2008 Indy 500

Notes taken during the ABC broadcast of the Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on May 25, 2008.

Welcome to Indianapolis, Indiana and the 92nd running of the Indy 500. Our boy Jeff from MyNameIsIRL.com is on the ground at Indy. He even took the liberty of calling me when I was walking the dog this morning to remind me that he is, in fact, at Indy. Check his site for some most tasty postings

pressdog beer of the race is Miller High Life tall boys, because I'm an American, goddamn it, and that's what Americans drink on Memorial Day weekend. 

I know you all got up with me on Sunday morning to watch the F1 GP of Monaco, so this is race two for us. Fortunately, we have the Extreme Expertise in All Aspects of Racing and Life, Eddie Cheever Jr., in the booth today. His Extreme Expertise and Knowledge will surely enhance my viewing.

Julianne Hough, former Helio Castroneves dance partner, sings the National Anthem. Does a nice job with it. Any connection to Dancing with the Stars ABC is all over. pressdog don't do notes on pre-race stuff, but I turned on the TV just in time to see the Helio Dancing with the Stars package, deluxe extended play version.

CSI Indianapolis reports they've found 872 spent shell casings around a deceased horse labeled "Helio Wins Dances with the Stars," which they are almost sure are a result of the slugs ABC continues to pump into it.

Fly-over! F-18s. Love those Navy fly boys and girls. Weapons are hot, repeat, weapons are HOT.

We got your Taps and your Jim Nabors Back Home Again in Indiana. Balloon release. We're good to go here.

Mary Hulman George represents: "Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines!" Giddy up. 250,000 fans hold up little boxes of wooden matches and give them a shake because it's time to light this candle!

Brent Musburger, who was Mr. Pre-Game, says this is the moment Danica starts another assault ... Big beer chug here. Gonna be a long race for us non-Danica Worshipers.

Marty Ried, Scott Goodyear, Eddie Cheever in the booth.

Sarah Fisher stalls leaving the grid. WTF? OK, she's back under way. May have just been a cagey strategy to get air, because unless you're in the fence or near Danicker, non big-three cars will be pretty sparse, TV wise. ABC has 11 cameras onboard, and only seven of them are on Danica's car (kidding).

Scott Goodyear does the CB radio to Helio. You got your ears on, Good Buddy? Come back. Helio says you have to be patient in this race. My viewing is enhanced.

Cue the Hat (the running order at the top) -- yo yo yo to the B Unit! I'm just kidding about you being big drinkers. I'm a kidder. I kid. All consummate professionals there in the graphics B Unit.

Starting lineup: Scott Dixon, Dan Wheldon, Ryan Briscoe, Helio, Danica, Tony Kanaan, Marco Andretti, Vitor Miera, Hideki Mutoh, Ed Carpenter, Tomas Scheckter, Townsend Bell, Graham Rahal, Darren Manning, Bruno Junqueira, Justin Wilson, Buddy Rice, Davey Hamilton, Alex Lloyd, Ryan Hunter-Reay, John Andretti, Sarah Fisher, Will Power, Jeff Simmons, Oriol Servia, E.J. Viso, Milka Duno, Mario Moraes, Enrique Bernoldi, Jaime Camara, A.J. Foyt, Buddy Lazier, Marty Roth.

Jack Arute, Jamie Little, Brienne Pedigo and Vince Welch are in the pits. Total pit deployment.

Goodyear says turn one of Indy is the only place in the world where you go into it three wide. Eddie says you have to remember to get through first corner, then first lap, then you can settle in and get the race going.

I'd agree with you, guys, but the IRL has had some famously fugly starts recently, including last year's single-filer at Indy, so we'll see if the tradition of Three Wide holds up.

Emerson Fittipaldi is the driver of the pace car. Gets air. He may not pull off and attempt to take turn 1. Pace car is an E85-powered Corvette. Corn alcohol power!

Let's light this candle! Pace car is off, we are .... GREEN GREEN GREEN.

Reasonably attractive start. At least 2.5 wide at the stripe. Nice.

Wheldon shoots around Dixon into the lead. Scheckter inhales Danica and Helio. He's taking his time moving forward as is his custom.

