After up-and-down year, Franchitti wins first title

New IndyCar Series champion Dario Franchitti knows all about luck -- both good and bad.

"I've had kind of a strange career so far in America because there have been some days (with) good and some (with) great luck," the 34-year-old Scot said. "And the Indy 500 this year, I think there was definitely some good things that went our way.

"And then there's sometimes, if I could sit here and talk about races that (I) could have, would have, should have won, but this or that went wrong, I would be here for a long time."

Without question, 2007 was a microcosm of those up-and-down fortunes.

Early in the season, Franchitti enjoyed just about every bit of good luck that was available on the racetracks, starting out with a seventh-place finish in the opener in Homestead and improving in each of the next four events, culminating with his first victory in the Indianapolis 500.

Franchitti probably should not have won the biggest open-wheel race of the season. He acknowledged he didn't have the best car. But strategy got him out front, and he was still there when the rain came, ending the race 44 laps early.

Everything continued to fall his way for seven more races, including a pair of victories on the short ovals at Iowa and Richmond, and Franchitti seemed on an easy road to his first open-wheel championship.

"But I kept telling people, even when I led Scott (Dixon) by 65 points after Richmond, that it was going to wind up being close," Franchitti insisted.

He was right.

After a solid second-place finish at Mid-Ohio on July 22, Franchitti crashed in four straight races. Not only were the airborne crashes at Michigan and Kentucky frightening, but Franchitti's once-big lead kept shrinking.

He went into the season-finale Sept. 9 at Chicagoland Speedway holding a 3-point edge over Dixon, who appeared on his way to both a race win and the title until the good luck suddenly swung back toward Franchitti halfway through the final lap.

Dixon ran out of fuel while leading and coasted across the finish line in second, while Franchitti took the checkered flag and began his celebration.

"I think it's cool that it came down to Scott and me," Franchitti said. "It comes down to Scott and me on the last two corners of the last lap. That pretty much sums up the year."

Dixon, the 2003 series champion, lost the title by just 13 points. He was calm and gracious after the agonizing defeat.

"Dario deserves it. Any championship is tough to win, no matter what formula, no matter what kind of cars," the New Zealander said. "I think it is tougher now, for sure. The key things to look at, you've got many different disciplines: road courses, street courses, short ovals, superspeedways and in between.

"And, on top of that, everybody's got the same car, everybody's got the same engine."

Despite everyone running basically the same equipment, Franchitti's Andretti Green Racing team, including Tony Kanaan, Danica Patrick and Marco Andretti, and Dixon's Chip Ganassi Racing, with teammate Dan Wheldon, dominated the series.

Franchitti and Dixon each won four races, and Kanaan, the 2004 champion, led the way with five wins, including three of the last five races. But the Brazilian driver started his charge too late in the season, coming in third, 81 points short of the title.

Wheldon, the 2005 champion, won two of the first four races before his season turned sour with a crash and a 22nd-place finish at Indy, the race he won in 2005 and still covets most.

Team Penske's duo of Sam Hornish Jr., the 2006 series champion and Indy winner, and two-time 500 winner Helio Castroneves split the other two victories in the 17-race season, and Castroneves led everyone with seven poles. But neither was consistent and both fell out of the points race well before the end of the season.

"(W)e just had a terrible year and I can't even tell you why," Castroneves said. "Roger (Penske) gives us the best equipment, we have great people on the team, but we just had so many things go wrong -- wings falling off, flat tires -- it was terrible."

Patrick, in her first year with Andretti Green, made a strong comeback from a down year in 2006 at Rahal Letterman Racing, showing she could run with the top dogs. But the one-time rookie sensation has now gone three full seasons in IndyCar without that elusive first victory.

She did, however, come up with 11 top-10 finishes, including a pair of thirds and her first runner-up finish, coming in just behind Kanaan at Detroit the week before the finale.

"I can tell you that this was a really good season for me, learning-wise," she said. "Working with my teammates and the other people at Andretti Green was a blast. They taught me a ton, and I improved a lot on the racetrack. I can't wait 'til next year."

Twenty-year-old Marco Andretti was not as happy, following up a Rookie of the Year season that included his first win in 2006 with a disastrous season that included a series of mechanical failures and five crashes.

This year's top IndyCar rookie was Ryan Hunter-Reay, a veteran of the rival Champ Car series, who didn't even get his ride with the Rahal Letterman team until he replaced fired Jeff Simmons six races from the end season. His results included a sixth-place finish and two sevenths.

Hunter-Reay's only competition for first-year honors came from part-time driver Milka Duno, whose previous experience was mostly in sports cars. The Venezuelan ran in seven races with a best finish of 11th in Texas.

Another big story in 2007 was IndyCar's switch from a 90 percent methanol-10 percent ethanol blend last season to 100 percent ethanol, making it the only racing series run entirely with the renewable biofuel.

To keep from slowing the cars too much, the series switched from 3.0-liter motors to 3.5-liter power plants. The cars got better fuel mileage with ethanol, so the fuel cells were cut from 30 to 22 gallons to be sure the drivers would still pit before the tires were completely worn out.

"There were only a very few growing pains with the fuel and engine changes," said Brian Barnhart, Indy Racing League president of competition and chief steward. "It sure didn't seem to hurt the close racing or the competition."