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Former IndyCar Series and Indianapolis 500 champion Dario Franchitti is returning to the circuit.
Target Chip Ganassi Racing on Tuesday announced that Franchitti will replace Dan Wheldon in the No. 10 Target Honda for the upcoming season as a team-mate for Scott Dixon.
Terms of the multi-year deal were not disclosed.
Franchitti, who left the IndyCar Series after winning the title in 2007 to drive for Ganassi in the NASCAR Sprint Cup and Nationwide series, has over 180 starts under his belt between the CART and IndyCar Series, resulting in 18 wins, 17 poles, 63 top-five and 95 top-10 finishes.

Franchitti headed back to IndyCar Series....

The Associated Press

The Indy Racing League's IndyCar Series is expanding, and more growth could occur soon.

The IRL will make its debut in Long Beach and Toronto next season.

The Grand Prix of Long Beach will be run on April 19. The 35-year-old event has hosted F1, CART and Champ Car races. This season, Champ Car ran its final event there after its merger with the IRL, but awarded the drivers IRL points. Next year, it becomes a full-fledged IRL event. The agreement is for through 2015.

The IRL will hold the Streets of Toronto race on July 12. It will make up for the loss of the Nashville event, which was dropped after efforts to negotiate an agreement for a 2009 race there failed.

2 new venues added to 2009 IndyCar schedule....

CBSSports.com wire reports

LEXINGTON, Ohio -- Ryan Briscoe never doubted The Captain's call.

That's team Penske boss Roger Penske, who came up with a surprising strategy Sunday that Briscoe turned into his second IndyCar Series victory.

"Roger, with his experience, he always finds a way to pit at the right time and get you back up to the front," said Briscoe, who drove sports cars for Penske last year before moving to the IndyCar team this season. "Today was a perfect case of that. Once we got back up there, we had the pace to run fast and pull away. It was just perfect."

Penske, the winningest team owner in open-wheel history, made the call to put Briscoe out of sequence with the other contenders. In the end, the team wound up with a 1-2 sweep in the Honda Indy 200 as Helio Castroneves followed Briscoe across the finish line.

Briscoe, Castroneves give Penske 1-2 finish in Ohio....

LEXINGTON, Ohio — That win earlier this year in Japan must seem like a long time ago to Danica Patrick.

Since her first IndyCar Series victory on April 20, Patrick has mostly struggled to be competitive. Her fifth-place finish last Saturday night at Nashville was her first top-five since Motegi. And Patrick was hoping it would be the catalyst for a big finish to the 2008 season.

"That is the kind of stuff that I would, should, could be doing every weekend," she said Friday before the first practice. "It has been a tough year for me, really. We just haven't really settled on good race cars and we have missed it in the races. We were a lot closer to it at the race at Nashville."

But, if Saturday is any indication, the Honda Indy 200 may be just more of the same struggles that she has faced so many times in the past three months.

Patrick's struggles continue with poor qualifying performance at Mid-Ohio....

By MIKE HARRIS

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. (AP) — Ryan Hunter-Reay figured the luck had to go his way eventually.

Turns out Sunday was the day.

Hunter-Reay got the opening he needed to earn his first IndyCar Series victory when Scott Dixon made an uncharacteristic mistake, ending his bid for a fourth straight victory on the road course at Watkins Glen International.

Preparing to make a run at leader Darren Manning after a long caution period, Dixon spun out under yellow and was hit from behind by contender Ryan Briscoe. That gave the runner-up spot to Hunter-Reay, who easily passed Manning on the ensuing restart and drove away with the fourth series win for Rahal Letterman Racing and first since 2004.

Dixon's mistake helps Hunter-Reay to victory....

FORT WORTH – Saturday night's Bombardier Learjet 550 ended with the cars coasting around Texas Motor Speedway at less than 90 mph.

That's a crawl for cars that reach speeds of 220 mph. What a downer.

Scott Dixon, the IndyCar Series' dominant driver, won his third race of the season. He was the fifth polesitter to win in 19 IndyCar races at TMS.

But he won it as the yellow and checkered flags waved together. Some fans were already leaving before Dixon crossed the finish line. It's the second time in a week that a late crash has forced an IndyCar Series race to end under caution.

That should not happen.

MORE....