Lap 3 -- Arute says the leaders are already trying to conserve fuel. Dixon is at fuel position 2. Dude. Already with the fuel. Rip the fuel knobs out. 

Lap 5 -- Briscoe throws a block party for Scheckter! If race control warn's Briscoe on blocking, he'll be down to his last 14 warnings before he gets a stern talking to.

Wheldon, Dixon, Kanaan, Briscoe, Scheckter, Helio, Danica, Mutoh, Vitor.

Ray Leto is Scheckter's engineer. Killer. Go Ray, go! I smell a story line! Danica's former engineer, Ray Leto, now dissed and dismissed, has Scheckter in the race. Revenge of the dissed engineer! ABC? Anyone? Bueller?

I don't get why ABC/ESPN doesn't play up the anti-Danica story lines. Yes, for sure you play up the "will she win again?" and "America's sweetheart takes on the boys" story lines. They got those going. But why not the "Anyone but Danica" and "She's not beloved by all" story lines? N-word: you got the Jeff Gordon rocks story line and the "we hate Jeff Gordon" story line. Multiple story lines, multiple chances to attract viewers.

Lap 8 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Debris. Missing mirror.

Holy Crap! Sarah Fisher is sideways in the grass. Many yelled obscenities here. She's stalled. WTF? Replays. Sarah stayed out and was doing the tire warm and just tossed the back end around and spun into the grass.

Cue the circus music! Didn't hit anything, but will go a lap or two down. A tiny tow truck pulls up and 18 clowns jump out and start hitting each other with giant, foam rubber jaws of life.

Lap 15 -- Goodyear says lots of pressure on her. Owner and driver. Eddie -- it is, but that was a silly mistake. Certainly nothing His Highness would make.

The mirror was from Bruno's car. They are trying to replace it. He has to have a mirror to return to the race. They have no mirror. Waiting for NAPA to deliver one, I think. Will be many laps down.

Lap 17 -- Green. Rice leads. Buddy Rice leads. Look for storm clouds. IMS radar reports a massive black cloud headed for the speedway. Spotters say it's actually a huge swarm of locusts that, along with Rice leading, are signs of the apocalypse. Rice and Wilson did not pit so they are 1-2.

Lap 20 Wheldon and Dixon around Wilson and Rice. Locust cloud dissipates. Wheldon, Dixon, Rice, Wilson, Kanaan, Scheckter, Helio, Marco, Briscoe, Danica.

Now Wilson gets around Rice. Jeff of MyNameisIRL.com confirmed that Justin Wilson is, in fact, the World's Tallest Open-Wheel racer. Jeff also has learned that Wilson is on the verge of being tossed from the league for being Entirely Too Nice and Accommodating. A clear violation. The guy gives you a total English butler vibe. Anything you require? Having a pleasant day? May I get your lordship some tea? Now, if only NHL had some cool Justin Wilson gear I could buy ...

Lap 21 - Danica complaining of understeer.

Lap 29 -- Wheldon leads. Justin Wilson is sticking in third, but will have to stop soon. Vince says he's saving fuel and hoping for a yellow (that could be the new tagline for the league. "Saving Fuel and Hoping For Yellows!")

Buddy Rice reports "I'm on the fuel light" and will pit soon.

Danica 7th. Much confetti in the stands. ABC execs start to get a tingling sensation deep in their collective loins.

Lap 36 -- Ed Carpenter goes around Briscoe. Vision around Penske. Satan contemplates investing in additional insulation for his house in hell to keep out the chill. Locust clouds start to reform. Reports of eight trillion frogs headed toward the speedway.

Lap 37 - Yellow yellow yellow. Rahal in the Wall. Ray-wall. Booth guys speculate that the car in front of him, Alex Lloyd, slowed to get into the pit and that caused Rahal to go high and mash it. Or, maybe, he's a rookie and screwed up. It's possible, even for a Rahal. Onboard replays. Bobby Rahal gets air. Been happier.

Lap 39 -- Festival of pitting. Danica in. Left front has an issue. Adds about 10 seconds to her stop. Danica gesturing. She's the best gesturer in the league. Most Valuable Gesturer.

