IndyCar
Helio Castroneves wins a record-tying fourth Indianapolis 500 mile race
INDIANAPOLIS, IN (Pittsburgh Racing Now) – Helio Castroneves is joining elite company after winning a record-tying fourth Indianapolis 500 mile race Sunday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Castroneves passed Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou for the lead for good with two laps-to-go and took the twin checkered flags first to join A.J. Foyt, Al Unser Sr. and Rick Mears as the only 4-time winners of ‘The Greatest Spectacle In Racing’.
“This is absolutely incredible,” said Castroneves. “From the beginning we were so comfortable. The car was incredible. I knew it was good. This is unbelievable.”
Castroneves other victories came in 2001, 2002 and 2009 when he drove for Team Penske. Sunday’s victory came driving for Meyer Shank Racing and was that organizations first NTT INDYCAR SERIES victory.
Castroneves and Palou started trading the lead back and forth with 17-laps remaining after most of the front runners made their final pit stops. Palou passed Castroneves on the front stretch with three laps-to-go and Castroneves tucked right behind Palou and followed him through turns one and two and then down the backstretch before pulling the same move on Palou.
Castroneves benefitted from a number of cars who were trying to make it to the end without pitting when he hit the backstretch on the final lap. Castroneves smartly used the draft from those cars to maintain his gap ahead of Palou, who tried to draft Castroneves but the gap was too great at that point.
“My strong corners were two and four and it was just a matter of the right opportunity,” said Castroneves. “I saw that traffic, because I needed that traffic to get away, so I decided I wasn’t going to wait.”
“It just hurts a little bit because I wanted this win really bad,” said Palou. “For sure the traffic didn’t help. I was doing everything I was doing to catch him but he was catching the tow from the traffic and I was not able to close up.
Palou may not have won but since the Indy 500 pays ‘double points’ towards the series championship he did take over the series points lead, so he while he was disappointed he couldn’t win, Palou was positive after the race.
“I’m living a dream driving a fast car for the best team in the paddock,” said Palou. “I’m super proud of what we’ve been doing but we’ve got to keep working.”
Team Penske’s Simon Pagenaud finished third in the No. 22 Menards Chevrolet with Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward in fourth.
“We got caught up on the first yellow and had to make an ’emergency pit stop’ and got sent back to the back of the field,” explained Pagenaud. “We had to fight back over 156-laps and I really think we had a car that could’ve won.”
Pagenaud said that prior to the race he told Castroneves if he couldn’t win the race, he wanted Helio to get his fourth.
“It’s great that we have a guy from our generation (Castroneves) going into the 4-club,” said Pagenaud referring to the 4-time Indy 500 winners. “I hope he comes back to go for five!”
Stefan Wilson brought out the first caution flag of the race when he spun entering pit road during the first round of pit stops and struck the wall ending his day.
The closure of the pits to clean up the Wilson accident cost pole-sitter Scott Dixon and Andretti Autosport’s Alexander Rossi dearly. The pair had yet to pit and were low on fuel and eventually ran out on pit road while making an ’emergency pit stop’. Both cars had to be re-fired and ended up losing a lap in the process.
Dixon got his lap back a little over halfway through the race and battled for an 18th place finish but ended up losing the series points lead in the process. Dixon sits in second place, one point ahead of third-place O’Ward.
The next race for the NTT INDYCAR SERIES is the ‘Duel in Detroit’ on Belle Isle, June 12-13, in Detroit.
INDIANAPOLIS, IN (April 24, 2024) Scott Dixon and the No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing team are leading the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Championship standings after Team Penske was penalized for violating the series ‘push-to-pass’ parameters.
INDYCAR disqualified Josef Newgarden’s win and Scott McLaughlin’s third place finish in the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg and docked Will Power 10-Championship points for the infractions.
Dixon’s epic win in this past Sunday’s Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach vaulted him into second position in the Championship standings, 12-points behind Newgarden. That changed following Wednesday’s penalties.
Dixon now holds a 2-point lead over Andretti Global’s Colton Herta and a 12-point lead over teammate and reigning INDYCAR Champion Alex Palou.
Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward sits in fourth position, 15-points back, following his elevation to winner at St. Pete. Power sits in fifth position, 20-points behind Dixon despite the 10-point reduction.
Dixon heads into this weekend’s Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix powered by AmFirst at Barber Motorsports Park having never won at the picturesque 2.3-mile, 17-turn road course in Birmingham Alabama.
“Barber has been interesting,” said Dixon, a six-time series Champion. “Second six times. Never won there. The goal was always to try and step on the top step again.”
Dixon is hoping a recent test will help him park the No. 9 Honda in victory lane.
“We had a really good test at Barber,” added Dixon. “Only probably half of the grid did, so it will be interesting to see how that applies.”
The first 75-minute practice session gets underway on Friday from 2:40 p.m. to 3:55 p.m. and will be live-streamed on Peacock.
McLaughlin is the defending race winner.
INDIANAPOLIS, IN (April 24, 2024) Team Penske is in hot water for violating NTT INDYCAR SERIES rules regarding push-to-pass and Josef Newgarden has been stripped of his win in the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg presented by RP Funding.
Team Penske was in violation of the following “Push to Pass” parameters:
- Rule 14.19.15. An indicator to enable Push to Pass will be sent via CAN communication from the timing and scoring beacon on board the Car to the team data logger. This signal must be passed on to the ECU unmodified and uninterrupted during all Road and Street Course Events.
