Hunter-Reay repeats at Mile

Published: June 18, 2013

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN
Daily News Sports Editor

WEST ALLIS — It’ll likely be a couple years before Ryan Hunter-Reay’s son realizes what kind of first Father’s Day gift he gave his dad.
On his first Father’s Day weekend as a dad, Hunter-Reay made two aggressive moves on consecutive laps to move from third to first with 52 laps to go in Saturday’s Milwaukee IndyFest 250 at the Milwaukee Mile. And once he was first, he stayed there, winning for the second year in a row at the Mile.
In victory lane, Hunter-Reay’s wife, Beccy, held the couple’s 6-month old son, Ryden.
”I did it for that little guy,” Ryan Hunter-Reay said in victory lane. “He’s 6 months old and I couldn’t be happier.”
It was a sweet and a bit of a tear-jerking moment for the Hunter-Reays as Ryan’s wife and son were unable to be at his other victory this season at Barber Motorsports Park. So the family missed out on the photo-op to have the family pose in victory lane together.
“I felt bad because we didn’t have the pictures of him in victory lane,” Hunter-Reay said. “This is even better, to do it on Father’s Day.”
They didn’t wait long to make sure they didn’t miss out on a second chance at what will forever be a priceless family treasure.
“He’s a lot of fun,” Hunter-Reay said of his little boy. “I’m sure we’ll have a big spot for (the picture), because that’s a special win. Not that many where you get to hold your son on Father’s Day weekend in victory circle.”
Finding that perfect spot is going to be a challenge, though. The Hunter-Reay household has become quite the collection yard for toys and baby pictures.
“He’s 6 months old and has stuff all over the house and can’t even pick it up or play with it yet,” Hunter-Reay said. “There’s just stuff everywhere.
“I’m leaning on my wife to help me sort it out a little bit, get some method to the madness. But he’s a lot of fun.”
Helio Castroneves, the series points leader going into the race, finished second and retained his points lead by 16 over Hunter-Reay. Castroneves’ Penske teammate, Will Power, finished a season-best third, while EJ Viso and James Hinchcliffe rounded out the top five.
“Great result,” said Castroneves, who started 17th in the 24-car field. “Extremely excited, to be honest.”
Hunter-Reay became the first driver to win back-to-back races at the Mile since Tony Kanaan in 2006 and 2007. It was also his second victory of the season, a season where he is defending his series championship.
And it was at this very track one year ago that got Hunter-Reay going toward his first championship.
Starting at the Mile last year, Hunter-Reay won three straight races, which moved him from seventh in the points to first.
“In sports, when you get momentum, a rhythm, it’s not something you can put a price tag on or finger on, it just happens,” Hunter-Reay said. “It kind of saturates the team with this feeling that, ‘Hey, we can get it done. If we perform our best, to our potential, we can absolutely win races.’
“That carried over week in, week out. We were able to win four races, more than anybody else last year. It all started here last year.”
The last two winners at the Mile have gone on to win the championship as Dario Franchitti won the 2011 race and eventually the series championship.
Michael Andretti, Hunter-Reay’s car owner and the event promoter, saw a change in Hunter-Reay’s demeanor a year before last year’s surge.
“He needed to have races where he didn’t have mistakes,” Andretti said. “I’d say in the middle of 2011, from then on it just clicked for him. I think those are things that happen with experience. ... He just started to see the bigger picture better.”
The big picture is the championship as the series moves into the second-half of its schedule.
The series will race at Iowa Speedway on Sunday. After Castroneves and Hunter-Reay in the standings is Marco Andretti, who finished 20th Sunday, 74 laps behind Hunter-Reay because of electrical problems. Takuma Sato is fourth and Scott Dixon is fifth.
Andretti Autosport has three of its four cars in the top nine of the points standings.
“I feel good about where we are,” Michael Andretti said. “I think we’re coming up to a lot of strong tracks for us.
“Hopefully history will repeat itself.”