VisitFlorida.com Racing survives wet weather for Watkins Glen win - MotorSportsTalk

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. – The No. 90 VisitFlorida.com Racing pairing of Richard Westbrook and Michael Valiante won their second race of the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship season, Sunday’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen held in primarily wet and frequently changing conditions.

Westbrook took the lead in the final 15 minutes when Joey Hand made a final splash for fuel in the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Riley-Ford, which took the car he and Scott Pruett shared out of the lead.

“We had plenty in the tank actually,” Westbrook said. “When Michael pitted the last time when he came in under his own, I knew we’d be in good shape and that was it until the end.

“It was super fun out there, especially when it was raining out there and we were on slicks. I think the officials did a great job today, with the red flagging and the standing water. They made some great tough calls today.”

It dropped that pairing down to second, while Action Express Racing finished third overall with the No. 5 Corvette DP of Joao Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi.

Hand survived a near miss when Ricky Taylor spun the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP on the wet track exiting Turn 10 in the final hour, then smacked a barrier. There was slight damage to the Riley-Ford but not enough to take it out of contention.

Fuel mileage was also a storyline in the GT Le Mans class, with the No. 17 Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR car making it home on fumes to score an emotional first victory of the year.

The win, achieved by Bryan Sellers and Wolf Henzler, occurs in the first race since it was announced in mid-May that Falken would be withdrawing its support of the Walker Racing program at year’s end. It leaves all in a position knowing they’ll have to find new work at the end of the year.

Starworks Motorsport (Prototype Challenge, Renger van der Zande, Mike Hedlund, Alex Popow) and Riley Motorsports (GT Daytona, Al Carter, Cameron Lawrence, Marc Goossens) won the other two classes.

All except GTD will be in action at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in two weeks, while GTD returns with PC at Lime Rock Park at the end of July.

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INDIANAPOLIS — The first Indy 500 victory for Josef Newgarden also was the richest in race history from a record 2023 purse of just more than $17 million.

The two-time NTT IndyCar Series champion, who continued his celebration Monday morning at Indianapolis Motor Speedway earned $3.666 million for winning the 107th running of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

The purse and winner’s share both are the largest in the history of the Indianapolis 500.

It’s the second consecutive year that the Indy 500 purse set a record after the 2022 Indy 500 became the first to crack the $16 million mark (nearly doubling the 2021 purse that offered a purse of $8,854,565 after a crowd limited to 135,000 because of the COVID-19 pandemic).

The average payout for IndyCar drivers was $500,600 (exceeding last year’s average of $485,000).

Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Roger Penske, whose team also fields Newgarden’s No. 2 Dallara-Chevrolet, had made raising purses a priority since buying the track in 2020. But Penske but was unable to post big money purses until the race returned to full capacity grandstands last year.

The largest Indy 500 purse before this year was $14.4 million for the 2008 Indy 500 won by Scott Dixon (whose share was $2,988,065). Ericsson’s haul made him the second Indy 500 winner to top $3 million (2009 winner Helio Castroneves won $3,048,005.

Runner-up Marcus Ericsson won $1.043 million after falling short by 0.0974 seconds in the fourth-closest finish in Indy 500 history.

The 107th Indy 500 drew a crowd of at least 330,000 that was the largest since the sellout for the 100th running in 2016, and the second-largest in more than two decades, according to track officials.

“This is the greatest race in the world, and it was an especially monumental Month of May featuring packed grandstands and intense on-track action,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said in a release. “Now, we have the best end card possible for the 107th Running of the Indianapolis 500: a record-breaking purse for the history books.”

Benjamin Pedersen was named the Indy 500 rookie of the year, earning a $50,000 bonus.

The race’s purse is determined through contingency and special awards from IMS and IndyCar. The awards were presented Monday night in the annual Indy 500 Victory Celebration at the JW Marriott in downtown Indianapolis.

The payouts for the 107th Indy 500:

1. Josef Newgarden, $3,666,000
2. Marcus Ericsson, $1,043,000
3. Santino Ferrucci, $481,800
4. Alex Palou, $801,500
5. Alexander Rossi, $574,000
6. Scott Dixon, $582,000
7. Takuma Sato, $217,300
8. Conor Daly, $512,000
9. Colton Herta, $506,500
10. Rinus VeeKay, $556,500
11. Ryan Hunter‐Reay, $145,500
12. Callum Ilott, $495,500
13. Devlin DeFrancesco, $482,000
14. Scott McLaughlin, $485,000
15. Helio Castroneves, $481,500
16. Tony Kanaan, $105,000
17. Marco Andretti, $102,000
18. Jack Harvey, $472,000
19. Christian Lundgaard, $467,500
20. Ed Carpenter, $102,000
21. Benjamin Pedersen (R), $215,300
22. Graham Rahal, $565,500*
23. Will Power, $488,000
24. Pato O’Ward, $516,500
25. Simon Pagenaud, $465,500
26. Agustín Canapino (R), $156,300
27. Felix Rosenqvist, $278,300
28. Kyle Kirkwood, $465,500
29. David Malukas, $462,000
30. Romain Grosjean, $462,000
31. Sting Ray Robb (R), $463,000
32. RC Enerson (R), $103,000
33. Katherine Legge, $102,000

*–Broken down between two teams, $460,000 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, $105,500 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing/Cusick Motorsports