Closest Margin in IndyCar History to end in Miami

Dario Franchitti led wire-to-wire at Sonoma to climb to within four points of IndyCar Championship leader Ryan Briscoe with two races left before Oct. 10 Championship finale at Homestead-Miami (photo courtesy: Chris Jones)

IndyCar and Grand-Am Sports Cars Storylines En Route to the
NextEra Energy Resources SpeedJam Championships
at Homestead-Miami Speedway Oct. 9-10

► Closest Margin in IndyCar History (4 points) to Culminate in Miami
► Sprint Cup Regulars Enter Frenzied Grand-Am Title Fight
► Grand-Am Victor Cut Teeth with Job in OPs at Homestead-Miami
► Miami’s Moraes Rebounds from Personal Loss to Personal Best
► Indy Lights Leader Closing on Championship Crowning in Miami
.

Closest Margin in IndyCar History (4 points) to Culminate in Miami

The IndyCar Series Championship has come down to the final lap of the final race each of the last three seasons, and it’s looking like South Florida fans can expect the very same compelling drama for this year’s Championship finale Oct. 10 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Just four points separate points leader Ryan Briscoe and second-place trailer Dario Franchitti—tying the closest Top 2 margin in IndyCar Series history with two races remaining.
“We're leading the championship, so hopefully we can hang onto it,” Briscoe said earlier this week. "If we're going to win the Championship, I'm going to have to win at least one of the last three races. But we know we're up there and the wins are going to come."
Last weekend marked the 13th time in 14 races that the championship points lead has changed this season. Miami resident and three-time Indy 500 Champion Helio Castroneves maintains his fourth-place position and is still eligible to win the IndyCar Series Championship.
In addition to the historically close margin between first and second place, just 20 points separate first and third place, making that the third-closest in league history with three races remaining (13 points in 2002, 17 in 2006). Scott Dixon—reigning Firestone 300 winner at Homestead-Miami—sits third place in the Championship points race.
"The Target team can win the last three races,” he said this week. “Hopefully we can do it and come home with another Championship."
Just three races remain on the IndyCar Series schedule, with Chicagoland and Japan on the slate en route to the Oct. 10th Championship in Miami.

Sprint Cup Regulars Enter Frenzied Grand-Am Title Fight

NASCAR Sprint Cup star Carl Edwards will join circuit colleague Marcus Ambrose in Montreal this weekend to team in racing in the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series, which also will crown Champions at Homestead-Miami Speedway Oct. 10.
“This is going to be great running in the Rolex Series in Montreal,” Edwards said of a course at which both drivers have recorded Top 10 finishes in Nationwide Series competition (which they also will run this weekend).
Entering Montreal, the Grand-Am Daytona Prototype teams are in a fierce battle to claim the hardware in Miami: The Top 5 teams are separated by an almost inexplicable 32 points. With just two events remaining before the Oct. 10 Championship finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas of the No. 01 Telmex Lexus Riley hold a four-point lead over Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty of the No. 99 GAINSCO Pontiac Riley team.

Grand-Am Victor Cut Teeth with Job in OPs at Homestead-Miami
Miami-native Andrew Carbonell recently claimed his first Grand-Am KONI Sports Car Challenge victory at Trois Rivieres—while sharing a car with his father. The KONI Series is a development ladder into the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series which will crown a Champion during the NextEra Energy Resources SpeedJam Championships Oct. 9-10. It was the pair's first-ever race together in the KONI Challenge, and their first victories in the series.
"This event is special to me," said Carbonell. “To be able to come back and stand on the top of the podium is just amazing, especially here with my father. I can't thank enough people for this. It's just amazing."
Carbonell worked a summer job in 2005 in the Operations Department at Homestead-Miami Speedway, under the tutelage of HMS VP of Operations Al Garcia and Director Jay Donnay. And his racing career has been centered there, as well: At age 12, he began racing karts at the go-kart facility located in the Speedway's parking lot and went on to win several karting championships at Homestead-Miami.
“He needed a summer job and I saw his potential right away based on how he drove those golf carts around here,” said Homestead-Miami Facility Operations Director Jay Donnay.  “He was always a good, respectable kid and look at him now.”

Miami’s Moraes Rebounds from Personal Loss to Personal Best
After missing a race earlier this month due to the death of his father, Miami resident Mario Moraes recorded a career-best fourth-place finish at Sonoma last weekend. The second-year IndyCar driver has shown flashes of brilliance and will be on track for the Championship-finale Firestone Indy 300 at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Oct. 10.
“The last two weeks have been really tough for me, but it felt good to get back into the car and have a good race,” Moraes said. “The KV Racing Technology team did a great job today, in fact for the whole weekend.”
After Chicagoland this weekend, just one race (Japan, Sept. 19) remains before the IndyCar Series heads to Moraes’ “home track” of Homestead-Miami Speedway for the IndyCar Championship Oct. 10.

Indy Lights Leader Closing on Championship Crowning in Miami
J.R. Hildebrand last weekend took a decisive step to clinching the Firestone Indy Lights driver championship—to be crowned at Homestead-Miami Speedway Oct. 9—with a commanding victory at his "home track" of Infineon Raceway.
"It doesn't hurt that I know the track like the back of my hand," said Hildebrand, who makes a stop with the Lights Series at Chicagoland this weekend before the Championship finale at Homestead-Miami on Oct. 9. "I won my first-ever race on the track in the Jim Russell Racing Championship Series.”

