INDIANAPOLIS – Beyond the top five and the couple other stories of note for drivers that ran in the top five yesterday (Tony Kanaan, Simon Pagenaud), here are a few other results of note at the end of Sunday’s 99th Indianapolis 500:
- Marco Andretti ended sixth in the No. 27 Snapple Honda, for his seventh Indianapolis 500 top-10 finish in 10 starts. It led the five-car Andretti Autosport contingent on a tough day; teammates Ryan Hunter-Reay, Simona de Silvestro, Carlos Munoz and Justin Wilson ended 15th, 19th, 20th, and 21st, with the latter two coming up short on a late-race fuel gamble. Said Andretti, “It was a frustrating 500 miles, we lost some track position in the pits and I lost some more out on the track. It was just a hard fight to keep the car balanced, let alone try to win.”
- JR Hildebrand ended eighth to lead the one-off drivers, in the No. 6 Preferred Freezer CFH Racing Chevrolet. Hildebrand ebbed and flowed between sixth and 17th after starting 10th. “I, along with a lot of other guys, was just hanging on for the first couple of stints. We had some dicing around in the pits, the stops kind of went both ways for us as we got through the race,” he said.
- Hildebrand’s teammate Josef Newgarden ended ninth, for his best Indianapolis 500 result. Charlie Kimball (third) and Takuma Sato (13th) also either set or equaled their best ‘500 result.
- Gabby Chaves ran as high as 10th and ended 16th to be top rookie (of two) in the field. A further post on him will come later this week.
- The other one-off or month-of-May only results: Ryan Briscoe 12th, Townsend Bell 14th, Alex Tagliani 17th, de Silvestro 19th, Wilson 21st, Pippa Mann 22nd, Sebastian Saavedra 23rd, James Davison 27th, Tristan Vautier 28th, Bryan Clauson 31st and Conor Daly 33rd.
- Daly is the first race starter to retire from a mechanical failure before the green flag since, ironically, his team owner Sam Schmidt (blown engine) and Alessandro Zampedri (oil leak) in the 35-car, rain-delayed 1997 Indianapolis 500 (race also featured an accident involving Affonso Giaffone, Stephane Gregoire and Kenny Brack before the green flag).
- Meanwhile Sage Karam is the first driver to retire on the first lap from an accident since Davey Hamilton in 2010. Karam’s wreck was more reminiscent of the Mario Moraes/Marco Andretti crash exiting Turn 1 a year earlier, in 2009.