Honda Indy Toronto

Honda Indy Toronto

IndyCar Series
Location	Exhibition Place Toronto, Ontario, Canada 43°38′14″N 79°24′56″W / 43.63722°N 79.41556°W / 43.63722; -79.41556Coordinates: 43°38′14″N 79°24′56″W / 43.63722°N 79.41556°W / 43.63722; -79.41556
Corporate sponsor	Honda Canada Inc.
First race	1986
First ICS race	2009
Laps	85
Previous names	Molson Indy Toronto (1986–2005) Molson Grand Prix of Toronto (2006) Steelback Grand Prix of Toronto (2007)
Most wins (driver)	Michael Andretti (7)
Most wins (team)	Newman/Haas Racing (7)
Most wins (manufacturer)	Lola (12)
Circuit information
Surface	Asphalt/Concrete
Length	2.874 km (1.786 mi)
Turns	11
Lap record	57.143 (Gil de Ferran, Reynard-Honda, 1999, CART)

The Honda Indy Toronto is an annual IndyCar Series race, held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally known as the Molson Indy Toronto, it was a Champ Car World Series race held annually from 1986 to 2007. The track has 11 turns, is a 2.874-kilometre (1.786 mi) street circuit, and is located at Exhibition Place.

It is IndyCar's second-longest running street race, only behind the Grand Prix of Long Beach^[1] and the fourth oldest race on the current schedule in terms of number of races run.^[2] The Toronto Indy is one of seven Canadian circuits to have held an Indy Car race, the others being Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Mont-Tremblant, Sanair, Montreal, Vancouver, and Edmonton.

History

In 1967 the first Indy race held in Canada was the Telegram Trophy 200, held at Mosport Park in Bowmanville, Ontario as part of the USAC Championship Car season. The race was won by Bobby Unser for his first career Indy victory. The Telegram Trophy 200 was again held in 1968 at Mosport, this time won by Dan Gurney.

Time trials for the 2013 race.

After a nine-year absence, Indycars returned to the Toronto area for the Molson Diamond Indy at Mosport Park won by A. J. Foyt in 1977 and Danny Ongais in 1978.

In the spring of 1985 Molson Breweries in-house promotional division, Molstar Sports & Entertainment proposed to run a CART sanctioned IndyCar race at Exhibition Place in Toronto. Toronto City Council approved the race by two votes in July 1985 for the race to be held the following year. ^[3]

The first Molson Indy Toronto was won by Bobby Rahal on July 20, 1986. The event quickly became Canada's second largest annual sporting event, eclipsed only by the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal, with three-day attendance figures routinely around 170,000 people.^[4]

In the 1996 race, American driver Jeff Krosnoff was killed in a crash with 4 laps remaining. In that same crash, volunteer corner marshall Gary Avrin was killed, and marshall Barbara Johnston also received injuries in the crash; she was treated and released that evening. Adrián Fernández won the race.

Looking towards the Direct Energy Centre during the 2013 race. Team Penske pits are at the bottom of the image.

The name of the race was changed in 2006 from the Molson Indy Toronto to the Molson Grand Prix of Toronto after it was purchased by the Champ Car World Series from Molstar Sports and Entertainment. The name was also changed to distance Champ Car from the rival Indy Racing League (IRL), which had gained the exclusive right to use the "Indy" name after 2002. In 2007, after Molson dropped their title sponsorship to the race, Steelback Brewery signed a multi-year, multimillion-dollar deal to become the event’s title sponsor, renaming it the Steelback Grand Prix of Toronto. This marked the first title sponsorship change since the event started in 1986.

The unification of Champ Car and the Indy Racing League was announced on February 22, 2008, and the Grand Prix of Toronto's future was left in doubt. After attempts were made to preserve the race for 2008, it was confirmed on March 5, 2008, that the race had been cancelled. On May 15, 2008, Andretti Green Racing (co-owned by Michael Andretti) purchased the assets of the former Grand Prix of Toronto.^[5] On July 30, 2008, it was confirmed that the race would return to Toronto on July 12, 2009.^[6] On September 18, 2008, Andretti Green Racing announced that it had signed a multi-year agreement with Honda Canada Inc. for the title sponsorship of the race, henceforth named from 2009 onward as the Honda Indy Toronto.^[7]

Michael Andretti is the all-time race win leader with seven victories.

