2010 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach

The 2010 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach was the fourth round of the 2010 IndyCar Series season, and took place on April 18, 2010. The race was contested over 85 laps of the 1.968-mile (3.167 km) street course in Long Beach, California, and was telecast by Versus in the United States. The race also marked the 25th consecutive year of Toyota's sponsorship of the Grand Prix of Long Beach, one of the longest-running active sponsorships of a motor race in North America.

United States 2010 Long Beach
Race details
4th round of the 2010 IndyCar Series season
DateApril 18, 2010
Official nameToyota Grand Prix of Long Beach
LocationStreets of Long Beach
CourseTemporary street circuit
1.968 mi / 3.167 km
Distance85 laps
167.280 mi / 269.211 km
Pole position
DriverWill Power (Team Penske)
Time1:09.3185
Fastest lap
DriverRyan Hunter-Reay (Andretti Autosport)
Time1:10.5537 (on lap 82 of 85)
Podium
FirstRyan Hunter-Reay (Andretti Autosport)
SecondJustin Wilson (Dreyer & Reinbold Racing)
ThirdWill Power (Team Penske)

Report

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Background

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Practice and qualifying

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Race

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The 27th edition of the Grand Prix of Long Beach got underway at 1:15 p.m. PDT. Points leader Will Power, starting on the pole for the third consecutive race led into the first turn. Justin Wilson attempted to go down the inside of Ryan Hunter-Reay, the man who started alongside Power on the front row, but he eventually settled into third spot. Tony Kanaan moved into fourth having got around both Hélio Castroneves and Ryan Briscoe at the start. The rest of the field got by the first turn without incident, usually uncommon in Long Beach. In the early laps of the race, Hunter-Reay stayed within a second of race leader Power, and Wilson kept a watching brief on the lead duo around 2 seconds behind Hunter-Reay. Fourth placed Kanaan was unable to keep up with the lead trio, but was able to keep Castroneves at arm's length.

This status quo was maintained till lap 17 when, coming off turn 11, race leader Power hit the pit lane speed limiter button by mistake. Both Hunter-Reay and Wilson took advantage of the error to go past, and Power got demoted to third by the time he had corrected it. On the next lap, Ryan Briscoe, who had spent most of the first stint holding off Scott Dixon, got around teammate Castroneves at turn 9 and left the latter to hold off the New Zealander.

The first round of pitstops took place between lap 25 and lap 30 and Hunter-Reay comfortably kept the lead ahead of Wilson and Power. Kanaan, in fourth, was now 15 seconds behind the leader, and fifth-placed Briscoe once again found himself harassed by Scott Dixon after the latter swapped places with Castroneves during the pit stops. Race leader Hunter-Reay began to catch lapped traffic at around the half-way mark, but maintained a lead of around 2–3 seconds over Wilson who in turn had Power 4–5 seconds behind him, the gaps fluctuating due to the traffic.

On lap 53, just a few corners after Hunter-Reay had got around Alex Lloyd to put him a lap down, Wilson also tried to get by him. However, he wasn't close enough and there was contact between the two, which left Wilson with a damaged front wing. He came in immediately and changed the entire nose assembly on his car, and filled his car up with fuel. However, the stop took 21 seconds and that meant that Power was able to make his second fuel stop and come out ahead of Wilson. Ryan Briscoe had a slow stop and dropped down to eighth behind Dixon, Castroneves and Mario Moraes.

The caution came out on lap 59 when Mario Romancini and Graham Rahal, both already a lap behind the leader, came together at turn 1 and ended up in the tyre barriers. This bunched the field up but importantly, Hunter-Reay had the two lapped cars of Raphael Matos and Takuma Sato between himself and second-placed Power. Thus, on the restart, Hunter-Reay had a clear run and pulled away from the field. Power struggled to get around Sato and Wilson took advantage of the situation to dive up the inside at turn 1 and take second. After his earlier incident with Lloyd, he was more cautious in dealing with the lapped cars, and by the time he had got around Matos, Hunter-Reay was over 5 seconds up the road.

Hunter-Reay managed the gap comfortably for the rest of the race and took his second career Indy Racing League win by 5.6 seconds from Wilson. Power had to make do with third ahead of Dixon and Kanaan. The top 10 was completed by Mario Moraes, Castroneves, Briscoe, Dan Wheldon and Mike Conway. Hunter-Reay's win moved him to third spot in the points standings, just 1 behind second-placed Castroneves. Points leader Power extended his lead to 42 points. Wilson moved to fourth in the points table, 4 points behind Hunter-Reay, while defending series champion Dario Franchitti dropped to sixth after his 12th-place finish.

