Before Saturday night’s SunTrust Indy Challenge began, the track announcer proclaimed that it would be “anybody’s race.“ And while that may have been literally true, 16 of the 20 drivers knew that it probably wasn’t going to be their night—after all, they hadn’t had one all year. Each of the eight races so far in the IRL schedule has been won by a driver for Team Penske or its top-tier rival, Target Chip Ganassi. They make their presence known on race week—at RIR, they took the top four qualifying spots, then Ganassi took the 1 and 2 spots with Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti.

As omens go, the start of the SunTrust Indy Challenge seemed to have a very bad one. Jacques Lazier ran into the wall before completing the first lap, bringing out a caution flag. During his interview soon after that—a guy who doesn’t finish a lap gets interviewed?—Lazier managed to say how sorry he was to let down the Novicomm LED Lighting Technology team.

Danica Patrick notched her only IndyCar victory on Japanese soil, and for a while it looked like Japanese teammate Hideki Mutoh might claim his first victory in Richmond. The Andretti Green teammates were one and two for a short while, but a pit strategy that had them zigging while the rest of the field zagged left Mutoh in an unlucky fourth, with Patrick right behind him.

In the early stages of last night’s race, Ryan Briscoe was positioning himself to lap the car of Mario Moraes. In the pits, team owner Roger Penske was the picture of calm. “Take your time, set him up,“ Penske radioed to Briscoe. Moments later, Briscoe was resting against the backstretch wall. “What happened?“ asked Penske, as he looked around for an answer.

Cautions: 137-150, rookie Mike Conway makes right-side contact with the barrier in turn four, leaves the race.
  One up: : Scott Dixon is the only driver who can hold out of the pits until they open on the caution, allowing him to take a commanding lead.
  One down: Mario Moraes was the only driver to pit back in the opening laps. That strategy did not work, and he is languishing.

Cautions: Lap 1-8, Jaques Lazier spins out, leaves the race. Laps 27-38, Ryan Briscoe spins out, leaves the race.
  One up: Danica Patrick moves from her 10th starting position into third, and it looks to be a strong night ahead for Andretti Green racing. Teammate Hideki Mutoh is in the lead.
  One down: Points leader Ryan Briscoe never felt good about his car

No one is expecting defending champion Tony Kanaan to win tonight’s SunTrust Indy Challenge at Richmond International Raceway. He’s still nursing the physical and psychological wounds of a horrific crash during the Indianapolis 500 last month. And he’ll start from the 17th position on the 20-car grid, an unenviable spot on a racetrack where passing is often a monumental challenge.

Dario Franchitti was determined to prove he could challenge NASCAR’s elite after winning both the 2007 Indianapolis 500 and the Indy Racing League championship. Instead, he struggled mightily during an awkward transition from open-wheel to stock-car racing. He wasn’t exactly a fish out of water, but the Scotsman swam upstream most every weekend.

Dire economic news coming out of the NASCAR camp doesn’t much affect the Indy Racing League—it’s already been through a period of belt-tightening. While stock car racing was flying high in the middle of the decade, the IRL still was suffering from the effects of a split in 1996 that resulted in two open-wheel series, dividing fans’ allegiances and making the teams cut their finances.

After a month of driving into walls, Tony Kanaan couldn’t be happier to see Richmond. The IndyCar veteran has suffered from horrible luck recently, and things didn’t improve last week, as he crashed in Iowa for the third consecutive year, causing him to wonder whether he was Bill Murray in the movie “Groundhog Day.“ If he is, that won’t be a problem this weekend—Kanaan is the defending champion in the SunTrust Indy Challenge, and his last tour victory came last year at RIR.

Dan Wheldon is a “been there, done that” kind of race car driver. Indianapolis 500 winner? Been there. IndyCar Series champion? Done that. Which makes his appearance Saturday in Richmond at least a little peculiar.