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"         After a year racing stock cars, I was blown away by the performance of my Indy car in the first test.   You get used to a big heavy car with plenty of power but no downforce sliding around the whole time. So when I got back in the Target Dallara-Honda it was quite a shock, although after about a half-day I was back up to pace.   One of the big advantages of being back in Indy cars was the chance to race at places like Long Beach, Toronto and Indy.   I like Long Beach, even though I haven&amp;#039;t been there in an open-wheel car since 2002. I was frustrated then because it was one of the street races I had not yet won, though I finished 2nd and 3rd. The course has changed since I first went there and I really enjoy the awesome atmosphere. It&amp;#039;s an event, a happening as much as a car race.   As for Indy, I started out having a funny relationship with the 500. Although I love the history of the sport, the first time I went to Indy I was not that into it. It was the 2002 Champ Car season and very difficult as we were swapping cars from Reynard to Lola. All of a sudden we&amp;#039;re at Indianapolis, we don&amp;#039;t understand the cars and we haven&amp;#039;t got very good engines. We were struggling.   The second year I missed because of a broken back.   But the more I went back, the more I got into the place, starting to understand it and fell in love with it. If you&amp;#039;re a student of the sport, there&amp;#039;s more to Indy than just the race. I&amp;#039;ve been to the Speedway museum many times. To walk around there puts you in awe of the guys who went before. To see some of the cars they climbed into...and I&amp;#039;m not just talking about the Jim Clarks, the A.J. Foyts and the Parnellis, but also the guys who got into borderline cars trying to make the show...that spirit is one of the things that has made Indy so special.   Of course, my favorite Indy car isn&amp;#039;t there. That&amp;#039;s (fellow Scotsman) Jimmy Clark&amp;#039;s 1965 Lotus-Ford, which is in the Ford Museum...and now has my grubby fingerprints all over it.   Qualifying for the 500 is difficult because of the way the cars are trimmed out. The amount of downforce you take out is crazy. A gust of wind the wrong way or a slight shift in the temperature \u2014 just the sun coming out \u2014 can make a mess of your qualifying run. Even in the four laps of the qualifying run, the car can change dramatically.   In 2007 I remember adjusting the car \u2014 the anti-roll bars, the weight jackers, that sort of thing \u2014 from corner to corner. You have to plan ahead and be very comfortable in what you&amp;#039;re doing.   In the race the biggest factor is the cars around you, so you set up the car to run in traffic. You have more downforce and change the balance of the car so it handles slightly differently.   Then you must be careful where you position your car because of the massive effect other cars have on the aerodynamics of your car. You&amp;#039;ll be going into Turn 1 and someone will jump across your nose and completely change the way the car handles. You have to get out of the throttle and the car will slide, and if someone does it to you just right (or wrong), you can lose a massive percentage of your grip. There&amp;#039;s never a time when you can get in a groove and relax.   At Indy there are so many pitstops and the pit lane is very narrow, so coming off Turn 4 wide open and trying to get slowed down in time for the 60-mph zone can be pretty interesting.   During a pitstop you&amp;#039;re reacting to instructions from the guys calling the race, resetting the fuel, the anti-roll bars and the weight jackers to allow for the full tank of fuel and fresh tires. Then getting ready for the pit out because you can gain or lose a massive amount of time then. If somebody is parked in front of you, how are you going to get around them?   Happily it all went right in 2007, although my experience winning the 500 \u2014 driving slowly to the finish in a downpour \u2014 is different than somebody like Sam Hornish who just edged Marco Andretti in 2006, or Scott Dixon in 2008. There were several years when I had the car to win the race and crazy things happened to prevent it, so at the end I was just thinking, &amp;quot;Oh my God, I can&amp;#039;t believe this is going to happen.&amp;quot;   But it did. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.roadandtrack.com/motorsports/news/a14800/dario-franchitti/>