Word has come from IRL president of competition Brian Barnhart that Scott Dixon is now the official winner of the Honda Indy Edmonton, after Helio Castroneves was tagged with a blocking penalty in the final laps of the race.
On the last restart of the race at Lap 93, Castroneves and teammate Will Power were battling side by side for the lead in Turn 1 before the former came away with P1 and Dixon managed to get past Power for second place. The final two laps ran without incident until Castroneves took the checkered flag. That’s when IndyCar timing and scoring dropped the three-time Indy 500 champ all the way to tenth place and it was revealed that he had been penalized for blocking Power.
According to RacinToday.com, the decision sent Castroneves over the edge as he ran toward Indy Racing League official Kevin Blanch and began to shout his protest. He was eventually led away by League security chief Charles Burns, but Castroneves grabbed Burns by the shirt and shook him until they were separated by Penske Racing president Tim Cindric. (UPDATE: Versus.com has put up the video of Castroneves’ outrage.)
Shortly after 8:30 p.m. ET, Barnhart confirmed to Versus that Castroneves’ penalty would stand, giving the win to Dixon. Power finished in second and Dario Franchitti came home in third.
UPDATE (8:58 p.m. ET): Versus.com has put up Castroneves’ post-race interview, which also features video of the incident that drew him the blocking penalty. I also got another view of things from one of my Twitter followers, @indy44 (Matt Archuleta). Okay folks, you be the judge!
