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"Long before H\u00E9lio Castroneves became famous for dancing the cha-cha-cha, Pocono Raceway was built to be the Indianapolis of the East.  Track founder Dr. Joseph &amp;quot;Doc&amp;quot; Mattioli had the speedway built from scratch in the late Sixties. He was a shrewd businessman, and there&amp;#039;s no question that IndyCar in the late Eighties wasn&amp;#039;t generating the same revenue that NASCAR was for Pocono.  &amp;quot;I remember liking Pocono a lot,&amp;quot; said two-time Indy 500 winner Al Unser Jr. &amp;quot;But the track surface was really, really rough and bumpy.&amp;quot;  Mattoli&amp;#039;s stubborn unwillingness to modernize the track led to a situation where the bumpy tarmac just wasn&amp;#039;t suitable for Indy cars anymore. In 2007, Mattioli&amp;#039;s grandson, Brandon Igdalsky, took over as track president. When Doc passed away in January 2012, Igdalsky became the track&amp;#039;s main visionary.  After a visit to the St. Petersburg Grand Prix and a positive fan study last year in the months that followed Doc&amp;#039;s passing, Pocono and IndyCar agreed on a contract for a race. The improvements Igdalsky has commissioned since becoming president have made a world of difference.   &amp;quot;The track today, it&amp;#039;s just so smooth,&amp;quot; said Charlie Kimball, driver of the No. 83 car for Chip Ganassi, on the speedway&amp;#039;s two-year-old surface. Prior to coming to Pocono, Kimball had watched YouTube footage of the last IndyCar race at Pocono from 1989. But the washboard pavement that once plagued man and machine is now nothing but glass-smooth asphalt. &amp;quot;We&amp;#039;re basically running around the entire track wide open,&amp;quot; said Kimball. While most of the drivers were quite happy with the track, there is also a matter of what the fans thought.  &amp;quot;I can&amp;#039;t believe that it&amp;#039;s been 24 years since I was last here to see the Indy cars,&amp;quot; said a friendly, 50-plus-year-old fan in the garage, as he waited for driver Pippa Mann&amp;#039;s autograph. &amp;quot;It doesn&amp;#039;t feel like it&amp;#039;s been that long, but I&amp;#039;m having fun.&amp;quot;  The atmosphere in the garage was much the same. Things felt electric and exciting. But it wasn&amp;#039;t a typical NASCAR crowd. While I spotted a few Jimmie Johnson and Dale Jr. hats throughout the weekend, there weren&amp;#039;t as many big NASCAR fans in attendance as I expected. The fans I saw didn&amp;#039;t even recognize Jeff Gordon when he strolled through Pocono. No, really.  On Sunday morning, as I made my way from the media center to the grid, I noticed that none other than Jeff Gordon was walking next to me. He was fresh off a flight from Daytona, where he had finished 23rd in the Sprint Cup 400-miler the night before. Gordon was dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt, but was by no means incognito. He was there with his young son, Leo, as a spectator. As we both made our way up to the area between the paddock and pit lane, where security checks your credentials, the security guy barked, not jokingly, at Gordon, &amp;quot;Hey, I need to see your ticket!&amp;quot; Gordon, visibly irritated by the request, pulled his pit pass out of his pocket and showed it to the guard. The security guy, no longer oblivious to whom he had just yelled, meekly let Gordon pass. Then, the requisite pre-race ceremonies commenced and the IndyCar boys went to racing.   From a commercial standpoint, the race looked like a success. The main grandstand appeared to be between 70 and 80 percent filled when the green flag dropped. While that&amp;#039;s not a packed house, it&amp;#039;s respectable given the NASCAR race attendance has been less than stellar at Pocono in recent years. However, a cynic might attribute the turnout to hometown favorite Marco Andretti starting from pole, or the $25 ticket fee, or just simple curiosity. While I don&amp;#039;t disagree with any of those points, something dawned on me as Scott Dixon came out of Turn Three and crossed the start-finish line to take the win.  I genuinely enjoyed myself.  The 400-mile race distance was just the right length in terms of creating entertaining race strategies. If I had a complaint, it&amp;#039;s that there wasn&amp;#039;t enough passing or side-by-side action. As I sat on the pit wall, watching the victory-lane ceremonies, I turned to a fan next to me and asked him what he thought.  &amp;quot;I enjoyed it,&amp;quot; he replied. &amp;quot;I was here for the first IndyCar race they ever had here. I used to come to the NASCAR races here too, but this was more fun.&amp;quot;  I asked him why. &amp;quot;NASCAR these days, it&amp;#039;s too plastic and contrived; it&amp;#039;s like professional wrestling.&amp;quot;  As I nodded in agreement, he summed it up. &amp;quot;But this ... this feels more real.&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.roadandtrack.com/motorsports/news/a4902/racing-racing-news-behind-the-scenes-at-the-first-indycar-race-at-pocono-in-24-years/>