Classification

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Qualifying

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  • All cars were split into two groups of twelve, with the fastest six from each group going through to the "top 12" session. In this session, the fastest six cars progressed to the "Firestone Fast Six". The fastest driver in the final session claimed pole, with the rest of the cars lining up in session order, regardless of qualifying times (fast six from 1–6, top 12 from 7–12 and round 1 from 13–25, with group 1 drivers occupying the odd–numbered grid positions, and group 2 drivers occupying the even–numbered grid positions).
Pos No. Driver Team Group 1[1] Group 2[2] Top 12[3] Fast 6[4]
1 12   Will Power Team Penske 1:09.9270 1:09.5469 1:09.3185
2 37   Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti Autosport 1:09.9322 1:09.5815 1:09.7506
3 22   Justin Wilson Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 1:09.9772 1:09.7909 1:09.7939
4 3   Hélio Castroneves Team Penske 1:10.0055 1:09.7446 1:09.8470
5 6   Ryan Briscoe Team Penske 1:10.2439 1:09.8363 1:10.0255
6 11   Tony Kanaan Andretti Autosport 1:10.1856 1:09.7656 1:10.1618
7 77   Alex Tagliani FAZZT Race Team 1:10.2228 1:09.8730
8 9   Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing 1:10.1233 1:09.9688
9 26   Marco Andretti Andretti Autosport 1:10.3594 1:10.1760
10 4   Dan Wheldon Panther Racing 1:10.1676 1:10.2574
11 06   Hideki Mutoh Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing 1:10.0433 1:10.2730
12 10   Dario Franchitti Chip Ganassi Racing 1:10.1816 1:10.3358
13 78   Simona de Silvestro (R) HVM Racing 1:10.3722
14 14   Vítor Meira A. J. Foyt Enterprises 1:10.4259
15 32   Mario Moraes KV Racing Technology 1:10.5093
16 24   Mike Conway Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 1:10.4586
17 8   E. J. Viso KV Racing Technology 1:10.5991
18 2   Raphael Matos Luczo Dragon Racing de Ferran Motorsports 1:10.5068
19 5   Takuma Sato (R) KV Racing Technology 1:10.7000
20 7   Danica Patrick Andretti Autosport 1:10.5503
21 19   Alex Lloyd (R) Dale Coyne Racing 1:10.8003
22 67   Graham Rahal Sarah Fisher Racing 1:10.7722
23 34   Mario Romancini (R) Conquest Racing 1:10.9914
24 36   Bertrand Baguette (R) Conquest Racing 1:11.4345
25 18   Milka Duno Dale Coyne Racing No time

Race

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Pos No. Driver Team Laps Time/Retired Grid Laps Led Points
1 37   Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti Autosport 85 1:47:12.5404 2 64 52
2 22   Justin Wilson Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 85 + 5.6031 3 0 40
3 12   Will Power Team Penske 85 + 8.5864 1 19 36
4 9   Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing 85 + 10.6287 8 2 32
5 11   Tony Kanaan Andretti Autosport 85 + 11.7732 6 0 30
6 32   Mario Moraes KV Racing Technology 85 + 16.5171 15 0 28
7 3   Hélio Castroneves Team Penske 85 + 16.8928 4 0 26
8 6   Ryan Briscoe Team Penske 85 + 18.2214 5 0 24
9 4   Dan Wheldon Panther Racing 85 + 19.4575 10 0 22
10 24   Mike Conway Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 85 + 19.9307 16 0 20
11 14   Vítor Meira A. J. Foyt Enterprises 85 + 27.4005 14 0 19
12 10   Dario Franchitti Chip Ganassi Racing 85 + 28.1352 12 0 18
13 06   Hideki Mutoh Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing 85 + 28.6037 11 0 17
14 26   Marco Andretti Andretti Autosport 85 + 30.0120 9 0 16
15 8   E. J. Viso KV Racing Technology 85 + 31.6182 17 0 15
16 7   Danica Patrick Andretti Autosport 85 + 32.1804 20 0 14
17 78   Simona de Silvestro (R) HVM Racing 85 + 33.1652 13 0 13
18 5   Takuma Sato (R) KV Racing Technology 84 + 1 Lap 19 0 12
19 19   Alex Lloyd (R) Dale Coyne Racing 84 + 1 Lap 21 0 12
20 2   Raphael Matos Luczo Dragon Racing de Ferran Motorsports 84 + 1 Lap 18 0 12
21 77   Alex Tagliani FAZZT Race Team 65 Mechanical 7 0 12
22 67   Graham Rahal Sarah Fisher Racing 58 Contact 22 0 12
23 34   Mario Romancini (R) Conquest Racing 58 Contact 23 0 12
24 36   Bertrand Baguette (R) Conquest Racing 45 Mechanical 24 0 12
25 18   Milka Duno Dale Coyne Racing 10 Handling 25 0 10
OFFICIAL RACE REPORT[permanent dead link]

Championship standings after the race

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Drivers' Championship standings
Pos Driver Points
1   Will Power 172
2   Hélio Castroneves 130
3   Ryan Hunter-Reay 129
4   Justin Wilson 125
5   Scott Dixon 112
  • Note: Only the top five positions are included.

References

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  1. ^ "Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach: Qualifying, Round 1 – Group 1". IndyCar Series. Indy Racing League. 2010-04-17. Archived from the original on 2010-04-20. Retrieved 2010-04-17.
  2. ^ "Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach: Qualifying, Round 1 – Group 2". IndyCar Series. Indy Racing League. 2010-04-17. Archived from the original on 2010-04-20. Retrieved 2010-04-17.
  3. ^ "Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach: Qualifying – Top 12". IndyCar Series. Indy Racing League. 2010-04-17. Archived from the original on 2010-04-21. Retrieved 2010-04-17.
  4. ^ "Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach: Qualifying – Fast 6". IndyCar Series. Indy Racing League. 2010-04-17. Archived from the original on 2010-04-21. Retrieved 2010-04-17.
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Previous race:
2010 Indy Grand Prix of Alabama
IndyCar Series
2010 season
Next race:
2010 RoadRunner Turbo Indy 300
Previous race:
2009 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach
2010 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach Next race:
2011 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach