EVEN I THINK ALONSO WILL BEAT MY BOY
Michael Andretti’s Indy 500 poser
MARCO Andretti, weighed down by the burden of a dynasty, will say a prayer before the start of Sunday’s 101st Indianapolis 500.
‘It comes from my mother’s side,’ said Andretti, 30, a polite, downto-earth Catholic from Nazareth, Pennsylvania. ‘She is a spiritual person. I say the prayers for safety. You definitely need someone looking over you in this business.’
It will be Andretti’s 12th crack at America’s most fabled race. He has come close to winning three times but he has never tasted the victor’s traditional swig of milk.
In fact, despite immense talent, he has won just twice in his whole IndyCar career — a problem if you belong to American motor racing’s foremost family.
Marco is the son of Michael Andretti, winner of the IndyCar title and 42 races. And there is grandfather Mario, a driver of legend, winner of the Indianapolis and Daytona 500s, the Formula One world championship and a whole heap more.
Soberingly for Marco’s prospects this weekend, his team-mate is the double F1 world champion, Fernando Alonso, 35, who has skipped the Monaco Grand Prix to be this side of the Atlantic.
It is the Spaniard’s first sally into oval racing but he has lit up the place with his duck-to-water arrival. If you doubt that, read this startling prediction from Michael Andretti, who has Marco and Alonso as two of the six drivers at his eponymous team.
He said: ‘I do not only think Fernando can win, but that he is going to win. If we don’t make mistakes, he has as good or better chance than anybody.’
Michael, 54, will be Alonso’s strategist when the McLaren man starts fifth on the grid in a dangerous race of which it is said: ‘To win you can’t only be good or lucky, but good AND lucky.’ Michael will try to help his man win, no question, but it is not what he would hope for in his dreams.
‘If I was being selfish, I would have Marco win it and Fernando come second,’ he half-joked. ‘That way Fernando would then come back and win it next year.’
Alonso wants the prize so he can go on to complete the Triple Crown — the Indianapolis 500, the 24 Hours of Le Mans and Monaco Grand Prix, which he has won twice already.
Marco, who qualified eighth, wants it for different reasons. ‘It would be the one-million-pound gorilla off my back,’ he explained.
He has switched from dad calling his strategy to old family friend Bryan Herta — a calming voice on the radio for a driver who says he races on pure adrenaline.
‘There are big expectations,’ said Marco. ‘If my name were Smith, it would be different. The name means it is double good when you are winning, but double bad when you are losing.
‘I haven’t won at all since 2011 and it’s killing me.’
Mario, now 77, first came to the track known as the Brickyard in 1958, three years after his Italian family emigrated to America. He made his debut here in 1965 and won the race in 1969.
‘A first-timer can be intimidated by the speed,’ he said. ‘You can go right up behind another car if you’ve got the balls, and Fernando has the balls.’
As for Marco, his grandfather just hopes he is not putting undue pressure on himself,
Asked what kind of milk — whole, two per cent or skimmed — he would drink on Sunday if his prayers were answered, Marco laughed: ‘If I won, I’d drink it straight from the cow.’