Past winners

USAC (Mosport Park)

Season	Date	Driver	Team	Chassis	Engine	Race distance		Race time	Average speed (mph)	Report
						Laps	Miles (km)
USAC National Championship Trail
1967	July 1	Bobby Unser	Leader Cards Racing	Eagle	Ford	40	98.36 (158.295)	0:59:14	102.770	Report
						6	14.754 (23.744)
1968	June 15	Dan Gurney	Oscar Olson	Eagle	Weslake-Ford	40	98.36 (158.295)	0:56:45	105.727	Report
						40	98.36 (158.295)	0:55:16	108.564
1969 – 1976	Not held
1977	July 3	A. J. Foyt	A. J. Foyt Enterprises	Coyote	Foyt	75	184.425 (296.803 km)	2:03:35	90.733	Report
1978	June 11	Danny Ongais	Interscope Racing	Parnelli	Cosworth	76	186.884 (300.761 km)	2:08:38	87.164	Report
1979	Not held
1980	Sept 14	Race cancelled following unification of USAC and CART schedules.

• 1967: Run in two heats of 98 miles (158 kilometers/40 laps) each. Second race stopped after 6 laps due to rain.
• 1968: Run in two heats of 98 miles (158 kilometers/40 laps) each.

CART/Champ Car/IndyCar (Exhibition Place)

Season	Date	Driver	Team	Chassis	Engine	Race distance		Race time	Average speed (mph)	Report
						Laps	Miles (km)
CART IndyCar/Champ Car
1986	July 20	Bobby Rahal	Truesports	March	Cosworth	103	183.34 (295.057)	2:05:50	87.414	Report
1987	July 19	Emerson Fittipaldi	Patrick Racing	March	Chevrolet-Ilmor	103	183.34 (295.057)	1:54:35	95.991	Report
1988	July 17	Al Unser Jr.	Galles Racing	March	Chevrolet-Ilmor	103	183.34 (295.057)	1:59:34	91.994	Report
1989	July 23	Michael Andretti	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Chevrolet-Ilmor	103	183.34 (295.057)	2:01:00	90.9	Report
1990	July 22	Al Unser Jr.	Galles/KRACO Racing	Lola	Chevrolet-Ilmor	94*	167.32 (269.275)	2:13:26	75.997	Report
1991	July 21	Michael Andretti	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Chevrolet-Ilmor	103	183.34 (295.057)	1:50:57	99.143	Report
1992	July 19	Michael Andretti	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	103	183.34 (295.057)	1:52:21	97.898	Report
1993	July 18	Paul Tracy	Penske Racing	Penske	Chevrolet-Ilmor	103	183.34 (295.057)	1:53:58	96.51	Report
1994	July 17	Michael Andretti	Chip Ganassi Racing	Reynard	Ford-Cosworth	98	174.44 (280.733)	1:48:15	96.673	Report
1995	July 16	Michael Andretti	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	98	174.44 (280.733)	1:50:25	94.787	Report
1996	July 14	Adrian Fernandez	Tasman Motorsports	Lola	Honda	93*	165.912 (267.009)	1:41:59	97.548	Report
1997	July 20	Mark Blundell	PacWest Racing	Reynard	Mercedes-Benz	95	163.495 (263.119)	1:45:43	92.779	Report
1998	July 19	Alex Zanardi	Chip Ganassi Racing	Reynard	Honda	95	163.495 (263.119)	1:52:24	87.274	Report
1999	July 18	Dario Franchitti	Team Green	Reynard	Honda	95	166.725 (268.317)	1:56:27	85.897	Report
2000	July 16	Michael Andretti	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	112	196.56 (316.332)	2:00:02	98.248	Report
2001	July 15	Michael Andretti	Team Green	Reynard	Honda	95	166.725 (268.317)	1:59:58	83.375	Report
2002	July 7	Cristiano da Matta	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Toyota	112	196.56 (316.332)	2:06:19	93.361	Report
2003	July 13	Paul Tracy	Forsythe Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	112	196.56 (316.332)	2:02:36	96.189	Report
2004	July 11	Sébastien Bourdais	Newman/Haas Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	84	147.42 (237.249)	1:45:36	83.749	Report
2005	July 10	Justin Wilson	RuSPORT	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	86	150.93 (242.898)	1:46:10	85.296	Report
2006	July 9	A. J. Allmendinger	Forsythe Racing	Lola	Ford-Cosworth	86	150.93 (242.898)	1:38:01	92.386	Report
2007	July 8	Will Power	Walker Racing	Panoz	Cosworth	73	128.115 (206.181)	1:45:58	72.534	Report
2008	July 6	Race cancelled following reunification of Champ Car and IRL.
IndyCar Series
2009	July 12	Dario Franchitti	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara	Honda	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:43:47	86.24	Report
2010	July 18	Will Power	Penske Racing	Dallara	Honda	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:47:15	83.451	Report
2011	July 10	Dario Franchitti	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara	Honda	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:56:32	76.805	Report
2012	July 8	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	Dallara	Chevrolet	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:33:27	95.787	Report
2013	July 13	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara	Honda	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:41:17	88.37	Report
	July 14	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara	Honda	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:35:02	94.177
2014	July 20*	Sébastien Bourdais	KV Racing Technology	Dallara	Chevrolet	65*	114.075 (183.585)	1:15:44	90.37	Report
		Mike Conway	Ed Carpenter Racing	Dallara	Chevrolet	56*	98.28 (158.166)	1:20:36	73.168
2015*	June 14	Josef Newgarden	CFH Racing	Dallara	Chevrolet	85	149.175 (240.073)	1:39:00	90.41	Report
2016	July 17	Will Power	Penske Racing	Dallara	Chevrolet	85	151.81 (244.314)	1:42:39	88.739	Report

