The 2004 Indy Racing League season featured the close competition, which has become synonymous with the league's competition and saw two Brazilians come away with series titles.
Tony Kanaan capped one of the most dominating seasons in IRL
IndyCar Series history by claiming the 2004
IndyCar Series championship with one race to go at California.
Thiago Medeiros rewrote the IRL Menards Infiniti Pro Series record book, scoring six victories and winning the championship by a 134-point margin.
Kanaan became the first driver in any major American racing series to complete every possible lap (3,305 or 3,305) in competition and won his first
IndyCar Series title.
Following an eighth-place finish in the season opener at Homestead, Kanaan never finished outside the top five and recorded three victories. Kanaan's title was the first for Andretti Green Racing and its ownership group of Michael Andretti, Kim Green and Kevin Savoree.
The stage for Medeiros's record championship season in 2004 was set in 2003.
Medeiros, whose first win in the series came in the 2003 season finale, liked winning so much, he won six of 12 races in 2004 for Sam Schmidt Motorsports, including a league-record four in a row, to stake his claim to the championship.
The Brazilian won the first of eight pole positions at Phoenix, where he became the first driver in IRL history to lap the field. He followed with consecutive victories at
Indianapolis, Kansas and Nashville. Medeiros returned to Victory Circle at two of the final three races of the season, including the finale at Texas.
Medeiros led a series-record 588 laps, including 249 consecutive laps in a four-race stretch. He finished in the top 10 in all 12 races and in the top-five in nine in claiming Schmidt's first championship as a car owner.
