Notes from the 2006 Indy Japan 300 at Twin Ring Motegi

Notes taken from the ESPN broadcast of the Indy Japan 200 at Twin Ring Motegi on 4/22/06.

Holy budget cuts! Jerry Punch, MD, goes solo on the track reporter front. No Jamie (maybe her height and blonde hair scared the Japanese fans). No Vince. No Jack the Root.

First mention of Danica is under two minutes in! Someone must have sent the ABC/ESPN guys a memo: "MORE DANICA." After relatively little about her during the first two races, it's a Danica Fest!

Danica Montage! FHM photos. Complete with audio from Todd Harris from last year. Good times, Todd. Somewhere in a bar Todd is screaming "ROOKIE SENSATION." Jerry Punch, MD, with Danica who is sporting her Jumbo Shades again. Jerry: What did you learn last year here? Danica is stumped. Not sure. Jerry: what's your strategy? Danica: move up fast.

Rusty and Scott. Rusty -- Danica is good. Scott -- Danica is good. Last year was her "coming out party."

Video of first practice -- Sam going ass-first into the wall. Video of second practice. Jeff "No Relation to Gene" Simmons in the ultra-stylish ethanol car going into the wall. Everybody go out and buy a tank of E10 to make Jeff's sponsors feel better!

Punch and Helio. Helio says turn 1 and 2 are flat out, turn 3 and 4 you have to drop two gears. Set up is a challenge. Do you set up for turn 1 and 2 or 3 and 4? Punch gives him an egg. The track is egg shaped. Get it?

WTF? ESPN is repeating the SAME EXACT video that we just saw two minutes ago. Danica montage. Danica interview. Video of race accidents. Helio interview. The egg from Punch. Nice. It's like the Groundhog Day movie. Maybe ESPN is letting the college mascots that run around their offices handle the tape replay. I hear there's a high school media production class in Trenton, N.J. that does a good job.

Come on, let's light this candle.

We're back from a commercial and it's lap 17. WTF again? ESPN did not show the start. Shocking. Dude, seriously, this is just sad. I hope some production manager at ESPN is screaming into the phone right now.

Let me bust out the lap chart and go back in time for ya: Lap 10 -- Helio, Dixon, Wheldon, Hornish, Franchitti, Kanaan, Matsuura, Herta, Meira, The Famous Author Danica.

The televised race started on lap 17. I'm seriously tempted to just bag the whole race and go watch a soccer game. But no, pressdog hangs in there.

Helio is dominating. Posting the top nine laps of the race. Marty Ried talks about lack of yellows.

Helio puts Simmons (Jeff, not Gene) a lap down. Major air for Jeff. Tough situation coming in after Paul Dana's death.

Lap 25 -- Wheldon, Helio, Dixon, Dario, Sammy, Kanaan, Matsuura, Herta, Vitor, Scheckter (Danica 11th)

Lap 27 -- yellow yellow yellow. Enge is junk. Smoldering black car. Eddie Carpenter is junk as well. Enge is getting out of the car.

Commercial number 82 in the first 30 laps of the race. Marty says we'll be right back, but I wonder on what lap. Maybe we come back from the commercial and it's lap 65, or it's the start of the race. Video guys are clearly involved in drinking games or doing shots every time Rusty Wallace says "I tell you what..."

We're back, right on the tail end of Punch's report. Seriously. We hear his last four words. I have no f-ing idea what is going on. But, hey, let's go to another commercial!

IndyCar Series Magazine ad. Maybe I can buy it and read about the start of the Motegi race, which ESPN thinks is none of my business, apparently.

Coming back into the race, Jeff Simmons says he's a huge sushi fan, so life is good in Japan. Ed Carpenter says the Japanese have great cucumbers. (?)

Race summary, in case you are joining us late, or have been here the whole time ...

Green green green. Yellow Yellow Yellow. Sharp gets sideways in front of the start-finish. Everyone else is on the binders. SIMMONS IS AIRBORNE. Does one barrel roll in mid air and lands again. Forget burning ethanol, Jeff is going to have a shot of the stuff (ethanol distilled for cars is the same exact stuff as the alcohol in beer and wine). Sharp back to the pits. He's rear wingless from the Simmons impact. PJ Chesson is toast as well. Sharp nuked the rookies.

Replay. Major props to the flag man. He hung in there, waving his yellow flag wildly, even leaning over the flag stand thing as debris and Jeff Simmons's entire car flew up in the air toward him. The flag man has major cajones. I would have been diving for cover.

We got 24 laps of yellow as they sweep up the combined crashes.

Scott Sharp with Punch -- no idea what happened. Snapped around on me.

Scott Goodyear -- once you start to slide, you're just a passenger. Goodyear laments Simmons's departure. He came up from the Indy Lights, Goodyear says. I think Scotty meant the Indy Pro Series. Indy Lights is long gone.

Punch with Enge, who has already changed into his street clothes. Enge says he was going for the pits and something in the front end broke. "At that point, I was just a passenger."

Marty throws Japan TV under the bus by saying that video supplied by them was not conclusive on what happened in the Enge crash, so thank God for Punch.

Lap 52 -- green green green.

Lap 53 -- Helio, Wheldon, Dario, Kanaan, Sam, Dixon, Matsuura, Herta, Buddy Rice, Danica.

Helio throws an NFL-worthy block. Booth guys are pretty sure the Iron Hand of Justice, Brian Barnhart, will be cracking down. Danica and Matsuura almost touch. Vitor is rampaging up the field. Rusty drops "hot rod" reference number 1.

