A little controversy is good once in a while, but what happened in Edmonton Sunday goes beyond little.  The penalty assessed against Helio Castroneves for blocking has generated a lot of comments as race fans struggle to find out why the penalty was given.

The series President of Competition Brian Barnhardt conducts a drivers meeting with the exception of the Indy 500, the morning of the race.  At each meeting before a road/street course event Brian has made it very clear:  "We will be visually dividing the braking point through the entry into the corner in half.  YOU CAN ONLY BE ON THE INSIDE HALF IF YOU ARE ATTEMPTING TO PASS SOMEONE.  IF YOU ARE ON THE INSIDE HALF BECAUSE YOU ARE UNDER ATTACK FROM SOMEONE ELSE, IT IT BLOCKING."  Clearly Helio was on the inside of turn one.  He was under attack from Will Power and so the Izod IndyCar officials had no choice but to penalize Helio.

It just so happens that we (Versus) taped the entire drivers meeting Sunday morning and did, indeed, find the portion where Brian spelled out the rule.

I'm not here to defend or criticize the decision but it does create some questions.  Robbie Buhl, Jon Beekhuis and I could think of a few situations at Toronto where a similar situation happened and no penalty was assessed.  It's too bad the race had to end with the controversy.  And now we also wonder if any further action will be taken against Helio for his confrontation with Kevin Blanch, the leagues technical director, and Charles Burns the head of the league's security.  We heard words from the three time Indianapolis 500 winner that we've never heard from him before.  But he cooled down quickly, enough to talk with Robbie Floyd and even got a chuckle from Helio. 

In any case, Scott Dixon was given the win, his second of the year.  Power, who started from pole again, led the most laps but lost the lead when he switched to the primary tires during his last pit stop.  Dario Franchitti, Ryan Briscoe and Ryan Hunter-Reay rounded out the top 5. It was a good day for KV Racing Technology.  All four of their cars finished 6th through 9th.  Canadian Paul Tracy finished 6th, his best of the year while Mario Moraes, E.J. Viso, Takuma Sato and Helio completed the top 10. 

Tony Kanaan wound up 12th, after starting 24th due to a crash in qualifying.  Danica Patrick came home 15th, while Justin Wilson finished 21st.  Simona de Silvestro, drove a great race although she ended up 22nd after going off course late in the event.

Congratulations to Chip Ganassi. He becomes the first owner to win the Daytona 500, the Indianapolis 500 and Brickyard 400 in the same year.  His driver Jamie McMurray won Sunday's Nascar Sprint Cup Race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and then saw Dixon given the victory in Edmonton.

We have two more road course races (and both of them are on natural terrain tracks) before ending the season on 4 ovals and of course all the remaining events are on Versus!