1997 Toronto Molson Indy

• 1990: Race shortened due to rain.
• 1996: Race ended with 1 1/2 laps remaining (93 of 95 laps completed) because of fatal crash on Lake Shore Boulevard. Driver Jeff Krosnoff and a track marshal were killed and the race was stopped near the impact point a lap later.
• 2014: First race was postponed from Saturday to Sunday morning because of rain. The second planned race is still scheduled for Sunday afternoon which means two races in one day. Because of this, both races were shortened from 85 laps to 65 to compensate for the delay. The second race however was further shortened due to time limit.
• 2015: Due to Toronto hosting the 2015 Pan American and Parapan American Games, the race was moved to June to avoid conflicting with the games.

Support race winners

Indy Lights / Atlantic Championship

ARS/Indy Lights			Atlantic Championship
Season	Winning driver		Season	Winning driver
1986	Fabrizio Barbazza		1986	Not held
1987	Tommy Byrne		1987
1988	Calvin Fish		1988
1989	Gary Rubio		1989
1990	Paul Tracy		1990	Freddy Rhemrev
1991	P. J. Jones		1991	Stuart Crow
1992	Bryan Herta		1992	David Empringham
1993	Bryan Herta		1993	Claude Bourbonnais
1994	Steve Robertson		1994	Richie Hearn
1995	Greg Moore		1995	Richie Hearn
1996	Gualter Salles		1996	Patrick Carpentier
1997	Hélio Castro-Neves		1997	Memo Gidley
1998	Guy Smith		1998	Alex Tagliani
1999	Geoff Boss		1999	Not held
2000	Not held		2000	Andrew Bordin
2001	Townsend Bell		2001	David Rutledge
2002	Not held		2002	Michael Valiante
2003			2003	A. J. Allmendinger
2004			2004	Jon Fogarty
2005			2005	Antoine Bessette
2006			2006	Robbie Pecorari
2007			2007	Franck Perera
2008			2008	Not held
2009	Sebastian Saavedra		2009
2010	Jean-Karl Vernay		2010
2011	Stefan Wilson		2011
2012	Gustavo Yacamán		2012
2013	Jack Hawksworth		2013
2014	Alexandre Baron		2014
2015	Spencer Pigot		2015
2016	Felix Rosenqvist		2016
	Felix Rosenqvist

