Newgarden Goes Back-to-back Winning 108th Indianapolis 500
The 108th Indianapolis 500 was quite the ride. Despite howling rain that sent the massive crowd beneath Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s grandstands, followed by the precision track drying, the show went on. And the delay of game? An astonishingly quick 3 hours and 59 minutes. Scheduled start was 12:45; green flew at 4:44. And less than three hours later, just as dusk began, the results were in.
The NTT INDYCAR SERIES and Indianapolis Motor Speedway put on a masterful show, and took care of their customers. There was the customary pomp of bands, parades of older Indy 500 race cars (with stars of the recent past in the driver’s seats), the singing of “Back Home Again in Indiana” and a brace of flyovers by the USAF Thunderbirds.
Even before these festivities began, Indianapolis Motor Speedway began a new tradition, giving all previous winners blue jackets that celebrated their victories in this prestigious race. And every single living winner gathered at the Yard of Bricks to celebrate this new tradition.
Unfortunately, the start wasn’t terribly clean – 11 rows of Dallara Chevrolet and Honda Indy race cars three abreast broke up at the fourth corner of the historic 2.5-mile oval – and the traffic jam of the initial lap resulted in the first of eight cautions that were relegated to the first three-quarters of the race. That this Greatest Spectacle in Racing ran clean from the 155th lap to the checkered flags at Lap 200 spoke to the proficiency of this field of 33 cars, drivers and teams.
Starting this race so late in the day, with conditions unlike those seen in any practice or qualifying, made it imperative for teams to rely on the talents of crew chiefs, strategists, engineering and driver input throughout the contest. Apparently, even though he was missing his strategist and engineer, substitutes Jonathan Diuguid and Raul Prados, respectively, served Newgarden exceptionally well and allowed him to become the first repeat winner of the Indy 500 since former teammate and four-time winner Helio Castroneves achieved the feat in 2001-2002 and the sixth to repeat in the race’s grand history.
Newgarden recognized the magnitude of what he’d achieved with these back-to-back victories. As one of the better oval runners in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES since he joined Team Penske, the Tennessee native, who started third in his team’s front-row lockout, “knew we could win this race again; it was just a matter of getting it right…there’s no better way to win a race than that (passing on the final lap)…I got to give it up to Pato (O’Ward) as well,” Newgarden stressed. “He’s an incredibly clean driver. It takes two people to make that work. It’s not just a good pass; it’s also someone that you’re working with that’s incredibly clean. He could have easily won this race, too, but it just fell our way. I’m just so proud of everybody.”
In earning his repeat win, Newgarden brought Team Penske its 20th Indy 500 victory, to go along with its 19th pole position, earned by Kiwi Scott McLaughlin a week earlier. Team Penske swept the front row for the race but was unable to sweep the podium, which went to a dejected Pato O’Ward, followed by six-time NTT INDYCAR SERIES champion Scott Dixon.
The concluding laps of the race, starting from final pit stops with less than 30 laps to go, had every fan’s eyes glued to the track, as the lead swapped between Newgarden’s Chevy-powered Dallara and Arrow McLaren teammates O’Ward and 2016 Indy 500 winner Alexander Rossi, both also racing for Chevy. The latter driver would end up in fourth place behind Honda runner Scott Dixon, with Dixon’s Chip Ganassi Racing teammate and reigning champion Alex Palou in fifth place.
Scott McLaughlin, the Team Penske pole sitter who would lead the most laps, 64, finished sixth, followed by Andretti Global’s Kyle Kirkwood (Honda), A.J. Foyt Racing’s Santino Ferrucci, Rinus Veejay from Ed Carpenter Racing and Conor Daly, competing for Dreyer & Reinbold Racing/Cusick Motorsports, the latter driver being the biggest mover of the race, coming from 29th on the grid to tenth, a massive achievement. The final three finishers in the top 10 all drive Chevrolet-powered Dallara Indy cars.
