2009 Round of Indianapolis

The 2009 Round of Indianapolis, the tenth of 19 events in the 2009 TM Master Cup season, was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana.

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Pre-race notes
The qualifying race was marred by a pair of major incidents. The first involved Collin Evans, who turned Enzo Medina before the start of the race. Though both drivers were in the top 14 in the final running order of the race, Evans was excluded from the race (he had been warned about rough driving prior to the race). This bumped Leon Keniston into the field.

The second incident involved Tyrone Stanley getting into Dan Clezl on Lap 3, turning Clezl into the wall &mdash; especially problematic as the two are teammates at Camelot Racing. Team boss Arthur Thomas was not pleased, and told all three of his drivers &mdash; Stanley, Clezl, and Kurt Walker &mdash; to either shape up or be shipped out.

Finally, Saar announced it would debut a new car in 2010 based on its Eagle model, as opposed to the Tyrant model it currently runs.

The race
"Plissken Wins!" "Plissken Wins!" "Plissken Wins!"

Those were two words many thought would never be used in conjunction together. But Kurt Plissken finally proved his critics wrong. Of course, they'll still say it took him longer than it should have-- but he doesn't care now. Actually, he didn't care then either.

The fans in attendance were treated to a real humdinger of a race featuring one of the cleanest and most exciting battles to the finish in Master Cup history. As the laps dwindled down, the lead changes continued to increase. Only a caution with four laps to go brought and end to the festivities and gave Plissken his first TM Master Cup win. Then Plissken surprised and delighted the crowd by performing a burnout.

"Yeah, I kinda surprised myself with that one too," Plissken stated. "I've always been told to act as if I'd been there before-- but I got swept up in the moment I guess," Plissken explained. Before speaking of the burnout, the normally stoic Plissken had to take a moment or two to compose himself. The usually monosyllabic driver was at a complete loss for any type of words. You could see several emotions cross his face simultaneously-- amazement, wonder, relief and jubilation to list just a few. The emotion of the moment could be seen as Plissken's good eye began to to tear up somewhat. "This was a long time coming for the team and especially for me. I... I just want to thank PSI for sticking with me-- for believing in me. A lot of drivers are on a short leash but they had patience to let me develop," Plissken explained.

"We needed to make a strong showing today &mdash; something to launch us in the right direction as the race for the championship intensifies. I couldn't be happier for this team and for Kurt Plissken in particular. I hope this is just the beginning of many in a long line of wins for PSI and Kurt Plissken," team owner Will Power said amongst the celebration.

When asked if the fact that the race ending under caution would put a damper on his win, Plissken said, "I don't know if I could've held off Howard and Rainsford or not-- turns out I didn't have to."

Plissken's combative teammate, Pete Maverick, was asked what he thought of Plissken's win. "Pffft, whatever," Maverick uttered as he walked away.