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Rookie Diary: The 5 Lap Pro Race! |
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September 16. Last Sunday, the 11th, was a race day filled with
anticipation. The Pro Series was in the final three races that
would determine who would win the 2005 season championship. The
points battle was the closest in the history of the Pro Series.
In the lead, by 33 points, was Brian Stewart Racing’s Wade Cunningham,
and hot after him, Sam Schmidt Motorsports’ Travis Gregg.
Could Wade hold onto the lead? The three races consist of two
oval tracks and one road course.  Photo Credit: Harv Sweezie, Brian Stewart Racing
Looking back over the season, Wade has shown that he is good on all
types of tracks, having recorded second place finishes on 1.0 mile, 1.5
mile and 2.5 mile oval tracks as well as both street courses and road
courses. Travis Gregg had shown his talent by winning every
previous 1.5 mile oval track race, but not having done as well as Wade
on all the other types of tracks.
The question for the 1.5 mile oval Chicago was, not so much which of
these two drivers might win, but which would gain points on the
other. In the three 1.5 mile oval races, Travis had finished
first, as well as having been on the pole for all. Wade had
finished second on the last two 1.5 mile races. Wade had recorded 11
top five finishes [every race], while Travis only had 4 top
five’s. Travis had led five races and Wade three.
To follow the drama you need to know something about the points
system. Winning the pole is worth 1 point. Leading the most
race laps is worth 2 points. The top ten finishing positions are
each worth [in descending order]: 50, 40, 35, 32, 30, 28, 26, 24, 22,
20 points. Below 10th the points drop 1 for each place. [Photo, L-R:
Geoff Dodge, Doug Zister, Wade, Sept. 12. See later in this story.]
In the last Rookie Diary we had made the obvious, but simplistic,
forecast for the Chicago race, based on past performance, that Travis
would win and Wade would come in second. We also said, what if
Travis also wins the pole and fastest race lap. Wade 40 points
and Travis 53. Net gain of 13 points for Travis. Point
spread going into the last two races, 20 points.
On Saturday, surprisingly, Travis’ first Pro race teammate, Sarah
McCune, won the pole [and wrote history by being the first female Pro
driver to win a pole, and be a part of the duo with Danica Patrick, to
be the first two female pole winners on the same IRL race day.].
While Travis did not win this 1.5 mile pole, for the first time this
year, he did nail down the other spot on the outside of the front
row. Wade qualified 5th, on the inside of the third row.
The take on the starting positions was that Travis was likely to take
over the race lead early, and Wade, who is usually awesome on starts
and restarts, would quickly be even closer to the front. But
again, the issue was not really whether they would end up 1-2 again,
but where they would finish at the end relative to each other.
When the race started it was it was like these two guys were drawn to
each other like opposing magnets, while Sarah McCune roared off into
the lead with Jay Drake, who had started 3rd right behind her on the
grid, following right behind her into 2nd.
Sarah quickly drifted up high, presumably to cut Gregg off. Drake
then pulled up further on the inside so that he was now side by side
with Mc Cune. It was like an inverted front starting row.
In the meantime, Wade, who had started right behind Drake, had followed
as the latter moved ahead, and now Wade found himself still on the
inside, but with Travis next to him on the outside.
While all of this was quickly happening Bussell (start 4th), Camara
(start 6th) and Simmons (start 7th) came swarming up the far outside
and the front pack was now running 3 and 4-wide down the track at 185
mph.
With this wild start, at the end of the first lap there was Travis in
6th and Wade in 7th. One can only suppose that these two guys
dueling for the championship did not want to risk playing bumper cars
with the tight wheel-to-wheel five-pack in front of them. Better to try
to pick them off one at a time than all at once!
At the end of lap two and three it was still Travis 6th and Wade
7th. On lap four Wade took 6th away from Travis, but on lap five
Travis took 6th back from Wade. For most of these five laps
Travis and Wade were dueling wheel to wheel.
And then all hell broke loose up in front in Turn 3. As McCune,
still leading, came down on the apex of the turn Drake came up from
behind and lower down, and with both of his inside wheels below the
white line tried to pass Sarah. They collided, once, twice, and
maybe a third time, before Sarah’s car shot perpendicular to the wall,
right up and across the track, rear end first, in a bizarre trajectory.
Her back end hit perpendicular into the back end of Cunningham’s car,
knocking Wade into the SAFER Barrier, pieces and parts of his car
flying in every direction. McCune’s car followed after Wade’s
car, but on her way to the wall she was T-boned by Chris Festa who had
no where to go. Bobby Wilson, Wade’s teammate, followed up by
hitting Festa, and the multiple effect of the last two put the rear end
of McCune’s car up in the air. It came down on top of the rear
end of Wade’s car. It was a horrific four-car crash with Wade’s
car being totally destroyed. McCune’s car wasn’t in much better
condition.
All four drivers were able to get out of their cars without help, and
were taken to the infield medical care center. All were later
released without having sustained any serious injuries, and all were
cleared to drive.
With these cars all having been running at about 185 mph [the speed the
NASCAR Nextel cars run] this accident happened in a flash and with HUGE
impacts. Wade was clearly the most fortunate of the four.
Lucky on the first impact that McCune’s rear end impacted straight into
Wade’s car just behind his cockpit, rather than between his two sets of
wheels. Wade was lucky also on the second impact from her car
when it came down on top of his car, but just back of the cockpit.
