Kanaan makes ‘500’ field in final hour; Sebastian Saavedra is 33rd qualifier; Tracy fails to get in the show
One superstar overcame the mayhem of Bump Day. Another superstar did not. And a young 19-year old went from bubble boy to Indianapolis 500 starter while in a hospital.
It was a Bump Day to remember at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway as the grid was set for next weekend’s Greatest Spectacle in Racing in wild fashion. Tony Kanaan wrecked his backup machine in the morning practice session, then had to battle with the repaired car throughout the day in practice before finally putting the piece in the show (four-lap average: 224.072 m.p.h.) with 35 minutes left. Paul Tracy, the ’02 runner-up at Indy, saw a decision to withdraw a 32nd-place speed backfire and cost him a spot in the world’s greatest race. And through it all, Sebastian Saavedra — who crashed his only car with roughly one hour left — managed to grab the final position on the grid when Jay Howard withdrew his own 33rd-place speed and failed to better it in the final run of the day.
“I probably lost five days of my life today,” said Kanaan, who wound with the 32nd position at the end. “But here we are. I’m glad to be here.”
After wrecking his primary car during his first qualifying attempt on Saturday, Kanaan wrecked his backup No. 11 7-Eleven/Andretti Autosport during practice at 9:21 a.m. ET. He spun while coming out of Turn 1 and tagged the short chute wall with the rear-end of his car before skidding to rest against the Turn 2 SAFER Barrier.
With parts from the cars of teammates Marco Andretti (front wing), Danica Patrick (engine cover) and Ryan Hunter-Reay (rear end), Kanaan returned with the repaired car at 1:40 p.m. ET and took practice laps at points during the afternoon before he finally went into the qualifying line. The 2004 IZOD IndyCar Series champion admitted to being “very emotional” due to the fans cheering for him to make the field, but he said he was able to maintain a relative state of composure even as the 6 p.m. gun to signal the end of qualifications drew closer to firing.
“I’m not going to say, ‘Yeah, yeah, it was totally cool sitting in the garage, yeah, we have to wait until five o’clock,'” he said. “No, of course not. But there’s a difference of being calm and being aware that you might not make it than actually lose your composure and go out and crash again.”
After Kanaan finally cracked the grid, the frenzy began. Following Jaques Lazier’s failed attempt to make the field at 5:28, rookie Mario Romancini withdrew his speed and got off the bubble with a four-lap run that averaged 224.641 and bumped off Saavedra. Milka Duno then made a futile attempt to get on the grid and Takuma Sato (224.178) followed that by bumping Jay Howard with 15 minutes left.
Howard couldn’t bump off Tracy’s bubble speed of 223.892, but the latter driver and his KV Racing Technology team decided to try and cement their spot in the field. That put Howard back on the bubble, and Tracy’s ensuing run was a disastrous one. It was waved off after two logged laps (a 223.7 and a 223.0). After that, Lazier and Duno made their final failed attempts, and with two minutes left, Howard threw out his 33rd-place speed and tried to do what Tracy couldn’t.
Turned out he couldn’t do it either. With Saavedra back on the bubble with his average of 223.634, Howard came up short with a four-lap average of 223.120. Saavedra was at Methodist Hospital thanks to his earlier incident when he got word that he was in the ‘500’ from his team owner Bryan Herta.
“We were well aware that we were going to have a roller coaster, that our race was to make the race,” said Herta. “And we knew that we were going to be part of whatever is happening today, that it was going to be touch and go. But never in a million years could we have imagined the scenario that actually unfolded. Thank God. I already had a hard enough time sleeping.”
Eventually, Saavedra was released from Methodist with clearance to drive after an MRI on his back was negative.
“It’s wonderful for me and my country,” said the native of Colombia. “I’m still trying to process it. I want to thank Bryan Herta Autosport and [sponsor] William Rast for believing in me and making my dream come true.”
