Will Power got by Justin Wilson on a Lap 72 restart and managed to hold off Dario Franchitti and Ryan Hunter-Reay in the final laps to win the Honda Indy Toronto and extend his IZOD IndyCar Series championship lead to 42 points.
Wilson had trouble with his car coming off of Turn 11 on the temporary street circuit as the cars headed to the green. Power was able to get a run on the outside and managed to outhustle the Englishman before they reached the right-hand Turn 1.
That lap turned out to be the one that turned the race on its head, as Ryan Hunter-Reay and Scott Dixon made contact while battling for third — which put Dixon into the wall at Turn 3 and eventually out of the race. Then Wilson wound up spinning at Turn 8, forcing him to rally in order to finish seventh.
At that point, it was all Power as he was able to keep a decent lead on Franchitti in the closing stages of the event. Today’s triumph is Power’s fourth of the season and his second consecutive win as well.
Tony Kanaan finished a solid fourth for Andretti Autosport, while Graham Rahal finished fifth in his first race back with Newman/Haas Racing. Danica Patrick claimed sixth, while Wilson, Marco Andretti, Simona de Silvestro and Dan Wheldon rounded out the top ten.
Toronto’s own Paul Tracy attempted to use strategy to his advantage, but wound up 13th in front of his home crowd. The other Canadian in the field, Alex Tagliani, finished 17th after he and Tomas Scheckter made contact and got tangled together at Lap 74.
After the race, Tagliani claimed on the IMS Radio Network that Scheckter told him the wreck was payback for taking him out at Toronto last year and that everything was equal now. When asked about the incident by another IMSRN reporter, Scheckter told Tagliani to “stop crying like a baby” and that the contact was not intentional.
We’ll have a bigger recap of today’s event later on today here at IndyRacingRevolution.com.
