They're Back!

The season opener at Miami/Homestead was just as wild as the Texas race that closed last season. Sam Hornish Jr. surprised the racing world with his win on his inaugural start in the Marlboro Team Penske No. 6 Toyota. The major story line here is that in over 35 years of Indy racing, Penske had never had a newly hired driver win right out of the box. Hornish, a two-time Indy car champion, was ecstatic over his season opening win.

This was the first time the Indy cars had raced on the newly configured Miami/Homestead track. Last season it was still a relatively flat surfaced track when the IRL opened up its 2003 season at the facility. Tony Kanaan won the pole for last season's race with a speed of 203.560 miles per hour. Buddy Rice won the pole for this season's race with a speed of 217.388 miles per hour. That's quite a lot of difference in speed due to the new banking on the corners.

The corners of the track are banked at different angles depending on the location or line the driver takes. Instead of a progressing slant to the banking as a set degree, there are three different degrees of banking from the inside line up the track to the outside wall. This caused some confusion for the drivers, as a couple of them lost traction in the lower groove and slid up and hit the cars above them, taking them out of the race.

The track certainly wasn't kind to one rookie. Mark Taylor of great Briton, rookie driver of the No. 2 Chevrolet powered Menards entry lost control of his car on one of the corners and tagged the wall on lap 39, taking him out of the event. It's a hard chore for a rookie in any series to justify his job, and whacking the wall right out of the box isn't the way to insure you employment for the entire season. Taylor's reputation will be on the line for the next race with everyone watching him like a hawk. Veteran drivers will do all they can to avoid running next to or behind a rookie who can't keep his car in a straight line.

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