Sato steals thunder in claiming Indy 500 win
INDIANAPOLIS — At the end of 500 miles around Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it was a former Formula One driver who took the checkered flag. He even drove for Andretti Autosport. It just wasn’t Fernando Alonso. Takuma Sato became the first Japanese winner of the Indianapolis 500 on Sunday when he denied Helio Castroneves a record-tying fourth victory as the two traded the lead in the closing laps.
“This is going to be mega big” in Japan, said Sato. “A lot of the Japanese fans are following the IndyCar Series and many, many flew over for the Indianapolis 500.”
Sato’s victory gave Michael Andretti a second consecutive win in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.” An Andretti driver has now won the 500 three times in the last four years, and five times overall dating to 2005 with the late Dan Wheldon.
Last year, it was with rookie Alexander Rossi. This time it is with Sato, who joined the team just this season and had largely been overlooked at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The Andretti camp expanded to six cars for the 500 to add Alonso, a two-time F1 champion who brought massive European interest to the race.
Alonso did have a spectacular race and simply fell victim to his engine late in the race.
Sato also had to hold off the savvy Castroneves. In a Chevrolet for Team Penske, Castroneves briefly took the lead but couldn’t make it stick as Sato grabbed it back. Castroneves was disappointed to fall short of the four-time winners club — particularly since it was his third runner-up finish. The margin of victory was 0.2011 seconds. It was only the second IndyCar victory for Sato, who won driving for A.J. Foyt in Long Beach in 2013 — a span of 74 races.
Ed Jones finished a career-best third and was followed by Max Chilton and Tony Kanaan, the highest finishers for Chip Ganassi Racing. Canadian driver James Hinchcliffe’s day came to an end when he was involved in a crash with 17 laps to go.