Helio ahead by 1.1 seconds. Get used to it. Rice up to 4th by lap 73. Started 18. He's almost as good as Danica. Danica is 9th after starting 14th.

Lap 75 -- (Stop me if you've heard this one before) Helio, Wheldon, Kanaan, Dixon, Dario, Sam, Buddy Rice, Herta, Danica, Matsuura.

Punch -- Danica feeling good about her car. I'm pleased to hear it. Renewed discussion in the booth about how important Motegi was to Danica last year. Coming out party. Knew she belonged. Rusty says no question she belongs. "This gal is very focused." Buddy is on the move. Let's talk more about Danica.

Marty slaps Japan TV again: "Our friends at Japanese television finally show us Kanaan."

Green pit cycle. Rusty begins starting every sentence with "I tell ya what." Mario in for a pit. (An alert poster below reminds me that Mario was not, in fact, in the race. It was Marco. I think they may be related.) Rusty: "I tell ya what, hope he doesn't snap the half shaft this time." Much cycling. We're through it by lap 100.

Lap 101 -- Helio, Dixon, Kanaan, Dario, Wheldon, Sammy, Herta, Rice, Danica, Scheckter.

Lap 109 Wheldon working on Kanaan. Marty says "if you were with us during pre-race, you heard Helio talking about" the different turns. Actually, Marty, we heard it twice. Which was better than actually seeing the start of the race.

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

Wheldon around TK on Lap 115, Much momentum talk again. Motegi Momentum. Momentum going into Indy. Indy is coming up. Don't miss the Indy 500.

AGR 5th in points, being bitch slapped hard by Penske and TCG. Matsuura is tied for 5th in points as well. Team Penske has led 317 of the first 400 laps of the season. That is a bitch slapping.

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

Hot rod reference number 2

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

If I was drinking every time he said "I tell ya what" I'd be mega twisted right now.

Lap 125 -- Helio, Dixon, Dario, Wheldon, Kanaan, Hornish, Herta, Rice, Danica, Scheckter.

Rusty, who just got done saying Helio was on fire to have 40 more horsepower this year than last year (when he had a pig Toyota) tries to recover the diss to Toyota. "Last year Toyota engines which were good engines, don't get me wrong, but ..." they mainly got bitch slapped every race.

Kanaan in with a leaking tire. Wheldon around Dario on lap 129.

Rusty: "I tell ya what I'd rather be on the tail end of the lead lap for sure." Too much saki in the both. Rusty is starting to double up his "tell ya what's" with two or more in a single sentence.

Lap 130 Helio in.

139 -- Helio's lead is UNDER A SECOND. This is a huge news development in this race.

Danica is surrendering 8th place to come into the pits, Marty says. Dixon around Helio. Touched tires. Dixon backs off.

Lap 143 -- Dario comes into his pit box going about 50 mph. Takes out one of his crew guys! Tire changer down. Slow mo replay. Looks nasty. Guy has some kind of leg injury, gotta be.

Lap 151 -- Helio, Wheldon, Hornish, Dario, Herta, Rice, Danica, Matsuura, Vitor, Dixon

Dixon pits. STALLS IT. Can't get underway. Pushing and restarting. Crazy. Punch says the guy down in Dario's pit is Steve Price and the IRL safety posse is on the job. He's sitting on pit wall. He'll get checked out later.

Commercial. Marty: Stay with us. Could go to the wire like Homestead (if there is a dramatic departure from the way the race has gone for the first 150 laps).

Back from commercial. Felipe into the wall. Got up into the marbles. He's done. AJ with Punch -- AJ says Felipe struggling all day. "Just one of them racing deals." Getting lapped by Sam and "he (Sam) likes to use a lot of race track." BAM. Super Tex is always good for one zinger.

167 -- green green. Buddy passes Danica. Kanaan around Sam on lap 170.

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

Rice may have blocked Matsuura. I'm sure Barnhart is CRACKING DOWN.

Rusty: "I tell ya what ..."

Penske has now led 388 of 475 laps. If this were a boxing match, the ref would stop it.

Lap 175 -- Helio (shocker) Wheldon, Kanaan, Hornish, Herta, Rice, Matsuura, Danica, Dixon (lap down), Vitor (lap down).

21 laps to go. Helio stretching it out in a Sebastien Bourdais-ish fashion. Driving one handed. Talking on his cell phone. Lap 185 Helio ahead by 4 seconds.

I think Rusty said something here about a top-5 finish for Rahal Letterman would be like the cure for cancer. I tell ya what, I'm not sure what he's saying.

Rusty says there is going to be some passing soon! Only if you count cars passing the start-finish line as "passing."

190 -- Helio (I swear!), Wheldon, Kanaan, Hornish, Rice, Herta, Matsuura, Danica, Dixon, Meira.

Helio is ahead by 5.4 seconds. Five laps to go. Riding with Wheldon. THE SUSPENSE IS KILLING ME.

200 -- Helio, Wheldon, Kanaan, Hornish, Rice, Herta, Matsuura, Danica (last car on the lead lap), Dixon (1 lap down), Vitor (1 lap down).

Helio climbs the fence. Almost hugs and kisses Punch during the post-win interview. Says again "I drove it like I stole it." Gives a shout out to the team.

14 cars running at the end. Danica was 8th. Wheldon sports some new white shades. Says the event was fantastic.

I was so moved by ESPN's dedication to quality, I decided to check through this for typos and such later. Just slap it up there!