Oh Thank Heaven

Tony Kannan took his first win of the Indycar Season last night in the Suntrust Indy Challenge in Richmond. Kannan dominated the race from pole and held off his fellow Brazilian Helio Castroneves and points leader Scott Dixon for the victory. Dan Wheldon and Oriol Servia rounded out the top five.

"I'm going to enjoy my win tonight for sure," Kannan said. "I knew that I had to keep fighting. There's nothing else I can do. If you're going to have the season you expect every year, then it's going to be pretty boring I would say. I knew it was going to turn around," Kanaan said. "I didn't know when. I thought it was last weekend [at Iowa] and I made a mistake."

"When those kind of things happen, I have a tendency to actually have more strength to turn the situation around. I think I work better when I put a lot of pressure on myself, and you know, I came in determined to win this race, and it worked out."

The night featured heavy carnage in which the yellow flag was waved nine times, tying the race record set in 2001. Only 12 cars of the 26 that started managed to finished the race, leaving many drivers frustrated at the end of the night. The crash during the restart on lap 79 was probably the worst as 5 cars were caught up in a crash. Ryan Hunter-Reay crashed out of a race for the second time in three weeks and was none to happy with the man he tangled up with Mario Moraes.

"I was going to give him the benefit of the doubt until I saw the tape of the crash but now I don't know that I can do that," Hunter-Reay said.

"It's just short-track racing. We had a busy race out there tonight. I was holding my breath on every lap. We were just out there surviving and trying to get some points and we can't even get that done without something like this happening to us."

Meanwhile Scott Dixon's points lead over Helio Castroneves was narrowed a little to just 43. The Indycar Series now moves on to twisty road course in Watkins Glen. The race will be next Sunday on ABC.

Kannan thrilled to end win drought [Autosport.com]

Drivers play down Richmond carnage [Autosport.com]