Helio Castroneves

By Andrew Cutler
May 23 2010

In my opinion, the new qualifying format for Indy is mostly a success, but the nine car 'shoot-out' at the end could use some tweaking: More on that in a moment. What clearly stood out from nearly all of the previous fifteen years was that the action and excitement levels were way up - as was the number of fans in the stands.

With five hours for teams to fill the top twenty-four grid spots, the day started out with nearly every contender taking their initial (they are allowed up to three) qualy attempt, meaning that the 'bumping' began by early afternoon. With the knowledge that the top nine cars would have a second session all to their own come 4:30-6pm to decide the ultimate make up of the top three grid rows, there was also a fair amount of 'bumping' going on amongst the drivers who's intial attempts slotted them in the 8th-13th range.

When the 4pm cut-off arrived, there were many of the usual suspects in the top nine - and one squad that wasn't, making room for several of the 'smaller' teams to make headlines. All three of Penske's cars (Castroneves, Power & Brsicoe) and both of Ganassi's (Franchitti and Dixon) were in, but Andretti Autosport failed to get even one of their cars in. Kanaan crashed during his qualy run & will have to try again today. Marco, Ryan and Danica all made the grid in 16th, 17th and 23rd, respectively. Danica's post-qualy comments (her closing words were "It's not my fault") were taken by many in the stands as her attempt to blame the team for her poor performance, and the 'boos' rained down. 

Joining the Penske and Ganassi driver in the shoot-out were series regulars Alex Tagliani and Hideki Mutoh, both of whom had shown promising speed all week. Also there were two of the 'one-off' drivers; Graham Rahal (I'm calling him a 'one-off' because this is the first time that he's drivien for his father's team) and Ed Carpenter.

The shoot-out quickly turned into the 'who can catch Helio' show, as the Brazilian opened the session with a blazing four lap run at an average 227.970 mph. It soon became clear that only Power and Franchitti MIGHT be able to match him but, ultimately, neither would.

The confusing part of the shoot-out - and the part that I and several others have an issue with - is that, unlike in the first session, if a driver opts to make a second (or third, or fourth...) attempt, and then feels compelled to 'waive it off' in mid-run, their prior run gets re-instated. Penske used this unfortunate wrinke in the rules in the closing minutes to send Helio out for a 'new qualifying attempt' that was really just an effort to eat up valuable clock time and prevent the Ganassi drivers from getting one more shot each at the Pole: Both still managed to just 'squeak' in under the 6pm gun.

Like Danica's comments, Penske's effort drew the vocal ire of the crowd.

IMO, the shoot-out should be shortened from 90 minutes to 60, with only two attempts allowed per car: That should eliminate some of the 'games' that Roger and Chip so love to play. 

Here is the grid as it stands after Pole Day:

http://www.indycar.com/news/show/55-izod-indycar-series/37553-2010-indianapolis-500-starting-lineup/

I now have ALOT of pictures and video to sort through. I will post a 'story' giving you accesss to them as soon as I can, as well as a recap of today's ('Bump Day') qualy results when they become available.