We got FIRE! AJ 4's car is on fire in the pits. The fire guys are on it like cats. Hosing the whole thing down. Fuel must have gotten out onto of he side pod because we definitely got flames. In car replays. Cuatro apparently either didn't know he was on fire or is incredibly calm about it. Didn't freak out getting out of the car. I would have been scrambling. He's a Foyt, after all. They fear nothing, including killer bees and flipping skid loaders.

A tiny fire truck pulls up and 16 clowns jump out to spray the crowd with silly string.

Goodyear says fire is the biggest fear of a driver. Eddie says fire is bad, but so is having continuing problems that take the enthusiasm out of the driver. Between being roasted alive and having the enthusiasm drained out of you, I'm going to go with being roasted alive as being worse. It's a close call, but roasted alive has to be worse than dispirited.

Lap 40 -- Jack with cutaway car. Shows us the buckeye. Nobody gets intimate with the cut-away car like Jack.

Jamie with Rahal -- Car ahead really slow. Finally an op to get by. Car came up a couple of feet. Got into the gray. Toast.

Lap 43 -- Wilson and Rice get the wave around. Restart montage.

Lap 44 - GREEN.

Onboard with Danica who is dirt tracking. Fighting it. Tries to go around RHR ... but NO. Danica is radioing something. Can't make it out. Terminal speed. Something.

Marco is 4th, but since he's not near Danica, he gets no air. Cheever "Where are the Penskes?" Good question. Arute -- Helio has been making fuel from the beginning of the race. Conservative until the last 50 laps. Because that's what the fans come to see -- people make fuel. Do not go as fast as you can under any circumstances.

Lap 50 -- Dixon, Wheldon, Kanaan, Marco, Scheckter, Manning (!), Ed Carpenter, Helio, Vitor, Mutoh. Danica is 13th.

Lap 59 -- Scheckter being conservative -- in 4th.

Lap 61 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Marty into the wall. Wall Marty. Something happened to Marty in turn 4, same as Rahal.

Lap 63 -- pits are open. Looks like Helio got hit in the front wing with some debris. Replays. Yep, Marty debris got him. He'll be in for a new nose. Jamie with Marty -- Finally got the car tweaked in and went around the outside of Lazier. Pretty slick up there. That outside is pretty slick. Took me out.

Manning back in 24th. WTF? Replays. On the way out of the pit, Rice clipped Manning's front wing.

Lap 67 this is a long-ass yellow. 10 lapper at IMS is long. What up with that? Did a bunch of track workers call in sick today or what?

Lap 69 -- Scott and Wheldon can talk to each other via spotters. Wheldon passed Dixon in a hairy spot and he or his spotter said "My bad." Dixon says "if he wants to lead, he can lead." Just don't pass me in some dangerous spot.

Cheever -- If you want to pass a teammate, do it someplace safe. (As in, not in a corner.)

Lap 73 -- green. Vitor dives under Capenter. Vitor told to fall back behind Carpenter since he passed before the green. Block all ya want, but do NOT pass before the green.

Lap 75 -- Wheldon, Dixon, Kanaan, Andretti, Scheckter, Ed, Vitor, Mutoh, Bell (!), RHR. Danica 11th.

Onboard with Danica. Behind RHR. Big lift in corner 1 and 2.

Arute says Dixon is at fuel position 2 while Wheldon is at one.

Lap 80 -- Dixon leads. Yellow yellow yellow. Camara into the wall. Wheel is bounding free down the track. The dreaded marbles gets another one.

This is turning into an N-wordish festival of yellows.

Again, a 10-lap yellow. Jamie with Jaimie -- Camara -- front end giving up a little more each lap. Couldn't get it better. Into wall.

Danica on the radio. -- I don't know what to say. Not very fast and got lots of understeer. 

Lap 87 -- Vince with Kyle Moyer. Vince -- What can you do to make Danica more successful? Moyer -- get her to be the leader. Get her up there she could run with them. As quick if not quicker.

Lap 90 - GREEN.

Lap 93 -- Tony around Dixon for second. Tosses up his fastest lap of the race and gets into the lead on lap 94.

