Franchitti Leaves Texas with 13th Place Finish
FORT WORTH, Texas (June 10, 2006) - Klein Tools/Canadian Club driver Dario Franchitti started eighth Saturday night and was hoping for a front-running effort, but quickly found the going tough and was forced to settle for a 13th place finish in the Bombardier Learjet 500k at Texas Motor Speedway. Franchitti gained a spot to seventh at the drop of the green flag, but slipped outside the top 10 by the 10th lap as he tried to sort out the handle on the Klein Tools/Canadian Club machine. For the remainder of the night, Franchitti fought to stay on the lead lap in a race that saw several long green flag runs. The leaders finally dropped Franchitti one lap down with 60 laps to go and he soldiered on to the finish from there. Helio Castroneves extended his lead in the IndyCar Series standings by grabbing his third win of the 2006 season. He was followed across the line by Scott Dixon, Dan Wheldon, Sam Hornish Jr. and Scott Sharp. The IndyCar Series returns to action in two weeks on Saturday, June 24, at Richmond International Raceway. The 250-lap SunTrust Indy Challenge presented by XM Satellite Radio will be broadcast live on ESPN2 at 8 p.m. (EDT). The race can also be heard live by XM Satellite Radio subscribers on XM channel 145, the official home of the IndyCar Series.Dario Franchitti, #27 Klein Tools/Canadian Club Dallara/Honda/Firestone:
"That was one of the toughest nights I can remember. The car was just uncomfortable during the night and just not very fast. One bright spot was every time I came in the pits we had fast pit stops, but that was about it. It was just a tough night. A few more cautions might have helped us a little bit for the sake of making a few adjustments, and we seemed to be pretty decent on restarts. But, other than that, I don't know what else would have helped. It was a long night."John Anderson, Team Manager, #27 Klein Tools/Canadian Club Dallara/Honda/Firestone:
"We just couldn't find it tonight and Dario did his best to just soldier on. We wanted to save fuel, but we just couldn't. We just couldn't stay with the draft. We just need to get on up to Kansas City (to the open test) and see what we can find. We just need to do some soul searching and find out why we're not as quick as we should be right now. We'll get up with the rest of those guys."
2006 Bombardier Learjet 500k Results Pos. Name Laps 1 Helio Castroneves 200 2 Scott Dixon 200 3 Dan Wheldon 200 4 Sam Hornish Jr. 200 5 Scott Sharp 200 6 Vitor Meira 200 7 Tony Kanaan 200 8 Kosuke Matsuura 200 9 Ed Carpenter 200 10 Tomas Scheckter 199 11 Bryan Herta 199 12 Danica Patrick 199 13 Dario Franchitti 199 14 Marco Andretti 199 15 Jeff Simmons 198 16 Felipe Giaffone 197 17 Eddie Cheever Jr 197 18 Buddy Rice 70 19 Buddy Lazier 56