INDY 500 GLANCE
WHAT: The 102nd Indianapolis 500 is the sixth of 17 races on the Verizon IndyCar Series schedule. WHEN: 11:21 a.m. (Central) Sunday green flag.
WHERE: Indianapolis Motor Speedway, a 2.5-mile rounded rectangular track.
FORECAST: 92, partly cloudy. BROADCASTS: TV — ABC, beginning at 10 a.m., Allen Bestwick, Scott Goodyear and Eddie Cheever in the booth and Jon Beekhuis, Rick DeBruhl and Jerry Punch on pit road. Radio — IMS Radio Network, including AM-920 in Milwaukee.
LAST YEAR: Takuma Sato became the first Japanese driver to win the 500 and gave owner Michael Andretti his third victory in four years. Sato took the lead from three-time winner Helio Castroneves with six laps to go and then held off his charges to win by 0.2011 of a second. A former Formula One driver, Sato finished on the podium in the 2004 United States Grand Prix and nearly won the 500 in 2012, crashing while going for the lead on the final lap.
SEASON TO DATE: Reigning series champion Josef Newgarden is the only repeat winner, with victories in April on the Phoenix oval and Birmingham, Ala., road course. Sebastien Bourdais, severely injured in an Indy qualifying crash last year, won the opener on the streets of St. Petersburg, Fla., Alexander Rossi on the streets of Long Beach, Calif., and Will Power on the Indy road course.
THE BUZZ: Danica Patrick, who became the first woman to lead the 500 in her rookie race in 2005, is back after a six-year run in NASCAR and is calling this her final race. Meanwhile, one of the series’ most popular full-timers, James Hinchcliffe, failed to qualify. New rules this year give every car the same bodywork, so only the Chevrolet and Honda engines and limited adjustments available to teams differentiate the cars. The effect of the universal “aero kits” on the style of racing is one of the big questions of the day.
ABOUT THE FIELD: There are six past winners, Helio Castroneves (2001, 2002, 2009), Scott Dixon (2008), Tony Kanaan (2013), Ryan Hunter-Reay (2014), Alexander Rossi (2016) and Sato. Castroneves is the most experienced driver in the field with 17 previous starts. Oriol Servia is the oldest starter at 43 and Matheus Leist the youngest at 19. Four starters are rookies, and three more have competed in previous 500s but were not in the race last year.