Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
S. Florida flavor
Servia will represent S. Florida driving club
Sunshine State well represented in Sunday’s Indy 500.
South Florida will be well-represented in the 101st Indianapolis 500 on Sunday.
Six of the 33 drivers have residences in the region, including Fort Lauderdale’s Ryan Hunter-Reay, the race winner in 2014. In addition, Oriol Servia will be competing in partnership with Palm Beach Driving Club.
Servia’s helmet will bear the logo of the PBDC, a members-only club for motorsports enthusiasts based at Palm Beach International Raceway in Jupiter.
The native of Spain and resident of Miami has eight previous starts in the Indy 500 with a best finish of fourth in 2012. Driving for the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda team, Servia qualified 12th for Sunday’s race at the famed Brickyard.
“In my career, I have always tried to align myself with companies and groups of people I found interesting,” Servia said. “Partnering with Palm Beach Driving Club couldn’t fit any better with that criteria, and as a race car driver, an alliance with a private driving club couldn’t be more fitting. I am really excited to represent PBDC and work on future projects with them.”
PBDC is a community of auto enthusiasts ranging from novices to International Motor Sports Association race car drivers. The club meets Wednesday evenings at Palm Beach International Raceway. Sessions on the track include novice, street car and advanced street car/race car. Twice a month there are afternoon sessions catering to open wheel, vintage racers and street cars.
“This opportunity allows us to partner with one of the top teams in open-wheel
racing and to showcase Palm Beach Driving Club at the largest single-day sporting event in the world,” PBDC managing director Paul Jones said of teaming up with Servia.
Meanwhile, HunterReay remains the most identifiable South Florida figure in IndyCar racing in the bright yellow Andretti Autosport Honda with notable local sponsorship ties to DHL (regional headquarters in Plantation) and Fort Lauderdalebased AutoNation, as well as his Racing For Cancer charitable foundation.
A graduate of Cardinal Gibbons High, HunterReay began racing gokarts while growing up in Boca Raton. The 2012 IndyCar Series champ will start 10th on the grid, although he turned in the fourth-fastest qualifying average speed of 231.442 mph on the 2.5-mile oval.
Unfortunately for Hunter-Reay, he missed qualifying for the Fast Nine Shootout, which determines the nine positions in the first three rows, after a disappointing 13th-place showing in the provisional session Saturday. Turning in the top speed in Group 1 qualifying the next day only set him up to start as the best of the rest on the grid.
It shouldn’t be a huge handicap, as Hunter-Reay won in 2014 out of the 19th starting position.
“If you have a good race car, qualifying means
Ryan HunterReay began racing go-karts while growing up in Boca.
nothing. If you have a mediocre race car, qualifying means something. It all depends. It’s just a bummer we’re not in the Fast Nine,” he said after Sunday’s fast final run.
Tony Kanaan, a longtime resident of Key Biscayne, will start closest to the front among the drivers with South Florida ties. The Brazilian qualified seventh at 230.828 mph.
The South Florida contingent also includes Colombians Juan Pablo Montoya (18th on the grid) and Charles Munoz (24th ), who live in Miami, and Brazil’s Helio Castroneves (19th), who lives in Fort Lauderdale. All but Munoz and Servia have won the race, including Castroneves three times and Montoya twice.
Castroneves, Montoya, Kanaan and Hunter-Reay all competed in the Race of Champions event at Marlins Park in January.
Spencer Pigot, starting from the 29th spot in the middle of row 10, was raised in Orlando and now lives in Indianapolis. Like Servia, he drives for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.