As for the championship points, Wade was listed as the 10th place
finisher – 20 points. Travis Gregg was in 5th place when the
remaining cars passed the start/finish line under yellow. It
looked as if Travis now had an opportunity to pick up a lot of points
on Wade, as many as potentially 32. But it turned out that Travis
was not able to take advantage of Wade’s misfortune.
Gregg got up as high as third during the rest of the race, but ended up
dropping down and finished back in 5th. He collected 30
points. He closed the points gap by only 10 points.
We want you to now hear, though, about the 5 lap race between Wade and Travis from Wade’s perspective.
“I think we were pretty strong. [After qualification, Wade was 2nd
fastest in the final practice and 2.649 mph faster than Gregg]. I
went straight forward at the start. I felt I could drive through the
field at will, and it wasn’t really a problem for me.”
About his duel with Travis he said, “I was a lot quicker than Travis,
but every time I tried to pass him he tried to put me on the apron or
up into the wall. He just kept squeezing me higher and higher When he
tried to put me into the wall that’s what put us to the back of the
field, which is pretty much why I was in the accident.”
“I stayed on the high side, because the car was working really
well. So I just decided to make a line and ran up high and the
accident went up high and by then it was too late to bring the car
down. I just had to brace myself.”
Regarding the start of the McCune - Drake accident that started
everything Cunningham could only comment that, “I don’t know a lot of
what really happened. Sarah was down low and Jay Drake was like
trying to pass her on the apron and it looked like he hit her twice and
she locked up the brakes, obviously. Then she went into like a
spin and it looked as though she was going to go up toward Turn
4. I went high with a conscious decision. And then
for some reason it looked like she got off the brakes and the car
turned like about 90 degrees and shot up into Turn 3 where I
was. I was sitting there and saw her coming and there was
nowhere to go. She hit me and I hit the wall.”
Wade said that at the care center they, “checked my blood pressure and
heart rate and monitored that for awhile, and took some X-rays. I
just had a bit of bruising.” Then he added, “My car is
gone. It was completely finished. They [Brian Stewart
Racing] have already picked up a new car and they are putting it
together for Watkins Glen. That will be on schedule.”
The day after the race, Geoff Dodge, winner of the Knoxville Nationals
“Fast Track to Indy Rookie of the Year” was there at Chicagoland
Speedway with the Brian Stewart Racing team to do his Pro Series
test. Also present for doing a test with Stewart Racing was
Daniel Gaunt, a 21 year old from Auckland, New Zealand, who has driven
in Formula Ford in New Zealand and the Toyota Racing Series in
Australia. Ron Dixon brought Daniel over for the test. Wade was
there, too.
The original plan was to use both Wade’s car, number 33, and his
teammate, Bobby Wilson’s, number 3. But now with Wade’s car
totaled, Stewart Racing was down to one car for Monday. Bobby’s
car had not been damaged as bad as Wade’s but still the team had to
work all Sunday afternoon, evening and on into the night to get that
car ready.
Wade was back at the track the next morning, and summed up that day for
us. “I jumped into the other car on Monday. They put my
seat in and set everything up and I went out and got up to speed right
away. I did some good lap times and pulled it in.
Everything felt OK.”
For the testing of Dodge, Rick Mears, the Pro Series driver coach, was
present, and both he and Wade provided some coaching for Geoff.
Said Wade about that, “I was a little bit of a driver coach for Geoff
Dodge but Rick Mears was there so I didn’t do a lot. I could
offer what I did during the week and advise and that was about
it. [See photo above.] I thought he and Daniel both did fine.” [The Knoxville
Raceway – IRL Pro Series partnership program will provide Geoff Dodge a
minimum of 6 Pro car races next year for being the highest points
rookie at this year’s Knoxville Nationals, which ran about 130 wing
sprints at their dirt track. [See our August 24, feature story, “Geoff
Dodge Starts a New Path to Indy.”]
As for Wade’s outlook for the final two Pro Series races and the
Championship, he had this to say. “I look at it just the same as
every race. I imaging we will get up to the front at
Watkins Glen, and if everything goes well then we’ll just have to show
up at California to win.”
“At Watkins Glen, on the road course, I think there will be the same
people up in the front and I don’t think there will be any
surprises.”
“California will be a course like Chicago, so that should be
technically easy. Both are tracks where you can run two wide.”
Coming up next, on September 25, will be the Pro race on the Watkins
Glen International road course. On the three previous Pro Series
road races this season, Wade scored a 2nd place finish at all
three. Travis Gregg recorded a 6th, 7th and 6th in those
three. If we do the math and the averages, we have to predict
that Wade will pick up 12 points on Travis.
We didn’t do too bad on the points spread for the Chicagoland race, but
on the finish positions we lost that credibility. And we didn’t
predict that it would be a 5 lap race for the Cunningham – Gregg
competition. You’d best just follow the race. And don’t forget
that Jeff Simmons is still a championship candidate. He is
currently the hottest Pro driver, having won three of the last five
races, including the Chicagoland race. Simmons, a veteran, finished
second in the 2003 Pro Series points, and drove in the 2004 Indy
500. He lies in 3rd, only 47
points back from Wade!
You can follow the Pro race live on the IRL Pro web site: www.indycar.com/pro.
For more news about Wade go to his official web site: www.cunninghammotorsport.com |
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