INDIANAPOLIS – Scott Dixon, the 2008 Indianapolis 500 winner, led nearly every session of practice and qualifying ahead of the 105th running.
Sunday was different.
The pole-sitter and betting favorite ran into trouble on his first pit stop and never fully recovered Sunday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Dixon played strategy from the start, giving up the lead from the pole on the first lap to settle in for most of the first run. But when Stefan Wilson crashed in the pits on his first stop after 33 laps, Dixon was stuck.
Two laps later he and a handful of others had to come into a closed pit lane for emergency service. His engine stalled and his team struggled to get it to refire, costing Dixon a lap. He got back on the lead lap but never contended again and ended up 17th.
“This place is tricky,” said Dixon, the runner-up last year and six-time and defending IndyCar Series champion. “It’s frustrating how it just came so early. You knew from that point, once you were a lap down, your day’s pretty much shot. I’ve had a long time to calm down. I had a lot of laps to just cruise around.”
The same problem befell Alexander Rossi, the 2016 winner and another favorite. He never managed to get back on the lead lap and finished 29th.
Problems in the pits
Graham Rahal also lost his chance to win in the pits, but his own crew was to blame.
Rahal spun and crashed hard in Turn 2 after a tire changer failed to get the left rear wheel properly attached when he pitted after 118 laps. Rahal had led eight laps and had been in front when he stopped.
“We had the fuel saving we were doing. We were in the perfect spot. We were cruising,” said Rahal, son of 1989 Indy winner Bobby Rahal. He finished 32nd.
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“We were going to … I keep using the word ‘going to’ and that’s the right word. … We got where we needed to be. We had them today.”
The accident occurred directly in front of the other leaders. Conor Daly punted the wheel as it bounded across the track, but it did not hit anyone else.
‘A tire just fell from the sky’
Although Daly’s chance to win was ruined by the wheel, he came out better than he might have. The aero screen added last season above the cockpit ensured debris wouldn’t hit his head. The wheel also didn’t break the car’s suspension, so he was able to salvage 13th.
“I thought we had avoided everything and I was like all right, this is great,” Daly said. “And literally out of nowhere, it was like a tire just fell from the sky. And we have that little visor strip with the aero screen. It’s like you can’t necessarily see all the way up in the sky, but you don’t think you really need to see that high. And like right at the last second, it was just like boom.”
Daly had led a race-high 40 laps, more than in any of his previous 69 IndyCar races.
Thinking championship
With Alex Palou’s runner-up finish and Dixon’s trouble, Palou leapfrogged his Chip Ganassi Racing teammate to lead the NTT IndyCar Series standings. Through six of 17 races, he is up, 248-212.
The series is scheduled for a doubleheader in Detroit on June 12-13 before racing at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, on June 20.
It’s a new track record
Not only was history made when Helio Castroneves became Indy’s fourth four-time winner Sunday, he won it in the fastest time.
His average speed of 190.692 mph broke the mark of 187.433 set by Tony Kanaan in 2013.
The race had just two cautions, for the Wilson crash and the Rahal crash, totaling 18 laps. Although Will Power and Simona De Silvestro both spun in the pits, neither hit anything or necessitated a yellow flag.
The Link LonkMay 31, 2021 at 08:07AM
https://www.jsonline.com/story/sports/motor/2021/05/30/scott-dixon-slowed-indianapolis-500-graham-rahal-loses-wheel/7473218002/
Two contenders get stuck, a tire falls from the sky and more from the 105th Indy 500 - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
https://news.google.com/search?q=Wheel&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
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