Meanwhile, both Sarah Fisher, Howard’s car owner, and Tracy were left to ponder over their costly decisions. Fisher said that the call to re-qualify Howard was “the best decision we had to make with everything [Tracy] was doing.” As for the “Thrill from West Hill,” he maintained that his was a “team decision.”
“It wasn’t like we were sitting on our hands waiting to go,” said Tracy. “But we felt at the time there we were pretty safe where we were. Turns out we would still have been in. But it’s a team decision…And you win and lose as a team. I’ve had a lot of wins in my career where we’ve made calls that were the right calls. We’ve made calls that are the bad calls. I just feel really frustrated for all the sponsors that got on board. This is not a cheap endeavor.
“We put a lot of work into this and we came up short as a team. It’s frustrating.”
Bruno Junqueira of FAZZT Race Team was the fastest qualifier on Bump Day with an average of 225.662 m.p.h. in the No. 33 machine, an entry that only saw a handful of practice laps before its qualifying run. He’ll start 25th on Sunday and appears to be a force to be reckoned with along with teammate and FAZZT co-owner Alex Tagliani.
“This month was short notice, but it got shorter today when we lost 20 minutes to get the car ready,” said Junqueira of his day. “So when I went to do the two installation laps and then three more laps, the car was already fast. Then we did a change and went out again and ran a few more laps and the car was really good.
“Last year, I ran 12 laps, this year I ran seven laps, so next year, I think we’ll go straight to the car for qualifying.”
He’ll join Alex Lloyd and Romancini in Row 9, The tenth row will feature John Andretti, Fisher and Vitor Meira, and on the final row, Kanaan and Saavedra are joined by Takuma Sato (inside; 31st).
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IZOD IndyCar Series
2010 Indianapolis 500
Starting lineup
POLE DAY QUALIFIERS
1. 3-Helio Castroneves, Penske, 227.970.
2. 12-Will Power, Penske, 227.578.
3. 10T-Dario Franchitti, Ganassi, 226.990.
4. 6-Ryan Briscoe, Penske, 226.554.
5. 77-Alex Tagliani, FAZZT, 226.390.
6. 9-Scott Dixon, Ganassi, 226.233.
7. 30-Graham Rahal, Rahal/Letterman, 225.519.
8. 20-Ed Carpenter, Panther/Vision, 224.507.
9. 06-Hideki Mutoh, Newman-Haas, 223.487.
10. 99-Townsend Bell, Ganassi/Schmidt, 225.097.
11. 22-Justin Wilson, Dreyer & Reinbold, 225.050.
12. 2-Raphael Matos, De Ferran Dragon, 225.028.
13. 32-Mario Moraes, KV Racing Tech., 224.888.
14. 21-Davey Hamilton, De Ferran Dragon, 224.852.
15. 24-Mike Conway, Dreyer & Reinbold, 224.583.
16. 26-Marco Andretti, Andretti, 224.575.
17. 37-Ryan Hunter-Reay, Andretti, 224.547.
18. 4-Dan Wheldon, Panther, 224.464.
19. 8T-E.J. Viso, KV Racing Tech., 224.380.
20. 23-Tomas Scheckter, Dreyer & Reinbold, 224.261.
21. 25-Ana Beatriz, Dreyer & Reinbold, 224.243.
22. 78-Simona de Silvestro, HVM, 224.228.
23. 7-Danica Patrick, Andretti, 224.217.
24. 36-Bertrand Baguette, Conquest, 224.189.
BUMP DAY QUALIFIERS
25. 33-Bruno Junqueira, FAZZT, 225.662.
26. 19-Alex Lloyd, Coyne, 224.783.
27. 34-Mario Romancini, Conquest, 224.641.
28. 43-John Andretti, Andretti/Petty, 224.518.
29. 67-Sarah Fisher, Fisher, 224.434.
30. 14-Vitor Meira, Foyt, 224.388.
31. 5-Takuma Sato, KV Racing Tech., 224.178.
32. 11T-Tony Kanaan, Andretti, 224.072.
33. 29-Sebastian Saavedra, Herta, 223.634.
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Quotes from league and team press releases have been used in the making of this article.
