A battle until the end

The 103rd edition of Indianapolis 500 had a dry but overcast start, with a risk of rain later in the day.

It was as classic as it could be, keeping it true to the traditions such as National Anthem, prayers and memorial ceremonies.

Simon Pagenaud started from Pole Position, while Ed Carpenter and Spencer Pigot were the two others in the first row. Ed Jones, Colton Herta and Will Power were in he second row, followed by Sebastien Bourdais, Josef Newgarden and Alexander Rossi in the third row.

The start went well, where Power drove past Pigot right away in Turn 2.

Colton Herta pitted unfortunately on the fourth lap due to technical problems with the gearbox. He didn’t make it to the pits, so the first Safety Car of the day was deployed.

Marco Andretti quickly changed over to an alternative strategy by pitting early.

Will Power was fast when the race got restarted and took second place. So it was Penske 1-2.

James Davison had a good start from P15 and was quickly up to ninth place.

Pagenaud was the first of the leading cars to pit after 30 laps, and gradually followed by the rest of the field.

There was panic when James Davison pitted for the first time. When he was about to get into his area, he was hit from behind by Helio Castroneves, so Davison crashed into one of his new tires and it flew through the pits. Luckily it didn’t hit anyone, but Davison lost a lot of time since his mechanics had to turn his car to the right direction before they could start doing the pitstop. Castroneves got a Drive-through for the incident.

56 laps into the race, Ben Hanley was in trouble when he suddenly lost speed on the track. He pitted and the mechanics changed his tires and refuelled as usual, but when he was about to go again it was clear for everyone – including the team – that his right drive shaft was broken and thus he was out of the race.

Will Power had a little incident during his second stop, where the air hose for the right front tire went under the car. Luckily it wasn’t stuck so the mechanic could throw it back over the wall like he should.

Jordan King was really unlucky in his second stop. He didn’t turn when he should and hit the mechani on the right front tire. The mechanic had to be carried from the spot, so we wish him a speedy recovery and hope the injury isn’t serious.

Kyle Kaiser was the first person to end up in the wall when he got overtaken by Sage Karam, and went a bit too wide. He did a 360 degree spin to start with, but then lost control of the car and drove into the wall. It deployed the second FCY of the day. But it was a shame for Juncos Racing team, who also had an accident in the practice last week and went to race with a reserve car. But still they qualified for the race and got a bunch of new sponsors since two of their big sponsors went away at the start of May.

Power was ordered to be at the back of the field for his earlier air hose problem, since you’re not allowed to hit the any pit equipment or mechanics.

Ed Carpenter was fast when the race got restarted and came up to second place, right after Simon Pagenaud.

Scott Dixon slowly but surely climbed up to eighth place after starting from P18. Ryan Hunter-Reay had a similar progress from P22 to P11.

Tony Kanaan and Santino Ferrucci drove side by side out of the pits, in a battle where Ferrucci won.

Alexander Rossi had a really good speed in his car after the third pitstop. He came up right behind Pagenaud and started to challenge him for the lead.

Marcus Ericsson did a good job as the best Rookie in eighth place after 120 laps – ahead of another Rookie, Santino Ferrucci.

138 laps into the race there was another drama in the pits, when Marcus Ericsson spun around in the pit entry. It looked like the rear wheels were locked and it sent him to the wall. He was out of the race and it caused another FCY period.

At the same time, Alexander Rossi had a horrible pitstop, where the mechanics couldn’t put the refuelling probe in place. They tried and tried but just couldn’t get it to refuel, until the very last second. Hence he dropped down to sixth place, with a lot of cars in front of him. Naturally, he was very frustrated and hitting the steering wheel with his hands a few times.

The race was restarted with 51 laps left, where Pagenaud was still leading, while Newgarden was second and Carpenter third.

Two laps later, Newgarden went to take the lead – but Pagenaud also had fuel enough for six laps less than Newgarden, so it was necessary for the Frenchman to save fuel, if he wanted to finish with only one more pitstop.

Conor Daly had a really good speed and slowly but surely climbed up to fourth place, after he overtook Bourdais.

Rossi fought back up through the field and quickly caught up with the leading group.

Pagenaud pitted with 31 laps left. It was clear that he was pushing it to the finish, if the race would continue to be green all the way to 200 laps. Rossi pitted one lap after, didn’t want to be caught behind a possible Safety Car.

Newgarden went to save fuel and that was one of the reasons why Ed Carpenter went to the front, two corners before Newgarden pitted for the last time.

When everyone in the leading group had done their last pistop, the running order was Pagenaud, Rossi, Carpenter and Newgarden. However, Pagenaud was already in fuel-saving mode, so he went from leading with a couple of seconds to just a few thousandth – until Rossi took the lead.

With 24 laps left there was yet another Safety Car, when Sebastien Bourdais and Graham Rahal had a contact on the way into Turn 3, and hit the wall hard. Rahal was really upset with the Frenchman for squeezing him over the grass. In the confusion, Zach Veach, Felix Rosenqvist and Charlie Kimball had a spin. While Kimball could continue, it was over for Bourdais, Rahal, Veach and Rosenqvist – but fortunately all of them were okay.

The race got redflagged with 19 laps left, in order to clean the cars and debris.

After about 20 minutes of red flag, the race got restarted with seven laps behind the Safety Car.

Scott Dixon pitted to get his car repaired, but he had a big damage on the bottom of the car, so he was out of this year’s battle for the win.

When the race was given green, Pagenaud took the lead right away. It only lasted for one lap before Rossi snatched it back.

Takuma Sato was up to fourth after overtaking Ed Carpenter.

Pagenaud retook the lead with ten laps left – while Sato went to P3 shortly afterwards. Then it went a bit quiet, before the last few laps.

Rossi took over the lead with three laps left. He held it for one and a half laps, before Pagenaud drove past him and kept it all the way to the finish.

Simon Pagenaud wins Indy 500 2019, ahead of Alexander Rossi, Takuma Sato, Josef Newgarden, Will Power, Ed Carpenter, Santino Ferrucci, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Tony Kanaan and Conor Daly.

NTT IndyCar Series already runs again next weekend, where there will be two races in Detroit.