Weather and restart crash slow IndyCar race at Iowa

As Tony Kanaan and Helio Castroneves battled for the lead early, the yellow flag was displayed just past the 30 lap mark of the 300 lap race.

Spitting rain forced officials to pull the cars down pit road and red flag the event. The engines were refired after a 26 minute stoppage. Just as the green flag was shown and the race got back underway however, disaster struck.

Blame it on the rain…or maybe just rookie error striking twice, but in two of the last four IndyCar races, Mikhail Aleshin has made contact with Takuma Sato with both cars ultimately ending up on the hook.

On a restart following the rain delay, Aleshin nailed Sato once again. Aleshin was running 16^th at the time when he came down below the yellow line out of Turn 4 and shot up into the path of Sato.

“I was trying to push on (Sebastian) Saavedra,” Aleshin said. “I think I was a bit too aggressive for the exit of the corner. The rear just went very fast and I couldn’t do anything really. There was no time to react and then I think Takuma just crashed into me because there was no time to react at all.”

Both drivers looked alright at first, but Aleshin was holding his left wrist and seemedto be in pain as he walked to the ambulance. He was holding ice on the area during his post-wreck interview with NBC Sports too. Below is a photo of Aleshin's car after the impact.

“All I saw was white smoke and then I couldn’t see anything,” Sato said. “It’s unfortunate.”

Team owner A.J. Foyt, who lost two race cars in the last two weeks and suffered an electrical issue at Pocono Raceway last Sunday, wasn’t nearly as understanding.

“It’s just like I said in Texas, all you got is a bunch of damn idiots out there anymore,” Foyt said. “I don’t know what they’re trying to prove on a start like that. It’s ridiculous. I think the officials need to come down on some of this crap because we’ve been the victim now a couple of times.

"It's not racing no more, it's who can survive the crash,"

The race got back underway on lap 64 with Helio Castroneves leading the way.