Six Motorsports Championships…Lots of South Florida Storylines
NASCAR Storylines en route to Ford Championship Weekend
at Homestead-Miami Speedway Nov. 20-22
► Miami’s Montoya in the Eye of the Storm: Sits 9th with Two to Go
► Dale Jr. Building Momentum Toward Miami Championship
► Hurricane of a Different Sort: “Tasmanian Devil” Heads for Miami
► Tampa Native Grateful for Opportunity to go Truckin’
► Panama City Team Hires Truex to Run N’wide for Miccosukees

Miami’s Montoya in the Eye of the Storm: Sits 9th with Two to Go

Last weekend at Bristol, Miami resident Juan Pablo Montoya ran as high as second before he was forced to make an unscheduled pit stop with just under 50 laps to go after cutting a tire. The misfortune led to a 25th-place finish, and he slid from seventh to ninth in the points standings. Even so, Montoya remains in the heart of the Sprint Cup Championship mix, which will be crowned at his “home track” on Nov. 22 following the Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“I had a great car all day,” Montoya said. “It is really too bad that I got a flat late in the race. Brian [Pattie, crew chief] and everyone that works on the Chevrolet did an amazing job. It is not the finish we wanted, but…we are still ninth and just need to bounce back in Atlanta.”
Montoya is on what would be a historical march—the first non-U.S. born driver to qualify for the Chase for the Sprint Cup. His running mate, Pattie, had to diffuse some on-track frustration when the tire problem at Bristol relegated Montoya to the latter half of the field.
"Dude, you're going to be fine. You're still P8 [eighth-place]," Pattie remarked over the radio.
With the Top 12 drivers qualifying for NASCAR’s Chase “playoffs” after Race 26, Montoya will enter Race 25, Sept. 6 at Atlanta, with a 64-point lead over 13th-place driver Kyle Busch. Just two races remaining before the 10-race Chase shootout for the Championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway Nov. 22 is underway.

Dale Jr. Building Momentum Toward Miami Championship
For the first time this season, Dale Earnhardt Jr. has consecutive Top 10 NASCAR Sprint Cup finishes: a third-place finish at Michigan in Race 23 and a ninth-place finish at Bristol Motor Speedway in Race 24, his fifth Top 10 in 24 races. After the Chase playoffs are set following Race 26, the Top 12 drivers will battle it out for the 2009 Sprint Cup Championship in Miami on Nov. 22.
“Making the Chase is a goal, but at the end of the year when you’re done racing at Homestead and you run the last lap and you get out of the car, what kind of feeling do you want to have?” Earnhardt Jr. said earlier this season. “The one I want to have is that we’ve fixed [2009 problems], that we’ve got something we can feel good about and work on and get all our stuff ready for next year, and feel like we can go in and get the job done.”

Hurricane of a Different Sort: “Tasmanian Devil” Heads for Miami
JTG Daugherty Racing's Marcos Ambrose in his first full season of NASCAR Sprint Cup competition but brings a veteran perspective in knowing a very fine line in trying to win a race and having on-track respect for those drivers seeking to qualify for the Chase playoffs, which culminate with the Sprint Cup Championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway Nov. 22.
"Just a wonderful night for me," the driver nicknamed “Tasmanian Devil” said after a third-place finish last weekend at Bristol. "My first year in the Cup series to be racing with Mark [Martin] in his 1,000th start, racing with Kyle Busch, who will probably go down in history as one of the best of all time; I just feel privileged to be out there and running with them.”
Ambrose was surrounded by drivers trying to earn a berth in the Chase and didn't want to hamper anyone's effort despite his desire to win the race.
"Racing is about controlled aggression,” he said. "If we all go out there full of testosterone, none of us will ever finish. There's a million ways not to finish a race.”
Just two races remain before the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship begins, with the Champion to be crowned at Homestead-Miami Speedway Nov. 22.

Tampa Native Grateful for Opportunity to go Truckin’
Tampa native Aric Almirola has had a roller-coaster 2009 NASCAR season. After starting the season in Earnhardt Ganassi Racing’s (EGR) No. 8 Sprint Cup car, he has found a home—at least temporarily—in the Camping World Truck Series with Billy Ballew Motorsports. Almirola hopes to be in the field when the Camping World Truck crowns its Champion at Homestead-Miami Speedway for “Kids Free” Friday on Nov. 20.
“Man, I have missed it so much,” Almirola said regarding time off from competition due to lack of sponsorship. “And for Billy to give me an opportunity to get back in a car or in a truck and be back on the race track has been a lot of fun; I’ve been very thankful of that.”
That feeling has got to be mutual, considering that in six Truck Series races this season, Almirola has posted three Top 5 and four Top 10 finishes. He does remain under contract with EGR and has talked with team officials of hopes of putting together sponsorship that will lead to a Ford Championship Weekend Nov. 20-22 appearance in both a Camping World Truck (Friday night) and a Sprint Cup car (Sunday afternoon).

Panama City Team Hires Truex to Run N’wide for Miccosukees
Phoenix Racing, owned by Panama City native James Finch, has put Martin Truex Jr. in its No. 1 Miccosukee Resort and Gaming car for upcoming Nationwide races, which could include the Nationwide Series Championship finale Nov. 21 at Homestead-Miami.
The team recently released Mike Bliss, who was running sixth in the Nationwide Championship points standings. “James wanted to make a change,” said No. 1 car crew chief Marc Reno. “The only reason we’re over there is to win races, and 10th ain’t good enough for us.”
Truex will compete in the races at Richmond and Dover later this fall, with drivers for additional races still to be determined, including the Championship-finale Ford 300 in Miami Nov. 21.