Castroneves finally masters road course

Scott Dixon was in the dark and Helio Castroneves knew exactly what had to be done.

In the end Sunday, Castroneves – the IRL’s erstwhile Spiderman – got to climb the fence in a victory celebration at the Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg (Fla.), and Dixon had to shrug off a frustrating defeat.

Castroneves, who failed to finish any of the three road or street course events last year, led a race-high 40 laps this time. But he found himself trailing Dixon by nearly 16 seconds after the New Zealander stretched his fuel to the limit near the end of the 100-lap event, taking the lead and pulling away after Castroneves pitted on lap 88.

“Until then, I was driving conservative and just trying to save fuel,” Castroneves said. “They told me to come in and I thought, ‘Oh no, I don’t want to pit.’ There was another car in the pits and I stayed out, but you can’t disobey twice and I had to come in the next time.

“Then I knew how far behind I was and I kept going really fast. I was taking a lot of chances, getting this close to the wall,” Castroneves added, holding his right thumb and forefinger inches apart. “They told me, ‘Go for it, go like hell.’ So I drove it like I stole it.”

Meanwhile, Dixon was battling two problems – a radio that was working only sporadically and a loose front wing that made his car bog down on every slow turn.

“I didn’t have a clue what was going on in the race all day,” he said. “I was just trying to go as fast as the car would let me, but I couldn’t turn the car on the slow speed corners.”

NHRA

Top Fuel driver Brandon Bernstein raced to his ninth career victory, beating points leader Melanie Troxel with a quarter-mile run of 4.534 at 329.83 mph in the O’Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals in Baytown, Texas.

Ron Capps extended his Funny Car points lead with a 5.005-second, 293.47-mph victory over Bob Gilbertson. Mike Edwards won in Pro Stock for the first time in four years, beating Jim Yates with a 6.731 at 206.01 mph.