- Rule 14.19.16. Race Starts and any Race Restart that occurs before the lap prior to the white flag or prior to three minutes remaining in a timed Race Event will have the Push to Pass system disabled and will be enabled for a given Car once that Car reaches the alternate Start/Finish line.
The issue came to light at this past weekend’s Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach when INDYCAR officials discovered the possible violation during the morning warmup. The Series made sure the advantage that was discovered could not be implemented during Sunday’s race.
The series then began an extensive review of data from the St. Petersburg race, which revealed that Team Penske manipulated the overtake system so that the No. 2, 3 and 12 cars had the ability to use Push to Pass on starts and restarts. According to the INDYCAR rulebook, use of overtake is not available during championship races until the car reaches the alternate start-finish line.
It was determined that Newgarden’s No. 2 and the No. 3 of Scott McLaughlin gained a competitive advantage by using Push to Pass on restarts while the No. 12 of Will Power did not. McLaughlin was stripped of his third-place finish and Power was docked 10-Championship points. All three entries have been fined $25,000 and will forfeit all prize money associated with the Streets of St. Petersburg race.
The integrity of the INDYCAR SERIES championship is critical to everything we do,” said INDYCAR President Jay Frye. “While the violation went undetected at St. Petersburg, INDYCAR discovered the manipulation during Sunday’s warmup in Long Beach and immediately addressed it ensuring all cars were compliant for the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach. Beginning with this week’s race at Barber Motorsports Park, new technical inspection procedures will be in place to deter this violation.”
Team Penske issued a statement where President Tim Cindric blamed the violation on software that was not removed following a test session.
“Unfortunately, the push-to-pass software was not removed as it should have been, following recently completed hybrid testing in the Team Penske Indy cars. This software allowed for push-to-pass to be deployed during restarts at the St. Petersburg Grand Prix race, when it should not have been permitted. The No. 2 car driven by Josef Newgarden and the No. 3 car driven by Scott McLaughlin, both deployed push-to-pass on a restart, which violated INDYCAR rules. Team Penske accepts the penalties applied by INDYCAR.”
Newgarden’s disqualification handed the victory to Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward elevated PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon to the top of the Championship standings.
LONG BEACH, CA (April 21, 2024) Scott Dixon put on a Masterclass in winning Sunday’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.
Dixon started eighth in the No. 9 PNC Bank Honda and used a combination of strategy and race craft to get the lead and hold off hard chargers Josef Newgarden, Colton Herta and reigning and two-time series Champion Alex Palou.
“That was fun,” said a smiling Dixon about his second Long Beach win. “I think it was definitely a bit sketchy in the fact that the pressure is coming hard and strong. Huge credit to the team. A big weekend for Honda, Acura, HRC. I think we had almost 200 PNC guests this weekend here.”
Dixon and race leader Will Power pitted during a caution period triggered when Ed Carpenter Racing rookie Christian Rasmussen hit the wall on Lap 15. That handed the race lead to series points leader Josef Newgarden who was followed by Marcus Ericsson, Herta, and Palou as the different strategies began to play out.
Newgarden and the drivers who elected to stay out started to hit the pits on lap 30 with Herta stretching it to lap 33. Meanwhile Dixon, Power and those who pitted earlier cycled to the front of the field before making their second and final pit stops on laps 52-53, handing the lead back to Newgarden, Herta and Palou.
The differing strategies converged after Newgarden and the rest pitted for the final time between laps 58-62. Newgarden came out of the pits in second, trailing Dixon by about three seconds with seven-lap fresher tires.
Newgarden was able to cut into Dixon’s lead but the six-time series Champion used an expert combination of push-to-pass and fuel saving to stay out front.
“I knew it was going to be tough,” said Dixon. “I think what you kind of hope for in the long run is that you get some caution laps again, which would have made it a lot easier for us. Again, the pace was pretty solid, man. We didn’t really have to push crazy amounts. It saved the tires as well. The car had plenty of pace left at the end.”
Newgarden got to Dixon’s gearbox in the hairpin turn that leads onto the frontstretch on Lap 77 but Herta made contact with the No. 2 Chevy, lifting the rear wheels off the ground sending the car into anti-stall mode.
“It seemed pretty obvious,” said Newgarden, who lost two-spots in the process. “He just misjudged it and ran into me. I’m not saying we were going to get Dixon. It was very, very difficult for me to get the run I needed to. I think traffic was going to provide me an opportunity, so that run right there, I was really excited about it.”
“I think he (Newgarden) set up pretty wide and was cutting back in and was a little slower at apex, but ultimately it’s up to me to carry the right speed into the corner and not run into the back of people, and I just misjudged it,” explained Herta.
Dixon took advantage of the extra breathing room to lock down his 57th career win, which is ten shy of A.J. Foyt’s series leading 67-victories.
“It’s one of those things that I always say hopefully when you leave the sport, you’re happy with the stats,” said Dixon. “Of course, these are big stats. This is a big deal. We’re still a long way away from that.”
The victory was Dixon’s fourth in the last six points-paying INDYCAR Series races dating back to last year.
“It’s great to win early in the season,” said Dixon. “It’s huge. It’s big for the team, big for everybody’s morale. Hopefully that stuff carries to the marquee event coming up here shortly in the 500. But right now the focus is Barber next week.”
The Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix powered by AmFirst on Sunday, April 28 at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama. Live coverage starts at 1 p.m. ET on NBC, Peacock, INDYCAR LIVE and the INDYCAR Radio Network.
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