Danica is up to 8th. Battling with RHR. Brie says no changes for RHR last stop, but they found a puncture. Lucky.

Lap 99 -- Marco charging.

Lap 100 -- Tony, Dixon, Marco, Wheldon, Scheckter, Ed, Vitor, RHR, Danica, Mutoh.

Marco and Wheldon -- Wheldon is fading for some reason. Scheckter is looking under Wheldon now.

Lap 106 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Kanaan is slow for some reason. Left front is trash. Spun out of control. WTF? Sarah Fisher is toast. Many screamed obscenities.

Holy Banzai! Marco dove under Kanaan like a Peregrine Falcon coming into the turn. Tony had no place to go but into the wall.

Vince with Mike -- It's a tough call. Should Marco have been there? Don't know. Tough call.

Yeah, tough if your son is involved, otherwise, not so tough.

Goodyear says maybe Tony just spins if Sarah wasn't there.

Maybe she should have had the courtesy to take the wall rather than hit Tony. Also, though, if Tony wasn't there spinning, Sarah, whose car was financed by following the Big Three around and returning their discarded, empty, redeemable pop cans (5 cents each here in Iowa), is still on the track.  Also, if you look at the photo of Sarah's trashed car, you'll see "This one is for the FANS" on the engine cowling. Story line? Anyone? $30,000 donated from fans? Anyone? Bueller? Maybe it was covered in the pre-race, but to me that sounds like a story line.

Right here it occurs to me that an incident like this one was sited as one of the reasons Dario Franchitti bolted AGR last year, because Mike took Marco's side when Marco speared him on a road course. The N-word is currently leaving voice mail on Tony's cell phone.

Down to Jamie with Tony -- Very stupid move on a teammate. Me being a good teammate didn't want to turn into him because then we have two cars out. Sarah Fisher, I feel so bad for her. She tries so hard. Just put a team together. She was crying so hard in the car. I hugged her and she apologized to me. I apologized to her. I said cry here, but then come out with a smile on your face or I'm going to feel bad.

Back to Jamie with Sarah -- Sarah -- you have no idea (how tough the month has been). I really wanted to go to Kentucky and not sure we can do that now ... Here Sarah gets farklempt and has to walk away. Props to her for coming out and facing Jamie at all after seeing about $100,000 of her person money get turned into festive carbon fiber bedazzlement because someone with 102 times more money got mental.

This whole sequence is pretty much why us Fisher Sponsors sent her a check this week. Looks like she'll need some repair cash, so send those checks in!

Holy shizzzz, now Jeff Simmons is around while trying to warm the tires, much like Sarah on Lap 8 ish.

Lap 117 -- Green. Roughly seven wide down the front stretch. Very street-race-ish. It's nightmarish to pass on the corners at Indy and everyone is pretty equal in speed on the straights, so Indy is kind of becoming a road course-ish race. Pass on restarts, draft someone's ass going through the corner and hope for a shake-and-bake sling shot down the straight. Oriol Servia goes low and about gets a wheel in the grass.

Booth guy say Danica is taking a defensive line. I think she took Oriol down into the grass. Holy Block Party. Danica? Blocking? NO WAY. She probably only has about 19 more warnings before the Iron Hand of Justice, Brian Barnhart, CRACKS DOWN. (Raise your hand if you think anything short of Danica popping off rounds from a Glock 9mm in the direction of other racers will get her any kind of penalty. I see two hands.)

Helio tries to go under Danica and she throws a block party for him too! Race control has had enough and send her this message.

Vince says Danica doesn't have the car to hold off Helio.

Lap 123 -- Danica radio. Yadda yadda. Cheever gushes that she has incredible poise to relay all that info on the fly. Marty admits that it was taped during a yellow.

Lap 125 -- Marco, Dixon, Scheckter, Wheldon, Vitor, Ed, RHR, Danica, Helio, Servia (!)

Lap 128 -- Wheldon is getting inhaled by everyone. Drops from fourth to seventh in a few laps.

A black A-10 warthog flies over the back of the field and lays waste to P15 through 24 and the booth don't see a thing. (Kidding. But aliens could pick up, say, Davey Hamilton right now and we'd only know because he disappeared from the hat and timing and scoring).

