 July 16, Nashville, TN. On
a cloudy day, with rain in the forecast, the Menards Infiniti Pro
Series
brought its own kind of storm to the Nashville
Superspeedway. Looking at the box score, it might appear as
if the race was relatively mundane:
Jaime Camara led flag to flag and won the event for Sam Schmidt
Motorsports. This was his second win of
the year, with his first being at the Freedom 100 at the Indianapolis
Motor
Speedway in May. However, box scores and
race summaries can sometimes be deceiving, and in this race, that was
definitely the case. Camara was
challenged for the lead on several different occasions, by several
different
drivers who for one reason or another fell by the wayside leaving him
as the
victor of a hard-fought, thrilling race. Of particular note was a
challenge by Jeff Simmons in which the two made contact, putting
Simmons into a spin. Simmons somehow was able to save his
spinning car and ultimately brought it home to a second place
finish. More on that incident later though...
At
the start of the race, Camara pulled away from the field, with Wade Cunningham
following close behind and, along with Jon Herb, passed the second place
starter, Travis Gregg. That was the
start of a slow slide for Gregg as he was then passed by Jeff Simmons on lap 4
and by Nick Bussell on lap 5. Also, by
Lap 5, Tom Wood, in his second race after returning to the IPS and fighting an ill-handling car, was
running in last place after starting in 6th.
Wood was not a factor for the rest of the race until he retired on Lap
22.
Additionally
notable at the outset of the race was the slow march of Jay Drake towards the
front. Drake, who is in the midst of an
attempt to run 11 races in 11 days, did not qualify and hence started at the
rear of the field. On the start, Drake
managed to pass Marty Roth and soon after passed Tom Wood. Throughout the race, Drake continued to
methodically improve his position, ultimately finishing in third place.
In
the first portion of the race, Arie Luyendyk, Jr also showed significant
strength after a somewhat slow start.
Arie fell back to sixth on the first lap, but by Lap 13, he was back in
contention, trying unsuccessfully to pass Jeff Simmons on the outside in Turn 1
for fourth. He then tried again on the
inside in Turns 3/4 and was also unsuccessful, scrubbing off some speed and
falling several car lengths behind. But,
by Lap 16, he charged back and made an inside pass of Simmons on the Turn 1
entry, moving to fourth place. At this
point, the strength of the car prepared by Brian Stewart Racing really began to
show as, once he passed Simmons, Luyendyk found himself approximately 300 yards
behind the lead pack of Camara, Cunningham, and Jon Herb, respectively. Then, in a period of 20 laps, while the lead
pack remained relatively static, Luyendyk managed to reel them in, without the
benefit of a draft. By Lap 32 he had
closed the gap, and on Lap 33 he got a good run on Herb and passed him cleanly
on the inside on the entry to Turn 1 and moving into 3rd. When asked about the car, Luyendyk said,
"We definitely had a car capable of winning today. It was strong from the beginning."
Further
back in the field, Jay Drake was continuing his relentless march to the front,
passing Nick Bussell on Lap 36 to capture sixth and then closing on Jeff
Simmons on the same lap. However, Drake
didn't get the pass completed going into Turn 1 and had to really get off of
the throttle, falling back somewhat.
On
Lap 37, Luyendyk in 3rd, came up quickly on his teammate Wade Cunningham --
still running consistently in second place -- and tried to pass him on the
inside of Turn 1. He was unsuccessful,
and instead elected to follow Cunningham for the next several laps. The three cars in front ran in more or less
the same order until Lap 45, when Luyendyk surprised the fans by driving hard
into Turn 1 and passing Cunningham for second place. The brief scuffle with Luyendyk seemed to
cause Cunningham to lose momentum and enabled Jon Herb to make a *very* close
pass in Turn 3 to take third. The battle
up front got even hotter when Luyendyk got a good run on Camara coming down the
backstretch on Lap 48. As Luyendyk dove
underneath the number 1 car of Camara in Turn 3, Luyendyk's front end appeared
to wash out and forced him to go high and abort the pass. Jon Herb took advantage of this situation and
passed Luyendyk on the inside. However,
just like Herb's pass of Cunningham several laps earlier, this was also a very
close pass and there was contact, bringing the race its first caution of the
day. Luyendyk suffered a punctured left
rear tire in the incident and was forced to pit during the caution for a tire
change and, although he continued to run, he was not in contention for the rest
of the day. Luyendyk said, "It's
disappointing to have a car capable of winning and not being able to get the victory."
Luyendyk's
exit left the field with the prospects for an exciting restart on Lap
53. As the green flag dropped, Camara was still
in first, followed by Jon Herb, and Wade Cunningham. Jeff Simmons
was close behind in fourth, and
Jay Drake, after starting 12th, was now running with the lead pack in
5th. On the restart, Simmons passed Cunningham on
the outside, and then passed Herb for second one lap later. By
Lap 56, Simmons was closing fast on
Camara, and attempted an outside pass in Turn 3. He ended up
missing the pass and drifting
high on the track, which allowed Cunnhingam to close the gap with him
and bring
the three of them (Camara, Simmons, and Cunningham) into a
tightly grouped lead pack. Simmons tried Camara again on the
outside in
Turn 3 and again ended up extremely high through the turn.
Then,
as the scoring tower clicked over to Lap 58, the fans in Nashville witnessed
(arguably) some of the best driving of the day as Simmons, still attacking,
dove underneath Camara on the entry to Turn 1.
The line that both drivers chose left no room for either of them, and
they made contact. This sent Simmons (on
the inside) sliding sideways, at full speed, into Turn 2. It also sent Camara drifting up into the
marbles, toward the wall. In a
miraculous feat of driving, Simmons, while sideways at approximately 160 mph,
managed to save the car and ended up driving out of Turn 2 in front of Camara. This incident brought the yellow flag out,
and Camara was scored in the lead because Simmons had passed him (sideways), an
instant after the track went yellow for their contact.
About
the incident, Simmons said (of Camara), "I thought that he was doing some
very defensive driving and just not driving his line at all, just trying to
take anything away from me when I had those good runs. But the officials didn't see it that
way."
Soon
after the field restarted, Jay Drake passed Wade Cunningham on Lap 71 to take
third place. The field remained static
from that point onward, with Simmons unable to challenge for the lead, and
Drake behind him.
The
Cleanevent 100 ended somewhat anticlimactically, when Jerry Coons, Jr., running
in his first IPS race, spun on Lap 75 bringing the track to a full course
caution. The event was a 77 lap race,
and so two laps later Camara accepted the yellow and checkered flags, recording
his second victory of the year.
When
asked about the victory, Camara said, "I've got to tell you, it was the
toughest race of my career. You know,
since the beginning, the first lap, it was tough because I had to push from the
first lap to the end of the race very hard." He continued, "I think I made a good
race today. I was trying to be
consistent the whole race. I had a good
car."
Certainly,
he had a good car… but so did several other contenders. The fans in Nashville had the chance to see
an excellent race as a group of talented drivers, in evenly matched cars, did
battle with each other on the track; demonstrating again the IPS tenet that
great open-wheel racing can be had without million dollar engine leases and
constantly rising expenses. With the
IndyCar Series' engine future in the air after 2006, perhaps that series can
learn something from its "little brother."
Look for another great Pro race next weekend at the Milwaukee Mile.
[The following is the finishing order at Nashville: Camara, Simmons,
Drake, Cunningham, Bussell, Herb, Festa, Luyendyk Jr., Coons Jr.,
Gregg, Roth and Wood.]
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