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It’s SIMON!!
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The racing gods stepped in today and gave us gorgeous weather to run the 103rd Indianapolis 500 and then also stepped in to produce a 15-lap shootout at the end of the race that erased all fuel strategies and left the whole contest up to one of a matter of speed and guts and when it was over Simon Pagenaud for Team Penske had his first Indy 500 WIN.
Pagenaud led the most laps of anyone - 116 - taking off from pole and keeping the lead through almost all the pit cycles to end up in an epic 15-lap battle with Alexander Rossi for Andretti Autosport, following a lap 118 shunt involving Graham Rahal for Rahal Letterman Lanigan and Sebastien Bourdais for Dale Coyne w/ Vasser Sullivan that also collected Zach Veach for Andretti, Felix Rosenqvist for Chip Ganassi and Charlie Kimball for Carlin, while damaging Scott Dixon for Chip Ganassi.
The race was red-flagged to clean up the debris and when it was restarted the lead would go from Rossi to Pagenaud to Rossi and finally back to Pagenaud with 1 lap to go, and the Frenchman crossed the line 0.21 seconds ahead of the Californian, with Takuma Sato for RLL lurking in P3 to pounce on any mistake by the leaders.
Another great Indy 500 with an extremely satisfying finish!
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P2 Alexander Rossi (left) and P3 Takuma Sato
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Notable:
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This was Simon’s month. He WON the Grand Prix of Indianapolis in the rain, WON his first Indy 500 pole and the WON the Indy 500. (His best previous finish was a P6). Almost immediately after the race Roger Penske announced that Pagenaud would be returning as a team Penske driver in 2020.
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This was Team Penske’s 18th WIN as a team and the 2nd in a row, following Will Power’s WIN, last year. Of the 4 Penske drivers in the race, only Josef Newgarden has yet to get on the Borg Warner Trophy.
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Best rookie was Santino Ferrucci for Dale Coyne, who finished P7 from his P23 start. He was impressive all day, and especially when he avoided the big shunt by going across the grass and onto the warm-up lane.
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Biggest mover was James Hinchcliffe for Arrow Schmidt Peterson who went from P32 to P11. His threading the needle at high speed through the last wreck was even more scary and impressive than Santino’s lawn-mowing.
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Best recovery was James Davison for Dale Coyne Racing w/ Byrd, Hollinger, Belardi, who was punted by Helio Castroneves for Team Penske in the pit lane and spun around, losing two laps. He would recover to P12 on the lead lap by the end of the race.
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left to right, Santino Ferrucci, James Hinchcliffe and James Davison
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With this result, here are the TOP FIVE in points leaving Indianapolis:
1 - Simon Pagenaud 250
2 - Josef Newgarden 249
3 - Alexander Rossi 228
4 - Takuma Sato 203
4 - Scott Dixon 203
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The next races will be the double-header in Detroit on Belle Isle, next weekend, May 31- June 2.
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