Lap 133 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Wilson into the wall. Tall and in the Wall. Got high, did a spinorama into the inside wall. Caution number 6. I tuned into IMS and got Talladega instead.

Brie with Wilson engineer. Not sure what happened. Taking it nice and slow. Got loose or something.

Lap 135 -- festival of pitting.

Moraes stays out and will lead. A tiny plane circles overhead and 32 clown skydivers jump out. With Moraes leading at the restart, the circus is rolling into town.

Carpenter has issues in the pits. Not sure why. Giving up all the track position he fought for. Cheever -- terrible, terrible. Brie says they can't get the car into neutral. Gotta be in neutral to do the pit stop. Ed is finally out in 23rd. Last on lead lap.

Helio is in 7th. Danica out in 9th. Replay of Penske stop. Left rear changer goes to adjust the rear wing, so the air jack guy does the left rear tire. INSANE. I'm sure they have a pit stop where the right front guy actually fuels the car as well.

Vince -- Marco didn't get any rear wing adjustment.

Lap 137 -- Jamie with Justin (who towers over her). Behind Darrin (Manning) experimenting with lines see what it is all about. Start to go high and spun into the inside wall.

Danica on the radio -- I can't pass, I can't pull up. I can't do anything. I cannot feel a difference from the last stop. I am slooooooow. Booth guys salute the pluck, the fire.

Lap 138 -- GREEN. Dixon goes under Moraes by turn 1.

Lap 139 -- It's a freight train passing Moraes.

Lap 140 -- Moraes waaaaaaaaaay high and brushes the wall. DP gets under RHR.

Lap 145 -- RHR back around Danica.

Bell passes Wheldon who is now in 14th. Those pigs ain't so easy to drive, are they Danny? DRR car passes a Ganassi car. Reports that the Nile River is now blood. Arute says the longer the runs, the more the balance goes out of Wheldon's car.

Lap 148 -- Moraes is now going N-word speed and gets called in. Last lap was 183 mph.

Lap 150 -- Briscoe is (guess!) conserving fuel.

Dixon, Andretti (you can still see Kanaan's bones dangling out from under the right front of Marco's car), Scheckter (!), Vitor, Helio, RHR, Danica, Brisco, Servia, Rice.

Lap 153 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Lloyd is spinning down pit lane. SEVENTH yellow. Lloyd brushed wall and then rebounded into the pit in and took out the pit speed limiter. Luckily a crew working on a car didn't get NAILED. Car took a good bounce or it could have been ugly.

Lap 155 -- we have had 59 laps of caution. Dude. Is this Daytona?

Lap 156 -- I think Wheldon has the cowling off. Scheckter is TOAST! Getting out. Hating life. BLOWN up, SIR!

Lap 158 -- Vince -- Scheckter. Broke drive shaft. End day. Very disappointed. Gave the car a good run. Did what we could do. (Does that mean that Scheckter got on it too hard and snapped the half shaft in a Marco-esque move?)

Jamie. Alex Lloyd. Don't know what happened. Grazed the wall. Car not handling right.

Lap 159 -- GREEN. Vitor leads! Satan searches for a parka in his closet. Danica and Briscoe locking up.

Lap 161 - Replay start. Vitor dives under Dixon, between Dixon and Carpenter. Sha.

Helio around Marco into third.

Lap 168 -- Yellow yellow yellow. Milka spins. Replays. Looks like Buddy Lazier gets nutty and goes high, then pinches down on Milka and she gets a tire into the grass. That ain't going to work at 215. Sin-o-rama and locks them up, putting holes in all four. It's toast. (I figure out later that they got it back to the pit, got new tires, got her back out to finish 19th.) She was last car on the lead lap at the time. Milka on the lead lap at 168. I smell another story line.

Lap 170 -- Pitting. OMG.

Circus music in stunning digital sound! Briscoe hip checks Danica coming out of his pit box and spins her into the inside pit out wall. TJ Patrick hurls himself onto Briscoe's car in a spittle-punctuated rage (Sorry, made that part up).

