While Ryan Hunter-Reay ended the Penske Racing domination at Barber Motorsports Park with his win in the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama on Sunday, one streak he didn’t end was that of Target Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon, who finished second in the race for the fourth consecutive year.
Hunter-Reay, who had never finished better than 12th in the race, beat Dixon by a .6363-second margin for his first win of the 2013 IZOD IndyCar Series season and the 10th win of his career. The 2012 IndyCar champ took the lead from Helio Castroneves on Lap 76 of the 90-lap race; Castroneves went on to finish third after Dixon passed him on Lap 77.
"I was driving my tail off trying to stay in front of Dixon," said Hunter-Reay post-race on INDYCAR.com. "(The victory) is excellent. It shows what we’re about. It shows that last year wasn’t a fluke. We really worked for it today. Unreal. I’m exhausted."
"We switched up strategies a little bit,” said Dixon. “I think we had to gain like 12 seconds to get back to the guys that were leading, which was Helio and Hunter-Reay. (The) car was super fast. I think definitely one of the cars to beat. We almost needed a slightly longer race, maybe another full stint.”
Castroneves’ third-place finish put him in the points lead after St. Petersburg winner James Hinchcliffe had problems on the first lap. "Today was a good day,” said Castroneves. “It was a little bit tough to recoup. We need to change the plan. We got boxed in and we got boxed in, Will (Power), people were shoving him in a way that was very difficult for us to get away. That was a shame on the start, but when we changed to Plan B we just decided to go for it. It paid off and it wasn't a win but for us for the championship, it is good and right now we just have to keep going. We need to keep going and you have to put yourself out there that's great and that is what we just did today."
Charlie Kimball and Will Power rounded out the top five. Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing driver Josef Newgarden recorded the first top 10 finish of his IndyCar career with a ninth-place run, as did rookie Tristan Vautier with his 10th-place finish. AJ Allmendinger, making his return to open-wheel racing, finished 19th.
"All in all today was a good day in the No. 2 IZOD Team Penske Chevy and there are a lot of positives to take out of it,” said Allmendinger, who won five times in the Champ Car World Series before moving to NASCAR in 2007. “We had a good start and I thought I was pacing myself well, we could have had a top-10 day without the couple breaks against us. It was a good day with a bad stall and unfortunately after that point we were saving fuel so it made it tough to make up ground. But I know that I can compete with these guys and look forward to getting even better at Long Beach."
The next race on the IZOD IndyCar Series schedule is the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach on April 21st on the streets of Long Beach, California. The race can be seen at 4 p.m. ET on NBC Sports Network. Stay up-to-date on IndyCar news at www.indycar.com.
Quotes in this piece provided by IndyCar Media.
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