Houston Preview

Hello Internet! It's Guido, back with a Scoring Indy race weekend preview. This week's just gonna be quick, because of the double-header nature of the weekend. I'll be posting (if everything goes right) a great deal this weekend. So, we'll conserve a little bit of energy by being brief for now. Here's how everything looked last year at Houston:


2013 Houston Race 1

Finish	Driver	Qualifying	Grid	Led	Completed	A.R.S
1	Dixon	3	3	44	90	84.74
2	de Silvestro	6	5	0	90	65.19
3	Wilson	14	12	0	90	65.88
4	Pagenaud	5	4	0	90	57.55
5	Newgarden	20	18	0	90	66.16
6	Jakes	11	9	0	90	51.27
7	Rahal	19	24	0	90	59.03
8	Bourdais	4	14	0	90	48.97
9	Viso	9	8	0	90	45.66
10	Filippi	8	7	0	90	43.67
11	Kimball	17	16	0	90	45.54
12	Power	2	2	40	90	48.95
13	Andretti	12	10	0	90	31.19
14	Saavedra	21	19	0	89	34.81
15	Franchitti	10	20	0	89	25.49
16	Conway	13	11	0	85	23.61
17	Sato	1	1	6	82	10.62
18	Castroneves	22	21	0	80	21.16
19	Servia	18	17	0	63	19.27
20	Hunter-Reay	16	15	0	57	14.70
21	Kanaan	15	13	0	34	6.48
22	Vautier	24	23	0	32	6.40
23	Carpenter	23	22	0	30	3.24
24	Hinchcliffe	7	6	0	1	1.40

2013 Houston Race 2

Finish	Driver	Grid	Led	Completed	Race Score
1	Power	9	51	90	95.62
2	Dixon	2	29	90	75.08
3	Hinchcliffe	8	0	90	66.13
4	Wilson	6	0	90	60.28
5	Bourdais	13	0	90	63.98
6	Pagenaud	3	0	90	48.3
7	Servia	21	0	90	63.92
8	Kimball	10	0	90	47.33
9	Conway	16	0	90	50.82
10	de Silvestro	17	0	90	43.8
11	Vautier	22	0	90	46.98
12	Saavedra	24	0	90	50.31
13	Newgarden	14	0	90	32.99
14	Sato	15	0	89	36.23
15	Franchitti	7	0	89	16.13
16	Viso	12	0	89	28.19
17	Jakes	20	0	89	28.49
18	Rahal	19	0	88	16.85
19	Filippi	23	0	88	22.25
20	Andretti	4	0	88	-4.66
21	Hunter-Reay	5	0	87	-3.04
22	Carpenter	18	0	61	6.81
23	Castroneves	1	10	53	-8.34
24	Kanaan	11	0	32	3.29

Observations

- Pagenaud, Wilson, Bourdais, and Dixon were all strong last year in both races. All four had top 10 times in the first practice session for this year's race. Coincidence? Not at all.

- If you're looking for Mike Conway to destroy worlds this weekend, I'm afraid to say you might be disappointed. It took the Destroyer two full races to figure out how to get into the top 10 in 2013, and it doesn't look like that number 20 car unloaded with a lot of speed this weekend. I'm normally bullish on Mike, but I'd sell for Houston in '14.

- If you want to impress your friends and neighbors with your ability to pick 'em. Tell them that the driver in this race, who hasn't run all season will finish at least one race in the top 10 (if not 5). Luca Fililppi is the real deal. Also, I have to rep my paisans.

- Final thought. I've got a feeling about Josef Newgarden this weekend. I don't have much of a basis for it (except perhaps the P5 in 2013 Race 1), but I expect him to run well. Very well.

Stay Tuned

Well, that's the briefest of brief previews, but I hope it whets your pallet for the races to come. Stay tuned after qualifying tomorrow for a couple of Race Predictions on Twitter to see just how much of a good feeling I have about Newgarden. You can get that and more by following me @ScoringIndy on Twitter.

See you soon!

-- Guido