Danica's suspension is TRASH. Replays. In car with Danica. Major hip check. Briscoe pulled out too wide and got on it, ass got squirrelly and right into the Golden Child. Cheever prounounces Danica's run "very good." You can almost hear the Kool-Aid I.V. dripping into him.

Brie with Mike Andretti who blames Kanaan. (KIDDING!). Mike says Briscoe lit it up coming out of the pit and swearved into Danica. That's pretty much what happened, all right.

Danica is out of her car and stalking down the pit lane! It cold be go time in the pits. Director is screaming "STAY ON DANICA" to the camera guys. A tiny Hum Vee pulls up and 87 clowns wearing full NERF battle armor get out and lock and load.

I'm kind of wondering what she's going to do when she gets to Briscoe, who is still in his car as the crew tries to work on it. Security Chief Charles! Out of nowhere. Snappy blazer, BTW, Charles. He's intercepting Danica, who may be about half his size. Scrambling PR people. Dude, let her go. Maybe she'll stomp on Briscoe's wing or throw a punch at Roger Penske or some simlar show of "fire."

Goodyear: This is why she is successful.

Cheever: I see nothing wrong with that.

Marty: She's a fireband.

Me: (insert sound of someone hurling into a bucket here).

Then tell Charles to let her go. I could use a pit fight. Only thing -- as I tell the daughters -- don't start punching without expecting to get punched back.

Lap 176 -- Green. Again, seven wide down the front stretch, funneling into single file into turn 1. Shades of Long Beach. Helio throws a block party for Marco. Blocking is illegal in the IRL, sometimes. Goodyear says Helio has already been warned once for blocking. So that leaves him with just 17 more warnings before he's on double-secret probation.

Lap 177 -- Dixon, Vitor, Helio, Marco, Mutoh, RHR, Ed, Rice (!), Servia (!), Manning (!)

Bride of Ice, Emma Davies-Dixon, gets air. The Family Cams are activated.

Lap 180 -- Jack -- Dixon was told by race boss Mike Hull to go full rich. Jamie says Vitor also good on fuel.

Lap 185 -- Dixon, Vitor, Helio, Marco, Ed, Mutoh, RHR, Rice, Manning, Bell (!)

Sandy Andretti (Marco mom) gets air. Emma cam. Around the horn on family cams.

Lap 190 -- Marco around Helio into third. Dixon, Vitor, Marco, Helio, Ed, Mutoh, RHR, Rice, Manning, Bell.

Helio may now be throwing a block party for Ed. At least he's an equal opportunity blocker. Race control is THIS close to having a word with him. They swear, he's only down to 10 warnings now. Seriously.

Dixon has the wings back in the delta and is supersonic. Good luck catching him. Although Vitor pulling it off would be a huge moment for us underdog lovers. And, as Goodyear will tell ya, catching is one thing, (say it with me) passing is another. Especially with all the block parties that have been allowed so far.

Mario Cam. Sandy Cam. Emma Cam. RHR gets around Mutoh in the battle for Rookie of the Year. More Emma cam.

Lap 195 -- Dixon, Vitor, Marco, Helio, Ed, RHR, Mutoh, Rice, Manning, Bell.

More Mario cam. Vitor throws up his fastest lap of the race and Dixon is unfazed. Dixon will win barring air strike. Wait, traffic coming. Traffic is smart enough to pull over and Dixon streaks by with Vitor in tow.

White -- No signs of air strike. Order restored in the unverse. The pole sitter and Big Three speed king will win. Checkers. Dixon will swig milk. Emma cam. Gets a big hug from Mother Ice.

Radio -- great job. great job. Dixon -- Whooooooo hoo. Good job boys. (I think he f-bombed in here, like "f-ing huge job, boys.")

Video of Danica stomping off.

Arute with Dixon. Dixon is out. Jumps on the back wheel and gives the crew some love. This should be good. Welcome to immortality? Arute: "No longer can we call you the ice man ..."

Emma arrives and interrups Jack's line. Big smooches.

Dixon -- Seemed to have a good car. Hold onto it and stay in front of guys on restart. Bit of a sitting duck on restarts. Try to save fuel, see how it was in traffic. Thanks the crew.

