Photo Credit: Richard Dowdy/IndyCar
The Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach gave Helio Castroneves, driver of the No. 3 Team Penske Auto Club of Southern California Chevrolet, his first podium finish of the season.
Overall, it was had been a strong weekend for the Brazilian and his Team Penske. They dominated all three practices in speeds and all four of the Team Penkse Chevrolets would make it into the fast-six. Castroneves ultimately was able to take the pole position for the race.
It marks no surprise that he was quickest, as he’s been quick so far and in the past, though was dealt with a small change from the past this year at Long Beach, virtue of some changes made to the curbs.
“Well, it was pretty similar than before, I guess,” he said. “It was not much of a change. It does get a little bit faster in Turn eight because of the curbing and plus people are taking the same line. Again, I think the hardest part was following people, and that’s related to some of the aerodynamics, different aerodynamics, at least in my case.”
There was very few passes made through out the 80 lap street course race. The race stayed green through without a caution, which is very rare to have happen.
‘You’re right, it’s very rare,” he said. “I guess that’s one of the things related to the aero package. It’s very difficult to get close to another guy, at least I was having this issue. I’m not sure about Scott. But I feel that probably those are the scenario. So I you don’t get even close, you can’t take a chance, or young drivers cannot make mistakes, and the yellow doesn’t come up. I don’t think it’s a matter of long distance. I think it’s just a matter of that kind of scenario, and that’s why it was very difficult to pass.”
As a result of having track position to start the race, the Brazilian would stay in contention all day, but on the last pit sequence of the race his Penske teammate Simon Pagenaud, driver of the No. 22 PPG Automotive Refinish Chevrolet, would take the lead from Scott Dixon, driver of the No. 9 Chip Ganassi Target Chevrolet.
“It as a great day starting the day,” he said. “Basically we led the first half of the race I would say, the wrong half of the race, but it was going no problem, no issues, and unfortunately we started getting traffic. We got a little in the way, and we didn’t know what to do. We tried to pass once and unfortunately it couldn’t happen. And then we pit, Scott (Dixon) had the reds. I would have put the reds, as well, but turned out to be one of those deals that Simon (Pagenaud) ended up going up one lap further plus, but wended up pitting the same traffic, so we lost a lot of time behind, so I guess that probably was the key of the race for us from first to third.”
Pagenaud would then keep the lead and take the checked flags at the end, as Castroneves was having to save fuel. This would relinquish Castroneves to a third place finish.
“I just don’t understand, since Scott stopped one lap earlier than me why we had to save more fuel than them,” he said. “That’s still– I’m not sure what happened. Well, third place obviously is great to collect points, and let’s move forward now.”
Next up will be the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park on April 24.
