This past weekend marked the start of the IndyCar season and also saw the most important Supercross race of the season: Daytona.
IndyCar started their season off in St. Petersburg, Florida. I fully expected the Team Penske cars to be above the rest, and for the most part it was that way with a sweep of the front row. The race looked to be a two team race between Penske and Ganassi, with all four cars in contention for the overall race victory. Will Power won the pole and held on to the lead until rookie Felix Rosenqvist in his Ganassi NTT Data car passed Power on an excellent restart. Rosenqvist held on to the lead until pit stops where Power pitted first and managed to take advantage of lapped traffic to regain the spot. The problem for these two was the drivers who stayed out longer put in some excellent lap times and overtook them, most notably Josef Newgarden and Scott Dixon. Newgarden and Dixon ran 1-2 until the finish in a day where the top two teams were clearly Penske and Ganassi. Simon Pagenaud, the other Penske, managed to sneak up to 7th at the end after starting 13th. Sebastian Bourdais was going for three in a row at St. Pete but had engine troubles early. For the most part, the teams you expected to be strong were strong. The surprises? Perhaps the gap between Andretti Autosport drivers. Rossi and Hunter-Reay were miles ahead of Andretti and Veach. Marco used some strategy to get closer to the front but just didn't have the car. It will be interesting to see what the next race at COTA will bring, because overall I'm thinking Andretti Autosport is disappointed with the way all their cars ran. Also, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing have to be disappointed because Graham Rahal and Takuma Sato looked like they were off all weekend. That team needs to pick up speed or Rahal is looking at a long season. Outside of that, no real surprises from the teams. COTA should be interesting in a couple weeks!
Moving on to Supercross. Eli Tomac is Mr. Daytona; he seems to be the best rider year in year out at the track. Tomac clawed back some points versus Cooper Webb, who continues to be in fine form this season. Webb seems to finish higher than expected every week, and it feels like every week we discuss the disappointing races of Ken Roczen. I still think that if any of the 4 main contenders (Webb, Tomac, Musquin or Roczen) get on a hot streak, they can win the championship.
In the Nascar world, Kyle Busch won at Phoenix for his first Cup win of the season. Kyle Busch is now at 199 wins overall in Nascar's top 3 series. This should have zero comparison to Richard Petty, as the records are separate. But Busch's feat should be celebrated as an incredible accomplishment and it will be something that will never be seen again with the limitations of running multiple races in each series. Team Penske looked strong once again, this week with Ryan Blaney taking the helm and showing that, in fact, all three Penske teams are going to be playoff contenders. If Blaney wins in the upcoming weeks, Penske will be all focused on the prize for one of their three drivers: they will be a force! Hendrick Motorsports is not where they want to be. Fact is Jimmie Johnson finishing 8th should NEVER be a good result. Johnson ran best of the Hendrick boys, and showed he's still capable of doing well when he has a reasonable car. This bodes well for the rest of the season, though, as it shows that Hendrick will be improving throughout the year.
Who to Blame? For this part, I'll take an in-depth look at some of the bigger Nascar conflicts from this weekend and come up with a verdict. Let's start with qualifying in the Suarez v McDowell fight (and I mean fight). Qualifying is always super important at a track like Phoenix where track position is key. What happened between Suarez and McDowell was simple: McDowell held Suarez during his lap and Suarez didn't like it. McDowell felt he shouldn't be getting out of the way because he had the right to be on the track. Suarez had the right to be upset because he didn't get a lap in due to this. However, Suarez lost all credibility in this matter when he purposely held up McDowell and almost caused him to wreck. McDowell didn't like this move, and suddenly both drivers had reasons to be upset. Who do I blame for this? The crew chiefs! Why do you leave it so late that you only have 30 seconds left on the clock? You only have 10 minutes to put a good lap time in for Round 1. You knew you may not get your best lap in at the end because traffic would pose a problem in some way. Ty Dillon's crew got him out early and he made it through. This isn't a bigger track where a draft may help you get a faster lap time. Even if there's better grip at the end of the round, I don't think it would be that big of a difference, especially for a team like Suarez that should make it through to Round 2 driving for Stewart-Haas. This incident clouded both their weekends and neither team recovered from this.
Next, Chase Elliott beats Ryan Blaney to the line at the initial start. A similar situation happened in 2015 when Kurt Busch was penalized at Phoenix for beating Jimmie Johnson to the line at the initial start. Fact is Nascar wants the leader to get to the line first at the beginning. Whether or not you agree with the rule, it's what Nascar wants. They want the pole sitter to have that advantage. I don't mind the rule, I like it. It's a little advantage to the pole winner since they get nothing in terms of points for qualifying there or leading a lap. But fact is Chase beat him to the line and a rule is a rule. This was the right call and Elliott was guilty.
Lastly, Daniel Suarez gets into Ryan Preece. Suarez had no time to react, Preece got off the gas and when you're coming, you can't do anything to control it. This is a short track and this is what you get with the animal. Preece will learn what to do in those situations in the future, it's still young days for him. I put the blame on Preece here.
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