TORONTO'S JACKHAMMER JUDO EXPRESS

Last weekend's Verizon IndyCar Series race was contested by 22 car and driver combinations, but a menacing 23rd opponent was present throughout the 85-lap event. The 1.7-mile street course near the waterfront in Toronto just celebrated its 30th anniversary, and with 30 seasons of snow-filled winters and steamy summers steadily warping the track surface, it has become the most punishing circuit on the calendar.

IndyCar driver-turned-commentator Paul Tracy likened the experience of lapping Toronto to riding a jackhammer. In some corners, drivers looked like they were either being hip-tossed in a judo match, and in the waviest braking zones, their heads looked like speed bags being pummeled by a boxer. Drivers were expected to race hard for almost two hours and hit their marks with great precision, all while overcoming the rolling earthquake taking place beneath their cars.

Despite those expectations, plenty of crashes took place in the race, and contact—from glancing blows to massive hits—were recorded in every session leading up to the Honda Indy Toronto feature.

Race day was particularly ugly for IndyCar rookie Conor Daly who battered the wall in morning warmup after he rode over a round cement curb placed at the apex of a corner. If there's a positive to be found, he wasn't the only one to experience the bounce-and-crash scenario...

The force of the contact with the curb torqued his arm in a violent whipping motion, ripped the steering wheel from his impressively strong hands, and left a problem behind within his shoulder socket. Daly then went into the race with an undiagnosed injury that was only confirmed after the checkered flag.

Courtesy IndyCar

"I threw my shoulder out when the wheel ripped out of my hands and I crashed in morning warmup!" the Hoosier told RoadandTrack.com. "It was so violent, and it caused some kind of inappropriate movement for my shoulder when it happened. I was pretty sore before the race, could barely move my right shoulder, and my right thumb was bloody.

"It's just tough on your hands because every braking zone has so many bumps it tries to shake the wheel out of your hands and you're holding on for dear life. The curbing can also take the wheel out of your hands…the only smooth places are when you're going straight between Turn 2 and 3 because they repaved it. The front straight hasn't been touched so it has its violent moments."

Daly has three days of downtime for his shoulder to heal before he's back in the No. 18 Dale Coyne Racing Honda Indy car for a test at the exhausting (but smooth) Mid-Ohio road course on Thursday. Considering the physical toll the 24-year-old faced in Toronto on Sunday, fighting to turn a car producing 5200 pounds of downforce around Mid-Ohio's sweeping corners sounds like more punishment than pleasure.

"It's a real physical challenge, but it's like that at every race," he said. "I wish I had more time to recover after Toronto, but you just have to suck it up. The veterans are used to the physical toll and they know how to train specifically to prepare for it. For me, in my first year, it's a learning process to get to the same place the veterans are at, but that's why we train so hard. Even the top guys say they struggle sometimes to reach that perfect place, and that says something about how hard it is to drive these cars. They beat you up, man, but that's part of the challenge. I don't think it will ever be easy, which I like."

DARIO 2.0

Courtesy Haas F1

We have another Dario Franchitti situation on our hands. It took far too long for Scotland's three-time Indy 500 winner to be recognized as something other than Italian, and like a baton being passed from one generation to the next, the same journey of mistaken nationality has just started for 18-year-old Santino Ferrucci.

Haas Formula 1's development driver certainly looks the part of a young Italian Grand Prix hopeful; the pint-size stature and curly locks help to sell the stereotype, but Ferrucci is actually a product of Woodbury, Connecticut. Yes, America's F1 team has an American teenager within its ranks, and he got his first taste of the Ferrari-powered Haas VF-16 last week during a two-day test at Silverstone.

"It was a great day and we achieved a lot for the team," Santino said. "We started with pit stop practices and everything went really well. I was then able to concentrate on some performance runs this afternoon. I had a lot of confidence in the car to really push the limits. Physically I felt good and the more laps I ran, the better I was feeling."

Ferrucci logged 388 miles of testing with the Haas team and covered enough distance to qualify for an FIA super license, which would be required if he graduates to race in F1. The karting phenom has focused his energies moving up the European open-wheel ladder since 2014, and currently competes in the GP3 series where American F1 hopefuls Conor Daly, Josef Newgarden, and Alexander Rossi trained in recent years.

"It's good to know I prepared well to be able to hop into the Formula 1 car from my GP3 car," he added. "Everything I've learned here will help me in the GP3 Series. The last couple of days have been a phenomenal experience. I couldn't be happier."

Haas F1 team principal Guenther Steiner had nothing but praise for the 'lil 'Murrican after his F1 testing debut.

"The last two days have been very worthwhile for us," he said. "It was a good job by Santino. He did more than we expected him to do. He only recently turned 18, and these cars aren't easy to drive, but he was well prepared. Everybody on the team has been impressed with him."

If he continues to progress at his current rate, Ferrucci could have more in common with Franchitti's lofty driving achievements than a simple disconnect between their names and nationalities.

On another related note, it also doesn't hurt that Franchitti and Ferrucci share the same manager and the retired IndyCar champion has mentored Santino on the road to F1…

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