Texas Hold ‘Em: Sam Hornish Streaks to Victory in Texas - Sam Hornish Junior loves the jet-fast high banks of the 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway. He’s won here in 2001 and 2002, was second in 2005, third in 2001 (another Texas round), and was fourth in 2004 and 2006. Hornish made himself at home again in Texas on Saturday night, June 9, 2007, by speeding away from the Andretti Green Racing duo of Tony Kanaan and Danica Patrick to win the Bombardier Learjet 550k.

“It’s been unbelievable,” Hornish said. “If you would have told me 10 years ago that I would ever win 19 IndyCar races in my career, I would have told you that you were crazy. I’m really thankful that I’ve been given so much. Sometimes I don’t think I deserve it, but for whatever reason I feel like I’ve been blessed.”

Hornish’s third win at Texas Motor Speedway did not come without drama, however. While he firmly controlled the race —leading 159 of 228 laps — on lap 198, teammate Helio Castroneves was caught up in a multi-car yard sale of a crash, bringing out the caution flag. Maintaining a nine second lead over Tony Kanaan at the time, when the race went yellow, Hornish knew the situation would allow the Andretti Green another shot at the win.

Said Hornish: “I was pretty upset at lap 200 when the yellow came out and I knew Tony was going to have a shot to catch back up to me when I had a nine-second lead,”

But there was no need to worry. When the race went back to green, Hornish and his number sic Team Penske Honda/Dallara raced away, finishing 0.0786 second ahead of Kanaan and his Andretti Green Racing teammate, Danica Patrick. The third place finish was the best of Patrick’s career.

“With two laps to go, Sam’s car became a little wide, which is perfectly fine,” Kanaan said after the race. “He didn’t do anything that was not in the rules, and then Danica started to understeer because Sam and I started to run too wide. I couldn’t get close to Sam and she couldn’t get close to me.”

And so it was: Hornish first, Kanaan second and Patrick third. Dario Franchitti finished fourth, keeping his 2007 IndyCar Series points lead with seven races of the series now in the record books.

The 2007 IndyCar Series will fire back up on June 24, where it will visit the futuristic Iowa Speedway for the first time in history.