I also found the race exciting. While there were no passes for the lead every lap-the way some think is exciting-the race ws exciting because it was both a physical battle between Briscoe, Dixon and Franchitti on the track and their teams in the pit lane. All of which is excitng to those of us who truly understand things beyond superficiality, which sadly is not many. I also agree with your analogy to baseball. If you truly understand the esoterics of the sport, you find everything exciting. Unfortunately, some don’t even know the meaing of “Esoteric” or anything beyond simplicity.

But I was apalled by the 3 lapping the entire field so early. That seemed to be the summary for the entire season. It’s hard to get excited about young guns like Rahal or RHR or Barrett–even Danica or Kanaan–when you realize they have no chance of winning unless a hideous wreck wipes out the four Penske/Ganassi cars.

It’s not a great metaphor but I’ll use it anyway: it felt like watching a Super Bowl where the game is a blow-out, and you’re not watching to see who wins, you’re just watching to see who’ll be the MVP. To me, that doesn’t carry the same level of excitement or interest.

So even though the race up front was great and I’m happy Dario won (and I don’t give a S— about fuel management; Dixon and Briscoe just managed their fuel differently); but as a race I thought it was forgettable, and as a season I thought it was lackluster.

I tell my friends this: the reason I love the Indy 500 is that it’s unpredictable. Sometimes the guy on the pole wins, but usually he doesn’t. A lot of the favorites don’t even finish. So while Penske, Ganassi do well at the 500 too, it’s not a done deal. The IRL season felt like a done deal. They could have parked the rest of the field and gotten the same result.

And that kind of race won’t help things.

The top 3 cars/drivers made everybody else look like they were driving Atlantics cars.

Good for them and their teams. But that won’t “play” in 2009 and its obvious most of what Indy Car is doing nowadays has turned OFF a bunch of people (and continues to turn off more and more people every year).

I am glad that some people enjoyed that race on Saturday. I am glad some of you actually could still watch it on your TV cable package. But just understand (as good fan Pressdog pointed out earlier here) that many were bored with that race and bored with most of the season. Just very little interesting with those 3 particular drivers and the same 2 teams winning almost every race. Just way, way too predictable. Predictability isn’t all that interesting. Knowing before the green flag on the season starts, who the top 4 cars are going to be (which you could do this year), isn’t exciting stuff.

Maybe 2010 will be better. It almost has to be.

…and Dario was not that far ahead when Dixon and Briscoe pitted. Yes, it probably would’ve been more climactic had the other two come out closer to him following their stops or if Dario had a litre less fuel, but in fairness Franchitti played it exactly right. Like Briscoe and Dixon, Dario has had a fantastic season and thoroughly deserved the title.

Richmond sucked because NOBODY could pass, leaders included, even when they approached backmarkers. It was almost, quite literally, a parade. On the other hand, there was plenty of passing to be had at Homestead, though I do wish that Versus had shown a bit more of the rest of the field. Versus had a fantastic first season, but between almost completely ignoring 20 of the 23 cars on the track and 12 (give or take one, I lost count) commercial breaks during an 88 minute race, this was not their strongest showing. It’s certainly something to build on for next year, though.