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Hornish Jr. wins Kansas Indy 300

Steve Brisendine Associated Press

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Sam Hornish Jr. threw himself a birthday party in Victory Lane.

The icing on his cake: Hornish now leads the Indy Racing League season points race after his second straight win.

“It’s a great day to celebrate my birthday,” said Hornish, who turned 27 on Sunday – and got a cream pie in the face from Marlboro Team Penske teammate Helio Castroneves before the race. “We’re just so happy right now.”

Hornish blew past Dan Wheldon after a restart with 17 laps to go at Kansas Speedway, then won a back-and-forth battle down the stretch for his third victory of the season.

“The last couple of laps were a little bit fun – but a little bit nervous, too,” said Hornish, this year’s Indianapolis 500 winner.

Castroneves fell out of the points lead despite recovering from an early crash to finish sixth. Hornish now leads him by 20 points in the standings.

“It’s a little disappointing to lose some points on the championship,” said Castroneves, who came in leading Hornish by five points.

Wheldon, the defending IRL champion, passed Hornish on the 197th lap of the 200-lap, 300-mile race. He was still narrowly ahead with two to go, but Hornish retook the lead in the white flag lap and held it until the end of the Kansas Lottery Indy 300.

“We gave it everything we got,” said Wheldon, who also was second here last year and has not won since the season opener at Homestead. “We just came up short.”

Vitor Meira was third for the second straight year, his third straight top-three finish here. But it was little consolation for the 29-year-old Brazilian, who extended one IRL record for futility and matched another.

Meira has not won in 53 career starts, extending his own record, and his winless streak matches the longest in league history. Robbie Buhl and Billy Boat also went 53 races without a win, but each of those streaks came after a victory.

He was followed in the top 10 by Scott Dixon, 2005 race winner Tony Kanaan, Helio Castroneves, Tomas Scheckter, Kosuke Matsuura, and rookies Marco Andretti and Jeff Simmons.