FORT WORTH -- What is it about Indy cars and Texas Motor Speedway?
Like oil and water, they just don't seem to make a good mix. At least lately.
That was the case again this weekend, when the Firestone 600 at TMS was washed out not once but twice. The resumption of the 248-lap race has been rescheduled for Saturday, August 27, just three weeks prior to the Verizon IndyCar Series season finale at Sonoma Raceway.
Dallas-Fort Worth maintained the climate of a tropical rainforest this weekend. When it wasn't raining, the sweltering humidity brought an already high water table bubbling up through the track's 15-year-old asphalt.
The rain stopped Saturday about three hours before the scheduled start time of 7:50 p.m., but despite a serious track-drying effort, TMS didn't drain the track to the drivers' satisfaction. A handful of drivers did everything in their power to keep the impatient fans occupied, including roaming into the grandstands for autographs and pictures, but track and series officials finally called it off at 10:30 local time.
It became clear Sunday morning that the problem areas were still there -- particularly in the apron at the exit of Turn 2. After another delay from an anticipated 1:06 p.m. start, the race finally got going for 40 laps, only to be interrupted by an ugly, two-car crash that sent star driver Josef Newgarden to Parkland Memorial Hospital with a fractured right clavicle and a small fracture in his right hand.
After running around behind the pace car for 30 laps while repairs were made to the SAFER Barrier, the rain returned with even greater force than on Saturday. With more rain in the forecast for Monday (and three drivers urgently needing to depart for France, where they will compete in the 24 Hours of Le Mans next weekend), IndyCar and TMS finally gave in to the elements and announced the 11-week postponement.
Per the INDYCAR rulebook, the race will actually resume from the point it was red flagged on the 72nd lap, with James Hinchcliffe leading Ryan Hunter-Reay.
"We maybe could have hung around and tried to get it dry tonight and run enough to get to halfway [to create an official result], but that's not right," said Texas Motor Speedway President Eddie Gossage.
"We want to give the fans a race and give them their money's worth."
It's too bad Mother Nature ended up being the winner, because the first 40 laps on Sunday before the crash involving Newgarden and Conor Daly showed that a close, competitive race was in the cards.
But in some ways, it's typical of Texas' 20-year history as an IndyCar track, where the number of edge-of-your-seat moments are almost matched by the number of times remembered for disappointment or anguish.
The first IRL-sanctioned event at TMS in 1997 produced a kind of pack racing never before seen in IndyCar, captivating some racing fans and flat-out frightening others. That same race featured a scoring error that resulted in the legendary Victory Lane confrontation between Arie Luyendyk and favorite Texas son A.J. Foyt.
The CART-sanctioned Indy series tried to race at TMS in 2001, but those faster, more sophisticated cars were, in fact, too fast -- to the point where drivers were on the verge of blackout due to the intense G-forces. The race was cancelled for safety reasons on Sunday morning, about three hours ahead of the scheduled start.
Fans left the track angry on that day 15 years ago because they didn't get a race on a perfect sunny day. A rained-out race is more understandable, and this year's fans -- especially the ones who came back out Sunday -- were left feeling more disappointed than anything.
Thankfully, the crash involving Newgarden and Daly didn't turn out worse. Newgarden was, essentially, an innocent bystander when Daly's car suddenly snapped out of control and pushed Newgarden into the wall, forcing his car onto its right side.
The cars separated, then came together again, with the roll hoop of the Newgarden machine making an even harder impact with the barrier. Newgarden was fortunate; while his car traveled a long way on its side, it never rose into the air and smacked against the fence.
That's especially important at a place such as Texas, which like the old versions of the Nurburgring or Spa in Formula 1, is one of those tracks where everyone breathes a sigh of relief when the drivers come out of the weekend unscathed.
An IndyCar wreck like Newgarden's would likely have caused serious injury not too many years ago. In fact, Davey Hamilton and Kenny Brack sustained severe leg injuries in similar crashes at Texas. Both made full recoveries.
In short, it's a place to be respected for many reasons. And that's why it holds an important place in the IndyCar Series hierarchy.
With Milwaukee no longer on the schedule, no other track outside of Indianapolis, Long Beach or Toronto has more IndyCar racing history. And thanks to Gossage's tireless efforts, no other track on the current schedule puts the same amount of promotional attention into its IndyCar Series race.
Some people want to blame IndyCar for not trying to race on Saturday (Mario Andretti, for one, thought the track was ready to go), while others want to point the finger at TMS for not being able to produce a dry track almost six hours after it stopped raining.
In the end, it doesn't matter. IndyCar needs Texas on its schedule, and Texas needs the IndyCar Series more than Gossage probably wants to admit. The relationship has occasionally been rocky, but the TMS president and IndyCar's Jay Frye put on a united front Sunday.
Both parties pledged to give fans a full day of activity when the series returns in August, with a practice session, an autograph session featuring all drivers and (hopefully) 176 laps of clean racing with a start time sometime in the 7 o'clock p.m. hour.
"You want to do the best for your fans," Gossage said. "That's what all of us work for.
"It's frustrating, but what can you do? You cannot beat Mother Nature."