SCCA Trans-Am Series

Year	Winning driver	Car
1993	Scott Sharp	Chevrolet Camaro	[8]
1994	Tommy Kendall	Ford Mustang	[9]
2004	Jorge Diaz, Jr.	Jaguar XKR	[10]
2005	Paul Gentilozzi	Jaguar XKR	[11]
2010	R. J. Lopez	Chevrolet Corvette	[12]

Pirelli World Challenge – GT

Season	Winning driver	Car
2007	Randy Pobst	Porsche 911 GT3
2010	Randy Pobst (GT) Peter Cunningham (GTS)	Volvo S60 Acura TSX
2013	Johnny O'Connell (GT) Lawson Aschenbach (GTS)	Cadillac CTS-V Chevrolet Camaro
2014	Race 1
	Nick Tandy (GT) Marcelo Hahn (GTA) Dean Martin (GTS)	Porsche 911 GT3 R Lamborghini Gallardo GT3 Ford Mustang Boss 302S
	Race 2
	Kuno Wittmer (GT) Michael Mills (GTA) Mark Wilkins (GTS)	Dodge Viper SRT GT3-R Porsche 911 GT3 R Kia Optima

Pirelli World Challenge – Touring Car

Season	Winning driver	Car
2007	Peter Cunningham	Acura
2010	Nick Wittmer	Honda Civic Si
2013	Race 1
	Michael Cooper (TC) Joel Lipperini (TCB)	Mazdaspeed 3 Honda Fit
	Race 2
	Michael Cooper (TC) Ernie Francis Jr. (TCB)	Mazdaspeed 3 Mazda 2

CASCAR Super Series

Year	Race name	Winner	Car
1999	Miller Lite 100	Robin Buck	Pontiac	[13]
2000	Exide 99	Kevin Dowler	Ford	[14]
2001		Robin Buck	Pontiac	[15]
2002	CASCAR Toronto Indy, presented by NAPA	Kevin Dowler	Ford	[16]
2003	Avenue ACDelco 100	Jeff Lapcevich	Chevrolet	[17]
2004	CASCAR Toronto Indy 100	Jeff Lapcevich	Chevrolet	[18]
2005	ATTO 100	Kerry Micks	Ford	[19]

NASCAR Pinty's Series

Ron Beauchamp, Jr. practicing for the 2010 Jumpstart 100

Year	Race name	Winner	Car
2010	Jumpstart 100	Andrew Ranger	Dodge	[20]
2011	Streets of Toronto 100	Andrew Ranger	Dodge	[21]
2016	Pinty’s Grand Prix of Toronto	Alex Tagliani	Chevrolet	[22]

Current series

• Verizon IndyCar Series
• Indy Lights Presented by Cooper Tires
• Canadian Touring Car Championship
• U.S. F2000 National Championship
• NASCAR Pinty's Series
• SPEED Energy Stadium Super Trucks^[23]
• IMSA GT3 Cup Challenge Canada
• Pro Mazda Presented by Cooper Tires

Former series

A variety of racing series have previously run as support series on the race weekend. These include:

• Champ Car World Series
• Atlantic Championship
• Barber Dodge Pro Series
• Pro Mazda Championship
• CASCAR Super Series
• Trans-Am Series
• Ferrari Challenge
• North American Touring Car Championship
• Motorola Cup
• North American Fran Am 2000 Pro Championship
• Canadian Formula Ford Championship
• Pirelli World Challenge
• Player's Ltd./GM Motorsport series
• Honda Michelin Challenge Series
• F1600 Super Series

^[24]

Race day attendance

See also

• List of Indycar races
• List of auto racing tracks in Canada
• Annual events in Toronto

References

External links

• Official website
• Map and circuit history at RacingCircuits.info
• 2013 IndyCar Results Page