Emotions were running high

INDIANAPOLIS - There was plenty of rancor to go around at Andretti Green Racing in the aftermath of yesterday's 92d running of the Indianapolis 500. Tony Kanaan was sore with AGR teammate Marco Andretti. And Danica Patrick was positively peeved at Penske Racing rookie Ryan Briscoe.

When AGR's garage doors were drawn shut, you could probably hear the shouting in Gasoline Alley over the cheers for Scott Dixon's victory.

Kanaan took issue with Andretti for undercutting him as they entered Turn 3 of Lap 106. Kanaan was forced to back off and washed up into the marbles, causing him to spin out in front of the oncoming car of Sarah Fisher, who speared Kanaan's car.

Kanaan, who led 11 laps midway through the race, wound up finishing 29th while Andretti went on to finish third, marking his second top-three result after his runner-up finish as a rookie in 2006.

"It was a stupid move," said Kanaan of Andretti's dive-bomb maneuver in Turn 3. "I think teammates shouldn't do that to teammates. I'm sure he'll have an explanation for what he did. Halfway through the race with a bunch of traffic, why are you going to dive into me like that? I will wait to see what he has to say."

Told afterward that Kanaan called his move "stupid," a contrite Andretti responded, saying, "I don't know, maybe it was a bit last-minute, but I don't know about 'stupid move.' You know, maybe he didn't expect it to be coming, I'll put it that way. But, you know, we didn't touch. I really didn't take his air away, it was just a last-minute thing."

Meanwhile, Patrick was left fuming at Briscoe when he clipped Patrick's car as they exited pit road on Lap 171, knocking her out of contention. Patrick climbed out of her car, ripped off her gloves, and began to stomp off in the direction of Briscoe's pit box before an unidentified Indy Racing League official corralled her and helped her to cool down.

Asked what she intended to say to Briscoe, Patrick said, "It is probably best I didn't get down there anyway, isn't it?"

Patrick had struggled all day to wring some speed out of her car, at one point complaining to her crew over the radio "I am slow! I . . . am . . . sloooow," before she finally began to charge her way to the front - getting up to seventh before the pit-road incident ended her day.

"But from what I can tell it seemed like it was relatively obvious what happened," she said. "You just don't come out of your pit box and swing three lanes out. That's why there is a 'get-up-to-speed' lane and an 'at-speed' lane. I was at speed."

Said Briscoe, "It's a real shame. I just saw the replay, and it confirmed my thoughts. We were both out there trying to win the Indy 500 today, and when it's time to go, we have to go. But from what I can see, there was still plenty of room on the right side for her to get around and there are people pointing fingers, but that's not the way we are."

Young Rahal hits wall

Graham Rahal, the 19-year-old son of 1986 winner Bobby Rahal and the youngest driver in the race, wound up the first to retire when he tagged the wall as he exited Turn 4 on Lap 37. Rahal, who finished 33d and last in his Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing car, blamed his accident on one of his father's drivers, rookie Alex Lloyd, who wound up crashing out of the race on Lap 153. "Lloyd was really slow and I was trying to be patient there because [Mario] Moraes kept coming down on me," Rahal said. "So finally I got the opportunity to get by those few guys, and I thought our car was pretty good. Lloyd, for some reason, wouldn't stay right on the bottom and when he came up just a couple of feet, I reacted slightly and just got in the marbles." . . . A.J. Foyt IV, who celebrated his 24th birthday yesterday, finished 20 laps down in 21st after he was forced to limp around the track in a car that was crippled by a pit fire on Lap 39 and later returned to the race. "It was a terrible race, a miserable race," Foyt said. "One of the worst of my life. You don't learn nothing trying to stay out of everybody's way, and that's the worst way in the world to race." . . . Ed Carpenter, Foyt's teammate at Vision Racing and stepson of team owner Tony George, the IRL's founder and CEO, had a decidedly better day after recording a career-best fifth place. His previous best in the 500 was 11th-place finishes in 2005 and 2006. "To be in the top five at Indianapolis is a great feeling," Carpenter said. "Happy for all the people that make it happen for us. My Mom and Tony for giving me the opportunity to show everyone that I do belong at this stage, and really I think we're going to get Vision Racing our first win this year." . . . Jeff Simmons, the 1998 Boston College graduate from East Granby, Conn., wound up 28th after starting 24th when his Foyt Racing car snapped around on Lap 114 under caution and struck the outside wall on the frontstretch. "I was trying to get the tires warm for the restart," he said. "I think it just hooked up, and I went into the wall."

Michael Vega can be reached at vega@globe.com.