The carnage in this event was sustained primarily in single-car incidents, but the first-lap caution, where 2022 winner Marcus Ericsson, attempting to move forward from the last row in his Andretti Global Honda, came together with fellow Honda racers Pietro Fittipaldi (Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing) and Meyer Shank Racing’s rookie Tom Blomqvist in the second turn. It was Blomqvist’s hugging of the low line that initiated the pileup, needing eight laps of clean-up. The second caution flew for the sole woman entered, Katherine Legge, driving a Honda-powered car for Dale Coyne Racing, experienced mechanical failure causing a four-lap yellow for track conditions.
Even earlier, Ganassi’s rookie Marcus Armstrong, who raced all road/street courses for the team in 2023 but is now contesting the entire schedule, had a mechanical failure on the sixth lap. Honda engines seemed to lack their normal abilities to withstand these 500 miles; the change in conditions might have been the cause. The third caution flew for another Ganassi driver, rookie Linus Lundqvist, who made contact in the first turn at lap 28, while Felix Rosenqvist, who moved from Arrow McLaren to Meyer Shank Racing this season, caused the fourth caution when he crashed at the first turn on the 56th lap.
Colton Herta’s poor luck at IMS continues, as the Andretti Global driver caused the fifth yellow, crashing in the second turn to end his day on the 85th lap, while contact between Dixon and 2014 Indy 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay (DRR/Cusick) came on the 107th lap, when they made contact on the back stretch. Dixon was fortunate to continue without damage. Marco Andretti, trying to change his luck in a sole 2024 INDYCAR appearance, got a bit too optimistic on the 114th lap and crashed in the first turn, while the final caution came for 2018 Indy 500 winner and the third Team Penske entry, Will Power, whose Dallara/Chevrolet got away from him on the 147th lap and shed a good deal of debris into and out of the second turn, resulting in a long, eight-lap final caution.
In earning the 108th Indy 500 victory, Chevrolet took its 13th victory, third behind Offenhauser, with 27 wins and Honda’s 15 victories in this prestigious race.
The manner in which Newgarden won the race, passing O’Ward on the final lap – only the fourth time a last-lap pass has resulted in victory – was somewhat reminiscent of his 2023 victory, when he beat 2022 winner Marcus Ericsson to the checkered flags. And also reminiscent was the manner in which Newgarden celebrated, joining fans in the stands, this time behind the start/finish line after hugging his crew after he came to a halt on the cooldown lap. It took INDYCAR security’s insistence that he return to Victory Lane to halt Newgarden’s celebration.
As expected, O’Ward was gutted to finish these 200 laps just 0.3417 seconds behind Newgarden. Once he returned to the pits, O’Ward climbed from his seat and perched atop the cockpit of his papaya and black machine, head in hands. “We had so many near misses, but we kept the No. 5 clean for 200 laps,” O’Ward said. “It s very hard to time your moves, especially on the last lap. In hindsight, I could have gone for it. I’m sure one day it will happen, but I’m really having to work for it!”
What about Kyle Larson, the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion attempting to be the fifth driver to complete the double, racing at both Indy and in the Coca Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway? His Arrow McLaren Chevrolet had a good day; he led four laps, was in the leaders’ view for much of the race, but did have a speeding ticket in the pits, that forced the Californian to perform a 50-mph drive-through. Larson ended up in 18th place, on the lead lap. In fact, there were 21 cars on the 200th lap when Newgarden tripped the checkered flags, with Ganassi rookie Kyffin Simpson in P21. Juncos Hollinger’s Agustin Canapino, in 22nd, was the final active driver at the close of this race.
Larson, for his part, decided to make the Indy 500 his primary target on this particular Sunday and did stay to the close, which allowed Justin Allgaier the opportunity to cover for him in North Carolina. Larson definitely enjoyed his first outing in an Indy car and said, “Man, the starts were a lot of fun. I had an issue on one and lost some spots,” to wheel-spin, “but I was able to learn a lot and work my way back forward. I hate that I got that speeding penalty,” he admitted. “I think it would have been a lot of fun to battle there at the end.”
There’s no rest for the Indy cars, who alight this coming weekend in Detroit for the annual romp through those city streets with the Chevrolet Grand Prix of Detroit. Will there be yet another new winner in this young season, as it reverts to street- and road-course racing during the month of June?
By Anne Proffit