Set to go for a late race restart, Michael Andretti made the decision to bring Ryan Hunter-Reay down pit road and put stickers tires on his No. 28 DHL Honda-powered Dallara. The results turned out to be successful as Ryan Hunter-Reay was able to slice and dice his way from 10th on the restart to the lead with two laps to go to pick up the victory at Iowa Speedway.
The day didn’t start off anything like the 2012 Verizon IndyCar Series Champion would’ve hoped for as everything seemed to go wrong from trouble on the track, to trouble in the pits, resulting in him being stuck at the back half of the top-10.
“I was really frustrated at times,” Hunter-Reay admitted. “I’ve learned in the years of experience that I’ve had in the Verizon IndyCar Series that you just have to keep your head in it. No matter what, you have to charge hard and be ready for it. Whether it’s a street circuit, short oval, races can turn. You have to put yourself in a position every time to take advantage of that, put yourself in a better position, get that car in front of you, whatever it is, just keep plugging away.”
Though being stuck there is what gave Andretti the opportunity to make the race winning call.
“Then at the end Michael Andretti made a bold move there, a pretty bold call, to call me in and take stickers,” Hunter-Reay commented. “I didn’t think we’d have enough time because of the way things were panning out with Montoya’s car and the wall. Credit to the safety team, they got that car cleaned up and we had just enough time to make it happen. We passed Tony coming to the white flag.
“It was a lot of fun the last few laps, as I’m sure (Josef) Newgarden told you. It was unreal. I hope I get to do that sometime again in my career, but I don’t think I’ll have 10 cars in front of me all on used tires and there I am on new. “
Coming through the field, Hunter-Reay commented that it was a “blur” the first couple of laps as he just made to pick the right line to slice his way through the field.
“I think we got at least four of them on the first lap,” he added. “I was surprised how quick Tony (Kanaan) was, though, on used tires like that. He took a while to catch. I felt like I had to duck my head down just to catch up to him. He was pretty hooked up.”
The call and drive through was made possible as a result of the tier fall throughout the race, that was giving guys a lot of push and understeer off the corners.
“It was an exciting night. The tire degradation is like that so the racing is exciting. I think it made for a good show,” Hunter-Reay said. “The gamble with that is when you do take new tires, you might not have enough time. Every track is different with how they come in, fall off. It was a pretty big gamble. Thanks to Michael Andretti for making it.”
Now with momentum on his side, Hunter-Reay heads to a track that he has visited victory lane before, making a visit there during his championship season in 2012.
In his first four appearances, Hunter-Reay posted three top-fives as well as a seventh. Though the two events last year didn’t go well, as he finished outside of the top 15 both days with problems.
Hoping to avoid the mechanical problems that plagued his season last year and have hurt him a couple times this year, Hunter-Reay will look to repeat his previous Toronto success. It’ll all depend on how things shake out as Hunter-Reay posted a second earlier this year on the streets of St. Petersburg and a sixth and seventh in Houston, however found poor finishes on the other street course events this year to date.