Milk coming. Ice has to readjust the wreath go get his drinking hand free. Little swing, then pours it on his head and tosses some the crowd. Arute -- "No longer can we call you the ice man. From now on your the milk man." Ganassi is there, swigging the milk owner's milk.

He's still the Ice man.

Brie showing amazing fitness catching up to and staying with Danica. Danica -- from what I know it was pretty obvious what happened. Unfortunate didn't get to show what the car could do in the end. Brie -- what were you going to do/say if you got to Briscoe? "It's probably best I didn't get down there, isn't it?" Props to Brie for getting The Quote that will be in every paper tomorrow.

No! We want pit fights. Where's Sam Hornish Sr. when you need him? Geez, Charles, let 'em play, OK?

Marco with Vinny -- Hindsight it's easy to point out what should have done different, but in the race the team has to make a decision. Did what we did and missed it. Rear wing decision. (Not sure if he decided to get wing or not get wing). Team decided, was wrong, kind of the way it goes.

The Kanaan thing? Marco -- I got the inside and stayed as low as posisble. Maybe I dived bombed in there too late, have to look at the tape, if so I apologize. Very sorry.

I give Marco this -- he stands up and is pretty straight in the interviews. When he screws up he usually says so, which I gotta say isn't that common in an Andretti. So give the kid props for being pretty straight with it all.

Vitor with Jamie. Vitor -- We really really prepared the car and everything went according to plan. Finished second, very very good result for the team. Big three watch out. Vitor gives John Barnes and Mike Griffin props for putting the team together.

Panther is the one-car team that may challenge. Jamie calls them the "little team that could."

Helio with Vince -- Vince asks what's with the block parties? (Give Vince big ups for asking the questions fans want to know and not being real concerned with making the drivers feel like stars or generally kissing their asses and not just going for the "describe the emotions" or trying to be part of the entertainment himself.)

Helio goes ahead and avoids the question. Talks about the fun-tastic team. Incredible team. Did a great job. Team effort. Way to not answer the blocking question, Helio. Note to IRL cars, make 'em wide. Apparently it's no longer illegal.

Jack with Ed. Ed got Fifth. Ed -- Top five is great for Vision. Bad pit stop. Couldn't get it into neutral. Had to keep my head after that stop. No more saving fuel after the stop so could rock up the field.

Brie with RHR. 6th. Highest finishing rookie. Epic battle. RHR happy with the result. Battling the big boys. RHR  and RLR is another "not fond of Danica" story line that is being ignored.

That's it from Indy. Lots of yellow. Not a lot of passing late. Last 10 laps were a lock stepathon. Could have had a pit fight but Charles got in there. Dude.

Lap 200 -- Dixon, Meira, Marco, Helio, Ed, RHR, Mutoh, Rice, Manning, Bell, Servia, Wheldon, Power (zero air!), Davey Hamilton (zero air!), Enrique Bernaldi (zero air!), John Andretti (zero air!), Buddy Lazier (accident-involved air only), Mario Moraes, Milka Duno (accident air only), Bruno Junqueira (accident air only), AJ Foyt 4, Danica, Briscoe, Alex Lloyd (accident air only), Viso (zero air!), Wilson, Simmons (accident air only), Kanaan, Fisher, Camara (accident air only), Roth (accident air only), Rahal.

The zero-air sponsors above are feeling great about their investment in the Indy 500. Tune in for the Milwaukee Mile at 4 p.m. Eastern, June 1 on ESPN. The pdog will be trackside for the race. Big. I'm sure Danica will insist on hanging out with me -- AGAIN.

--

Comments

[Jerry]

Great report, but you missed the "lock step" in the first five laps.

[Thlayli]

Nice job, P-dog.

Marco Andretti: ugliest firesuit ever.

Anyone who bet that Milka would be the highest-placed female finisher would've won a LOT of money.

Gotta like the double-IPH formation ;)

[jennifer]

great job - i laughed so hard I was crying at the Eddie remark - fire is bad but having enthusiams drained from you is much worse -

look forward to MKE notes -

[pressdog]

Thanks. It's a tough call, the whole roasted alive vs. dispirited thing. I pretty much have tuned out the Lock Steps.

[KevinA]

Well done, p-dog, though I actually disagree with you and others on Security Charles stepping in. I'm probably being a snob, but I don't need WWE, N-wordish acts to be what saves the sport.

I somehow missed Eddie's stupid remark. Tough call there, Eddie. Jack Arute is a tool, and I can't stand Musberger.

More thoughts here: http://racingandpolitics.blogspot.com/2008/05/rough-and-tumble-92nd-indy-500.html

BTW: More Emma Cam Please!

[jdh417]

Best moment for me: Jamie with Vitor. That guy has the heart of a champion.

Near best moment: The Milkman mere seconds of foreplay away from giving Emma a "special delivery" right on top of the car, in front of the cameras. That kiss was like something out of romance novel.

I agree P-Dog, they should have allowed the confrontation. That way, the next time Danica runs into somebody in the pits, like TK for example, they can march over and confront her in the same manner. Oh, if only Paul Tracy or Robbie Gordon were around.

[clydester]

Great job P-Dog! I look forward to reading your race notes for the Formula 1 and Indycar races.

BTW... My brother always teases me that I am one of only 3 people that actually watch Formula 1 in the U.S. I guess I found my second person.

Hope to see you at the Milwaukee Mile.

[Dale Nixon]

From what I was told, it wasn't Security Chief Charles-in-Charge, that was Danica's personal assistant (bodyguard), who in fact makes even the SCC look mortal.

[Dale Nixon]

Umm, I kind of wrote that backwards...I meant that Danica's bodyguard makes Charles look tiny and was also "on the scene".

No more posting before 8:00 AM, I swear...

[Doug]

Great stuff as always pdog!

I was there! First time back since Paul Tracy won in 2001. :P Many memories of why I loved the race so much. Also many of why I left. Still a long way to go, but overall good stuff.

Count me in the "I hate Danica" club. I tried to like her, but no. Sad that the race's biggest cheers came from her marching down pit lane to confront Briscoe. Then again, most of the rest of the race was a bit of a snoozer. Save for that AWESOME pass by Vitor for the lead!!!

Will be tuned in next week!

Cheers

[pressdog]

Security Chief Charles is very formidable, so the Danica Defender must be house sized. Dale shouldn't post when he's hung over.

[gary patrick]

That pass by Vitor on the second-to-last restart was ballsy!

[ramblinman]

Great job p-dog. I got to see much up in Stand A on Sunday. I wish that ABC would show us more. Like the Marco/Tony incident had several in-car cameras and yet very little replay.

Each time the leaders would catch up to traffic, I swear that I could hear them cue the circus music over the PA system. This was the reason for the Dixon/Tony/Marco/Sarah mess in turn three.

Watching Danica march down pit lane looking like a little bobble head doll was fun. Even better was after the pit crash, Team Penske ran down to retrieve Briscoe, yet Team Danicker merely stood and gazed while one safety worker started pushing her back. The poor guy had to stop every so often and catch his breath before he got any help and until her team finally came to the rescue. Much Danica gesturing to the lone safety worker who was bedeviled by several clowns.

Moraes wasn't any where near being on the lead lap and had no business leading the one restart. Must've been on the circus channel, or clowns were deployed in the pagoda. He and Milka should've been black flagged towards the end of the race. Very slow!

Love the Cheever roasted alive comments.

Have a blast at Milwaukee.

[Bash]

Excellent notes as always. I just caught the broadcast yesterday, having been at the race and busy wading through a million photos after I got home. I haven't yet been able to block out the "lock step" thing - it annoys the bejeebers out of me! Well done to Dixie - awesome race for him.

Four pages of photos start here:
http://bashful7.com/BashUp/2008-indianapolis-500-carb-day

[pressdog]

Tasty shots, Bash. Thanks for sharing the linkage.

[Brett]

Watching Danica march down pit lane looking like a little bobble head doll was fun. Even better was after the pit crash, Team Penske ran down to retrieve Briscoe, yet Team Danicker merely stood and gazed while one safety worker started pushing her back. The poor guy had to stop every so often and catch his breath before he got any help and until her team finally came to the rescue. Much Danica gesturing to the lone safety worker who was bedeviled by several clowns.